“It’s Good To Talk” – those were four memorable words from a 90s British Telecom advert starring Bob Hoskins…he was big in the 90s…look it up…
Now I’m done dating myself, let’s continue…
The point is that it is good to talk and be involved in great discussions around topics you care about. That thinking led us to start our new podcast, Story x Story. We talk a whole lot with friends and fans at conventions about manga, comics and gaming. Now it’s official with a microphone and an Anchor account.
Starting Our Podcasting Journey
I’ve been a listener of podcasts for at least a decade, even longer for audiobooks. I’d listen to podcasts on technology, comics, screenwriting, politics, sports and video games. They’ve been great for getting through commutes and making you look smarter!
But most of all it’s enjoyable, and at times comforting, to hear the voices of people whose opinion you value. And we want to give our podcast the same feel.
As storytellers, it made sense to start a podcast about stories. We don’t only talk about stories in the world of manga and comics, but stories across pop culture. We also like to pick out tips from the stories we consume that would be useful to others creating stories.
In case you’re wondering, the name Story x Story is very much inspired by the manga series Hunter x Hunter. That’ll surely be a future trivia question at a convention quiz night.
I’ve done several podcast and radio appearances over the years and really enjoy the audio format. It’s less pressure than having to consider how you look on camera and podcasts give you more flexibility to speak for longer. So I expected to enjoy building our podcast, which has been a great experience so far!
Story x Story: Learning Opportunities
That’s in large part to the guests we have on the show. Getting to bring in different people means each conversation is a new voice and a chance to learn from another person’s perspective. And when we do have returning guests, talking about new stories keeps things fresh and entertaining.
The first year of recording has been a blast and presented new challenges and opportunities to learn. Like understanding the need for not only visual branding with a strong logo but audio branding through intro music and audio idents.
We finally got all those sorted by episode 9 (Let’s Get Philosophical). And then there’s recording the podcast itself and learning how to make sure to get a good blend of guests over a season and make sure each gets their time to talk in each recording. This was especially the case when we had our post EGX “Royal Rumble” episode 10 (Roundtable Royal Rumble) with a rolling lineup of guests over a 2-hour recording.
The last episode of 2019 was a live recording that presented new lessons to get our heads around. And then we took a break…
This allowed me, co-host Tazziii and producer Gina to step back a review of what we had done so far as well as plan for the future with new ideas and show formats.
Which brings us to Story x Story Season 2. The first episode is up now and we kicked things off with a fun discussion about Birds of Prey with Youtuber and Twitch Streamer Trista Bytes (Spotify | Apple Podcasts | RSS). We’re looking forward to bringing on more discussions and guests to talk all things story. We’ve also got new types of shows and hopefully new places to take our new podcast.
We’re excited to see where it goes. We’ll keep talking in the meantime.
