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The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Hello, everybody, and welcome to episode 13 of the VO Meter podcast.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
I am Sean Daeley with my host, Paul Stefano.
Hi, everybody.
Hi, everybody. It’s like the clerks on The Simpsons, oh, my pimples.
A mix of that and maybe President Clinton.
Oh, gotcha there. Well, that’s a lot of fun to do. So we have a wonderful guest on today, voice actor and coach Terry Daniel.
You might know him from his very open Facebook presence in the voiceover camp and the voiceover pros groups. But other than that, since we have a coach and demo producer on the show today, the topic of the day is demos and demo production. Some exciting stuff.
So, before we talk about that specific topic of the day, let’s quickly do some current events. What has happened in your VO world in the last couple of weeks, Sean?
Well, just kind of recovering from the summer. I just got back from vacation, as we talked about in our last episode, so just trying to get some projects wrapped up. Every month, I’ve got these very long e-learning projects from my first and most loyal client, and so I have to make sure that those are all polished and done in a few days.
Other than that, I got some new international clients that I’m excited about, and working on an audio textbook for an actual English Language Institute in the Middle East. So some increasingly fun projects. I’ve seen some people complain that July was an incredibly dead month for them, and for me, it’s actually been one of my most successful ones this year.
So, yay! What about you, Paul?
Yeah, I’m actually in the same boat. I wrote, I think, that same post you were reading from Dan Hurst. I wrote that I’ve had my most successful month, I think, too.
I just wrote a blog post about it that John Florian picked up, and it’s going to feature on Voice Over Extra this week, so that’ll be cool. But it comes from a couple of e-learning projects that I did, where I signed up with this big e-learning company about six months ago, and waited patiently till they got me a few jobs, but now they’re starting to come in, and they’re all union scale or close to union scale for explainer work or e-learning. And I’ve done three of them so far.
I have another one that’s coming up this week, and they pay on time, and it’s fantastic.
Wonderful, wonderful.
I also am in the middle of four audiobooks that are in various stages of completion. One’s almost done, one’s in editor’s hands, and two more have to start. And then, finally, I have done some work for that giant 10,000, or was it 60,000-word e-learning project I mentioned in episode 10.
I’ve done the first couple jobs for them. They’re coming in very slowly, a few sentences at a time. So whenever they come in, I just knock those out, send them off.
They pay me the per-minute rate, and it’s worked out well so far. Hopefully, those will keep coming.
Very cool. I actually, unfortunately, I did lose a recent e-learning client. It was like an 18,000 word project.
So they auditioned My Voice. It was actually a referral from our friend, Mike Norgard. And it was a project that the time-to-rate ratio was no longer working out for him.
So he recommended me. And unfortunately, they’re just like, we can’t quite get the sound from you we want. But they’re very cordial.
And I felt like it was a bad fit too. So I’m not too disappointed. But yeah, something that I wanted to bring up is because, as you noticed, Paul and I, we do a lot of either audiobook work or e-learning or corporate training stuff.
And that kind of work doesn’t really have dead periods throughout the year, unlike say commercial or some of the broadcast television work that you can be doing, which tends to kind of peter out during the winter and summer holidays because everyone’s on vacation. So…
Especially if you’re working with other countries.
Yeah, exactly.
Because maybe vacation here in the US., but I’m working with a company in Australia, where it’s winter.
Exactly, exactly. So, I mean, these are all things that you should consider. I mean, if you get to a point where you’re doing multiple genres of work, you could basically be working through the entire year because you’re like, oh, like during the bulk months, you got your commercial and promo work.
And then during the quieter ones, you can work on your longer e-learning or audio book stuff.
So that brings us to our topic of the day for discussion. And we’re going to talk about demos and some faux pas that some people might make when they’re starting out. And we’ll talk about our experiences with our demo production.
So I’ll start off with the biggest faux pas that everyone tells you not to do. And I think we talked about this in episode one as just the biggest overall newbie mistake, but producing your own demos. And I was totally guilty of this.
I created some that I thought sounded good. I used a friend’s music catalog because he was offering it to me for free. And great tunes, but that wasn’t necessarily the best fit for the copy I was writing.
I wrote my own copy with zero experience other than my bachelors in journalism. And they were terrible. But I put them out of my website and we’re actually going to play one right here so you can hear just how terrible it is.
But it suffices to say, it didn’t get me any work. And all it did was get me criticism from, and rightfully so, from all the VO pros that are out there. When you have a job to do, the last thing you need to think about is where to lay your head.
You want to know when the day is done, you can relax, recharge, and get ready to do it all again tomorrow. You have a dream, but you’ve put it on hold. Maybe it’s about the kids.
Maybe it’s about the house. Maybe it’s about the time. Well, the one thing it doesn’t have to be about is the money.
With the Next Day Small Business Loan from Mayfield Community Bank, you can make that dream a reality. Open your eyes. Stretch your arms.
Do you hear that? No? Nothing?
Exactly. When you go camping, all the hustle and bustle of your normal world just melts away along with your cares. Go.
Oh, Paul, Paul, Paul. How far you’ve come.
Or a little bit, at least.
Well, to your credit, it can be a great learning experience to try and produce your own demo. It’s like writing those letters that you don’t end up actually sending because it could get you in trouble. Yeah, that’s a fair point.
But it’s important. I’m working on some new demos with the Global Voice Acting Academy, and they really want me to be as involved as possible. They want me to do my own research, figure out where my voice fits in with what products, try and find my own scripts, maybe write my own scripts.
And they do want a much higher level of involvement. But whether or not you want to do that for your first demo is debatable. And as Paul said, you should definitely get some feedback from trusted sources before you go off submitting it to agencies and stuff like that.
Yeah, that was the key. Once I heard from the pros out there, mostly on the VOBB, that was a terrible idea. I did immediately take them down, and it was a good choice.
But it’s interesting that you brought that up, though, Paul, because recently in our sort of VO support group, we’ve been talking about genres where making your own demo might actually be a good idea.
Yeah, that can’t be the case. Audiobooks specifically, the coach that we work with, Sean Pratt, has suggested that you create your own samples for your audiobook work, and that was echoed at VO Atlanta when I was listening to Amy Rubenet talk, where she said the same thing, that your audiobook samples really only need to be you reading an audiobook or the text of a book. And there are some criteria that Sean recommends.
It’s that it’s about a five-minute length and that it’s one genre, one piece, so it could be young adult, drama, it could be historical or non-fiction, but it should be one genre that showcases your talent in that specific type of work.
And another thing is that since a lot of people are self-producing for say ACX or just have a home studio, your demo is selling your studio as well. So like with commercial and narration, you might be going into an external studio still when you’re working with an agency. But for things like e-learning or audio books, you really want to showcase your studio sound too.
Yeah, exactly. So let’s shift gears and talk about professionally produced demos. I know you had one done early on I believe with our guest today.
Let’s talk about those experiences.
Yes, I actually had several demos done with Terry, because I wanted to do all of the voice over.
I will do all the voice over.
I will do all the voices. All of them. Oh God, don’t get me started.
My girlfriend and I just slip into German all the time. There was one time we went on a nature hike, and we were just talking like this for the whole time. And then when we got to the top of this beautiful, it’s called Moana Falls, we heard some…
We were eavesdropping on some people talking behind us, a couple of tourists, and it was like, so where are y’all from? Oh, via from Germany. I hope they didn’t hear us on the way up.
But anyway, so I wanted to do Oz devices, and I talked with Terry, and I was like, I want a commercial demo, I want a narration demo, I want an audiobook, and I want a telephony or IVR. And he hooked me up with all of them. And that was about, four years ago.
We worked together for about six months, and then I actually told him, you know what, I think I’m ready for a demo. And he’s like, you know what, I think you are. As I mentioned later in the interview, I actually traveled home to the States to visit my family.
I was still in Japan at the time, and then had booked a local studio from there. That way it was a lot easier to coordinate schedules, and I could communicate better with the engineer, and didn’t have to use broken Japanese. And Terry didn’t have to try and navigate the Japanese at all, which I’m sure he appreciated.
How did that work out for you?
Really, really well. Like I said, this was almost four years ago, and depending on what circles you inhabit in the voiceover realm, people will recommend different amounts of time before you should update your demos. Some people say once every three years, some every two, every year.
I’ve heard as often as every six months.
Wow.
Yeah, I mean, if you can afford it, you want the most current content you can get that really showcases your ability. But honestly, I’m still booking work off of my demos from four years ago. As long as it showcases your abilities and it sounds like you, why change it?
Awesome. My first professionally produced demo was done with Edge Studio, and that was as part of their training program where there was a package deal, and there was a set amount of weeks where you were doing classes and then individual coaching with some of their coaches privately, and that was to be determined how many sessions you had until they thought you were demo ready. So once that was done, we did the demo.
I went to a professional studio in Washington, DC., and they recorded it for me there with a phone patch into Rachel Butera, my coach at Edge, and mine came out great. It signed me to my first five agencies.
Wow.
They seemed to love it, and I had a really great experience there. Now, the one thing I want to caution against is that in that sort of environment where you have group classes and a pre-determined time where you’re going to produce your demo, you want to be careful that you’re ready, because I have heard people have bad experiences with that type of environment. Where they felt like they were pushed out the door because they weren’t ready.
Now, in my case, similar to what I did with Terry, which we’ll talk about in a second, I was champing at the bit. I was ready to go. I was studying all the time, practicing as much as I could, and I thought I was ready.
And I pushed that process along. And I also made sure that I was heavily involved in the process. I think that’s another problem that sometimes people have.
Especially if they’re brand new, they feel like they shouldn’t put in any input because what could they possibly provide to these professionals up on high that must know better? And I would caution you to know thine self, as Shakespeare said, and know what you want to get accomplished with your demo. I definitely had that mindset where I had a certain sound I wanted to get across, and I was not going to let them tell me any different.
And I think it bared… The results speak for themselves, where I was immediately signed to some agency, so it must have gone pretty well.
Well, it’s an important skill set to start building as early as possible, because one thing that we don’t consider is that we’re creative collaborators. We work with a whole other team. Even though we record on our own, we’re still kind of collaborating with the producer or with the agency, trying to get a specific sound out of whatever we’re recording.
So it’s really good to kind of build that collaboration from the beginning and being able to communicate as part of a creative team.
Yeah, because those skills will serve you well later. When you’re in a session, especially if it’s in your own studio, the director on the other side of his remote session may not hear you walk into the wall or drop that glass of water. And you would want to say, oh, you know what, we need to redo that because I tripped or I just heard my dog bark in the background.
Now, you don’t want to have that happen all the time because then you’re not professional, but you want to make sure that you’re aware and being professional on your end so the professionals on the other end can do their job. So not long after my Edge demo, because as we’ve talked about, I’ve only really been doing this about three years, I looked into getting another demo done because my demo with Edge was only a commercial demo. And I wanted to get a narration demo done, so I started doing some research and asked some of my peers, which I highly recommend doing, ask your peers who they worked with, who they like, and get some advice on who does a good job out there and also might fit into your budget.
And Sean, you said that your demo was done with Terry, and I was a big fan of that, so I contacted him and started working with Terry as well. And I didn’t do any specific coaching, it was just the coaching and preparation for the demo production, so my process was much shorter, probably only about six weeks. But we wrote some copy together and recorded it in my studio, which didn’t have to happen, but I was pretty confident in the way my studio sounded.
It was Volvo Studio approved, yeah, Volvo Studio certified by the tech committee there. And I was confident in the way it sounded, and when I sent a clip to Terry, he thought so too. So we did it in my studio with him passion, via plain old Skype, and it worked out great.
Now, I want to say again, Terry, as you’ll hear in the interview, has a very strong personality, if you don’t already know him. And that could have a detrimental effect on the result, if you’re not strong-willed, like I was saying before. So even with somebody who has a strong personality, you want to make sure that you can work with them, and they’re going to listen to your feedback.
Now, it turns out, Terry is really receptive to feedback. So I had a script that I wrote myself. So there was, I think, four clips he wrote, or five clips, he wrote four of them, and I wrote the last one.
And it was because it was an Edgar Allan Poe piece. And a lot of my work is based on sort of a low, dark, creepy voice. I’ve done a lot of horror audiobooks.
I’ve done some character work where it’s a creepy serial killer. And that’s a voice that suits me well. So I made sure I got that in there.
And the other reason is because living in Baltimore, I wanted to have something that represented my local flavor. And everybody here loves Edgar Allan Poe because of him spending some time here and ultimately passing here. And his grave is a local landmark.
So I put that in. At first, Terry was like, I don’t know about that. And I said, no, we’re doing it.
And we did it.
I thought it was one of your strongest spots.
Yeah, I think so, too. That’s what most people say. So again, the point is, know yourself and make sure you get your own flavor into your demo, even if someone else is producing it.
Very cool. And so kind of going off of that, like really having your own input. Like I was saying, I’m working on two new demos with the Global Voice Acting Academy right now, a new commercial and new narration one.
