Tech Blog

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Anyone who tends to record audio or video that requires transcription later on (being a journalist, I know this all too well), likely knows how tedious and repetitive the experience can be. While not the automated solution I was hoping for, I won’t argue with free software that helps me do the job faster and with more precision.

Express Scribe is an app available for PC, Mac and Linux, and it’s probably as close as you’ll get to professional-level transcription software without paying a cent for it. The gist of this package is that it allows you to tinker with the audio or video recording to help you type faster and without having to switch back and forth between a word processor and a media playback app.

It does this by giving you the option to change the pitch and pace of the sound, so that you can keep up with what’s being said. You can even adjust the volume of the left and right channels in case that helps bring out the voice and eliminate background noise. And in order to keep from having to switch back and forth between apps, you can create customized shortcuts to do everything from controlling playback and emailing text.

If you need to bookmark or flag anything along the way, Express Scribe lets you do that, too. You can also choose which word processor you want it to partner with, so that you can stay focused on typing. After using this for over a week to transcribe interviews, I can say that it did simplify the process for me, though I wouldn’t go as far as saying that it cut the time of my workflow by a huge margin. However, it did streamline things, and while it took some time to get used to the shortcuts I created, I can see this app cutting more time moving forward.

Though I wasn’t able to try it, there is integration with Dragon Naturally Speaking to convert speech to text automatically. Not sure if that includes the possibility of integrating with MacSpeech Dictate, but it might be worth a shot.

Anyway, give Express Scribe a chance if you need a useful — and affordable — way to transcribe audio and video files.