Audio Creation Exchange
Contents
About
Audio Creation Exchange (ACX) is a marketplace for professional narrators, authors, agents, publishers and rights holders to connect and create audiobooks. ACX is owned and operated by Audible Inc., an Amazon company. All titles produced through ACX are made available for sale on Audible.com, Amazon.com and iTunes.
ACX Audio Submission Requirements
The ACX website has the current instructions on Audio Submission Requirements, but here I'll type a summary of the main bits:
- On ACX you can find and paid a professional voice narrator, or narrate it yourself (video).
- You'll also need to include a retail audio sample that is between 1 and 5 minutes long.
- Opening credits minimum requirements (must match book cover):
- Start with: "{Title of audiobook}". "{Subtitle if applicable}". "Written by {Name of author}". "Narrated by {Name of narrator}".
- Closing credits minimum requirements:
- End with: "The end."
- Split up your chapters into consistent files:
- Start each section with: "Chapter 1: {Chapter title}."
- Each file must contain only one chapter or section and be < 120 minutes.
- Each file must have 0.5 to 1 second of room tone at its beginning and 1 to 5 seconds of room tone at its end.
- Talk consistently (consistency in audio levels, tone, noise level, spacing, and pronunciation... free of extraneous sounds such as plosives, mic pops, mouse clicks, excessive mouth noise, and outtakes).
- Mono files are strongly recommended (and must the be same for all).
- Each file must measure between -23dB and -18dB RMS. Each file must have a noise floor no higher than -60dB RMS. Each file must be 192kbps or higher 44.1kHz MP3, Constant Bit Rate (CBR).
ACX Requirements Via Adobe Audition
If you don't have a professional recording studio, getting background noise low is really, really hard. Even in the quietist room in the house a microphone will pickup plane and car noises, and worst of all, your laptop fan is louder than you think. Dress in cotton clothes an get a long cable to your microphone... yup - still noise. Adobe Audition can help.
Section Names (for Upload Manager)
When you upload sections (as MP3s), you are asked for a list of Chapters. Some sections are already there/required... here's what my first upload looked like, with the bold ones already added.
- Introduction
- Start
- Chapter 1: Flavors
- Chapter 2: Ice Cream Types and Imitations
- Chapter 3: Toppings
- Chapter 4: Shapes
- Chapter 5: Bonus Material
- Closing credits
- Audio Sample (1-5 minutes)
