Here’s a quick write-up of the stages I go through when working on an episode of my podcast.

1. Prep. This includes scheduling guests, watching the episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that we’re going to talk about and taking notes, analyzing my notes for themes, listening to other BtVS podcasts to see if they bring up anything new that I want to be sure to talk about, and doing some basic research on things like who wrote and directed the episode. [Tools: email, calendar, TV, Hulu, pen and paper, podcast app]

2. Recording. This is when I sit down and actually record with my guests. I bring in my notes, but it’s pretty freewheeling. [Tools: Audacity, microphone, earbuds.]

3. Editing. I go back and listen to the recording. I cut out basic stuff like “ums” and “ahs,” but also big tangents that don’t really tie into the episode discussion much. [Tools: Audacity, earbuds]

4. Processing. I clean up the sound during this stage. [Tools: Audacity, earbuds]

5. Finalizing. I add the intro and outro music and compress the whole thing into a tidy little MP3. [Tools: Audacity, earbuds]

6. Writing up show notes. I listen one more time and make a note of anything I want to be sure to link to when the episode goes up. [Tools: Audacity, earbuds, notepad app]

Again, I’m not actually releasing the show yet, so I don’t have any information yet on that part of the process. When I do, I’ll try to document the process of releasing and marketing episodes.