Because like we were saying, every now and then it can be important to try and reevaluate, see if your demo is still the best representation of your current skill set and talent. And my friends and coaches over there, Christina Melizia and David Rosenthal, were like, yeah, this is good, but it doesn’t showcase your whole, like enough variety and it doesn’t showcase your full abilities. So that was the main reason why they would encourage me to make another one.
Right now, like I said, like I had a lot of help from Terry for my previous ones, but this one, it’s just like, you really get what you put in because it’s like, they really want me to have a much higher ownership of these demos. So Christina was very helpful. She sent me a couple of talent who she thought had a similar kind of voice and style to me.
She’s like, study all of their work, listen to their demos, figure out what kind of products they’re marketing for, figure out what kind of products you want to do. And then, like nowadays with the internet, it’s so easy to just research commercials. I mean, we have YouTube.
You can literally just do like BMW commercial, like 2017 commercial and see what they’re doing right now. Or another popular one is ispot.tv, which is where it’s pretty much just like all commercials all the time. And you could even like learn about who voiced a spot or who produced a spot.
And just learn about, like you can learn so much more and be so much more involved in the process. It’s kind of, it’s a little intimidating, not gonna lie, but it’s also very empowering too. And I know that when we are, that we’re done working on these, they’re just gonna be amazing.
So before we get started with Mr. Terry Daniel, we will actually have a VO Meter stick from a mutual acquaintance, Mr. Rob Marley. No, not the reggae musician. This is voice talent and blogger Rob Marley.
He’s got an incredible blog and a wonderful free ebook that you should definitely check out. But before you do that, why don’t you listen to this episode’s VO Meter stick?
Hey, everybody, it’s time for the VO Meter shtick.
What did he say?
It’s time for the VO… Oh, nevermind. The VO Meter shtick?
Oh, got it.
Hi, Sean and Paul. Thanks for allowing me to share my shtick with you. Wow, that sounded bad.
Anyway, I was listening to your last podcast, and Paul had mentioned that he had his first live directed session with a client, and I thought I’d share my first experience. Now, I thought I’d planned out everything perfectly. I’d worked with hundreds of clients so far in my voiceover career, but this was my first experience with the client.
In this case, the producer and engineer of the spot listening in while I did the recording. It’s one thing to be able to flub a line and redo a take while you’re by yourself in your little studio, but man, it’s a whole different ball game when there’s someone watching or listening closely to your performance live. I didn’t know if the client was gonna use video with Skype, so I made sure my background looked professional.
I mean, come on, I work out of a closet. Now, I’ve studied acoustics for several years, and I understand the finer points of wave propagation and acoustic absorption. I’ve done the work, treated the walls, carefully isolated all interior noise, and my room boasts a very respectable negative 73 dB noise floor.
In other words, it’s pretty good. I work really hard to be as professional as possible, but the trust that a client has in me might be completely nuked if they catch a glimpse of a T-shirt hanging in the corner of the shot that says, damn right, I’ve been naughty, now spank my evil butt. As it was, the client connected via the audio-only mode of Skype, so it wasn’t really a problem.
The first take went well enough. I thought I hit all the key points and the client seemed okay with this take. They asked for a second take, and while I was setting up for that, I discovered that the first take didn’t record.
I don’t know what happened. I apparently never started the record or thought I did. I hit the shortcut keys I use for my software and thought things were recording, but they weren’t.
So it was at this point that I have to then tell the client that there was a problem with the first take and that we would need to do it again. They understood and I quickly delivered a respectable second, third and fourth takes. The client seemed happy and the audio sounded good, but I never heard from this particular producer again.
The moral of the story is try to be prepared for anything, but know that it’s gonna be the thing you can’t imagine that will probably be the thing that trips you up. Knowing how to fix the problem and how to handle yourself while you do it is what separates the amateur from the pro. And it’s something we all need to be reminded of from time to time.
Anyway, thanks for letting me ramble at you. Love the podcast, keep up the great work.
Okay, so now we are pleased to welcome our guests for this episode. We are so excited to have coach, voice over talent, marketing extraordinaire and dare I say, ambassador to the voice over community, Terry Daniel. Welcome, Terry.
You know, I like to be preferred to as the pharaoh of voice overs.
Very nice.
Yeah, so please address me as that from moving forward, or I’m going to hang up on you bastards. Just kidding. I mean, honestly, I’m very, very happy to be here.
Fantastic.
Yeah, we’re very excited to have you. So Terry, let’s jump right into it. I’m sure people are wondering who aren’t familiar with you.
How exactly did you get started with voice over?
This is a true story. My parents, this is going to make me sound like a real dinosaur. My parents bought me a Donnie and Marie microphone when this is the latter part of the 70s.
I’m probably about maybe nine or 10 years old when this is happening. This is like Mr. Microphone. This is where you put the battery in, you turn on the mic, and you find that empty frequency on your FM dial, and then you can kind of sing and talk through.
Go look up Mr. Microphone commercials on YouTube. It’s hilarious. You’ll watch it 10 times in a row because it’s hysterical.
I had one of those actually. I think we’re close to the same age.
I had one as well. I would put on concerts for my parents and it was just brutal. I would try to sing the entire album from Paul McCartney and the Wings.
Nice.
I would sing Terry Jacks, that depressing freaking song, Seasons in the Sun, which I believe was very depressing. And man, I was one screwed up kid. And that’s kind of how I got started because I had a microphone in my hand and I really haven’t put it down since because after that, that’s when I kind of got into radio.
And I started just a quick funny story with you guys. In the, you know, about 18, 19 years old, you know, we all had like those silver Panasonic boom boxes. I would record commercials off, you know, various shows.
And then I would practice along with the commercials. And on television, I would record the TV spots, you know, in between The Love Boat and The Dukes of Hazzard, you know, with my Montgomery Ward’s video cassette recorder. And I would practice along with those commercials.
But then I would do like fake radio shows. I would record them onto a cassette with my Sears Home Stereo. I would plug a little Radio Shack microphone into the input and, you know, play songs and write and perform fake commercials.
And I would even record phony prank phone calls. I would stick the microphone to the ear part of the landline phone. And I would call up businesses like McDonald’s in the area and bullshit them and tell them…
You know, I told one manager of McDonald’s, and I’m recording this, by the way, I said if he could get everybody in the entire restaurant to stop eating their breakfast and stand up and sing Here Comes Peter Cottontail, that I would send the restaurant $50,000. And, you know, I’m pretending like I’m this hot DJ in LA. You know, hey man, this is Chuck McCann from K-Rock LA.
And then I would have him go do something really stupid. And this guy did. You could actually hear him slam the phone down.
And you could hear him in the restaurant area coaching people to stand up. And you could literally hear about 30 people sing, Here Comes Peter Cottontail. So then he comes back to the phone all excited that I’m going to send him a check.
And then there’s this kind of subtle, dramatic pause. And I said, well, Bill, I think Bill was his name. I said, Bill, you’ve just been the victim of a prank.
Sounds very Howard Sternish. He tells a similar story about starting that way.
19 years old, kind of a jackass, 19 years old. I would never encourage people to do that. I mean, you could get away with so many weird things back then.
Do you guys remember when…
Lose no caller ID.
You could call somebody, and then you could click the receiver, and then get the other line, and then call somebody else, and then you click your receiver again, and then you connect those two people, and then you can just sit there and see what happens.
Yeah, I think I technically still have that service on my phone, but I haven’t used it in 20 years.
So these people think, you know, I didn’t call you, you called me. No, you called me, I didn’t call you. You know, you just sit there, and they just bitch back and forth.
This is pre-internet, so life was pretty entertaining back then. But long-winded story short, that’s what really got me excited about doing voice overs and just being able to do this for a living has been a lot of fun and really such a joy, gentlemen, such a joy.
Well, you’ve obviously grown up quite a bit. But what is the focus of your voice over business from a talent standpoint now?
Well, it’s interesting because we all fall into that specialty. We all fall into that niche. And many, many years ago, I was more of a commercial e-learning type dude.
That’s pretty much all I would do. The occasional IVR gig, I guess, would come across my desk. But really within the last few years, I’ve gotten more into theme park announcements.
For example, if you’re on a roller coaster ride at Six Flags, you guys have heard that voice.
Mind the Gap.
Please keep your hands and feet inside the car until the car comes to a complete stop.
It’s so assuring and authoritative.
Yes. And what’s nice is it’s a beautiful fit for my attention span, which is very limited at the ripe old age of 49. I’ve tried to do a few audiobooks.
I couldn’t stand it. I would entertain the idea of maybe doing another one if I were to play a character in the audiobook, but some of these long 300-page audiobooks on search engine optimization and various car parts, I would prefer to send those gigs to you guys.
Yeah, it takes a special breed. I’ve done a nine-hour book on… I’ve done a nine-hour book on Radhaswami, the Middle Eastern religion.
Try that.
Well, you know, and you hear from people all the time, you know, that have these ACX accounts, and they’re doing it just to get experience. And I think that’s great. You know, it’s a good service for that.
But I just, you know, as the years kind of went on, I got a little spoiled with these promo announcements that I’m doing at theme parks and baseball games and state parks and all that. You know, they just send me three sheets of announcements at pretty much the same rate as some of these audio books would pay. So I got pretty used to that, and I’m pretty happy with it.
Very cool. And so about how long into your career did you start transitioning into voiceover coaching, Terry?
The coaching part of it was, you know, I did a lot of theater back then. You’re going to hear a few bumps. My crazy yellow lab is right above the studio, so she might get a lot of hand here.
But I got into the coaching aspect because, you know, I directed some plays back in the 90s. You know, I used to be a drama coach and ran an improv group. I’ve always enjoyed the mentoring and the teaching part of it.
But what really got me motivated to do it was, you know, I would get calls from people who, you know, dropped about six or seven grand on what we call demo mills in the industry. And I’m not here to bash my competition or, you know, hang anybody out to dry, but there’s plenty of them out there now that charge way too much money for too little. Everybody’s reading from the same scripts, everybody’s demo sounds the same, and you’re really more of a number than a person.
It really broke me when somebody called me, and literally, this is not a joke, they started weeping because they had paid like five or six grand. And, you know, this coach or program, they promised her stardom, and they filled her head with all these empty promises. And I just got kind of tired of it.
I’m like, you know what? I’ll start taking a few students here and there and just kind of showing them what worked for me when I launched into this full time many moons ago. And it’s just a straight up mentorship program.
I’ve tweaked it, obviously, a few times since. But that was really the birth of Terry Daniel, The Voice Over Coach.
Very cool. And so what do you feel separates you from, as a coach, from either these demo mills or even some other coaches out there today?
Well, I’m not much of a smoke blower. I’m a pretty candid person. You guys have known me for a long time now.
And I don’t really mince words in Facebook groups or anything. And honestly, I’ve put my foot in my mouth a few times because of it. But you heard my story when I was young and doing the prank phone calls and just being kind of a class clown.
I mean, that certainly hasn’t changed. But the only part of the reason… What was the question again?
See, I told you, ADD voice talent. I warned you guys.
He’s got his prescription right there, folks. It’s real.
All right.
It’s been confirmed.
The separation thing. I think it’s because I’m real. I don’t try to…
I love the teaching end of it, but I’m not teaching science. I’m not one of those big grouchy history teachers that you had in high school. I take it seriously to a point, but we have a lot of fun with it.
It’s very candid training. I think people have gotten a lot out of it. At least that’s what they tell me.
And I think that’s just the separation, is because I treat people as an individual, and I try to find a niche for each person, as opposed to inviting 500 people into a weekend seminar and then forcing them into a studio that Monday morning to do a demo. My God, I think even some of the top tier talents in the country aren’t going to be ready for a demo that quickly. So mine’s a little more of a drawn out mentorship where we just kind of keep working until I feel that they’re ready, until the talent feels that they’re ready.
There’s a mutual understanding that, all right, you know what? We’ve been working together for 35 years. Okay, well, maybe not quite that many.
Let’s take the next step.
But I never like to pressure anybody. I’m like, okay, we got to get this done by then, and this done by then, because we got to get you into the demo session by Thursday, July, such and such. And all that does is create anxiety and tension, and people are a little more too keyed in on their calendar than just learning the craft and practicing.
So I kind of take that off the table.
That’s what I was going to say. I mean, you’re so just genuine when you work with people. Like, you don’t put on any kind of teaching persona.
And like, you’re just incredibly flexible and relaxed and fun to work with. So I miss our old coaching sessions, Terry. You never call it anymore.
Speaking of which, I think Sean and I worked together back when I still did have the Donnie and Marie microphone. So I think, you know, I don’t even remember. I think Sean, you and I, that must have been…
That was about four years ago, I think.
Oh, was that only four? It felt like 14. Well, you were such a jerk to work with.
I would have been 14, 14 years ago.
Oh, don’t rub it in.
You were so high maintenance and you were such a diva. No, I’m kidding.
Well, Terry, talking about the way people approach the coaching and the demo production, do you feel that it’s better to listen to what the coach or the demo producer says wholeheartedly? Or do you feel that it’s better to come with your own ideas and have sort of a give and take? Because I know when we did our demo, and it’s been very successful, thank you very much.
I appreciate all the help.
I’m very happy about that.
