Crown of Thorns Pod'rama

Crown of Thorns Pod'rama is a dramatised, full-cast recording, or multivoice podfic, of irisbleufic’s Crown of Thorns (The Walls, the Wainscot, and the Mouse) ‘Verse, The Walls, the Wainscot, and the Mouse ‘Verse on Archive of Our Own, a 275,000 word “Book Omens” fanfiction inspired by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman’s 1990 novel Good Omens. This collaborative fan production involved over 60 people in total, and took about fifteen months to organise and complete. The runtime of the audio drama is 36:47:12, plus an additional 17:18:13 of bonus material, for a total of 54:05:25 of audio content. 
The project was conceived, organised, and produced by Literarion, who began soliciting participants via social media and in various Discord communities in October 2019. Podfixx, Literarion and CompassRose voice the narrator, Aziraphale and Crowley, respectively. 
Compared to many other collaborative podfic projects, the Crown of Thorns Pod'rama stands out for its scope but also for its process (podficcer auditions, collaborative editing, involvement of the fic's writer as a consultant, commitment to documenting the production process) and for its production values (the work include a large number of graphics and an original musical score.) 
==About The Story==
 Crown of Thorns is a collection of short stories set after the events of the book, with the common thread of following Aziraphale and Crowley's lives in the aftermath of the not-Apocalypse, as well as the people that they meet when trying to carve out a place for themselves in the human world. It features both canon characters and original characters, including themes such as love (and the emotional risks the main characters are willing to take in order to still love those around them), family and found family, friendship, mortality, humanity, passage of time, and the spectrum of morality.
==Pre-Production==
===Project Inception===
In their interview with LenaLawlipop, Literarion talked about their motivation for the project and its initial organisation: 
Most of the internal working of the project took place on a dedicated discord server. 
===Casting===
Unusually for multivoice podfics, participants who wanted a speaking role were invited to submit auditions, and were cast by Literarion and a team of directors including the author, irisbleufic. Irisbleufic also served as a consultant and advisor to the project as a whole.
41 voice actors from all over the world were cast in the speaking parts, including Podfixx as the narrator, Literarion as Aziraphale, and CompassRose as Crowley. Irisbleufic made guest vocal appearances as themself and in minor roles in several chapters. 
About the process of casting, Literarion saidCrown of Thorns Cast Interviews by LenaLawlipop, 2020:
CompassRose said: 
====Full cast====
from production credits, Production credits on Archive of Our Own
*Podfixx as the Narrator, The Father, Eve, and Burbage
*CompassRose as Crowley
*Literarion as Aziraphale
*Tifaria as Adam Young
*BabelGhoti as Anathema Device and Tom the Cat
*Nemainofthewater as Madame Tracey
*Arcafira as Ligur and The Doctor
*Tartansea as Dagon and The Steward
*Nash Nolastname as Hastur and Gemma Tomlin
*Djapchan as Newton Pulsifer, Licinia and Gavin 
*The_Shame_Basement/beanellinies as Sergeant Shadwell and Leonardo da Vinci
*LenaLawlipop as Mary Hodges and Rashid Bhatia
*kerravon as Phillippa "Pippa" Morrison and The Auctioneer
*UnholyCrowley as Amanda "Mandy" Tomlin
*Gorillazgal86 as Sophia Device-Young
*NotBreadPudding as Natalie Device-Pulsifer
*Cynthia Chang as Janet Device Pulsifer and The Gentleman
*phinnsy as Raphael
*irisbleufic as Girl on the Train (irisbleufic) and Ruth
*Izzybutt/Kendra 'Izzy' Murray as Uriel
*Jesse James as Robert Garmon
*Lady_Iwa/Lady Lier as Ivan Sagarra and Jaime Hernez
*Originblue as Rani Bhatia and John Device
*HatsuAka as Tanith and The Apprentice
*Spinnerofyarns as Pepper and The Estate Agent
*closetcellist as Brian and Michael 
*Hali as Wensleydale and George Cranby 
*qwanderer as Asmodai, Mr. Young, Harold Morrison, Mr. Andrews, Receptionist #3, and Mary Anning
*miss_echidna as Agnes Nutter, The Medic, and Dani 
*StarcatcherBetty as Death and Gabriel
*AJfanfic as Receptionist #1, The Driver, and William Shakespeare
