George

More than just a voice – David Houston

May 31, 2011 by George Leave a Comment

Months ago when I was involved with the Random Acts of Culture Project, voice artist David Houston was kind enough to post about it. Today, I want to return the favor.

David is based out of Austin, TX, and is more than just a voice guy. He also is a fine musician in his own right, and you should absolutely check out his guitar instrumental “That Which Was Lost.” He talks about it very briefly in his post “New (Old) Music,” and then let’s the music speak for itself:

The talents and skills of the people I know always amaze me. Thanks for sharing this, David! You can follow him on Twitter at @DavidHoustonVO.

Chapter and Voice – Book Marketing via AudioTeaser

May 26, 2011 by George Leave a Comment

Chapter & Voice JoJo Jensen, voice artist, author and entrepreneur tells the tale:

“It would be really cool if you recorded the first chapter of my book,” my friend Tom said in his easy manner.

I looked at him like he had just invented the snickerdoodle. Brilliant!

Chapter & Voice didn’t start out as a business… it began as a favor. I wanted to help Tom spark interest for his military science fiction novel. It was (and still is) a ripping good yarn, but he was stuck in marketing and submission hell and didn’t know what else to do.

As an author myself, I knew how hard it was (and still is) to market and sell manuscripts. But… I also knew that as a professional voice talent, I could record and produce an audio sample that would give Tom the attention-grabbing marketing tool he needed to sell his kick-butt, action packed novel.

The recording for his book totally rocked. When I mentioned my little endeavor to other writers, they flipped out. They wanted me to record samples of their books too! So- I did. And, here we are.

Here’s what I know now. Audio, in all its forms, is gaining in popularity and Chapter & Voice is here to help writers use this medium to get published, get known and sell books.

And with that, Chapter & Voice was born. It was a great pleasure and privilege to be a part of kicking off this project, along with Heather Henderson, Stephen Bowlby, and Jamie Muffett.

To be clear, this is not full audiobook production. We will record about 1,250 words from whatever section of the book the author would like, and send back a clean, polished “AudioTeaser,” which can then be used to promote the book to buyers and publishers. I know from talking with JoJo a number of times about this that she is very excited for Chapter and Voice to see the light of day. She definitely has a vision for this, and really wants to open up this new path for marketing books in an exciting and effective new way.

So go check out Chapter and Voice on the site, find us on Facebook, and of course follow the Twitter account @chapterandvoice. It’s definitely fun to be on the leading edge of something like this!

The Image Issue – Do You Look Like You Sound?

May 24, 2011 by George 19 Comments

A look in the mirror photo © 2008 Andrey Maximov | more info (via: Wylio)I don’t remember who recommended it to me, but last year I started running a Google Search on my name that lets me know when I show up on the web. It’s a good thing to know when people are talking about you, and more importantly, what are they saying. If nothing else, it can be gratifying to see the hits, informative to know where backlinks to your website are showing up, and entertaining when it is seemingly untethered from reality.

Once I started voicing for ROOT Sports Northwest, I saw some posts about the “Root Sports voice over guy” on the SB Nation Seattle Mariners fan site, Lookout Landing. Some of it is pretty funny: I was blamed for the Mariners losing games, called drunk, and the very erudite “sounds like a retard given the confidence of a booth and multiple tries.” Ah, my fans.

But there was an interesting thread that came up speculating who the voice was. And since there was a press release out and circulating about my getting the gig, one of the enterprising Mariners fans was able to find the information and my picture. Once it was posted in the thread, there was a comment that I found pretty interesting (especially after being accused of being drunk):

“He looks exactly how he sounds like he should look.”

This got me to thinking. I know that I am doing something many voice artists don’t do; that is, letting people know what I look like. The standard argument against letting your face come into play is that it can get you stereotyped into or out of specific kinds of jobs. I remember specifically speaking to a female participant at Faffcon 2 about this problem. She believes because she is blonde, a picture would lead people to assume that she has a higher voice, where her actual voice is dark and smoky.

Age is also a consideration, particularly for women. Sadly, it has been reported frequently that even if a woman’s voice sounds much younger, she can miss out on a job because she may not look as youthful as she sounds.

And so I am curious: do you use your photo in your promotional material? Is it on your website, and if so, where? Do you think it has been a positive for you, or are you considering another direction? I would love to hear your thoughts.

UPDATE: Thanks to all the Mariners fans at Lookout Landing who stopped by to check out the post. You guys are pretty cool!

An Open Letter to Skype and How it Might Happen

May 11, 2011 by George 3 Comments

Via Scoop.it – voiceover and voice acting

There is a Twitter fellow you should be following: @SomeAudioGuy. He is an audio engineer that works heavily in the voiceover field, and his daily observations about what actually goes on in some pretty high profile sessions are invaluable to the beginner in pointing out what kind of preparation you should have going into a session and the etiquette you should follow if you ever want to come back. He also blogs at his site.

Back in March of last year, he wrote “An Open Letter to Skype on Behalf of Audio Engineers,” in which he asks Skype to do something that doesn’t seem that far fetched anymore:

“See, if you’re capable of linking our computers to engage in real time 720p video calling at 30 frames per second, SURELY you’d be capable of granting us a 256kbps or higher audio only connection.”

He proposes this as a way to get past the cost and technical difficulties of ISDN, and even as a competitor to the growing Source:Connect platform. I have used Skype in place of a phone patch in the past, and will likely do so again. but if Skype were to offer such a thing, this would be revolutionary.

Enter Microsoft.

On Monday, the Redmond software giant entered into an agreement to purchase Skype for over $8 billion dollars. Considering the company was valued at $2.7 billion during the worst of times at the end of it’s ill fated time as part of eBay, this is a huge jump.