When we were working together, I felt like I was maybe pushing a little too hard, but I definitely had some ideas in my head. I tend to be a little stubborn. Do you find that that’s a better style where the person comes with their own ideas, or do you feel more comfortable when you’re providing the direction almost wholeheartedly?
Somebody like you, Paul, you had some experience, obviously, so you weren’t super green. So I welcome ideas, and when I work with people for the first time who have zero experience, sometimes they’ll bring ideas, and it doesn’t always work very well. As long as I can have some veto power, I definitely want it to be an established, good working relationship.
And it’s never my way or the highway. Somebody, a student might actually write his own, her own scripts. Now I have somebody to write the scripts because my programs have received a complete makeover.
I’ve got a website designer. I’ve got a marketing person, and it’s a little more than just Terry Daniel. There’s other players involved as well as we slowly kind of get out this other program.
But I’m always up for ideas. I think that’s part of being a good coach is being open to listening to creativity from the talent. Now, well, I’m the teacher, you’re the student, so what do you know?
It’s not that kind of a relationship, and especially with demos. Those are going to be very important to come up with scripts that not only are a good match for that person’s persona and skill level, but to also come up with content that matches with their personalities and their hobbies and interests, because you have to be engaged in the content that way. And there’s just different methods that we use now.
Back then, when I first started doing the demo thing, I was kind of learning as well, so I would do what a lot of companies did. Oh, let’s just find some scripts online, and we’ll do that for your demo. That’s no longer the case at all.
That was a learning experience, and although there were some good demos that way, I didn’t want to use the same scripts as 15 other companies were using. So now, when I do demos, all of the scripts are 100% originals.
Awesome. Very cool. Do you ever turn people away for either coaching or demo production?
Nope. I’ll just take their money. No, I’m kidding.
I just contradicted everything I just said in the last 20 minutes now with that stupid joke. No, I do turn people away. I don’t exactly put them through a Peter O’Connell entrance exam.
Entrance? You know what? That’s one of those words where it looks easy on paper and I can never say it in conversations.
Entrance. I don’t necessarily put people through an entrance exam, but I do have them read a few scripts, fill out a form, learn a little bit about what they’re able to do technically. You don’t have to be perfectly technically sound to work with yours truly, but you have to have a little bit of skill, let’s be honest.
And I do turn plenty of people away. I do get a lot of emails and phone calls from people all over the country and overseas, and it’s a little bit of a process before we get started for sure.
And then just wrapping up on the demo production, what percentage of people working with you would you say you’re able to record from their personal studio versus making them either come to you if they’re local to Minneapolis or go to a local studio where they are?
That’s a great question. You know, more and more… Paul, you did it from your home setup, and that worked out great.
It’s getting to be more and more… Yeah, I think…
It’s getting more and more likely that they can record from their home setup, but I usually have to send… They’ll send me a couple MP3s, and I’ll kind of dissect the audio a little bit. It’s got to be A1.
I might throw the MP3 over to a Cliff Zellman or a Dan Leonard and go, you know, this sounds great to me, but I’m just wondering if I could get a second opinion, because we’re going to do this person’s demo from their recording studio. And if it’s not the case, you know, I typically book somebody in a studio in their area, and they patch me in. Sean, I think we did your…
Didn’t we do yours in Japan or something like that?
No, I actually timed it. So when I visited my home for Christmas in Washington, I found a local studio over there.
Oh, that’s right. Yep, yep, yep.
So that way you were only like three hours ahead instead of like 18.
Yeah, that was very helpful. So that was a perfect example of just recording in a studio in their area. I do invite people to come and see me.
I mean, they’re always welcome to fly here if they want to do the demo live and have that face-to-face time, but that’s what we do for local talents here in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. But it’s pretty easy now with studios that have Phone Patch, Source Connect, and even Skype.
It’ll work as long as both parties can hear each other. It works really well.
Yeah, it can certainly be tempting to use your own studio because it showcases the quality of audio you can come out with, but in the same vein, it’s still so much to be the engineer and the assistant director and the talent. It’s a lot to worry about for your first demo.
I agree, and that’s the beauty of doing it in a studio. You have the coach, you’ve got the engineer to worry about all the audio, and I love doing it in recording studios for that main reason for sure.
And so one thing I’ve noticed and really like about you, Terry, is that you’ve been pretty much an early adopter of social media as a marketing tool. So could you tell us a little bit about your web presence on the various social medias out there?
Well, I believe social media is a fantastic platform for political piss matches. And I love to just soak it all in and waste at least eight or nine hours of my day pretending like I know every f***ing thing. I’m sorry, is this show rated PG-13?
Because then I think I can get away with that.
We might have to roll back that.
We’ll get your own Terry bleep, it’s fine.
All right, no, serious answer. You know, social media has been responsible for probably about a dozen or more brand new clients every year. You know, some of them stick around to become regular clients.
Some of them don’t, but still, you know, have relationships based on like Twitter, Facebook, and even Instagram. I have not, and this might sound silly, because people always think, oh, well, you got to be a part of LinkedIn. I mean, LinkedIn is a major business, you know, blah, blah, blah.
But I just honestly have never been, I’ve never really liked it that much. I like to stick to just two or three different social media sites. You know, I’m not much of a Snapchat guy.
I know all the kids love that one, but I’ve gotten some pretty good gigs, you know, via relationships that were started via Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Very cool. And like I said before, you’ve really built a Facebook community for voiceover talent, because you’ve sort of started two pages with fellow talent, Dave Courbassier. So why don’t you tell us about those?
Well, there’s two groups, and here’s where it all started, honestly, and a lot of voice actors that are listening to this podcast are going to remember it. It really all started on Voice Over Universe, the website. Many, many years ago, when Facebook was just kind of getting going, there weren’t really all these groups in there.
I mean, you had your profile, and you had probably about 20 or 30 friends, and it was fine, but Voice Over Universe was really the place where we all came to kind of chat with one another. They would schedule events in there. The beauty of going to a voiceover conference, I believe it was Voice 2008, where everybody that met up met on this Voice Over Universe website, and it was terrific.
It was almost like a class reunion or something. Everybody kind of knew each other, and it was a heck of a lot of fun. Of course, back then, there was one voiceover conference.
Now there’s one every day somewhere.
Seems like it, doesn’t it?
Yeah, it’s gotten a little watered down, to be honest with you, but there’s still some good stuff out there. But the Penny Abshire James Alberger event in the early years of 2008, 2009, 2010, they were just lights out fantastic conference. But then Facebook got around, and suddenly these groups popped up out of nowhere, and they started to become popular.
As a matter of fact, it kind of put Voice Over Universe about six feet under once they got popular. But Dave had a group called Voice Over Friends, and I had a group called Voice Over Pros. And the same people were in both groups, and we were both kind of doing the same thing.
I’m like, you know, I called Dave up one day. Why don’t we just combine the two groups? This doesn’t really make a hell of a lot of sense, right?
So he agreed to do it. So we got everybody together, and then just called it Voice Over Pros. So there’s, you know, tons of people in that group, and there’s a lot of good discussions.
You know, occasionally there can be too many chefs in the kitchen, and everybody’s an expert at just about every subject, but that’s, you know, you’re going to get that in just about any forum. I also created Voice Over Camp, which is really created for the new talent. You know, people interested in either getting into voice overs or they’re just getting started, and they don’t want to be overwhelmed by, you know, sag after a voice actor’s and all this stuff that they’re not going to be familiar with for a very long time.
That’s kind of a place for them to go. So it’s VO Pros and VO Camp. I don’t know the exact URLs for those, but if you do a search in the little search box of Facebook, just type in Voice Over Camp and Voice Over Pros, and you can find either of those two groups.
There’s a search box?
I know. Can you believe it? I never know the actual URL for these things, but people obviously find them because we get requests for people to come into those every day.
And it’s really amazing because now I think there’s about 100 voice over groups out there, and that can get very overwhelming. And by the way, it can be quite distracting to your career while you’re sitting in there, about 15 to 20 different voice over groups, soaking up some of the information and asking questions and giving out your expert opinion. Suddenly it’s like 9 o’clock at night, and you haven’t done a damn thing.
Yeah, that certainly has happened to me on occasion.
We’ve all been guilty of it, believe me. But that really has become… I mean, Facebook…
I know there’s groups on LinkedIn that people kind of swarm to once in a while, but really these Facebook groups are really huge now for lots of different industries, not just voice over, but podcasting and photography and theater acting, on-stage acting and improv. It’s become quite the empire.
Well, speaking of podcasts, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention your own podcast, which is where I was really introduced to you first, The Voice Over Cafe. I was an ardent fan listening to every episode. You mentioned Voice 2008.
I remember the interview that you and Trish did from there live, which was just hilarious. Because, frankly, it was just a mess. But it was so much fun.
And Sean and I actually tried to mimic that when we went to the Mid-Atlantic Voice Conference last year. We did it live from there as well, trying to drag on your coattails.
It gets a little noisy, and people are talking over each other. The Voice Over Cafe was actually spawned from an older podcast that Trish and I did called Voice Overs On Demand.
I think technically that’s who you were representing in Voice 2008.
Yes, and you can still find those old episodes on iTunes. And the hilarious part about that podcast is the audio never sounded the same on every episode.
That sounds familiar.
Kind of like ours.
It would be like I’d use a different mic, or it’d be louder, I’d use different… It was just a mess. But yeah, Voice Over Cafe, we record that podcast about once every two years.
Because it’s been so hard to get together. When you’re working with like five or six people, unless you all work together in the same office, it gets to be a little challenging. Oh my God, yeah, so we’ll definitely be back at it.
There’s no question about it. And it’s voiceovercafe.org for that one. But I did create a mini podcast series for the voice talent with ADD, and that would be 95% of all voice talents.
What? What do you say?
You can go to voiceoversermons.com and the beauty of it, yeah, it’s me rambling and ranting about stuff, but there’s good information in there, and I think the longest one ever was like 10 minutes long, so that one does pretty well. It’s just something you can kind of plug in and take a little lesson and just be done with it by the time you get off the toilet.
I love your voiceover sermons because they’re short and sweet, and it either gives you a nice reminder of something that I had been failing to do in my own business or just new ideas. Sometimes it can kind of pick you up and you’re like, oh, I’m not making any progress. Like, shut up and get back to the mic.
And sometimes it can really get me into trouble. I’ll give you a little story here. One time I bashed a talent agency here in town because they didn’t sign me.
The former owner, this is how it got started. The former owner was going to bring me in and add me to the roster, and decided at the last minute that I wasn’t a fit for the agency. And I was kind of young and stupid back then because I let my ego get the best of me, and I started lashing out, and sent them along, drank a bunch one night, and left a big, long, angry voicemail.
You know, this is like quite a few years ago now.
Like almost one?
And then they have new ownership, and then I tried to get back in with the agency, and the funny part is, they like the demos, and it sounded like it was going to happen. So I go in, and the new owner brings this up at the meeting. I’m like, wait a minute, what?
I understand that you did a little podcast episode, and I literally just shit my pants when she said that. Because I was not kind in the episode about that particular agency. I apologized profusely for it, regretted it, deleted that episode.
So I have been known once in a while to put my foot in my mouth. But it had a happy ending because they’re a terrific agency. I get a few gigs every month from them.
They’ve been very good to me. We had to start from scratch, and I had to kind of earn their trust, which was justified, really, after my horrible mistake of just teeing off without really thinking about it. And then it’s really become quite a very, very positive relationship.
Awesome. Well, Terry, as you may know, our podcast focuses mostly on the newer talent who are just starting out, and our focus is really to try to educate them on the stupid things we’ve done, and maybe you’ve done as well, to maybe sandbag their career and try to avoid those things before they get into trouble. What’s some advice you can give to talent that are just starting out, either equipment or where they should go for coaching?
What’s the right path to start down so they eventually have a fruitful career?
Well, you mentioned, I mean, I’ll start with… Let’s start with the equipment, because if you’re gonna spend $200 on a USB mic, you might as well spend $400 on a really good mic. If you’re really serious and passionate about it, spend the extra money.
It will go a long way. USB mics are good for on-hold messages and maybe a podcast or maybe an explainer video, but if you really want to get into more of the commercial broadcast work, it’s gonna benefit you to buy that better mic. And I know that even I used to say, I’ll just get a USB mic for a couple of years until you build up your clientele.
I used to say that many, many years ago and I’m like, you know what? You could get a Rode NT1A for like $200 more. It sounds incredibly better than like an AT2020 or a Samsung or an MXL or one of those mics.
So not to really put the cart before the horse, but you should definitely learn how to read a script before you start buying equipment. But if you’re gonna buy a microphone, what’s an extra $200 if you’re truly passionate about doing this?
So speaking of, what are some other kind of shortcuts that you see newer talent trying to take that really just like, oh, why won’t they listen?
Well, for whatever reason, if you really look at any kind of industry, universities, schools, training programs, they all cost money. And sometimes newer talents will read blogs or read things online where they’re almost floored when you tell them that it’s going to take a little bit of an investment to get into this. You know, coaching, equipment, demos.
Time.
