Tag: podcasting

• October 15, 2022

  Help My Audio Drama Win an Award

  

  Read on to find out how you can help my debut audio drama, “The Adventures of Captain Radio,” win an Audio Verse Award!

  VOTE NOW

  In the fall of 2020, I was desperate for an escape. Between the bitter election and the threat of the pandemic, the future looked pretty bleak. So, in an effort to tune it all out, I wrote a script for a science fiction adventure set in the distant future. It was a lighthearted, retrofuturistic, utopian story in which a mustache-twirling villain bent on destruction faces off against a space-age knight in shining armor.

  Against all odds, that script became a podcast. My collaborator William McDonald helped corral a stellar cast of voice actors, a composer to write music for the show, and a graphic designer to create our show art. It went from concept to reality in less than two years and now we’re up for an award.

  

  The Audio Verse Awards recognize the finest audio dramas of the past year and “The Adventures of Captain Radio” is one of about 150 nominees, all of which are stellar. The competition is stiff — that’s where you come in. We need your help to make it through to the final round. Voting is open through October 30, 2022, and we could really use your vote.

  All you have to do is go to audioverseawards.net/vote to cast your ballot for “The Adventures of Captain Radio.”

  You should know that the ballot isn’t very mobile-friendly, so it’s best to use a desktop or laptop (or you can switch to the desktop view on a mobile device by clicking the “Aa” symbol near the top of the page). On the New Productions category, simply find our show art in the lefthand column and drag it to the right column to rank us as one of your choices. The more shows you rank, the more weight your vote will carry.

  Our whole team has poured so much heart into this story and these characters and it would mean a lot to see those efforts rewarded with a 2022 Audio Verse Award. Thank you for your support and for your vote!

  VOTE NOW

  — 30 —

  Jonny Eberle is a writer, podcaster, filmmaker, and photographer in Tacoma, WA. You can find his words in Creative Colloquy, Grit City Magazine, and All Worlds Wayfarer. While you’re here, read more of his travel writing, sign up for his monthly newsletter, and follow him on Twitter.
• February 18, 2022

  I Guess This Makes Me a Podcaster: On Creating The Adventures of Captain Radio

  

  Let me start out by saying that I didn’t intend to create a podcast. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always enjoyed podcasts, having been a fervent Radiolab listener for more than 10 years, and I regularly recommend shows like 99 Percent Invisible, Levar Burton Reads, The Moth, and Imaginary Worlds to anyone who will listen. But I never thought I would make one. These shows were highly produced works of art. Coming from a film background, I knew how much time and energy that takes to pull off.

  But then, the whole world changed.

  A deadly pandemic upended my daily routine. I was out of work, alone at home, for days…and then weeks…and then months. I read a lot, but I also dove headlong into every podcast I could find, sampling from genres and formats I never knew existed. I listened all the time—in the shower, while weeding the garden, out walking the dog—trying to shut out terrifying reality with comforting voices in my ears.

  All that listening dredged up an old idea. Back in college, I used to joke with my friend and frequent collaborator Will McDonald that someday we were going to make a black-and-white sci-fi B-movie called Captain Radio and the Mutant Mole People from the Eleventh Dimension. For years and years, it was nothing more than an inside joke. Then, in the fall of 2020, something clicked and I realized that Captain Radio wasn’t a movie at all, but a 1930s radio show.

  I started writing. Soon, I had dashed off three scripts bursting with rocket ships, ray guns, robots, mad scientists, rapid-fire dialogue, melodrama, and (of course) a valiant hero. It was silly stuff, popcorn fare of the highest order, but it felt good to write something hopeful in the midst of a global catastrophe. I needed the escape, and I suspected others did, too. So, I pitched the show to Will and asked him to come along as the star and co-producer. For some crazy reason, he agreed. Together, we assembled a talented voice cast from across the country, many of whom we knew from Theatrikos Theatre Company in Flagstaff, AZ.

  After a lot of work finalizing the six-episode story, organizing recordings, learning my way around Audacity, creating sound effects with random objects lying around my house (wine glasses, bags of rice, and a wet sponge among many others), the first episode dropped on December 31, 2021. Chapter 4 is out now and as we rocket toward the season finale in a couple of weeks, I’m proud of the work we’ve done and hope listeners have enjoyed coming along for the ride as much as we’ve had fun putting it together.

  If you’re interested in checking out the show, you can find The Adventures of Captain Radio in all the usual places you consume podcasts, including Apple Podcasts and Spotify. If you enjoy the show, please take a moment to leave a rating and review telling others one thing you liked about it — that helps us immensely. You can also buy merchandise featuring artwork and quotes from the show, or you can skip all of that and make a monetary donation on Ko-Fi to help pay the bills. You can learn more on the Obscure Studios website if you’d like to dig deeper.

  I didn’t set out to become a podcaster, but here I am. I’m so excited to be sharing this spacefaring journey with you. Thanks for listening.

  — 30 —

  Jonny Eberle is a writer and aspiring podcaster in Tacoma, WA. His fiction has been featured in Creative Colloquy, Grit City Magazine, and All Worlds Wayfarer, and his debut audio drama, The Adventures of Captain Radio. Follow him on Twitter or join his mailing list for more news, writing, and musings.