You know how you sound lower-pitch to yourself and higher-pitch to others? (Science says it's because of bone conduction.)

I sound high-pitch to myself. I've always sounded like a kid. Friends teased me about voice-acting for anime. I tried to avoid being self-conscious about it, but you know how sometimes that sneaks in anyway. I found it difficult to listen to recordings of my presentations or podcasts. I ended up paying other people to transcribe them.

As it turns out, this might be one of the things you can fix with money. Here's a quick comparison of:

• the Blue Yeti
• the Logitech H800 headset I usually use
• the Logitech Webcam Pro 9000 I use for video
• my computer's built-in microphone

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With the Yeti, I can deal with listening to myself. Hmm. That's something. It's not cheap, but if this is one of those rare occasions you can spend money to get around confidence barriers… bring it on!

I justify the expense by telling myself that this will encourage me to make more videos and screencasts. Let's see how it works out. For recording and webcasts, I put the Yeti on a thick stack of fleece to help muffle the vibrations from the desk.

I know there are even fancier microphones out there. I think those will have to wait for a better setup, though. I'm fine with the quality of the Yeti, and I've learned not to let my expenses outpace my senses by too much.

If you're thinking of getting your own, try getting it from a brick-and-mortar store so that you can return it if it doesn't work out for you. Apparently, microphones do different things for different voices. Here's an affiliate link to it on Amazon, if you're inclined to get it online: Blue Microphones Yeti USB Microphone – Silver Edition. =) (I'll get a tiny fraction of the purchase price, which is handy for buying the occasional book.)

Hope this helps! I'd love to hear (from) you.