Podfic Self-Rec Meme

[cantarina]

Hey podficcers, you all know you make awesome stuff, right?

Start a new thread and rec us one of your own podfics. If you feel up to it, include a few words or sentences (or an essay, or a book, or a recording) on why it's one of your faves. It's okay if all you do is drop a title and a link! It's hard to brag about yourself.

You can also reply to someone else's thread with squee for that podfic or to a rec for a different podfic they've made.

Comments

arioch/spiritthatdenies

[myrdschaem]

Close Encounters of the Queer Kind
That is my first explicit podfic I made and I really like the songs I found for it. Of course, feel free to compliment my other readings too. :P

Re: arioch/spiritthatdenies

[the24thkey]

I clicked through to your profile and ended up listening to the yoi Project Runway AU you did for Pensieve Podfic and it was so cool, holy wow! :DDD For one, I'm really impressed that you did something experimental like that and made it flow so smoothly, und außerdem habe ich jetzt irgenwie voll Lust auch was auf Deutsch aufzunehmen. ;D Really cool.

cantarina/vworpvworp

[cantarina]

An OK Man Kinda Sorta Tries to Battle

Remember when Community created its own Doctor Who parody canon and fandom latched on it and made fanworks for it? I podficced a parody of a parody and it's the silliest, goofiest thing I've ever made.

Re: cantarina/vworpvworp

[myrdschaem]

First, I didn't know there were Inspector Spacetime fics, so my life is now richer. Eeeeee!

As an ESL speaker, I think you did a good job on the accents! I recogniized the differences and knew what they were supposedto be. The idea of written badfic being podficced as questionable accents is wonderful! That's such a creative way to tackle things. <3

[lavenderfrost]

Ok, I'll jump in.

After She Wakes

No single thing stands out for why I like this one so much. I think it came together really well overall - the reading, the music, the cover, all of it. Also, Shakespearean ladies = underappreciated fandom. <3

Not gonna lie, every time I get a kudos notification email from AO3, this is one of the main projects I end up hoping it's for.

[idella]

This was great to listen to :) I love your choice of story and your voice and performance; you are excellent as Miranda and everyone else (I like the way you read and edited the mean ladies to give one example). Your use of music and cover are great too :)

the24thkey

[the24thkey]

SUP, SO SEDUCTIVE

Soooo this is a small fandom in terms of podfic (kpop), but I'm really proud of this and the only things you need to know to listen to it are 1) these two people are in a band and 2) they once recorded a really embarrassing song called Trouble that featured a line about black stockings.

It's a PWP, which I've never done before (exciting!), and it's really sweet and funny. And also it has lingerie. Yay? :D

Re: the24thkey

[chestnut_pod]

How clever to synch the title with the music like that! I also see that you have another, longer podfic in this fandom called "before things come together" with really pretty cover art, and would like to give you the high five of one Canva-user to another (I think?)!

idella

[idella]

it takes forever to be over

(content notes: major character death, pregnancy)

I'm pretty happy with my Dana Scully performance in this one, and with my pacing!

Re: idella

[the24thkey]

I don't know too much about this fandom, but I can tell that you created a really great mood for this podfic. And a big part of that is the pacing, definitely!

[glitteryv]

TBH, I really love all of my podfics. That said, the soft spot I have for A Day in the Life is rather epic.

Part of it is that I have fond memories of recording it (iirc, the outtakes added up to abt 20 mins of me LOLing at the overall goofiness). And I think that joyful vibe shows up in the final edit.

[idella]

*downloadsssss*

Adding a rec for your podfic there's a light on in the hallway (so you know i'm here) because it's a lot of fun! (Gerard Way/Ray Toro, sweet and soft vampire AU)

shmaylor

[shmaylor]

Read-Only Memory (Rogue One)
This is one of those stories that I just love so intensely that every moment of recording and editing this podfic was a gift. Getting to immerse myself in every sentence, falling as fully into the characters as I could. And I think that love really shines through when you listen.

Re: shmaylor

[dancinbutterfly]

You should be so proud of this. It changed literally everything about my experience with AI fiction. (weirdly, I think my relationship with AIs in reality are the same because i'm naturally fearful of computers as preY2K luddite) This fic launched my love of this ship to the point here its probably my OTP, up to and surpassing Baze/Chirrut and and I wouldnt have experienced it all if you hadn't made this podfic. Thank you for your hardwork and for sharing it.

[missizzy]

Now and at the Hour of Our Death
I loved this version of Karen Page as soon as I read this fic and instantly wanted to record it. It;'s the only fic where I sought permission instead of just looking for a blanket one, since I've got social anxiety issues, but this one was worth it.

