As you should know by now, Ben Bova is going to be the Guest of Honor at Balticon 45. But long before that happens he will be premiering his new webcomic at Intervention. Intervention takes place September 10-12 2010 at the Hilton Washington DC/Rockville 1750 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland 20852.
Long time Balticon attendee Rob Balder, and Bill Holbrook will be collaborating with Dr. Bova on this new webcomic called Duel in the Somme. We’ll post more information and a link to the comic when it is available.
Thank you to all of you who checked in when the podcast stopped updating in iTunes. The problem has been fixed and the podcast will continue on with no signs of stopping.
Read it, share it, love it. Balticon 45 will be here before you know it.
Highlights!
Special Guest of Honor: Steve Geppi
Fan Ghost of Honor: Mark Owings
2010 Compton Crook Award Winner: Paolo Bacigalupi
2011 Compton Crook Award Winner: TBA
A Four Day, 24-hours-a-day Extravaganza!
Dr. Tom Holtz Jr. is the Senior Lecturer in the Dept. of Geology at University of Maryland College Park. He is also one of, if not the, world’s foremost authority on the T-Rex. And we talk all things dinosaurs. Dr. Holtz is an engaging speaker and one of the best science communicators out there today. If you’ve watched just about any dinosaur special on TV, you’ve probably seen him.
Here is his picture from his own website:
His book Dinosaurs: The Most Complete, Up-to-Date Encyclopedia for Dinosaur Lovers of All Ages
is available at Amazon. It’s from 2007, and we’ve learned so much more since then. He keeps it up to date with an online appendix on his website.
Perennial New Media favorite and professional musician, George Hrab has a new album out. He has graciously allowed us to release Trebuchet to you for free.
WHAT?!?! Is he crazy? No, not at all. Well, maybe.
He hopes you like it so much you’ll buy a copy as a download or on CD. So do I. In full disclosure, George Hrab is one of my favorite musicians. Still, if you like it, please support George so he can make more music in the future.
-Paul Fischer
featuring Phil Plait, Peter Gregson, Slau, and The Skeptical Shoe Horns.
1. God is Not Great
2. Everything Alive Will Die Someday
3. Ms.Information
4. Fifty Stories
5. FAR
6. Remora
7. Sviatoslav Lobster
8. When I Was Your Age
9. Trebuchet
10. Atlanta
11. Death From The Skies
12. Never Knew
13. Hai Yookito ‘Ya
14. Where Have You Been?
15. One Hypnopompic Jerk
16. Small Comfort
17. Happy Birthday Baby
all songs © 2010 Geologic Records / You Call That Music
Here’s all the fun you could ever fit in your pocket. The Balticon 44 Pocket Program is here. Start planning your weekend.
Friend of the show, Lawrence M. Schoen and I sat down at Balticon to talk about his Hugo Award nomination, traveling, how exercise effects writing, and much much more.
Hugo award nominee and friend of the show, Lawrence M. Schoen reads Sweet Potato Pie from his upcoming collection of short stories. Lawrence is nominated for the 2010 Hugo Award for his short story The Moment. His new collection will be launching at Balticon 44.
This is our second interview with Gene Wolfe and I think the best interview we’ve ever published. This is due in large part to Jim Van Verth.
When we published our first interview with Gene we received the normal amount of downloads in the first few weeks that I was used to. Then something amazing happened. Our download count kicked up from the low hundreds to the mid thousands. I did some checking and discovered that Jim Van Verth mentioned our interview on a Gene Wolfe fan site. Of course I wrote Jim an email to thank him, but when I saw that Gene was returning to Balticon, I went out on a limb and asked him to help me with an interview.
I knew that with a newborn baby in the house there was little chance that I would be able to really dig into Gene’s incredible body of work in order to give his amazing career as an author the credit it was due. But Jim was already a huge fan of Gene’s and well versed in his works. I’m not sure how we’ll top this one, but it really raises the bar for me. I want to thank Jim again for the work he put into writing all the questions for this interview.
I also want to thank John Taylor Williams again for guest hosting and mastering this audio. I’ve just entered a new position with a new company and there’s lots to do. We’ve also been dealing with a string of illnesses with our child. Nothing serious, just the normal stuff that kids get when they start socializing. However normal it might be, sleepless nights and crying babies make little time for editing audio.