*stardust_podfics as The Student and William the silversmith
*keeperofseeds as Receptionist #2 and Garrud the silversmith
*CatofApocalypse as Shopkeeper #1, Shopkeeper #3, and Arthur
*Ecchima as Shopkeeper #2, The Waiter, and Rosemary
*Chonaku as Constance Plashkin
*Tezca as Amos, The Policewoman, The Hairdresser, and Anat
====Production team====
from production credits
*Literarion: Producer, Director, Editor, Beta, Social Media
*Podfixx: Director, Editor
*Lady_Iwa/Lady Lier: Director, Graphic Designer
*Judie: Director
*Luninarie/Nuitarie: Musical director, composer and performer of the soundtrack
*UnholyCrowley: Head Editor, Organiser, Social Media
*CompassRose: Head of Graphic Design, Director, Social Media
*LenaLawlipop: Head of Social Media, Interview host and head interview organiser, Editor, Organiser
*AJfanfic: Head of Zine Production, Graphic Designer, Organiser, Social Media
*The_Shame_Basement/beanellinies: Organiser
*CatofApocalypse: Beta, Graphic Designer
*closetcellist: Organiser
*Djap: Editor, Beta
*FireflysWriting/Firefly/Feuerbluete: Organiser
*green_grin/Grin: Beta, Graphic Designer
*HatsuAka: Organiser
*Luin: Organiser, Social Media
*missechidna: Organiser
*NotBreadPudding: Editor, Organiser, Social Media
*ORiley42: Editor, Organiser, Beta
*Pandi: Organiser
*qwanderer: Graphic Designer, Organiser, Social Media
*Sssneklady: Organiser
*Sobakasu: Organiser
*Tezca: Organiser
==Editing and production==
Because the project used voice actors from all over the world, with vastly different recording equipment, the objective of the editing process was to get all the actors sounding as consistent as possible. Recording, editing and production were all done in the free, open-source audio editing application Audacity. The audio editing and beta listening team assembling the recordings were coordinated by UnholyCrowley as head editor. 
Before recording began, a team of volunteers edited document copies of each chapter to produce scripts, colour-coded by each character’s lines. These scripts were used as reference throughout the recording and editing process.
The voice actors all followed the same procedures of initial cleanup for their raw recordings, editing out mistakes and doing basic noise reduction and normalisation processing. They also used Audacity’s labelling function to mark each line.
The chapter editor then took the chapter script, Podfixx’s narration track, and all of the voice actor tracks from that specific chapter, and used Audacity to edit them together. Working on the narration track, the editor would find each character’s dialogue line and substitute it with the voice actor’s version of the same line, editing vocal levels and removing any stray clicks and breaths along the way. Since Podfixx read the entire chapter, including all character dialogue, her reading was sometimes used as backup when a one-liner character didn’t get cast or an actor dropped out of the project.
Once the dialogue editing was done for the whole chapter, the editor would add in the transition music at scene breaks or changes of location, as well as the intro and outro music relevant for the chapter. The chapter was then sent to the head editor.
The head editor’s responsibility was mainly to do a last sweep over the editing to ensure consistency (since each editor on the team had their own style of editing). During this step, the head editor would go over chapter audio with a “fine toothed comb”, ensuring that the rhythm and flow of the chapter and characters sounded natural to a listener, as though overhearing a conversation. Once all these tweaks were made, the head editor ran final audio processing: compression (for crispness), and normalisation (to level all the tracks at a similar volume/amplification), and exported the chapter to publication-ready MP3 and WAV files. Before publication, the final file was reviewed by a beta listener to make sure nothing was missed.
===Posting schedule===
The posting schedule, along with many other details of project planning, was established by Literarion before the project started, and involved one chapter or more (depending on length) released per week starting on January 26, 2020, and finishing with the final chapter release and epilogue, in seven parts from December 18 to 24, 2020.
