I have Skype and my brother has Skype. We were in a call and each were recording our own voices using audacity. My sound file (recorded with a blue yeti) had only my voice and not any audio from the skype call. My brother’s audio file (recorded with his laptop mic) had his voice alongside my voice from the skype call. Why did my brothers Audacity record the skype call? He was wearing headphones so his microphone shouldn’t have picked it up. What is the setting that I gotta get good? Thanks. Yup.
Your brother has the “magic” machine. Most machines and setups will not allow you to record both sides of a Skype call. There are special software packages designed specifically to allow you to do a “podcast” by recording both sides in real time.
If he likes to record internet audio, podcasts, or other on-line works, no doubt he has Stereo-Mix running as a sound source and that has been known to allow bi-directional recording — for some really lucky people.
Reel Life Podcast http://reellife.podomatic.com/
Chase is just such a person. We went on and on about how impossible it was and he just plugged it all up, turned it on and stared his podcast with his far-away brother. He thinks we’re crazy.
If the goal is to just record your voice, you can usually do that by telling Audacity in the Device Toolbar to record from the microphone, not Stereo Mix. Please note when you do that, that you are now arm-wrestling Skype for supremacy over the microphone. May the best algorithm win.
http://manual.audacityteam.org/o/man/device_toolbar.html
You are using the recommended method. Both of you produce a clear, clean local recording and one sends the sound file to the other for mixing in to the show. Do Not use MP3 for this as convenient as it might be. Use WAV until you submit. MP3 creates sound damage and the damage increases as you do production.
Shipping files back and forth is how this was done. It looks like a four-way Skype or Chat, but it was all done in Video Post Production.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PU8hXDim-1s
Koz