[idella]

Your performance is super fierce and I don't even know who Karen Page is? But after listening to this I want to be their friend.

annapods

[annapods]

That choice was very hard to make, but I think I have to rec Secrets of a Lost Woman. I think I just like the flow of the monologue?
The fandom is Alice Isn't Dead (yay small fandoms), and the backstory is that Alice, the wife of the narrator, went missing, and when she started looking for her she came accross a lot of weird supernatural shit. (Or at least that's what I understood, I haven't listened to the podcast either.)
And of course, feel free to pick some other podfic of mine to talk about! If possible one of the latest ones, but I'll take anything.

Re: annapods

[the24thkey]

You rocked the first person POV for this, I loved it! The way you brought out the narrators frustration, her amusement, and every one of her emotions was just really well done.

analise010

[analise010]

The first podfic that came to mind was Savage Lovecast Episode 69 - and I even posted a rec for it - but my podficbigbang story kept playing over and over in my head.

I posted like a map of a place you've never been and it's my #2 podfic of anything I've ever posted. It's a Leverage story, where Eliot and Parker go undercover, while Hardison keeps an eye on them, remotely. During the entire story, Eliot keeps thinking that he's unworthy of love, but his feelings for Parker and Hardison won't go away. I love the podfic and, even though the angst is high, the payoff at the end is so worth it.

Re: analise010

[xancredible]

Aah, I've been meaning to download that podfic and I've done so now. Angst always is an appeal for me <3

[xdiorix]

I've loved a lot of the podfics I've made, but one of my pet favorites is 11 Characters That Never Were The Slayer. I love massive crossover fic and I'm immensely proud of the voice work in this. This was one of the first few podfics where I'd started committing to doing accents for character voices and I was pretty pleased with the end product.

[chestnut_pod]

This is an amazing piece of character voice work! Not just of the speaking-characters; each fandom chunk seems to have a slightly different mood and tone that you carry through in the narration and pacing :)

[vepres]

Double self-indulgence...

Burning Out My Eyes. [Lucifer (tv), gen, pre-show, 00:08:42]

Lucifer doesn't have much podfic in it, and I wanted to come out of the slump I'd been in so I recorded one of my own stories. I like recording poetic freeform stories. I should do it more often but I very rarely record less than 15 minute pieces.

[chestnut_pod]

That's a super cool title font on the cover!

It's also great to see poetry as podfic! It's a fun genre and one that can always use more talented readers :)

ItsADrizzit

[itsadrizzit]

So, my latest podfic, for Podfic Big Bang certainly isn't the longest podfic I've recorded, but in a lot of ways was the most ambitious and I'm SO PROUD of how it came out.

I hesitated reccing this because the rec really assumes you're able to listen to a podfic with background music and effects below the text, so (as someone with sensory processing disorders of many other kinds) I apologise to anyone who may have trouble listening to the version with effects. There is a non-music/sound effects version, and it's not like you're really missing anything if you choose to listen that way, but for me the version with effects really opens up the world.

The fic is an AU where one character is a DJ, so I wanted to set the stage for his sets by putting together some club-appropriate mixes to go along with the text. Not stopping there, I also added a lot of background noises to set the stage for WHERE the various characters were as they went about their lives: sounds of the ocean when they are on a yacht/near the coast, city sounds, restaurant backgrounds, the clink of plates and forks as they set the table. Just small things that add a bit of a third dimension to the words and help the reading come alive. Making the mixes was a huge project for me and I loved EVERY SECOND of it. I'm not sure I'll ever, you know, change directions in life and become a DJ myself, but for these tiny 3 minute musical interludes I had SO MUCH FUN looping and fading and cutting things in and out to bring the world to life.

Loose Ends Football RPF - Tottenham Hotspur (Dele/Eric Dier). Rated M. It's an AU so no actual football playing happens at all.

Re: ItsADrizzit

[the24thkey]

I haven't been able to listen to all of this yet, but so far it's just really cool to listen to. It must have been so much work to think of and look for all the sound effects and the music and arrange them, but I think it really pays off and creates a very immersive experience. I'm looking forward to keep listening! :D

[xancredible]

I'm really proud of my reading of Coffeeshop Muffins (BBC Merlin, Merthur gen or romance ending optional).

It's a modern AU (no magic) and Merlin and Arthur have been best friends since they were pre-schoolers. The author made the romance optional with a second ending option if you'd rather they stay best friends. I'm proud of my recording because it's really easy to read this story too fast, and I think I managed to keep a good pace that works for the comedy.

[chestnut_pod]

I listened to the version with the romance ending and I agree, you have great comedic timing!

I also admire your dedication to recording the whole 'verse, and doing all the different versions. That's such a treat for a reader and listener, to see that someone has put in so much love and time into something you also love :)

[chestnut_pod]

I recently made my first major music-including podfic, which was this little Mushishi podfic. I'm just so proud of the atmosphere I managed to create, how dreamy and soft it is. It was a big departure for me and I'm pleased it turned out so well.

