Import, Edit & Render Podcast Audio (Reaper)

So you’ve got some hot takes and now it’s time to slice them up into your sleek, new podcast. Great! Read on and you’ll know everything you need to work with Reaper:

• Import audio into Reaper
• Navigate Reaper and play your audio
• Edit, slice and blend between media items (audio clips)
• Render (export) your podcast to MP3

Using our Rodecaster Pro to record your podcast? Click here to learn how you can transfer files to your computer.

Importing audio into Reaper

1. In the menu bar, go to Insert > Media file…
2. Select the file(s) you wish to import and click Open.
3. If you selected multiple files, you will see the following dialog:

4. There will now be a new track (or tracks) with your audio as a new media item.

Navigating the timeline

1. To zoom in on your audio clip, just scroll up and down using your mouse or trackpad, or pinch zoom on a trackpad.

2. To move backward or forward through the timeline, scroll left and right with your trackpad or hold Shift and scroll up and down with your mouse.

Playing audio

1. To preview your mix, just click Play ▶ in the bottom left or press the Space bar.
2. To choose where audio playback begins, move the playhead by clicking anywhere in the timeline.
3. You can also scrub forward and backward using the Left and Right arrow keys, or by clicking and dragging the playhead’s handle. Try it!

What are media items?

The building blocks of any Reaper project are media items. Media items are just sections of an audio file (like a WAV or MP3) which we use in our project. What’s cool about media items is that when we shorten them or slice them up, they still reference the original audio file, so we can easily lengthen them again to reveal parts of the audio which were “cut”. This makes Reaper non-destructive, which is very useful when tweaking your podcast to perfection.

To edit audio in Reaper, we’ll need to understand three basic functions…

Moving and resizing media items

1. To move a media item across the timeline, just click and drag it with your mouse or trackpad. You can also move it to a new or different track.
2. Shorten/lengthen a media item by clicking and dragging the left or right edges.

Splitting media items

Splitting a media item is a great way to quickly cut out audio which we no longer need.

Position the playhead where you want to split a media item, then press S.

Crossfading media items

You want your podcast to flow, and a big part of that is having smooth transitions between media items, otherwise called crossfading. Luckily Reaper automatically does this when media items are overlapped — this is a key reason for choosing Reaper to edit your podcasts!

1. To crossfade between two media items, just drag one or the other until they overlap.
2. You don’t have to delete a crossfade like in other audio editors — just move the media items away from each other and the crossfade disappears.

Rendering a podcast

Before sharing it with the world, we need to render our project. Rendering will scan through the whole timeline and mix every track into one audio file by recording the master track’s output.

1. In the menu bar, go to File > Render…
2. At the top of the Render to File dialog, set the Source to Master mix.
3. Under Output, choose where you want to render the audio file, and give it a file name.
4. Under Primary output format tab, set the Format to MP3.
5. Click Render 1 file.

6. The Rendering to file dialog will open and begin rendering your file. This could take anywhere from a few seconds to several minutes, depending on how large your project is. To view the new file when it is finished rendering, just click on Launch file in the bottom left.

Putting it all together

That’s all you need to start crafting podcasts in Reaper. To see everything in action plus a few bonus techniques, Click Here to watch a demonstration where we’ll import and edit audio recorded by our very own TPZ students.