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I bought a shiny new Olympus 4100 PC digital voice recorder for the occasion. As I wrote before, the recorder was not Mac friendly, even though the clerk at the NYU Computer Store swore it was.

No worries, though. I took my roommate’s PC and planned to load the interview and then transfer it onto my Mac with a memory stick.

But the PC did not have the correct software, and my software was at work. I tried to download an update from the Olympus website – but no dice.

So I got creative. I still had a NYU camera and microphone so I set up a little sound studio.

I propped the speaker of the voice recorder close to the omni microphone, and then created an echo chamber by placing an empty shoebox over the whole set up – I know, it’s very high tech.

But it worked and sounded great. I ingested the picture-less video to Final Cut, and edited it from there. Finally, I turned it into a QuickTime video and tossed it up on the old blog. It wasn’t pretty, but it worked.

But who needs old journalists, when there will be thousands of driven, dedicated, and hungry (literally) journalism graduate students looking for work – I know about 190 in lower Manhattan alone that will be in need of employment in 2 weeks. Once the spring rolls around there will be a lot more.

So lets get these kids (myself included) together and start a business publication. We are all well versed in the new media environment, and I’m sure many can work a camera or slap together a slide show. And we’ll work for nothing – just getting out of our parents’ homes should be enough.

And with the cuts going on all over the nation (more than 500 k in November alone) we can have other experts and guest columnists join our ranks. This includes Wall Street refugees – all with a ton of connections and insight.

We could put it up for nothing, and a media company with young employees geared toward young employees could drive some strong traffic, and with it possibly some big advertisers. Young adults still are targets for advertisers – hell we’re the only ones without plunging mortgages.

Voice-overs are tough.

I tried to record a few audio bites for my Thrillist video and podcast and it took forever. Each recording required at least ten takes. And with the 5-second count-down, the time really added up.

My first mistake was to improv. I kept on messing up facts or mixing up words. For example I wanted to sy “more than 2 million dollars” instead of the dreaded “over two million” during my podcast, but I kept messing up. I was so concentrated on saying “more than” that I would forget what number to say, or what came next.

Then there was tone, and talking too fast. I have to slow myself down for the voice-over, but still, individual words came out rushed or jumbled.

I finally learned my lesson for the slide show. I actually wrote a script for that (in all caps and 20 point font). It worked. I was clear and calm and did the whole 1 minute recording in two takes, versus the 10 takes required to record a 10 second clip for my video.

So I guess acting isn’t easy. You have lines, plus expression and action. Oh, and you have to have display different emotions and tones. I can’t even imagine trying to sing on tape.

There were way too many windows and sliders and buttons. I tried dragging photos into the viewer for my slide show, but the program made an annoying “doink” noise and the photos slid back to the menu bar. I began to sweat and pounded my desk a few times.

After the frustrations of Final Cut, I was at the end of my rope with editing tools.

I was about to cut my slide show on Final Cut, but decided to check out the “Help” menu before I gave up hope. That’s when I found the “getting started tutorial.”

See, I never read directions first – except for IKEA furniture. And I always pay with frustration and grinding teeth. I don’t know why I never learned this fact. I guess I’m just impatient or think I can figure it all out on my own. I never do.

So I took a deep breath and read the online file.

And guess what — it was clear and simple and explained the process beautifully.

iMove is pretty cool. It’s kind of like the dumbed-down version of Final Cut (translation: it’s perfect for me).

I like the drag and dump function, and the voice recorder is simple. And I finally wrote and read off a script. It sounds much better than shooting-from-the-hip and requires less take.

And the Ken Burns Effect is pretty cool. I bet Burns feels pretty badass that he has an effect named after him. But is it really his invention? Was he really the first one to zoom and pan over his photos? Either way – nice work Ken – I loved your Baseball doc.