Websites, time, exactly. And for whatever reason, there’s books out there that can be very mythical about this, and they think they can just take a free ride and jump over the rainbow to the pot of gold without putting any effort into it mentally or financially. And I think that’s where people really get snake-bitten because they realize, oh, man, I did everything the wrong way.
I’m not getting anywhere. You know, maybe they got a couple of Fiverr gigs, you know, or something like that. I know, that’s kind of a…
That’s definitely… The cheap shot. Yeah, that’s profanity in the voice over pro world, but…
And they just kind of stumble, and they’re never going to get picked up by any talent agencies with that type of mentality. And honestly, that’s where people really make the mistake. They assume that they can…
This isn’t something that you can do. Oh, I’m unemployed. I’ll just get into voice overs, and that’ll take care of everything.
Make a quick buck.
Yeah, it’s just… It’s not that. And for some reason, voice overs once in a while have…
You know, the industry… It’s not like it has the reputation of that, but at least one out of every five inquiries that I get from somebody who wants to get into voice overs, somebody is absolutely astounded when you tell them the pricing for either coaching or a demo or just building up the business, period.
Indeed.
And one thing that… I mean, it’s funny that they do that to you, because frankly… And I’ve done this a lot on the voiceover camp.
Terry has some of the most reasonable coaching and demo production rates out there. Shh!
Don’t say that.
And still do, by the way. And still do, I’m still way under what any of my competitors are charging. Thank you very much.
Well, we’re not tossing out numbers here, but you get a lot of bang for your buck. Like, for example, Paul and I were both previous students of Terry’s, so we actually still have access to an entire archive of all of his webinars, and we’re welcome to join his bi-monthly online classes and just practice scripts or learn more about marketing. And of course, you’ve got all of your free content through your blog and your voiceover sermons.
You really are pretty generous with all the content you offer to students and non-students alike.
And dare I say, it’s actually quality. The demos you produced for Sean and I have signed both of us to agencies.
Across the world.
That’s really good to hear. And I started to kind of branch out a little bit on the programs. I’ve got an excellent copywriter.
I’ve got a couple of other coaches that I’m kind of honing in to my big program that I’ve just recently… Well, it’s kind of a soft launch. And even a website designer.
Because if you really think about it, people tell me that they like my programs. They’ve gone through the coaching, they’ve got a great demo. It’s like, oh man, now I need a website.
And I never really had that as part of the program before. But now I have a website designer on my staff. I really wanted to create a program that was really the full toolbox.
The full plate of meat and potatoes, so to speak. Where it’s like, alright, so coaching, some group classes, some demos, some after demo mentoring, and website. It felt like I needed to kind of add to the toolbox just a little bit.
Why don’t you tell us about your new staff?
Oh, absolutely. I’m using a terrific talent named Tawny Plattis. She’s the one who writes the scripts for the demos, and she’s very, very good.
She also used to own a retail store and has got a ton of marketing experience. She’s done very well in voice acting as well. And Rob Marley, who’s a great blog writer and does a lot of narration work, really.
Not like a big commercial broadcast guy, but just a ton of big kind of independent contractor like Voice Talent, but a very, very good coach. And then Josh Risser, who’s a very talented young man. Designing websites is what he does for a living pretty much, and I added him to the staff as well to help design and develop Voice Over websites for students.
So it really has become quite the full menu, so to speak. Not necessarily menu. My brain is shutting down.
I’m not using the right words now all of a sudden.
Josh, by the way, is the most recent like on the VO Meter Facebook page, so thank you very much, Josh.
Oh, terrific. Yeah, he’s a good talent all by himself, but he’s a really good web master, and he’s got an understanding of what… He doesn’t build websites that suck.
There’s your marketing tagline.
I know, your tagline right there.
We build websites that don’t suck. He’s really cool, a very talented guy, and just a hell of a good website designer too. And it was just…
Even if things are going well, I’ve been a solo voiceover mentor for many, many, many years now, but it’s still nice to change things up here and there and add a few pieces and take some pieces out. I’m always trying to improve my craft as a voiceover coach as well. Paul, you’ve been very voiceless with your opinions.
I sound like I’m being sarcastic, but I’m really not. I like people who have a quote-unquote clue. I enjoy getting feedback and ideas from them, and both of you guys have been gracious with that type of feedback, so I do appreciate it.
Yeah, well, we were inspired by you, and it’s the whole reason we started this podcast, among others, but to give back to that community, to some of the knowledge that we’ve gleaned from all the successful pros like yourself.
Well, I appreciate that, and this is episode number… You guys have done pretty well with this podcast, especially considering… Yeah, this is number 13.
I know there’s people… And Rob Marley actually… Paul, you told me that you were doing it, but then Rob Marley told me about it, thinking that I didn’t already know about it, and he was a fan, really, ever since the first couple of episodes.
You guys are newer in the industry. You don’t try to pretend that you’re an expert at everything. You’re kind of like new guys who are trying to find your way through the voice over world.
You’re very real, you’re very genuine. You’re not a narcissistic elitist. It’s not your way or the highway.
And you don’t… Never mind, I was going to rip on a couple people, but forget it.
No, I’m just kidding.
Like you were saying, we don’t blow smoke. We just kind of want people to know the reality of getting involved in the business if it’s something they want to do.
Absolutely. And I will tell people who are listening to this, and I wrote a blog on this recently and maybe even did a sermon on the same blog, it’s just that there are so many different opinions out there, and there are so many chefs in the kitchen when it comes to voice over advice. So make sure that you’re getting advice from all over the place, not just like one voice over group.
Because I’ve heard people that, well, What’s-his-name said that in this group, so I’m going to just go ahead and be an auto mechanic instead. And somebody that just wants to give up. I’m like, you know, in this day and age of forums on Facebook and LinkedIn, people are going to have about 150 different opinions on the same subject.
And you really have to just dig deep and really do your research and not base everything on what one or two people say.
Yeah, it’s a valid point. And to be certain, most of the community will help if asked, as long as you’re respectful about it.
You’re right. It’s a very, very helpful community. There are people out there that kind of troll new talents, and they like to just tell them what idiots they are.
And there’s just no place for that. I see this stuff in these, quote unquote, professional voiceover groups. I’m like, who the hell is this guy?
You got a guy who’s got about a year of experience going into 25 different voiceover groups and spewing out a bunch of bullshit to people when…
Wait, are you talking about me?
When they have no idea what the hell they’re talking about. And honestly, if you’re really that successful, you probably don’t have eight or nine hours out of the day to give people advice.
Well said. Sage advice. Well, Terry, it’s been…
So put that in your AT2020 and smoke it.
Well, Terry, it’s been such a pleasure. We’ve been waiting for this for such a long time.
That smells good, Sean.
Well, I am in Washington, but…
That’s true.
That’s true. I’m sorry, Paul.
I was trying to wrap up in a nice little way. But anyway…
So was I.
It’s been a pleasure. We were so happy that you said yes to come on. We have admired your work and benefited from your coaching for so long.
It was really great to have you on.
My pleasure, guys. I’ll come back any time. This is a lot of fun.
I appreciate you having me.
So before you leave, Terry, what’s the best way to get a hold of you if people just want to ask you questions or get some coaching?
Well, I like it when people come to my door and knock. No, I would say you can hit me up on Facebook. I’m easy to find.
Come into Voice Over Camp on Facebook, or you can send me an email, terry, T-E-R-R-Y, at universalvoicetalent.com. And the website is the same address, universalvoicetalent.com. Doing a makeover of that one, thank God.
That one’s been collecting dust for a little bit. Not collecting dust, meaning that it’s not working, but it’s time for a makeover. No question about it.
But those are different ways that you can get a hold of me.
And we’re back, man. Isn’t he just sound like a guy you want to have a beer with? Thank you so much, Terry.
Learned so much, and had a blast talking with him. So you can find him up on Facebook, or you can find him at his personal website, universalvoicetalent.com. Thanks for listening to this episode of The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Thanks again, everybody. Have a great day. Thanks for listening to The VO Meter, measuring your voice over progress.
To follow along, please visit www.vometer.com.

The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Hello, everybody, and welcome to Episode 12, a full dozen hard to believe of the VO Meter podcast.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress. We almost got a baker’s dozen there.
Yeah, a baker’s dozen will be the next one, I think.
Yeah, it’s 13.
I’m just flabbergasted that we made it to 12.
I’m flabbergasted that we’ve had over 2,000 downloads.
Yeah, we are at 2,458. Wow. So hopefully this next episode will push us over 2,500.
And that combined with 12 episodes will be a real milestone in my mind.
Maybe we should add more incentives.
Maybe, and I think we have some ideas on a way to do that.
Oh, yeah. You have to listen to the rest of the podcast, though, so don’t leave now.
Please don’t. I know nobody will. So, just so everybody is clear, I am coming to you from Sonny Duck, North Carolina, on the outer banks of the North Carolina coast.
I’ve been on vacation all week, but I have sucked it up to come back for our fans and conduct an interview with our special guest and do episode 12.
Very nice. And who is our guest this time, Paul?
It is the fabulous coach, blogger, voice over talent, none other than the nether voice, Paul Strikwerda.
Yes, awesome. I totally forgot to turn the W into a V in the interview, but it was close and he was very polite. I’m sure he’s used to people messing up his name.
Yeah, I’m sure as well. So we will get to him in just a moment, but before we do that, let’s talk about some current events. What’s going on with you, Sean?
Well, it’s funny that you’re traveling now. I actually just got back from a two-week pseudo vacation in Hawaii because my girlfriend lives and works up there. And so I’ve actually been up there, it’s like my third time this year, but it’s the only way we can see each other with her schedule, because me doing freelance, I definitely have a little bit more flexible, and I just bring a whole bunch of gear with me and try to pay off the trip while I’m there.
Well, that sounds like a great excuse to go to Hawaii.
All right, like anyone needs one.
You want to trade?
Hey, you sound pretty happy out there.
I can see the beach, I’ve got a glass of wine in my hand, things can’t be better.
Sounds wonderful, man. Sounds great.
So let’s talk about your travel setup. We want to talk about that theme for this episode, how we maintain work or at least work in an emergency situation when we’re traveling. What’s your travel rig like?
Well, it’s relatively simple. It does take up a little bit of room though. It’s mainly my laptop, my 416, my Sennheiser 416, and a newer interface, a one channel interface by Audient called the ID4.
And I’ve been following them since back when they only had the ID22 as it was the only entry into the line of digital interfaces. And it honestly sounds just as good. Obviously doesn’t have all of the features, but it sounds fantastic.
And for $200 or less, if you go refurbished or a demo unit, I think it sounds incredible. And it’s incredibly simple to use. And it actually has dual headphone outs.
So you’ve got the typical quarter inch headphone connector for studio headphones, and then an eight inch one for earbuds and the like. Or you could just have two people listening on it at the same time. It’s just so much packed into that little box.
Yeah, that’s fantastic. I know we actually recorded episode three on that very unit.
That’s right.
At the Atlantic Voice Over Conference.
Yeah, at MAVO, and then that’s what I used again at VO Atlanta for my team. So we had that, and we actually had what I’m speaking into now, the Carry On Vocal Booth. And I use it as sort of like additional treatment in my, I call it my blanket booth.
But yeah, as you can see, it sounds great. Or actually, no, we’re using the Yamaha AGO3 today for ease of interview purposes. But also a great sounding travel unit.
Yeah, for sure. So my setup’s a little bit more simple, maybe, depending on your opinion. I’m using the Blue Raspberry USB mic, and I have that running to a Dell Venue Pro, which is one of those hybrid laptop tablet machines where you can remove the tablet or plug it into a keyboard and it becomes a full-fledged laptop.
So I use that, and then I have it inside a homemade Harlan Hogan-ish portable. If you remember, when he first started, his deal was to put out plans on how to create your own version of his portable. So I had this fabric case, I guess that’s what it’s called, from Bed Bath & Beyond, and I lined it with acoustic foam on all five sides.
And those are those little collapsible fabric boxes that you can use for a shelf or just laundry bags or something like that.
Or you can use it to hold toys, that’s what I use it for home actually when I’m not recording. And then I stick the microphone in the back of it, stick my head inside, and you probably hear the birds and the seagulls because I’m literally on the beach right now. But it sounds great inside a regular house room, or for the last week, I’ve been using it inside my car for auditions, and it sounds pretty good.
Yeah, a lot of people have used cars either when they’re traveling, and as long as you’re in a reasonably quiet spot, most cars are already, like they already have quite a bit of sound isolation and absorption just to make it a more comfortable driving experience.
Yeah, and I did a remote session with our good friend Marisha Tepera two days ago. We were doing a dual point of view audition. I was in the back of the car with the Porta Booth, and she said, that sounds great.
And I said, well, maybe I should just use this all the time.
Use what you got. And doesn’t the Raspberry have some kind of like noise canceling technology too?
Yeah, I won’t say I exactly know how it works, but it does do a pretty good job of canceling out some of the ambient sound. I mean, if one of my kids comes out here and starts asking for dinner, I’ll be in trouble.
It won’t erase them.
Yeah, or go back on the boogie board. But for now, it sounds pretty good.
