Recording phone conversations?

[ben]

Does anybody know how to do this (for a regular land line, not skype)? Do I need a special phone that you can plug into a mixer or something?

For something that "just works" skype doesn't always cut it.

[love_detective]

Have been struggling with answers to that question for a week now.

Just yesterday recorded a test in this manner - and yes, it will always work:

I set up a mic to record the speaker on the speaker phone and put that mic into one input of the mixer.

Mixed that in with my voice and poof. Done.

Not pretty, but reliable.

[alissa]

i don't have a speaker phone.

i use my cell phone. i put a mic over the ear holes, wear headphones and talking into the mouth hole. the audio that comes out is obviously really loud for me and not so loud for the other end.

so then, i just compress the audio. A LOT. to even things out.

[jawbone]

I ordered a piece of equipment to do this. It was like $30. Apparently, you can hook the device up to your mixer and then talk to the person through the handpiece. I haven't recieved it yet, so I don't know how it works. I still think SkypeOut is the way to go. You can talk into your mics and the person can hear you perfectly.

[ben]

Hey jawbone, do you have a link for that piece that you ordered? Was it just from radioshack or something? I was just searching through radioshack's website and found this:
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&category%5Fname=&product%5Fid=43%2D1237
It looks like it can pipe your conversation into a computer, it has a 1/8" jack. $15.49 sounds like a good price too.

[jawbone]

Unfortunately, someone ordered it for me without me taking a look at it. I was going to use it as a backup in case Skype failed on me, but I got Skype to work and I never got the equipment.

I saw that device at Radio Shack. I almost bought that, but I really needed two people to be able to talk to the person on the phone, so that wouldn't have worked for me.

[love_detective]

Skype does seem to be the answer.

Don't know anyone yet with whom I can conduct a Skype recording interview.

Anyone up for a test session?

Will send Skype address back channel via email.

J

[pdadave]

Unless you really just want something simple that sounds "ok," the RadioShack stuff isn't really going to cut it. If audio quality isn't a big factor, then that might be a fine solution, but from what I have found, the RadioShack $30 type stuff never sounds very good (and I have tried a lot of them).

JK Audio is probably the next solution up and has cheap (in the sense of pro audio, but not compared to RadioShack) equipment for basic call recording. For instance, this is a neat took for hooking up to a cell phone:

Daptor 2 ($175): http://www.jkaudio.com/daptor2.htm

For landline telephone stuff, they have:

AutoHybrid ($175): http://www.jkaudio.com/autohybrid.htm

or a more advanced hybrid system:

Broadcast Host ($450); http://www.jkaudio.com/broadcast-host.htm

I haven't tried these, but have considered them for telephone setups in the past. But with some of the new Skype service and functionality, I am considering them less. There is a lot you can do with Skype.

I am open to help with a Skype test if you need help. I ran one a couple weeks back just to try out some of the recording stuff for myself.

[bramley]

I have been using Skype Out for a few months now with great results. I have avoided the terrible feedback the guest sometimes gets by setting the sound levels quite low.

But recently I discovered that no matter what I do the guest will get his or her own voice incredibly loud on a 2-7 second delay if I'm calling someone who isn't in a major city. I could call someone in Berlin at noon and it was fine but in the small town in the Pyrenees at 12:15 and it drove them mad. Same with Paris vs. a French 'burb. Anyone have ideas about this?

[pdadave]

Make sure that you are only sending them your microphone (or line in depending on your setup) and not your Stereo/Mono mix. (Can be changed in Windows Volume Control in the Recording Mixer....if you are using Windows.) If you send your mix instead of just your mic they will get back what they are sending to you, and it will be delay.

[allthewhile]

Make sure that you are only sending them your microphone (or line in depending on your setup) and not your Stereo/Mono mix. (Can be changed in Windows Volume Control in the Recording Mixer....if you are using Windows.) If you send your mix instead of just your mic they will get back what they are sending to you, and it will be delay.