Best listened to with headphones!

[the24thkey]

Oh, this is beautiful. I really want to listen to it again at night, in the dark, when I can just close my eyes and focus all my attention on your voice and the music. It feels perfect for Mushishi, and I especially like the way you used the song that comes in around 7 minutes in, with the drums that feel like they reverberate through my entire body.

[jadesfire]

Gosh, this is an awesome thread! I have about eleventy-billion things bookmarked now. Thank you!

It's also been the kick I needed to start uploading some older stuff to AO3. It was recorded 9 years ago, so the audio quality is a little iffy, but I still think A World Called Castastrophe is the best performance I've ever given. It's the one I'm still trying to live up to, being new again to podfic after a 5 year gap!

[chestnut_pod]

Welcome back!!

This is a lovely performance. I have not yet finished it, but I've listened through the first twenty minutes getting ready for the day and really enjoyed your pacing, the interest you put in narration, and the differentiation of your character voices.

It's also so nostalgic to come across a podfic with an Amy MacDonald song as the intro… I feel like I can remember a time when every other podfic started with one of her songs (perhaps because of "The Student Prince") and it brought me right back to the old Merlin/Torchwood days in a very pleasant way :)

[duendeverde4]

Ok, so. Everything started after i posted December, 1991. It was ok, but i was beginning to question my voice. I just sounded happy throughout the entire podfic, which is a bit weird since the story begins with Tony Stark dreaming of Bucky killing off his parents. It’s mainly a story about overcoming grief and finding love and forgiveness and i sound like freaking Cinderella. The same week, unprompted, two different groups of friends commented on how i always sound happy. So, you know, that got me thinking.

I had just read the most amazing bucky/tony/steve fic, The Mechanic, The Soldier, and The Captain , where Tony is kidnapped by hydra and turned into The Mechanic, something like a winter!tony. I really wanted to record that, but knew i could never do a deadpan delivery a winter soldier character asks for.
So, of course, i waited till i got an inflamed throat (i get those pretty regularly, whenever the season changes) and recorded all parts after the kidnapping. Then i waited to get better and recorded the flashback scenes before the kidnapping, where i sound like a completely different person. Which was the point, Tony-then will is not the same as tony-now.
I really wanted for the flashback scenes to sound like a memory, floating and never really there. I wanted you to float, with happy voice and incorporated music, just so i can punch you in the gut with the reality. Present!Tony sounded detached and in so so much pain, with nothing but my voice on these parts. To listen to it after listening to the flashback was pretty heartbreaking. I think.
Oh yeah, i incorporated music on the background of some scenes. It helped the flashbakcs sound less grounded in reality than whenever Tony narrated from the present and I wanted to give a cinematic feeling too. It also really helpped to convey the feelings the character was feeling.
The main reason i added music tho, was because i was obsessed with this comment on youtube, on a song from Edward Scissorhands Soundtrack, “Ice Dance”, where the op said that he was out on a bike ride or something with this girl and she was laughing, this song started playing in his head and he knew he in love. I enjoyed his story, as if being in love is like being in a movie and makes you add your perfect soundtrack to that. As if when you are with your loved one(s) everything stops being real except you, and in your head you’re in a perfect scene from a perfect movie. I wanted tony to feel something like this. They don’t have that many interactions, so the ones they do have i wanted to make it special.

I feel a bit pretentious since everyone just wrote a little thing about their podfic and i wrote a book. But i really wanted to talk about it ever since i’ve made it so there’s a lot i want to say! I really wanna do something like this again, just create a concept and go with it. The sound quality isn’t my best but it isn’t my worst one either =p

[the24thkey]

It's really cool how much thought you put into this! This comment of yours is like a little making-of, and now that I've read it I kinda want to read more meta (?) like this. I relate to what you described - when you record podfic you do become a lot more aware of your own voice, right? And sometimes you know it will suit a fic perfectly, but other times it feels like the story calls for a different mood, a different pace, and you have to think about how to change your performance to suit that.

So yeah, thank you for sharing your more in-depth thoughts about your work! :DDD

[chantress]

Oh, what a fun thread! I've definitely added several podfics from here to my "To Listen" list, and it's super fascinating to read why people recced the ones they did. :D

As for my own works, while I'm really pleased with the Star Wars podfics I've been making more recently, my rec is going to have to be for "I Will Lead And Thou Shalt Follow". It's part of a much longer Silmarillion AU, but can easily stand on its own if you're not able to commit to a sprawling 1-million-plus-word series.