Yeah, it does sound nice. All right, so anything else for current events?
Well, as I said, I’ve been on vacation, but when I get back, I’m booked for four audio books until probably the end of October, where I just have my schedule entirely taken up, and that’ll be pretty exciting.
Very nice. Yeah, my schedule… The first half of the vacation was nice, but then I got at least four different gigs or auditions that came my way, or while I was in Hawaii.
And so my girlfriend was very supportive, and she gave me full reign of her room. Yeah, it’s great. So I just moved all the clothes on either side of the mic, and then just shoved every pillow in the house in there as well.
And then she didn’t have too many blankets because it’s really hot in Hawaii, so I used a lot of beach towels behind me, and it sounded pretty well. None of my clients complained. I even checked in with a few of them to make sure it was okay, and they’re like, yeah, it’s totally acceptable.
And it was a lot of fun. I even did a remote session with this German client for this sort of medical assistance app, and that was a lot of fun. It was only one sentence, and those guys were hilarious too, so it was a lot of fun.
One sentence, and then that was the whole job?
That was the whole job.
Fantastic. I should promote the one book I have that was released recently. It’s called The Fat Kid by Mark Roeder.
That’s R-O-E-D-E-R. If you’re looking for a new book to listen on Audible, please check that out. It has one rating so far.
That’s five stars. I’m pretty proud of that. And yeah, I’d love to have some more.
So go on there, download it, and let me know what you think.
Will do, yeah. I’ll do that after the show. And I meant to say, though, that was really smart.
Actually contacting Marisha to have someone to play off of for that dialogue was a really good idea. And you guys are similar age range and voice types. I think it would be totally believable.
Yeah, it worked out pretty well. It’s always nice to have somebody to bounce off of when you’re doing an audition.
You know how Facebook has those ridiculous… Do you want to find out who your soulmate is of your contacts? Like quizzes?
I clicked on it and Marisha was my soulmate. Yeah.
Okay, well I thought you would just come back from your girlfriend’s house.
This was a long time ago. I just thought it was funny. Obviously my girlfriend is my soulmate.
Obviously.
Perfect for each other.
So before we get to Paul, we have to go through our regular segments with the show. Our fans literally clamor for it. So before we go any further, let’s get to this week’s Questionable Gear Purchase.
So this week, like I said, I’m on vacation. And that’s really probably the only reason I wasn’t able to buy anything. But just before I left, I decided to upgrade my headphones in the studio.
And I picked up some Biodynamic DT-770. They’re pretty popular with a lot of our colleagues. And I plugged them in, and they sound really good.
I’m wearing a pair right now.
Oh, really?
Yeah, no, they were my first big headphone purchase, for sure.
Okay, yeah, I got a pretty good deal on them. And I wasn’t sure if they would be a big improvement. But I gotta say, if nothing else, they’re much more silent than what I was using before.
The ones that came with the Scarlett Studio Kit.
Oh, there’s no hissing or electrical noise?
Well, I just mean actual noise canceling.
Oh, yeah, the isolation in these is fantastic.
That’s the word, isolation.
Yeah, yeah. And they’re so freaking comfortable. I think someone described them as kittens on your ears.
Yeah, I will say I don’t find them as comfortable. Oh, is it the Scarlett? Maybe because I have this big giant head.
Well, I do too. I got a big old pumpkin head.
What hat size do you wear?
I don’t wear hats.
What kind of statement is that? I don’t wear hats. They’re not cool enough.
No, but when I wear a baseball cap, like a fitted one, it’s a seven and a quarter. So I know that’s on the big side. So these are a little tight, but they do, like you said, they isolate fantastically, and they’ll work great for the podcast and also for editing.
Yeah, because you won’t have any headphone bleed-through issues. But hold on to those buyers. I’m sure they don’t…
It’s mostly metal. The spine that holds the earcups is completely metal, so it takes a little bit more time to break in.
I’m not planning on getting rid of them. I know they sound great, and they’re definitely an improvement for editing, which is really what I wanted them for.
I actually got a new pair of headphones as well, because I was very lucky. I actually won a pair of really nice headphones when my team won the Team Challenge at VO Atlanta. Those were like the Sennheiser 280 Pros.
And those are about $100 headphones. And I found out after the fact that voice actor Crispin Freeman is also a big fan of those, right at the $100 mark. But they were talking about head size.
They’re just a little bit too uncomfortable, because they’re very springy plastic, so it really wants to stay closed, clamped on your head. And just after long sessions, I’d be getting these pressure headaches, because it’s digging into my temples.
It’s because you got a big head. It’s too big for your body. Seinfeld reference.
You might be a little young for that.
Just barely. So I got another pair that I see recommended a lot, which are actually very affordable ones, the AKG 240s. They’re super comfortable.
They look really nice. They’ve got all these golden trim on the earcups and looks very nice design-wise. Some issues though is that they’re semi-open.
So like the isolation we were talking about with the Biodynamics, you don’t have. So if you turn up too much or your volume too much during a directed session or recording a podcast, you might have some bleed through. But if you’re just editing playback from a recorded session you did earlier, they’re perfect.
They do add a little bit more bass, but for… they’re $120 less than the buyers, so if your budget is limited, they’re definitely ones to look into.
Awesome. I also forgot to mention, I bought some monitor speakers. Which I’ve never used before.
But I bought them because they have someone else coming in to record an audiobook when I get back on Monday. I wanted them to be able to hear themselves with decent audio.
What did you get?
I got the Behringer MS-16.
I don’t know if it’s Behringer or Behringer. Pretty sure it’s Behringer. It’s from the Germans.
Whatever, I don’t work for them. At least not yet. If you’re listening, we’d be happy to be a sponsor.
Or have you as a sponsor. Yeah, so they sound pretty good. I just have them sitting on top of my bookcase where I have the rest of my studio equipment.
Hopefully they’ll be good enough for my guest on Monday.
Nice, nice. Well, I’m sure. And there are some other affordable options.
I know the Personus Eris E5s are recommended a lot, as well as the KRK5s. So right at the 150 per pair price point.
Yeah, awesome. So any other purchases from you?
Actually, well, a bit of a bet. I got the Yamaha AGO3. I got rid of it because of personal reasons.
It was a gift from an ex. And then I got it back because it made the podcast and playback for some of the Zoom room meetings that I have that much easier. So I was just like, curses, there’s nothing at this price point that does quite what that unit does.
And a lot of our fellow talent rave about it, too. So I’m like, well, it’s all right to have a backup. Still waiting on Mixerface, though.
Lord knows if that’s going to happen at this point.
Oh, boy.
But then other than that, sort of a backup option, I got another SKB case with that, where you can sort of adjust… It’s just a really nice mic case where you can adjust all of the cushioning inside of it to fit whatever mics or mounts or interfaces you want.
I remember you talking about that a couple episodes ago. You love that thing.
Yeah, I know, I know. Well, someone gave me a Neumann TLM 103 wrapped in bubble wrap, so I needed a better case for it.
It rides safely, didn’t it?
It did, I’ll give you that. Sounds good. So good that I don’t use it very often because my space is not quite that isolated.
416 isolated, not 103 isolated. Which brings me back to another point about traveling. With equipment, I really recommend that USB mics can be great because they tend to have a smaller capsule and a smaller pickup pattern than your average large condenser mic.
And actually, there are some like the Yeti and the new MK4, which are pretty much just like digital versions of analog mics. So I wouldn’t recommend taking those. You just have to be aware of how much ambient noise is in whatever space you’re recording in because just like in your home studio, the space is the most important factor.
Yeah, that’s a great point. As you can hear with my USB setup right now, it’s not isolating at all. You’ll hear every seagull, every crow, even probably the fly that’s on my arm right now that I’m swatting away.
So the space, as always, is the most important thing. So with that, before we get to our special guest, let’s move on to this week’s VO MeterStick. We have a demo from one of our fans, Sonny James, who sent this along along with a question about mic placement.
Hey, everybody, it’s time for the VO Meter Strik. What did he say? It’s time for the VO…
Oh, never mind. The VO Meter Strik? Oh, got it.
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So, Sean, what Sonny really wanted to know was how to properly place a shotgun mic within his booth. He’s interested in buying a 416 or an NTG-3, and he asked me what’s the best mic position for him, and how do we normally address that?
You have to experiment and find out yourself.
Yeah, and that’s kind of exactly what I told him. We sound like a broken record, but it really is true. I’ve tried both of those mics, and what I found was neither of them was really good fit for my booth and my voice, and really in any position.
I tried above the nose. I tried below the chest, pointing up. I tried at my right ear, at my left ear, pretty much every possible combination, and it didn’t work for me.
And that doesn’t mean it won’t work for Sonny, but the point is you really have to get it in your space and experiment.
The 416 is definitely one worth trying. It’s probably the most accessible industry microphone out there. It’s still very cost prohibitive for some, but still, if you can afford it, you should definitely try it.
But my 416, it took me almost a year to get a placement where I’m like, oh, that sounds really good. And it wasn’t until I was with a place with better acoustic treatment that I was able to find a better placement for myself. So you really just have to keep experimenting and exhaust all your options before you give up on a mic.
Yeah, and I would say, find a place where you can either borrow the mic or maybe rent the mic and get it in your space before you make a commitment. And then send it out to friends or colleagues that you know that would give it a listen and tell you, hey, that’s not the best placement. Maybe try it in a different space.
Send it to us.
Exactly.
We’d be happy to play the audio and say, or play it on the show and tell you how it sounds.
We are cruel but kind. So with our feedback, so. So like I was saying, we offer cruel, but we like to think instructive feedback.
We want all of our listeners who reach out to us asking to help improve some aspect of their sound or their business to be receptive to our feedback. So speaking of being receptive to feedback, our next guest is actually extremely generous with his time and his experience and in the education that he tries to bring to new talents who are trying to get into the voiceover industry. So without further ado, we’re gonna take you guys into our interview room at Source Connect Now and bring you our guest today, Paul Strikwerda.
All right, so we are using Source Connect Now right now and we have a very special guest today on the VO Meter. He’s a dear friend. I’ve been following his blog and his book for the last several years.
We have today, I hope I get his name right, Paul Strikwerda.
Very good. Woohoo, thank you.
How are you doing today, sir?
I’m doing great. Looking forward to this. I’ve been looking forward to this for a couple of months now.
I’ve been following you guys too. And we met up in Atlanta finally. And I remember you asking me, would you like to be a guest on the podcast?
And I said, can we do it tomorrow? It took us a little while, but finally we’re here in different places on the planet, but we’re together.
Yeah, I just want to make sure you actually said yes under your own free will. But thank you so much.
Because people can be so much more polite in person and then just kind of quietly fade away over email, you know.
Oh, no, I would never do that.
I would, but apparently you’re nicer.
Hey, he’s a real mentions this.
You know I’m almost the nicest guy in voice overs. The nicest guy that must be Bob Sauer, right? That’s how he advertises himself.
And I’m the third, so that makes you the fourth, I guess, at least. So for some people in the voiceover community who might not know who you are, Paul, why wouldn’t you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you came to the States and became a voice talent?
Ooh, I could fill the entire podcast with my life story. But it begins in the Netherlands. Because many people know that I am from the Netherlands and a lot of them still believe that I live and work in the Netherlands.
But I came to the United States at the end of the last century, which is so long ago now, 1999, December. I remember it well. I came in the same plane that took the boy band in sync back to the United States.
Are you kidding me?
So I have no idea who these guys were. But imagine this, the door swung open. I came out as one of the first people and all I saw was a whole group of teens yelling, yelling, yelling.
I said, what a warm welcome.
And they all ignored me.
They said, Lance Bass, will you marry me? Oh dear. But anyway, I came to the States because I wanted to start a new life.
I’d been in radio and in television for most of my life in the Netherlands, working for public radio and television and our Dutch World Service. And it’s kind of this, Holland is a very small place. It’s this been there, done that part of thing.
I was coming out of a relationship and I decided to pack my bags and I literally arrived at Philadelphia Airport with two suitcases in my hand. And then I came to a nice place called New Hope in Pennsylvania. And I looked at myself in the mirror and said, okay, I’m here, now what?
And I said, okay, I want to do something with microphone, with my voice, but how, where to start? And I found a note in the paper talking about a talent agent in Philadelphia, Mike Lemon Casting. And Mike Lemon casts all the actors in the M.
Night Shyamalan movies, but he also has a big voiceover roster. And so what I did was I went to one of those cattle calls. There were like 500 people wanting on-camera work.
There were like four people for voiceover work, and they hired me on the spot. And I spoke with a very British accent at this time, and that’s because a lot of Dutch kids grew up being taught English with the Queen’s English. So they thought I was English, and that’s how I got my start, pretending to be an Englishman, doing all kinds of commercials, like for Dorney Park.
I remember that was the first one that I did, and said, boy, this is fun. I could do this for a living. And I’ve never looked back ever since.
That’s fantastic.
Well, Paul, I know you eventually settled down in the borough of Easton, or technically you’re in Wilson, I think. And as we’ve talked about, that is where most of my family is from. My grandfather made a similar trek from Italy and settled in Phillipsburg, New Jersey, and eventually moved across the river to Easton.