That's only true if you're recording. As soon as you stop recording (from all the programs I've tried at least) it sounds fine. I had this problem with both mixcastlive and totalrecorder. My solution was to take the recording off of the computer. Basically I can hear both myself and the person through my headphones and my iriver is plugged into the speakers and then the headphones into my iriver. Works like a charm. Just make sure you have the levels set correctly. There's a tendency for the caller to sound too soft.

-jayson

[pdadave]

Good point. Things tend to work better if you aren't trying to record and use Skype on the same computer. Using an iRiver (or similar device) or just another computer is a good option. It gives you a lot more control and options.

[bramley]

I actually have no trouble using Skype Out and recording on the same computer -- unless I'm calling someone who is a bit more remote from a major city center. This is the interesting part, something clearly set apart from sound levels and setup. I've never tried recording Skype to Skype since that doesn't really apply to my rather non-tech guests, so I don't know if this would make a difference..

Make sure that you are only sending them your microphone (or line in depending on your setup) and not your Stereo/Mono mix. (Can be changed in Windows Volume Control in the Recording Mixer....if you are using Windows.) If you send your mix instead of just your mic they will get back what they are sending to you, and it will be delay.

Could you explain this a bit more? I'm not sure how I assign what I'm sending the guest and what I'm sending into Audacity.

[mental-escher]

See the following link (400kb mp3 file) for a real life example from the set up I've tried which seems to work pretty well for fairly minimal $ (considering you can use the same set up anywhere you can take your little iRiver flash player/recorder... Hmmmm!).

mp3 file: Example of recording thorugh iRiver 790 mp3 player/recoder with stereo Audio technica clips (SP-BMC-2, ~$40) (http://www.mental-escher.net/mp3/ME_05-04-25_telephone_example-iriver_n_lapel-mics.mp3). One lapel mic is attached near the speaker phone (not too close!) and the other is on my lapel. Works pretty **** good at 128 compression, then saved at 56, with only background noise being the dog and the tv.

[palisade14]

Ben,

I use this from RadioShack:
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=17-855

Check out my podcast for the exact audio quality you would get:
http://www.douglasblaine.com/users/iamnotdustin


It ain't great, but it is real inexpensive. And for now that's what I can do considering my subject is always in a different state. Mybe I SHOULD try Skype.

Good luck, it looks like there were a number of great options here before I got a chance to reply, but I thought I'd let you know my current solution.

Enjoy

Douglas

[PCOSGurl]

Would this work?
http://www.telephonerecording.com/prodDetails.asp?ProductID=187

[allthewhile]

See the following link (400kb mp3 file) for a real life example from the set up I've tried which seems to work pretty well for fairly minimal $ (considering you can use the same set up anywhere you can take your little iRiver flash player/recorder... Hmmmm!).

mp3 file: Example of recording thorugh iRiver 790 mp3 player/recoder with stereo Audio technica clips (SP-BMC-2, ~$40) (http://www.mental-escher.net/mp3/ME_05-04-25_telephone_example-iriver_n_lapel-mics.mp3). One lapel mic is attached near the speaker phone (not too close!) and the other is on my lapel. Works pretty **** good at 128 compression, then saved at 56, with only background noise being the dog and the tv.

No offense, but I really really don't like the sound you've got going on there. It's too strange for me to have the stereo sound like that.

[enrevanche]

I've got a couple of folks lined up to interview but no reliable way to capture the information (so far.)

I have been experimenting with a Skype-based solution for recording phone interviews, but the results, to say the least, are underwhelming. (It sounds like the caller and I are shouting to each other through pickle barrels or something.)

I am now thinking of getting something like one of these jobbies from Radio Shack (http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=43-1237) and using the "line in" recording feature on my iRiver... or even using some hard-core 1970s technology like a cassette recorder and then digitizing the recording.

Anyone have any brilliant ideas? I haven't really seen a consensus emerging in this thread...