Skype as a company has bounced around over the last few yearrs. They started as an independent company, were inexplicably purchased by eBay in 2005, spun off again in 2010, and now this. Over this time, they have introduced and discontinued many features, but the core functionality has remained and been improved. Now Microsoft steps in with its $55 billion dollar warchest and takes on a company currently provides about 13% of the international call market share.

Microsoft has the money and incentive to make Skype a viable rival to any number of telephony solutions. Skype on its own probably did not have the funding to go this route. This opens the door for Skype to provide exactly the level of quality that SomeAudioGuy asked for back in March of 2010. He said:

“You would become the hero of studios nation and world wide. You could single-handedly lift the entire recording industry out of the data dark ages. And We would gladly pay for a stable service.”

I think more than just the audio engineers would rejoice. Love them or hate them, Microsoft has this power. I say keep your fingers crossed for developments in this area to end the “tyranny” of ISDN.

An Open Letter to Skype and How it Might Happen

May 11, 2011 by George

There is a Twttier fellow you should be following: @SomeAudioGuy. He is an audio engineer that works heavily in the voiceover field, and his daily observations about what actually goes on in some pretty high profile sessions are invaluable to the beginner in pointing out what kind of preparation you should have going into a session and the etiquette you should follow if you ever want to come back. He also blogs at his site, http://someaudioguy.blogspot.com/.

Back in March of last year, he wrote “An Open Letter to Skype on Behalf of Audio Engineers,” in which he asks Skype to do something that doesn’t seem that far fetched anymore:

“See, if you’re capable of linking our computers to engage in real time 720p video calling at 30 frames per second, SURELY you’d be capable of granting us a 256kbps or higher audio only connection.”

Enter Microsoft.

“You would become the hero of studios nation and world wide. You could single-handedly lift the entire recording industry out of the data dark ages. And We would gladly pay for a stable service.”

See it on Scoop.it, via voiceover and voice acting

Interview with Dr. Ann Utterback – Part 2

May 6, 2011 by George 4 Comments

Part two of my interview with voice specialist and author Dr. Ann Utterback. Ann has a PhD in speech and specializes in voice and diction. She has written dozens of articles and 8 books on the voice, including the Broadcast Voice Handbook. Her most recent article on tension and the voice can be found on Voice Over Xtra.

Part one of this interview is here.

Is there a consistent problem you run into with beginners that you would love to eliminate before clients get to you?

I often say that breathing is the energy for speech. It is really helpful when someone comes to me who has already done some work to improve breathing. I’ll give you an example. I used to do an exercise in workshops where I asked participants to exhale an “ah” sound for as long as they comfortably could. Invariably, the person who went the longest had some experience playing a wind instrument. They already knew how to inhale a full breath of air and how to control the exhalation of that air. Now not everyone wants to take up the tuba to improve their voice! But there are other ways to work on breathing. Yoga is great for breathing. Aerobic exercise expands the breathing capacity. Any of these things will help. Breathing is something we can all work on on our own. If a client has done this before they see me, it shortens the amount of time I need to work with them.

Do you find that previous performance training, such as singing or stage work, provide a help or a hindrance for those you work with?

Singing and acting can certainly help your voice. It can, however, really hurt your voice. It all depends on the type of training you receive when you are doing it. I’ve had clients who have permanently damaged their voices singing without good instruction. Not just rockers, either. I had one client who sang in a choir but received bad advice about projecting her voice. Stage acting can also promote misuse of the voice. That was more true back in the days before microphones were used so extensively on stage, but it can happen even today.

Can you walk me through what a telephone evaluation with you would be like?

This is a good place for me to state very clearly that I am not a voiceover instructor. There are plenty of people out there doing that who know lots more about voiceovers and how to develop character voices, etc., than I do. I am a voice specialist who works with issues like breathing, articulation, sounding conversational, having good vocal energy, and keeping your voice healthy. A typical session begins with the client sending me their work. I review this extensively before our session. In the session, I begin by doing a vocal health assessment. I ask the client lots of questions about the history of any voice problems, how they care for their voice, if they have symptoms of stress, and other questions along those lines. I also ask about diet, smoking, water consumption, and exercise. Once the history has been covered, I begin discussing the areas where I believe the client needs improvement based on my review of their work. I explain the concepts and give exercises from my book, BROADCAST VOICE HANDBOOK, that the client can begin doing to make the improvement needed. Some clients do only one telephone consultation with me, and use the tools I give them to work toward improvement on their own. Others may schedule more sessions so I can walk them through the exercises and keep them on track. I’ve always told clients that I can give them in one hour the tools they need to improve. I don’t want anyone to think that they will have to pay for numerous sessions. That’s a choice, but not a requirement.

Is there a success story you can share that makes you proud of the work you do?

I worked with one young women, let’s call her Mary, whose voice was so young-sounding that she couldn’t get a job at the smallest television station in the country. What is needed for a childlike voice is work with resonance. Mary took this work so seriously that she did the exercises I gave her everyday for probably an hour. I was amazed by her commitment. But, it paid off. In a couple of years she had not only gotten an on-air job in television, she was working in New York city, which is the number one television market in the country! I used to play a recording of her “before” and “after” voice in workshops, and no one could believe it was even the same person. She is living proof that you can make major changes in your voice if you really work at it.

I want to thank Ann for taking the time to answer these questions, and I truly appreciate what she is adding to the voiceover community. Take a few minutes to check out Online Voice Coaching and see what she has to offer. You can follow her on Twitter at @AnnUtterback.

George

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