And my dad grew up in a house. The address was 1621 Northampton Street in Wilson, which is so close to you, it just boggles my mind. My first introduction to you was the interview on East West Audio Body Shop with George and Dan.
And I turned around when you mentioned where you were living and I said, did he just say Easton? So that’s when I immediately looked you up. And tell me a little bit about how you ended up in the Lehigh Valley and how that is for your voiceover business.
Oh yeah, that’s a great story. It’s a fantastic neighborhood. It’s only 19 blocks from New Jersey and probably a two minute walk from your family.
And I absolutely love it here. People in the Netherlands and Europe who know me just don’t believe this when I tell them that yesterday, we had a bear in our neighborhood. They had to sedate the bear who was up in a tree and he fell down eventually and they caught him and now he’s in a better place.
Doesn’t mean they killed him, but…
It’s like humane treatment, right?
Yeah, we have roaming bears and deer and sometimes a wild coyote too. So those things do not happen in the Netherlands. So I really feel that I’m in the United States right now.
And the reason I’m here is really love. I married the love of my life and she had a home here and she wanted me to move in and said, hey, do you have a soundproof basement?
And she said, of course.
This is Pennsylvania. Yeah, we have basements with nice thick walls. And I thought, hey, voiceover studio said, honey, I’ll be here tomorrow.
Well, it is a great town. I’m actually headed there right from the beach on Saturday to visit with my family who still lives there. And unfortunately, we’ll just miss each other, but I’ll have fun in your place.
Yes, but this is one of those places where you really are part of a community if you choose to be part of a community. And that’s what I love most about the borough of Wilson and Easton as well. One of the things that I do here is that I’m one of the announcers of the local farmer’s market.
And many people say, ah, farmer’s markets, that’s no big deal. And it, well, maybe it’s not. But on a Saturday, we get about 4,000 to 5,000 people and they don’t have a billboard, all these vendors, so they need somebody with a mic who really announces the specials on a Saturday.
But we also have live music and we play music, some kind of a DJ. I’m the lost and found department. So sometimes I get cell phones.
Sometimes I get lost husbands. It’s really fun to be there in the middle of my community doing some volunteer work. And I became part of a band of actors called the Bachman House.
Now the Bachman House is one of the historic public houses from 1753. And as actors, we are kind of reenacting history that is part of the roots of Easton. So you might find me on a good day dressed up in like 1750 clothes, pretending to be one of the founding fathers.
Isn’t that fun?
That’s great. I’m familiar with that farmers market. My cousin is a chief of police in your town and often has to be there to help with crowd control.
And my aunt is a big fan of the farmers market itself.
Well, it’s the oldest continuously ongoing outdoor farmers market of the entire United States. And I hope you can tell from my voice that I’m really, really proud of that. And we were, last year, we were voted the number one market in the United States.
And, of course, I didn’t know all these things when I came to Easton. But I’m really, really happy in this community. And if you were to walk down Main Street with me, you wouldn’t go far because every minute or two I see people I know and love, and it couldn’t be better.
Well, that’s great. So just to wrap up on the towns we are in at the moment, just so everybody knows, I’m at the beach. I don’t want to rub it in too much, but if you hear some stray seagulls or people yelling on their surfboards, I apologize, but that’s where I am, and I’m having fun.
So with that, let’s move on to talk about your business… Sorry, I muted myself for a second. Let’s move on to talk about your business and some of your publications.
Sean, can you ask the first question about that?
Yes, actually, one of the first resources that I found when I started researching voiceover about five years ago now was actually your blog, The Nether Voice Blog. So why don’t you tell us a little bit how you got started with that?
You know, when I started my voiceover business, I wanted to find a way to advertise myself without really advertising myself. Because nobody knew me, I knew nobody in the whole voiceover community, and I knew that I loved one thing, I’ve always loved to write. So I just out of the blue one day said, hey, why not write about my experience in Europe and my take on the voiceover business here in the United States?
That’s kind of an angle that not too many people cover who are blogging. And I love telling stories, you know, that’s part of our profession. We are storytellers.
So it started very simple with just one blog post, and three people read it. Second blog post, four people read it. And now I have over 38,000 subscribers.
And that’s in about seven years. So I find it a very efficient way to advertise my business, as well as becoming kind of someone who loves to stir the pot and push the envelope every once in a while. Because there’s lots of things that I like in my business, and there’s lots of things that I think could be improved.
And I write about that. And thirdly, I have this whole thing of giving back to the community who has given so much to me. So I don’t think that people need to reinvent the wheel who are part of the community, who are new to the community.
So as a service to them, I want to pass on my experience, and I do that in my blog.
And it’s a very generous experience. I just got to say, you can definitely tell that you love to write because it’s just filled with poetic devices, and there’s such a sense of wordplay and actual play. It’s really a joy to read.
And you mentioned how you do like to stir the pot, though. Could you talk about some of your less popular posts or less popular ideas that you talk about in your blog?
Oh, that is risky, isn’t it? But okay. I mean, I started it…
How about the ones that generate the most buzz?
I might as well dig in. Some people know me. At least that’s the impression I got when I was at VO Atlanta.
Some people know me for my criticism of pay-to-plays, in particular one Canadian one, voices.com. A couple of years ago, I wrote a number of blogs, and I wasn’t too flattering, and they got thousands and thousands of hits. Some people still tell me that if you type in the word voices.com in like a Google search engine, the things that come up, number two and number three, are my blogs.
And it really started the discussion, I think, or continued the discussion about this whole pay-to-play model. And I described how I first started off as being a fan. I even won a prize at one point from voices.com because I was so complimentary of what they did and how they had started my business.
But once I started doing better as a voice over and learned more about what their model was about and how their way of doing business was gradually changing, my opinion of pay-to-plays and particularly voices.com started changing. So people who have been following my blog probably have been following in my footsteps and noticed that shift in my perception. So, oddly enough, when I walked the halls of the hotel in Atlanta, some people looked at me and said, oh, he’s the guy who brought down voices.com.
Well, not too fast, my friends, because they’re still in business. And they attracted a big investor recently, as you probably have heard, and they are looking to expand. So they’re not going anywhere, just staying put and they’re expanding.
But I will continue to scrutinize whatever it is that they’re doing and hopefully write about it. Because I need to say a big thank you to voices.com, because every time I write about them, my blog goes through the roof. So I hope that they stay in business and keep on doing what they’re doing in the way they’re doing it, because it’s good for me.
Another thing that I write about is really the people who think it’s just so easy to break into this business. You don’t need to know anything. We’ve talked about this before many times on your podcast as well.
They think it’s easy money and you don’t need any education. And I hold up the mirror and say, is that really true? Do you really think that you can make a fortune in voice overs?
You know, I know a lot of people who are in voice overs, and they’re no millionaires. Have you ever heard of someone who’s doing voice overs as a millionaire? I don’t.
And I’m not in for the money, but it’s not a get rich quick scheme. So I write about that too. So one of the blogs that I wrote was about five reasons not to get into voice overs.
A lot of people hated me for that.
I remember that one.
Oh gosh, yes. But what they forgot is to read the very last line. So I give these five reasons why you shouldn’t get into voice over.
And at the end they say, well, I can’t really imagine doing anything else because I love it so much.
Well, Paul, I can say from being at VO Atlanta as well, I know that look you were getting from people because I kind of had a similar impression. Even though we had talked socially over social media and emails, I kind of did see you as the pot stir and antagonist. But I want to tell our fans that a nicer person both in VO and the whole world, you will not find.
I think within five seconds of seeing each other, we were embracing a big hug. So Paul is just so friendly. And really, I think what it comes down to is journalistic and professional integrity.
And that’s what you have above reproach. And I really admire you for that.
I can only say it takes one to know one, really, because I had the same thing. And there are, you know, so many people have a wrong impression because I tend to be very critical. But I also am admiring people who have reached the pinnacle of their careers in voice overs.
And I talk about those people too. It’s not just that I’m blogging to take people down. But as in blogging, as it is in the news, people tend to focus on things that are not positive.
That’s what they tend to remember. So they look at me and say, oh, that’s that guy that likes to push the envelope and be kind of a crumudgeonous type of writer. And I use some snarkasm too.
So I have to take credit for that. And I love stirring the pot because there’s so many people who are blogging these days, and they’re all fighting for your attention. They all want to be read.
So in order to attract an audience, you need to be controversial. So it’s also a tool that I use to attract new readers, and it seems to be working.
Well, let’s talk about so-called anybody blogging. You mentioned in your book, Making Money in Your PJs, which everybody should go out and get, by the way, that you really want to focus on advertising yourself without being a blowhard about it and tooting your own horn. So is it your opinion that everybody can and maybe should be blogging as a means to advertise their business?
Or is it really a specialized skill that only the people who are good at it should do?
I’d say that it’s not for everybody. Because first of all, it takes a lot of time. I think my average blog takes maybe five minutes to read, but I spend the morning or afternoon writing it and maybe even longer researching it.
And that’s a big chunk of your week. And not everybody enjoys writing either. It’s not everybody’s strength.
I’ve always loved writing. I’ve been a journalist in the Netherlands and I’m used to cranking out some copy and coming up with headlines and things like that. But there’s other people who are much more into vlogging or into podcasting.
I know people who are really good amateur photographers and their blog is filled with photos. So I’d say if you don’t feel that inner urge to share your ideas with the world, if you’re not ready for people to comment on those ideas, often in a negative way, then you really should not start vlogging. It takes a long time, in my case, six to seven years to really get an audience that gives you some clout as well.
So it’s not an immediate payoff. And we live in this time of instant gratification. So people, if they don’t immediately see results of their efforts, they’re ready to give up.
And you have to have, I think, a unique point of view. So you need to, I think, talk about topics that a huge group of people is interested in, but you need to give your spin. And if you have to think about what that is, maybe then you’re not ready to blog either.
Well, good. I’m glad you clarified that, because, yeah, frankly, there are people who shouldn’t be blogging and people who shouldn’t be hosting a podcast. Maybe some that are talking right now.
Maybe, maybe. So another thing we wanted to ask you, one of the chapters in your book focuses on equipment. And how maybe the most expensive mic isn’t good for you.
Maybe the most inexpensive mic isn’t good for you. I know you, at least last I checked, were using the Gafel M930. Talk to us about how a newbie, because frankly that’s a lot of our audience, should go about looking for their first VO equipment.
You know, I am very lucky, because the mic that I’m using right now, the Gafel that you just mentioned, was a mic that I won. In a raffle, they literally took my name out of a hat.
That’s great.
There is this website called Recording Hacks. I don’t know how active they are, but it’s basically a review of all kinds of microphones. So if you want to find out what new model Blue came out with, what the difference is between one shotgun microphone and another shotgun microphone, go to recordinghacks.com.
And they used to have this giveaway, so I entered and out came my name and they gave me this very expensive German microphone. It’s $1,750. Well, you don’t…
It’s a wonderful thing. I love it to pieces, but you do not need a $1,700 microphone to get started. I would advise against it.
What I would do is just not get the cheapest of the cheap, but one microphone that I particularly like is the CAD-E100S microphone. Every now and then, you can buy it new for about $300, and it’s type of a shotgun microphone because it has… It focuses on your voice like a laser beam almost.
It has very low self-noise. It’s very well made. It’s built in America, and it looks fun too.
And it just has this great sound that sounds really good on most voices.
I actually use that at home.
See?
There’s a really funny story about how I acquired it in our last episode. I’m sure we won’t bore our fans again with that.
Exactly. Well, you know, then you know all about the CAD E100S, and I’m not getting paid by CAD to advertise them, but I mentioned that microphone in my blog about five years ago or so, and I called it the best microphone for voiceovers you’ve never heard of. And after that, I think it really took off, and I still see lots of people talking about the microphone.
They’ve had some quality control issues, but there’s a good warranty, so if you get one that’s not to your liking, they’ll fix whatever the problem is. But most people seem to be really happy. So I’d say get something that’s not too cheap, not too expensive, but something that at least will give you a good shot at producing quality audio.
I’m also a big fan of the British company Audient. I have a preamplifier. It’s an ID22 from Audient.
But you can get an ID4 for about $300 as well. And once again, it’s very well built, built like a tank, so you can take it on the road with you. It has very quiet preamps, and it’s just solid.
It will never ever let you down. And I use Twisted Wave as my digital audio workstation. And really, apart from getting some monitors, and my monitors are not more than $100 a pop, then you should be in business.
And I want to say, Paul, your gear reviews and that mindset really helped me along my journey, because I got an Audient as soon as I could afford it, and I’ve had a long loving relationship with them since. I’ve tried their ID14 and ID4, it’s still my favorite portable unit yet. And what’s really funny is my 416, I also wanted a raffle last year.
Yeah, it was at VO Atlanta, actually. Oh, right! You should talk to our mutual friend David Rosenthal about that one.
Which reminds me, because I found out, like, I do a lot of… I’m what’s called our membership liaison for the Global Voice Acting Academy, which David Rosenthal is our president of. And I know that you did a lot of sort of educational materials with him through the Internet Voice Coach.
