Still Wanting to Fit in

This week was all about putting it together. I used Natural Readers to convert my lines into an AI voice. I am female with having a male character so this was very important for me to complete. To me this was the easy part because the lines were already typed so it was really:

1. Copy line
2. Paste onto the Natural Readers
3. Record voice onto phone
4. Send over phone recording to email
5. Put it into chip champ

After I did all of that my lines did not even equal the 6 minutes which was needed to make the time frame. I had to redo some lines and make them longer but that did not take up much time.

I also redid my bumper because I felt like it did not go with the show.

Here is the old bumper:

Here is the new bumper:

I feel like the new bumper is way better but I wish I had put the music all the way through. By the time I noticed the music did not go all the way through, it was in the radio show already and I did not want to be that person to ask them to put in a different one. That was bad on my part 100% I should have double checked it.

The next day I was sent the final project through Discord because that is where my group and I were discussing the project at hand. Rishi (one of my group members) had put all of the audios together and made it one talk show. However, I did notice a few little details that needed to be made but he made sure to quickly edit the audio.

My first reaction was “oh they were using their real voices and reading off of the script.” I was not expecting that at all! I felt so out of place again; using an AI voice, it made my character stick out like a sore tongue. I ended up asking my group if I should redo my part and maybe have someone that is a male to read my script, but they said AI was okay.  

Then I got nervous because after I complete an assignment I always check to make sure I had all the requirement made and sure enough something caught my attention.

“It must not be just a recording of a conversation.”

The reason this had me nervous was because our radio show was a talk show with no background noise or anything really at all other than us talking. Of course, we had the bumpers and the commercials which all had sound with them, but man was my hands sweating. I ended up emailing the professor about this issue I was worried about.

I was told to write about it and here it is:

At the beginning of this project, I felt pushed aside because I could tell the two people I was working with were actually discussing things without me. How? Who knows, maybe they were friends, maybe they had other classes together. I do not know but one thing I do know is that I started the discord with them and there was no communication from them until I was TOLD that they were going to write the script and I just need to create a logo and record mine lines.

Once I had a chance to open discord since making it, I was stunned. I was kind of upset because they did not want my input on the plot or lines. The time I read they were going to make the lines, the intro was already made…I did not read the intro at this time but instead I offered my help but they did not want it.

Fast forward a little bit, I told them I did not feel like we were all on the same page and I asked them to find a time where we can all talk about the script and once again, they said no… at this moment I gave up working with them. I kept my head down and recorded the lines they gave to me. I will say they asked me if I wanted to add anything but at the time there was nothing I could do.

They made it into a talk show…Not much you can add if someone has it already finished. I gave them my bumper and my commercial and they put everything together creating the radio show. Again, I was stunned, they used their real voice and my character was AI created so they sound very very different, not once did they tell me that they were using their real voice. However, I did not tell them I was using AI. Just bad communication.

I brought up the fact of redoing the whole show over again with a different plot and they turned that down really quick. I do understand that they put in a lot of time and effort however, I know this is not what the professor wanted and it makes me upset knowing that we could do better. At this time it was Wednesday, I told them because I want to redo it that I will do all the lines and editing but they did not want their effort to get throw away. (I completely understand this). We sent it into canvas and now we hope for the best.

I feel as though I was the odd ball out and it really sucked. I have been looking forward to this project ever since we found out about it and I feel like I was let down by my group in every way possible. I had no creativity in this project, and I am a very creative person so to just watch it all happen was depressing and stressful. I really hope we do not get stuck with the same group, and I say that in the nicest way possible. I am sure they are great people who did not mean for this project to make me feel pushed to the side.

All in all. I loved the idea of working in a group for the radio show, but I know the result could have been better. Here’s to another week…I guess.