Thanks in advance -

Barry

[PCOSGurl]

Anyone have any brilliant ideas? I haven't really seen a consensus emerging in this thread...


Brilliant and low tech...
http://www.podcastalley.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1397&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15
(scroll to the post by DVDTalk and listen to his interview...it sounds great (to me))

[s]

I just did my first SkypeOut interview with a friend of mine who was on a cell phone in Chicago. (I don't have the original audio on this computer, so the linked soundfile below is a snip from the finished podcast, complete with a music bed, but it still gets the point across.) Previously I had tried the whole mic-near-speakerphone and it was marginally tolerable; the trade-off seems to me that mics near small speakers give you an annoyingly sharp, high-freq sound, and Skype is a pathetically muffled low-freq sound. This setup was just using AudioHijack recording two tracks: a hijack of Skype (monitored in my headphones) and a separate hijack of my microphone (monitored out to skype via soundflower). I had previously gotten the AudioHijack "Application Mixer" effect thing to work per the instruction manual, but then it crapped out on me. I think a separate hijack of Skype is better, though, because after this I'm going to experiment with various Equalizer settings applied to the Skype sound as I record, to see if I can boost the crispness in the higher vocal range without accentuating the clicketypops. (Technical term, that.)

http://wtfbarbecue.com/audio/wtfbarbecue-skype-interview.mp3

[Bert Hughes]

I have the Radio Shack adaptor mentioned near the top of this thread, but I think I need a mono 1/8 inch female to XLR cable so I can connect to my mixer.

[RandomChatter]

I normally can't stand Radio Shack's products. However, I did pick up the inline recorder, and I was surprised. It works very well.

Sure, it's not professional quality, but then I can't afford $450+ just for phone recording equipment.

I work for an A/V company who specializes in video teleconferencing, and there's all kinds of equipment at work that I could rig up if I wanted to. But the Radio Shack inline recorder is VERY easy to use and is good enough quality that I can tweak it out with Sound Forge on my laptop.

Haven't tried the wireless one. Sounds like a cool idea, but if I were doing a phone interview, I'd avoid using a cell phone.

Oh, one more thing, the inline recorder works fine if you're in a speakerphone situation too. Or conference calls, or any other situation where you have more than just two people in the conversation. Basically, if it goes over the phone line, this will pick it up.

[jsotkin]

I do a lot of telephone recording. Here's what I use:
An analog telephone.
A Dynametric Logger Patch TLP-102 $52
A GN Netcom Headset with adapter.

It all plugs into the mic jack on my PC.
I record into Cool Edit

However, the logger patch can be used without a headset, going directly from the handset of the phone into an MP3 player for direct recording.

The Dynametric site has quite a few different pieces of equipment, http://www.dynametric.com

[Bert Hughes]

That looks just liek the Radio Shack model, but I think it may output line level instead of mic level.

[benc]

Is it just me, or is everybody ignoring the fact that a regular modem can plug into a phone line? Then you can just useWindows Dialer (http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org/how_do_i_get_phone_dialer_to_wor.htm) to call, and record it with any audio recording software. I've haven't tested this on Windows XP, but I seem to remember doing a few recordings back in my Windows 95 days...

[RandomChatter]

That's a great point, and I'm sure many people ARE forgetting it. And speaking of forgetting, the only thing I remember is that it always used to come out the PC speaker... If one were to record that way, would it be by selecting "line in" or "mic in" as the active input? Given the way Windows handles audio input, I had assumed this wouldn't work.

Another thing to consider is that not everyone records on their PC, and many who do run their mics through a mixer first. Or in some cases, such as when I stay late at work but then have to do a phone recording, it's necessary to run the mic line into a portable recorder.

[voice]

Is it just me, or is everybody ignoring the fact that a regular modem can plug into a phone line? Then you can just useWindows Dialer (http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org/how_do_i_get_phone_dialer_to_wor.htm) to call, and record it with any audio recording software. I've haven't tested this on Windows XP, but I seem to remember doing a few recordings back in my Windows 95 days...