So I’d love to know a little bit about sort of the mentoring role and the coaching role that you play with voiceover students.
Right. Well, David, he is just an all-around great, phenomenal, wonderful guy. Super talented and a nice person.
And we immediately clicked. And he had this idea way before, well, this was a couple of years ago, Internet Voice Coach. And he had read my blogs and he said, hey, could you start writing, from the international perspective, some blog posts specifically for my site?
And that’s what I started doing. I did one every week. And I did a blog for my website as well.
So at some point it became a little bit too much and I stopped writing for him. But I think that I produced about maybe 20 different blogs for Internet Voice Coach. And what I do with my company is that I also coach people.
It’s not easy to become one of my students because I want people to go through several hoops and different layers before they are accepted by me. Because I want to make sure that they are so motivated and totally committed to the whole process. Because I notice that people who just want to try things out and experiment are just not in it for the right reasons.
I want really people who want to become a professional voice over and not explore options. So I think it’s so important. And it’s so much fun to teach people.
And I learn so much from my students every time that I coach them that when I start listening back to myself, I learn a lot too simply by listening to other people. And I did that the other day in a kind of a different context, because one of my clients said, I’ve recorded something with a different Dutch voice talent. I have no idea what he is saying.
And if he’s reading the script, could you review it for me? So I was actually proof listening, and I got paid for it. And my goodness, I couldn’t believe my ears what I was hearing, and it wasn’t good at all.
There was so much noise from the mouth, from the environment. He wasn’t reading the script. He was putting emphasis on the wrong words.
It was really rubbish. I couldn’t believe that this guy got hired. So I did a very comprehensive review, and it was like four pages for five minutes of audio.
And the next thing I hear from the client was, thank you very much for the review. I just fired your Dutch colleague. Can I hire you?
That wasn’t intended, but that’s certainly an interesting way to get clients.
Yeah, kind of an ideal turnout for that situation. Yes!
It was not one of those things where I was begging for a job, but I thought, hey, maybe this is a new model, because there’s so many people who hire us that also need proof listeners. So even if you’re not suitable for the job, we can all check whether someone is listening to the script, reading the script or interpreting in the right way. So who knows?
I’m going to try this again.
Exactly. And I’ve done some proofreading and transcription work because I do work for a lot of international clients and Asian and European clients. And sometimes the scripts are just riddled with spelling errors or just don’t sound natural in American English at all.
Absolutely. And that’s one of those, I call it, hidden powers that we have. You know, I think the ideal voiceover should be like a superhero for their clients.
But people don’t realize it. If you’re working, especially with clients abroad who have to translate scripts, and you’re right, a lot of clients have to not spend too much money, and so they hire somebody who’s not really good at translating.
Or they use software.
It shows. So one of the things that I offer my clients as well is I’d be happy to go over this script. Of course, I’ll charge you for it, but then you know that you don’t embarrass yourself by having somebody read a script that simply is unprofessional.
Wonderful. And that’s something that I encourage a lot of people too. I know that costs can be prohibitive, but if there are certain things, and I learned this from a lot of your blogs, if there are certain things that you’re not good at, or not as good at as, say, just acting into a microphone, try and outsource it.
Work with a team, because you’ll eventually come up with a much better product than you would by yourself.
I think that’s so important. And I started to realize that as I got busier and busier and busier, you have to play your strengths. So I’m really okay with words, but I stink with numbers.
But I happen to be married to somebody who is really good with numbers, and who even seems to enjoy balancing the books.
That’s my secret weapon, too. My wife’s a CPA.
Yeah, exactly. Aren’t we lucky, right? And that allows me to focus on what I think I’m good at.
The same thing with editing. You can make much more money narrating an audiobook than editing it. So why do that stuff yourself?
I mean, Richard Branschland didn’t get to be one of the richest people on earth by doing everything himself. When you look at people who have so-called made it in life, they made it in part because they found people who were brilliant at the things that they were not. So I use the same model for my voice over business.
Wonderful. And one thing that I’ve always liked about you, Paul, is that you’re so generous with your experience and you offer so many educational materials. I mean, you’re a coach.
And I know, again, coaching, like many other aspects, people have to prioritize what they can invest in. But if they can’t afford coaching, one of the first places I send them to is your blog. And if they can afford a little bit, then I send them to your book.
So why don’t you tell us about your eponymous Making Monies in Your PJs book?
Well, it’s just one of the ways I make money in my PJs.
Because at some point, I’ve written so many, many blogs. And the thing about a blog and a little bit about podcasts as well is just it comes and it goes. It doesn’t have a lot of staying power.
A book, though, you buy it and you can put on the shelf and you can pick it up and then read a chapter and put it away again. So I thought I need to find some way to give my blogs some staying power. So I selected, I think, the best 40 or 50 blogs and I put them in a certain order, different chapters, and all of a sudden I realized, my goodness, I have a book!
And it’s over 400 pages. And it’s so easy these days to self-publish. I was a little bit impatient.
I didn’t want to go from publisher to publisher and say, can you please do this? You can just go to Amazon and they have a machine that spits them out on demand. And not only that, you have the version in paper, of course, the paperback, but also the digital one for the Kindles, the iPads.
And so a number of years ago, I decided to take the plunge and produce this book. And it’s been doing really, really well. Like I said, it’s making money for me and my PJs.
And it’s one way for me to monetize my blog. But again, not just for the money, because I don’t feel very motivated by money. If I were, I probably would be driving a different car.
But it’s also because I know that the book is making the rounds. A couple of months ago, one of the guys I saw on that TV series, Mad Men, he contacted me out of the blue and said, Hey, my name is so-and-so, and you may have seen me on Mad Men. And I said, Yeah, yeah, I just watched your episode on Netflix the other day.
He said, Well, what many people don’t know is that I’m teaching voice overs in New York. And I’ve just read your book. And is it okay if I use it in my class?
So I know it’s making the rounds. And I thought, my gosh, that’s the best compliment someone ever paid me.
And what I love is that… Whatever happened in the audiobook version? Oh, you know…
I know a guy. I started it. I started it.
And then I got so busy with stuff that would make me more money that I kind of put it on the back burner.
Gotcha.
And now I’m at the stage where I said, I need to work on a second edition. I need to update the information in the book. So that’s one of my projects for the next couple of weeks after my vacation.
I’m going to update this Making Money in Your PJ’s Book. And then if I have time, I will record it.
Well, if you need an editor, I’m pretty familiar with the content. So I’d be happy to take a look at it for you.
Yes.
Hey, practice what you preach. Very nice.
I was thinking of outsourcing it.
Well, Paul, that pretty much wraps it all that we had planned to ask you today. I just wanted to say thank you so much. It’s a little surreal, actually, to have followed your work for so long and then to actually become a bit of a friend and mentee to you.
So thanks again for everything that you offer the voiceover community, just your unique voice and just your generosity of spirit. And thank you so much.
Oh, it was an absolute pleasure getting to know you in person and now being your guest. And I think the next time we got to get together, you’re welcome here in Easton. I’ll show you the town, and I’m sure that Paul knows a couple of other places that I might not know.
And we’ll have a pint here and a pint there, and we’ll talk voiceover, we’ll talk life, and I’m looking forward to that day.
Sounds wonderful. Thanks so much again, Paul. Enjoy your vacation.
Maybe I’ll pass you on the turnpike on my way there while you’re leaving.
Be sure to wave. As we say in the Netherlands, hartelijk bedankt, ik heb het met heel veel plezier gedaan.
I have no idea what that means, but it was eloquent.
Thank you so much, it was a great pleasure to do this interview.
Wonderful.
Fabulous.
And how can people get a hold of you or find out about your blog?
Good question. nethervoice.com. That’s all you need.
nethervoice.com. It’s one word. Nether is in Netherlands.
Voice is in voice.
And that’s some brilliant marketing right there.
And that’s where I find my blog, my demos, and how you can get in touch with the Dutch guy.
Awesome. Well, thanks again, Paul. It’s been a real pleasure.
All right. So we are back. And wow.
And that, like, talk about generosity of spirit. It was so great to have Paul on again. How are you feeling after that, Paul?
Yeah, he’s just a breath of fresh air. Like I mentioned, meeting him personally in VO Atlanta, when you talk to him in person, you just want to give him a big hug.
Exactly. He always has, like, a big smile on his face. He’s so genuine.
And he’s just a very charming guy.
Yeah, indeed.
So, and speaking of which, he has generously offered the first 15 people to comment to this podcast.
A free copy of his book, Making Money in Your PJs by Paul Strikwerda. I’ve read this book at least five times already. I read it almost annually just to make sure that my voice over business is as good as it could be.
And it’s one of the first books I recommend to new talent who are interested in the kind of mindset that you need to have in order to have a successful voice over business. So, once again, if you’re one of the first 15 people to respond to this podcast in our Facebook comments section, we will contact you and we will get you a copy of Paul’s excellent book, Making Money in Your PJs.
So if you haven’t found us yet on Facebook, please go to our page. It’s The VO Meter, in case you didn’t know that. On Facebook, make a comment.
If you’re one of the first 15, we will send you that book.
Awesome. Thanks again, Paul, for that incredibly generous offer. And then once again, if you want to contact Paul or if you want to read his blog, that’s the nethervoice.com.
So nether, as in the Netherlands, where he’s from, and voice, as in voiceover.com. And then you can thank him as well for being on the podcast. So that wraps up this episode of The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Thanks again for listening, everybody. Have a great summer. Thanks for listening to The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress. To follow along, please visit www.vometer.com.

The VO Meter… Measuring Your Voice Over Progress. Hi, everyone.
Welcome to episode 11 of The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
We have a super exciting show coming up. We are basically like kids in a candy store because we are interviewing two of our idols, basically, George Whittam and Dan Lenard, from VOBS, formerly the East West Audio Body Shop. We watch their show every week.
We’re in the chat room contributing. They, I like to say they taught me everything I know, and I’m just so excited to get to that interview.
I am too. George and Dan have been very generous with their time and have agreed to come on our set after being on theirs. Was it two months ago?
Yeah, about that.
Very cool. Yeah, so I hope you guys are interested in a gear-centric episode because that’s what these guys are all about.
Yeah, it got a little geeky, but that’s okay.
Yeah, a little bit, a little bit. Len, we’re raising the sophistication of our podcast.
Exactly.
But with that, let’s talk about some current events. Do you have anything exciting that you wanna talk about, Paul?
I do, actually. I mentioned last episode that I had taken on a long title or just finished a long title under a pseudonym, and I went looking for some more work under a said pseudonym, and I just landed a six-book series that’ll be coming out in the next couple of months. I’m working on the first one now.
They’re all about an hour to an hour and a half, short stories in the same genre. So those will be coming out shortly. Again, if you’d like to go check it out, listen to episode 10 with the little Easter egg about how you can find the pseudonym.
Do that, and you can look me up on Audible.
Now I just can’t get that theme song out of my head.
Which one’s that?
He’s the man with the name that you want to touch.
Oh, right, you’re right, right.
But you mustn’t touch.
And then I have another client on Freelancer who is sending me an audio book every two weeks. And I have one of those coming out this week and another one I should be working on starting tomorrow. And then finally I have a client today who has sent me the first of what is supposed to be a 30,000 hour English lesson job.
30,000 hour?
Right, I should explain it’s an ensemble where sort of like the work I’ve been doing with you, actually, there’s several different narrators playing different parts for English language learning for non-English speakers. And I’m doing one of the roles. So I don’t know exactly how many lines it’ll be, but it’s supposed to be 30,000 hours total.
It’s a job out of India. And I’m working on it obviously remotely and did the first job today in a small piece and we’ll see how the rest goes over the next couple of months.
Very cool. I mean, it’s nice to have a giant, gantic gig like that that you can rely on. That’s very cool.
Yeah, unfortunately, I didn’t bill at that rate. So it’s not like it, and there’s no retainer. So it’s not like it’s a guarantee.
So I’m hoping that they’ll keep me on and they’ll like what they hear, but it sort of remains to be seen. I have to make sure I do a good job, which I always do with my clients, but especially this time, because that carried out there with so much extra work.
Very cool, and if they need a young 20 to 40-something-year-old voice, just let me know.
I will let you know for sure. Although I watched the… They have a scratch track with a computerized voice, and I watched the video today, and there’s like seven women characters and me.
So I don’t know what that means.
Lucky man.
So what’s going on with you?
Well, last episode, we were talking about when I went out to Seattle to get some professional headshots made for my new agent, and I finally got those back, and they look awesome. I try not to be too vain about it, but I posted some of my favorites on Facebook, and I got 200 responses that ranged from the hilarious to the downright raunchy.
Yeah, I participated in some of those as well.
What was that?
I participated in some of those comments as well.
That’s right. But I mean, largely they were all positive. It was pretty hilarious.
Yeah, I saw them too. I think they look great.
Well, thank you very much. A lot of my friends were like, you’re a lot handsomer in these than I remember you being. And so, I’m like, really?
I saw you like three weeks ago. And so, I don’t know.