===Music===
The pod'rama’s original musical score was composed and performed by Nuitarie. Nuitarie’s soundtrack was given its own “story” on Archive of Our Own,, Soundtrack page on Archive of Our Own and can be heard in full on Bandcamp., Crown of Thorns: album by Nuitarie on Bandcamp
Of the composition process, Nuitarie said, during their interview with Lena Lawlipop, Lena Lawlipop with Nuitarie, interview:
===Artwork===
Crown of Thorns Pod'rama was designed as a multimedia endeavour from the start, and original fan art was integral to the concept. Artists were solicited along with voice actors in the initial stages of the project, and there was ongoing artist recruitment during the year. Each chapter on AO3 is accompanied by original artwork created by one of 26 different artists, which was also included in all promotional social media posts for the chapter. Other incidental artwork was also created over the course of the project.
Crown of Thorns: The Pod’rama Zine was created by AJfanfic, using the artwork and text excerpts from the chapters that inspired each piece, with a cover illustration by CompassRose. The zine is freely available., Crown of Thorns Pod'rama Zine on Archive of Our Own
====Participating artists====
from production credits, Production credits on Archive of Our Own
*AJfanfic
*Betaart0
*catofapocalypse/(BratofA)
*Chonaku
*CompassRose
*Dearest-Angel
*Ecchima
*FireflysWriting/Firefly/Feuerbluete
*green_grin/Grin
*HatsuAka
*Jeebs
*Khenq
*Kakushimiko
*Madcheshirefox
*Mageink
*Ouida
*Pandi
*Petimetrek
*qwanderer
*Shae-C
*squidsticks
*suvroc
*Tezca
*Tifaria
*Tio-trile
*ZeTomato
===Bonus content===
Several significant dates during the 2020 release year, including Gaiman’s and Pratchett’s birthdays, April Fool’s Day, the anniversary of the TV series release, and the canonical “Birthday of the World” in the Good Omens ‘verse, were recognised with art, social media postings, special challenges including a “Draw This In Your Style” event inspired by the many various Good Omens book covers, or special episodes. These were promoted through the project’s social media (tumblr, twitter, instagram).
Other bonus audio content was also created in conjunction with the project. LenaLawlipop planned and conducted interviews in audio or text form with many team members about their fandom history and specific involvement in the project. These interviews and transcripts can be found on AO3. Head editor UnholyCrowley assembled three compilations of bloopers from participants’ voice recordings, covering chapters 1-25, 26-50, and 51-76, which can be found on AO3. A joke edition of Chapter 21, using various text-to-speech accents, with a joke cover, was created for April 1, 2020, and released ahead of the actual content.
===Project conclusion===
The project as a whole concluded on December 31, 2020, with the release of the art fanzine, LenaLawlipop’s debriefing interview with Literarion, Lena Lawlipop with Literarion, project wrap-up interview, and the final blooper compilation. 
The planning documents and background material were archived for the use and reference of others who might want to undertake similar projects., Legacy documents page on Archive of Our Own
==Recs and Reactions==
==Example graphics from the project==
Image:CoT-Post-FL.jpg|Image from early social media post recruiting participants
Image:CoT-logolow.png|The Crown of Thorns logo mark, designed by Shae-C
Image:CoT-nuitarie-soundtrack-cover-lantern-FL.jpg|The cover of the CoT soundtrack
Image:CoT-chapter-15-FL.jpg|The cover of Chapter 15, with an illustration by green_grin in the standard chapter template
Image:CoT-Ch29-social-announce-SQ-GNU-FL.jpg|Chapter announcement commemorating Sir Terry Pratchett and the Glorious 25th
Image:CoT-EarthBirthday-SQ-FL.jpg|Social graphic for the Good Omens canonical birthday of the world
Image:CoT-Zine-FL.jpg|Crown of Thorns: The Pod'rama Zine cover, with illustration by CompassRose
==References== 
Category:Collaboration
Category:Slash Podfics
Category:Good Omens
Category:2020 Podfics
Category:2021 Featured Articles
Category:Social Media Feature-Fanwork Friday