Great point. That's how I do the phone interviews for my podcast (http://www.venturevoice.com). Just any modem won't do, you need to have a voice modem (also called telephony modem). The software I use to record the conversation is Call Soft Pro (http://www.download.com/Call-Soft-Pro/3000-2064_4-10343103.html). You don't even need to dial with the computer, just hit "Record Call" when you're ready to start recording what on the phone line.

You can hear the quality for yourself on my recordings. It's mixed results: If the person on the other end is speaking loud, the quality's great. If the person on the other end is speaking softly, you'll need to amplify and it's hard not to amplify the static along with the voice.

Anyone else have experence with this method?

[macguys]

I use Skype In, Out, and Skype-Skype for interviews. I do it using two computers. Computer 1 is my sound cue computer and has Skype, iTunes, and other audio sources on it. It plugs into one stereo channel on my mixing board. I route the Aux out from the studio mic on that board into the input of the Computer 1. That way, the interviewee gets the same quality sound as the listeners hear.

Comptuer 2 records and processes the audio. The main mix from the mixer is fed into it. A set of headphones plugged into Computer 2 is my monitor.

[ExtraLife]

I use skype most of the time, but when I can't you would be amazed how good a speaker phone sounds right up next to the mic. You can hear the results from tonights show:

http://myextralife.com/ftp/radio/EL_Radio_28_06-30-2005.mp3

[theDVshow]

I use this as well from Radio Shack and it works great...

http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?cookie%5Ftest=1&catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=17-855

[CoffeeGeek]

No need for two computers to record a skype convo.

Look for a program called hotrecorder. Designed specifically for skype. Works great.

Mark

[jbisjim]

I use this as well from Radio Shack and it works great...

http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?cookie%5Ftest=1&catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=17-855

I use that as well. I plug that gizmo into my mixer board and record it all on Audacity. Seems to work really well.

Rob @ podcast 411 I know uses skype out. We may go to that once i have more experience with skype.

[Will-Casel]

I use this from RadioShack:
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=17-855

Check out my podcast for the exact audio quality you would get:
http://www.douglasblaine.com/users/iamnotdustin


It ain't great, but it is real inexpensive. And for now that's what I can do considering my subject is always in a different state. Mybe I SHOULD try Skype.


I used that as well. Plugged it directly into my Eurorack Mixer.
I need to tweak the settings on my mixer a little better next time, but it turned out decent.

Check out my telephone interview with musician Queenie to see how it sounded. (Show #12)

http://www.CloudyDayArt.com

[SkinnyWhiteBoy]

One more vote for skype!
Check out the interview I did with Greg St. Clare (cruisebox) in episode 11 of my podcast (shameless plug ensues) @ http://skinnywhiteboy.kastpod.org

[addictedtorace]

Ben,

I use this from RadioShack:
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=17-855

Hey everyone,

Buyer beware. I just wanted to let you know that I bought the above gadget and it did NOT work at all for me. :x It only recorded my end of the conversation, no sound at all from the other side of the phone.

I followed the instructions exactly. So I don't know what the problem is, but is it possible that it just doesn't work with Motorola phones/earpieces? I tried it on two different Motorola phones and neither worked.

I was VERRRRRY disappointed and am going to return it to RadioShack today. In the meantime, I'm still looking for a solution to this problem of recording phone interviews.

Carmen

[addictedtorace]

Ben,

I use this from RadioShack:
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=17-855

Hey everyone,

Buyer beware. I just wanted to let you know that I bought the above gadget and it did NOT work at all for me. :x It only recorded my end of the conversation, no sound at all from the other side of the phone.

I followed the instructions exactly. So I don't know what the problem is, but is it possible that it just doesn't work with Motorola phones/earpieces? I tried it on two different Motorola phones and neither worked.

I was VERRRRRY disappointed and am going to return it to RadioShack today. In the meantime, I'm still looking for a solution to this problem of recording phone interviews.

Carmen