Audio

Most video editors are similar in design. Once you have learned the basics in one application it is often easy to apply these skills to another program. This is fortunate as there are no free cross-platform video editors available. Here are some comparisons of different tools:

Windows Movie Maker and iMovie come free with Windows and Mac OSX respectively. Recent versions have made them much more than the basic editors they used to be; they now support images from modern hard drive cameras, and video from mobile phones.

WordPress is a system for creating websites and blogs. You can have your own installation of WordPress if you have some webspace, or you can use the free service at wordpress.com. It is easy to install WordPress and learn how to publish webpages, and it is a good vehicle for publishing and promoting your audio and video online. If you are using wordpress.com, you either have to pay an upgrade fee to host media files, or you can include them from SoundCloud, YouTube or other audio and video sharing sites.

Making a CD with audio files can involve two kinds of CDs. One type is a data CD, which is suitable for reading on other computers. The other type is an audio CD, which is suitable for playing on audio CD players. There isn't an obvious free, cross-platform application available, but there some specialist tools you can use. Infrarecorder & cdrtfe are good tools for Windows. Burn is available for Mac OSX, and Brasero is a great solution for Linux.

Mobile Media Converter is a free software application originally created to allow the transcoding of audio from early mobile phones into a format which could be edited by Audacity or other audio editors. It is now a more flexible tool which can covert many audio as well as video formats. Mobile Media Converter also allows you to download video or audio from a video sharing site like YouTube, and transcode it into a format that can be more easily edited and distributed offline.

SoundCloud is an internet service that allows you to listen to and share audio files. The service is mostly used by musicians, but SoundCloud actively encourages contributions from journalists, communities and campaigners. You can upload large files and make them available for online listening or for download. You can add audio from your smart phone, email or via a phone call. You can also embed a SoundCloud audio player in the pages of your blog or website. Users can leave comments at specific points on each audio track.

Audio Boo has taken advantage of the recording and internet capabilities of smartphones and created a service which publishes audio to the internet from a phone. You can download an app for your android or iPhone which allows you to record, edit and upload audio to your account. Using the BooMail feature, you can also send audio attachments directly to your account to a special email address. In certain countries there is a phone number you can call, leave a voice message and your message is then made available online.

Airtime allows you to schedule audio files in a calendar timeline. It is designed with radio stations in mind, as a free software replacement for similar commercial scheduling tools. It has a scheduling calendar, smart playlists, archive management and a very stable output. You can also switch output to live streams coming in from remote DJs or journalists. Airtime is often used in a radio studio outputting to a radio transmitter. With internet access, it is also possible to upload and schedule shows remotely.

Audacity is an 'audio editor'. It can record sounds, like voices or musical instruments, or import sounds from a portable recording device like a sound recorder or phone. You can combine these voices and sounds and edit them to make documentaries, music, podcasts, etc. The ability to edit and layer different sounds on top of each other brings the power of a recording studio to your computer.  There are also many audio effects that you can add to your project. However, Audacity isn't really suitable for the more complicated needs of professional musicians.