It's coming up on the third anniversary of when I posted it, and while I'd definitely make different choices in terms of pacing/voices/editing if I were to record it now (not to mention that the author has revised the fic since then), I've been re-listening to it recently and find it every bit as compelling as I did when I first made it. There's a richness and depth of description and emotion in this 'verse that's hard to find anywhere else, and I still feel like I was able to harness some of that feeling, however briefly, and convey it in the podfic.

[hananobira]

This thread is so fun! I'm adding so much stuff to my (already overflowing) To Listen playlist. Thanks, Cantarina, for organizing it!

It's a day late for Halloween, but how about a ghost story? "Sin" by glitterburn.

For context, Abe no Seimei is kind of like the Japanese Merlin. He was a real historical figure who lived a thousand years ago, but all sorts of mysterious magical abilities have been attributed to him in the intervening millennium. Supposedly, his mother was a kitsune fox spirit, he was an astrologer who could predict the future, and he had psychic powers that he used to protect the capital city from demons.

In the Onmyouji movie series, Minamoto no Hiromasa is his earnest but bumbling sidekick who always needs to get rescued from imminent peril by Seimei. There's a lot of Seimei clutching Hiromasa in his arms and swearing he won't let him die; it's very good for me.

I really enjoy this podfic because I got to be ~creepy and ~atmospheric. Plus I got to include recordings of ancient Japanese biwa music!

[xancredible]

I might give this podfic a try because I'm a huge fan of your work and I just adore your voice and reading style.

[originally_dw]

This is a great idea and I've already downloaded some new listening material! I was toying with whether I would comment myself but I think I will.

The work I'm most proud of and the one I think is my best is All Life is Yours to Miss, 11 hours of Harry/Draco recorded for Epic Podfic Big Bang a couple of years ago. It was a lot of work but I really like my performance. The feedback has been so good and so consistent and I'm just really happy that I put this out into the world!

[sunquistadora]

I was just re-listening to this one yesterday! You do such a fantastic job of everything with it!

[sunquistadora]

I am so so late to this meme/had it open in a tab for way to long. But! At least that means I have a nice to-listen list from the previous commenters! I super wanted to do this because I keep doing things in very very tiny fandoms, and I'm especially proud of my Charioteer podfic Rabbit Season. It was a really intense story, which, to be fair, is pretty much expected for anything about gay people in the 40s, and I got emotional enough recording it that it upset my cat. His heroic attempts to comfort me mid-recording cannot be in vain!

[bessyboo]

Late comment is late bc lol my life rn, but! Here nonetheless! I had SUCH trouble choosing between my Pod Togethers this year, because I’m really pleased with both of them—and if you’re a fan of podfic that sets a mood, esp the music & specific casting of the multi voice aspect, check out The light is in the architecture—but I’ve decided to rec Mission Report: Operation Sidestream.

So this is a Star Wars story which—shoutout to hk—contains the delightful trope UNDERCOVER AS A THREESOME (why aren’t there more stories with this???) and really gave me carte blanche to play around with character voices.

One of my favorite things about doing first person POV fics is getting REALLY close into their frame of mind; even when you’re reading narration, you’re expressing specific things about that character’s feelings on what they’re narrating at all times, and this includes dialogue by other people. I’ve played around with this idea in a previous PT, but this took it to an almost Rashoman-like level by layering the different 1st POVs, and oh my god, it was SO. MUCH. FUN. I actually went through and recorded the story not in order, but by part, so I could keep the voices consistent, and I’m really really pleased with how it turned out.

I also did a thing with character-specific musical cues from the canon that I’m not sure you could do with nearly any other source, which I also think turned out pretty well.

[velocitym1]

One podfic I've been thinking about recently is Heavy in Your Arms. (http://archiveofourown.org/works/1140953)
It's an Avengers Clint/Natasha story.
I really enjoyed working on it, and I'm really proud of how the voices came out. Throughout the story it switches between Clint and Nat's POV and then at one point they're kind of mind linked and I was switching between the two voices as if they were one. I know I've gotten better with the production/editing since I recorded this, but for pure voice work this was one of my shining moments.

[freekydj]

This is currently on my phone to listen to. Can hardly wait now.

[frecklebombfic]

This is an incredibly late addition to the self-rec! I was wrestling with this for ages, but I think if I could only rec one work of mine, it would have to be Going Back to Yesterday.

I'm really proud of it on a few counts: it's the first time I successfully incorporated atmospheric SFX into a podfic, it's the first time I ventured into a new genre, and it has a demanding ensemble cast that I feel like I really nailed in the reading. It was an ambitious project, where I really loved the work and wanted to do justice to my concept for it. There is some creepiness and ambiguity in the plot elements, which I really leaned into with the performance and production, and I feel like this is the first time I had such a coherent plan for a podfic.