Finally, I would like to thank Gene for taking the time to talk openly and honestly about his career as a writer.
-Paul Fischer
Head of New Media, Balticon
Promo: Tumbler, by Brand Gamblin, also available at Podiobooks.com
Bumper: Cory Doctorow’s Craphound.com
Music: A Dark Machine
John Taylor Williams can be contacted on Twitter: @WryneckStudio
A day in the life of a sought-after commercial artist. It’s almost impossible to walk through a book store, game store, or computer game store without seeing cover art from Kurt Miller. Join us as we discuss how computers have effected the life of this amazingly prolific artist.
Guest hosted and mastered by John Taylor Williams of Wyrneck Studios
Scott Sigler’s Special Guest of Honor speech, The Changing Face of Content Delivery. As recorded at Balticon 43.
Guest of Honor Charles Stross talks about writing and his books. This is one of the more out there interviews as Charlie outpaces this poor interviewer mentally and verbally. The man has a keen whit. The good news for you, is you can sample this Brit’s work in audio form through the first and only live Escape Pod (See Episode 206 or the Special Episode in the Balticon Podcast feed).
Promo: 7th Son: Descent
J.C. Hutchins has released a newly rerecorded version of what was originally a podcast only novel. The novel is now in print and available from St. Martin’s Press. Buy the book now from Amazon and help an author who has given so much to the podcasting community.
Music: Drive Away by Matthew Ebel
Matthew contacted me via Twitter to see if he could play his original music at Balticon 44. While I took a crash course in listening to his music, he reviewed his schedule for 2010. I liked what I heard, and given his dedication to New Media it seemed like a great fit. Unfortunately, he had a conflict, so he’s penciled us in for 2011. In the mean time, dig the music, and check out the artist if it sounds as good to you as it does to me.
Audio posted by Chooch Schubert for his Random Acts of Chooch Podcast.
Quoting the original show notes:
This is the audio from a panel I spoke on at Balticon 43 over Memorial Day weekend. A special thanks to my fellow panelists: PG Holyfield, Scott Sigler, and MAinPA.
I believe that this was the first panel I was on during the weekend, and was chosen as “moderator” on the spot without having any notes or talking points to go from. Luckily, we all talk a lot, so there wasn’t a lack of content
From the Balticon program:
Upgrading your gear is a serious temptation. In these trying economic times, bargains abound and the desire for some new shiny device in your studio sometimes outweighs the other factors in your life. Our panel of technophiles talk about what’s out there, where to buy it cheap, and when you should buy it. We all love our gear, but we shouldn’t deprive our families of food and shelter for the next new gadget.
Audio posted by Chooch Schubert for his Random Acts of Chooch Podcast.
Quoting the original show notes:
This is the audio from a panel I spoke on at Balticon 43 over Memorial Day weekend. A special thanks to my fellow panelists: Thomas ‘Cmdln’ Gideon, Dan the Fan.
The version I am posting is not edited for content, but has been processed to remove noise and (hopefully) make it more listenable.
Cmdln has posted his own recording from this panel at Archive.org in uncompressed FLAC, MP3, and Ogg Vorbis formats.
From the Balticon program:
This session will go beyond the basics of recording a voice with your built in audio program. We will give an overview of the various types of audio recording equipment and techniques of non-linear audio editing. This should help you in creating advanced productions such as multi-voice dramatizations, music recording and mixing, as well as carry over into video production.
This session will cover: mixing board types and interfaces; microphone types; non-linear audio editing and effects (cut, shift, cross fade, noise reduction, compression, noise gating); multi-track mixing and recording different audio resources.
Products we discussed during the recording:
- The book that Dan mentions during the discussion is Modern Recording Techniques, Sixth Edition.
- The midi controller I mention is the Korg nanoKontrol. Apparently they changed pricing, or I just got a great deal because they are $60 which is almost twice what I had thought. Still, I think it’s well worth it
- There is some discussion on the Zoom H2 and Zoom H4
- Thomas mentions his use of a M-Audio MicroTrack II