That’s not where they saw you. I mean, I was talking to you offline about how the last time I saw you in person was at VO Atlanta, where you were basically on no sleep and tearing your hair out over the challenge.
Just drenched in sweat and emaciated and like bags under my eyes.
Falling up a stairwell. So, you definitely didn’t look as good as you do when you’re all coiffed and taking headshots.
Well rested and cleaned up.
Yeah. That’s great. Congrats on those.
They really came out great.
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.
So, Michael Doucet out of Seattle did a really good job on those. Other than that, I’ve just got my monthly e-learning project that I’m working on right now. Just sent some scripts to you this week, actually.
I just finished some huge narration projects that I was working for this lovely German production company. We have a very nice rapport going so far. But this was 31 individual scripts, about half hour each.
Yeah, it was a pretty long project. But the rate was very nice as well. And they were a pleasure to work with.
So, hopefully they will come back for more.
Now, did you do those all at once and then split them up later? Or did you record them all individually?
I usually do it in a couple of sessions. I focus on long form mainly. So I do try to record long stints for an hour or two and then just kind of divide it up later.
If I’m smart, usually I’ll start and stop and record individual files just for archiving purposes. But you can do the same thing in twisted way, just using the markers and the split by markers feature.
Yeah, that’s kind of what I was thinking. I’ve done similar work in the past where I use that exact feature, put the marker in, split by marker, and it will put them all in the same folder for you with that file name convention that you create. It’s really awesome.
It is very awesome. And Dan Lenard actually has some great tips about getting very specific with how you arrange your markers so it’s like everything has the same amount of opening of room tone and everything is uniform. And it’s very cool.
You should definitely check it out.
Awesome. Well, we will get to our main topic and our interview with Dan and George in just a minute. But first, why don’t you tell us about our VO Meter Stick this week?
So up next, we have the very talented Jack DiGoglia. You might know Jack as the incredibly talented transcripter for the VOBS podcasting episodes. Like he’ll watch these episodes and write very detailed notes and transcriptions, including time codes of interesting things that happen in a given episode.
So as my workloads increased, I can’t watch these episodes as consistently as I used to. So I’m very grateful to Jack for always providing these detailed, just wonderful write-ups of the episode. And if I read them and I really like what it was about, I’ll still go back and watch it.
I don’t care. So thank you, Jack. That is a great volunteer service that you’re offering us.
This is a slightly different VO Meter Stick than we usually do in that Jack has actually sent us a series of bloopers from some of his audiobook recording sessions. So without further ado, take it away Jack with our VO Meter shtick.
Okay, everybody, it’s time for the VO Meter shtick. What did he say? It’s time for the VO…
Oh, never mind. The VO Meter shtick? Oh, got it.
He touched Coulter’s cheek. He touched Cotter’s neck. Judy countered as she paused to push her thick glasses back up her nose.
As she paused to push her thick glasses back up on her nose. Her pace failed. Her face paled.
Hiding his hands in his trembling hands. With an amused look in his eyes and a well-modulated tone to his voice that carried a hint of condensation. That carried a hint of condescension.
Emergency medical personnel transported the city to city hospital under heavy escort. Several minutes passed and his version became blurred. Hoffmeyer grabbed a set of cufflinks from his belt.
Hoffmeyer grabbed a set of handcuffs from his belt. She held up her two favorite Barbie dolls. They look like the beach.
They like the beach. The Huey was painted in drab olive. The Huey was painted in olive drab and had seen better days.
Server virtualization is a mythology of dividing the resources of a computer. Server virtualization is a methodology of dividing the resources of a computer. He pulled the hair off her forehead.
He pushed the hair off her forehead. This pre-Columbian artifact is made with such intimacy. This pre-Columbian artifact is made with such intricacy.
He had a preposterous gut that spilled out over his belt. He had a prosperous gut that spilled out over his belt. Nazar al-Bayati supported a heavy brush of a mustache.
Nazar al-Bayati supported a heavy brush of a mustache. They were all chanting among themselves. They were all chatting among themselves.
Flocked wallpaper, brass wall scones, brass wall sconces, her head gently cradling her son’s head, her hand gently cradling her son’s head. You’re looking at images from the side scan solar system. You’re looking at images from the side scan sonar system.
The Sphinx is southwest of the Great Period. The Sphinx is southwest of the Great Pyramid. As lunchtime approached…
As lunchtime approached… Willie’s second tug pulled her through the side of the garage. Willie’s second tug pulled her through the side door of the garage.
By three years of age, a child’s speech skills and vocabulary. By three years of age, a child’s speech skills and vocabulary. Mr. Javier asks them if there were any new words in the book they don’t have on their P-list yet.
Speak freely.
Thank you, Jack, those were hilarious. Something I hadn’t thought of, creating your own personal blooper reel. Good stuff.
So believe it or not, we actually do not have a questionable gear purchase this week. I know our fans are going to clamor for it, but I managed to not buy anything stupid this week.
Pretty much the same for me too. I have some knickknacks and just minor purchases that I have varying levels of satisfaction with, but nothing to bore or like to tell your ears off. So no questionable gear purchase this week, folks.
Sorry.
I was also a little scared that Dan and George would yell at me. So I tried to restrain myself at least this week while we talk to them, and hopefully it’ll go over well.
Well, they might anyways. I don’t know if they like poking fun, but who knows? Maybe they can tell us about some of their questionable gear purchases.
That’d be awesome, yeah.
All right, but speaking of Dan and George, we’re sure that you guys are chomping at the bit to get to hear what they have to say about all things audio. So without further ado, here are Dan and George. All right, we are moving on into our Source Connect Now studio, and I am very excited to have these two upstanding gentlemen.
They have over 200, that’s 275 episodes of their East West Audio Body Shop slash Voice Over Body Shop podcast. They’ve had agents, celebrity voice talent, anyone under the sun that’s related to VO, you name it. We have the home studio master, Dan Lenard, and the audio engineer of the stars, George Whittam.
How are you guys doing?
Fabulous, great to be here, guys.
Yeah, man, it’s really fun to join you. Fun to join you guys here today.
All right, and we are so excited to have you. So we’ve got a lot of questions, and Paul, why don’t you start off with that?
Well, guys, we are big fans, as we talked about in the show, but we may have some people that may not be as familiar with your show and your individual backgrounds. And I thought maybe we could start by just talking a little bit about how you got started and some of the things that brought you to where you are today. And actually, if we talk about backgrounds, we have a lot in common.
George, I don’t know if I ever told you this, but my wife went to Virginia Tech at the same time you did. I think it overlapped by three out of the four years. And my brother-in-law was the exact same year as you were there.
And Dan, I sold insurance for a while, which is something I know you got into and got out of quickly. There’s a lot of commonalities there. And I was wondering if you could just talk about where you started and how you’ve gotten to the point you are now with your businesses and the show.
All right, well, you know, I’ve been in broadcasting. I started like in 1975. Yes, there was human beings on this planet back then.
No one was alive then.
I was in radio and television until about 1992. And then I sold insurance, life health, long-term care, disability insurance, broke a few telephones trying to do all this stuff for all that.
Got your Series 7 in 66?
I did. And then, and I did sell mutual funds and things along those lines and annuities. But I hated it.
So I got out of that. And my mother-in-law, bless her heart, suggested that perhaps I go back to school and teach high school what I really loved, which was social studies. And US history and the Constitution.
And I did. When I was 40 years old, I went back to college, got my teaching degree, and ended up teaching in our public schools for three years and really enjoyed teaching, despised the very ground that administrators and other people, you know, they’re horrible. I mean, there are some wonderful people in education, but…
As an institution, you’re saying.
As an institution, it’s pretty bad.
Not narrowing it down to anybody in particular.
Well, I could narrow it down to a couple of people in particular. We won’t mention any names, and they’re not in Voice Over and they would never know this. I ever said this.
That’s every teacher, by the way.
Yeah, but I tend to think that our educational system was run by a bunch of insane Marxists who really were hell-bent on making sure that this country got completely dumbed down. So when you tell kids, hey, you know, you can be something, they don’t like you telling them that. It’s kind of interesting.
Anyway, education and I obviously split ways around 19, or in 2001, and I found myself at home finishing up my master’s degree and a project that I did got me involved in recording again and doing voiceover again. And I just checked out to see what was going on in voiceover. And voiceover was in 2003, was really just starting to take off as far as an internet business was concerned.
So I had the chance to really get ride the front crest of the wave on that. But because I had experience working in radio studios and recording studios, setting up the proper environment for proper recording was a real simple thing for me and using the right equipment. And people started…
I would list it… Back in the early days of online forums and stuff, I would start to type in things and people started to notice that I was commenting on it and they started writing me questions. And after about a year of spending a long time writing questions or answering questions, the missus said, you know, you really should hang out a shingle.
You can’t take 30 years of experience and just sort of like dole it out for free. And so about 2005, I started becoming the home studio master and been doing it ever since. And it’s always fun to teach people.
Having my master’s degree in education, I apparently am able to relate fairly, what is seemingly complex to make it a little bit more simple. George?
Oh, whoa.
Remember, you’re here too. He’s only heard that story about 30, 40 times.
Well, my background is really in music. And then I studied music at Virginia Tech, got a degree in recording and audio engineering and music performance and a minor in communications. I did radio in college, just for the hell of it.
I was on AM and FM and didn’t think much of it. I just thought it was fun. It was an activity.
It was neat to be on the air, but I wasn’t thinking of it as a career in broadcasting at all. I was really focused on recording. That’s what I wanted to do.
At graduation…
Can I pause you for a second? You said a minor in performance. What was your instrument you played?
I have a major in music, and I have a minor in telecommunications.
Oh, sorry.
But my music performance, I played trumpet.
Oh, I didn’t know that.
Oh, I did too.
That’s another commonality. I have a trumpet sitting right outside the whisper room.
My dad’s still an active musician. George A. Whittam in the chat room is still being…
He calls himself Brass Lips sometimes.
Yeah, I was the exact opposite in undergrad. I was a communications major and a music minor.
I love it, man. There was a lot of commonalities.
Funny.
And I just never was big into performance. I hated practicing. That’s probably the big problem.
So I was in engine engineering. I started a recording business in 1997 with my dad called Eldorado Recording Services, which was built into an Eldorado RV. You ever see those tan and brown striped aluminum siding chunker RVs you see in Venice, California along the side of the road?
I used to have one of those with a studio in it. That is awesome. And it was for doing remotes and stuff.
It was a lot of fun, didn’t make any money, burned a lot of money, but my dad was very supportive. He thought it was really cool and fun. Recorded a bunch of stuff, but then decided it was time to move to LA.
Came out in 2004 after three years of doing radio broadcast for the Eagles Radio Network for football. That was where I got the…
E-A-G-L-E-S, Eagle… Eagles!
Yeah, that’s where I got to spend some time in real broadcasting, doing real stuff where actually people were listening and…
Did you work with Meryl Rees?
I did.
I worked with… This is Meryl Rees.
And you’re listening to 94WYSP.
And I worked with that guy for a couple years. For our fans that don’t know, he’s the classic voice of the Eagles for the last like 50 years. He’s amazing.
Yeah, he’s been there a long time. He’s like the Harry… Is it the Harry…
Harry Carrey?
Harry Carrey.
Harry Carrey was the fifth.
The very… The Vin Scully of the…
Yeah, you know, those guys that have been doing this forever, that’s him. Anyway, left that world after three years and came out here, started doing answering ads on Craigslist for film production sound mixing, because I figured that was the way to make a living here. At this point, Voice Over was still not really on the radar.
I had helped with setting up one studio in Philadelphia and just, that was it, you know, it was just me helping out a buddy. Moved out here, did that film production stuff for a while, started getting a referral or two from an agent, actually a manager named Jason Marks, because I had helped out that one voice actor, his name’s Howard Parker. I call him my client zero.
Ground zero.
Yeah, he’s like client zero. He’s the origin of the disease. And he’s still a very successful…
Yeah, very successful voice actor to this day. But, and then he referred me to his manager, his manager started referring me clients. Somewhere along the way, Connection led me to Don LaFontaine, worked with him for a few years.
And then not long after Don passed away, Dan and I met at… Maybe it was around the time or a little bit before. Dan and I met at…
Yeah, we met at…
We met in 2008.
2008. I met Don in 2007.
Yes. Yeah, Dan and I met at Voice 2007.
And then you and I met at 2008.
Correct. Dan helped me out. I was doing my first presentation in front of people live about Voice Over, ever.
And Dan helped me on the fly, dumb it down, so it didn’t glaze everybody’s eyeballs over in the room. And well, we hit it off ever since. I mean, we just stayed friends after that.
So how did that lead into the show itself?
Well, we started doing a few things together online. Remember, we did a webinar, I think, for one of the pay to play services.
Oh, we did.
Yes.
I forgot about that.
Yeah, hey, it was like seven, eight years ago.
So that was the first thing we did together.
Together, and we collaborated on that. And then we did a workshop at the Don LaFontaine Lab. Yes, we did.
Because my mother lives out here in California, and we would come out here a lot, and so I’d come visit George, and we’re like, hey, why don’t we do an all-day workshop? Or was it a two-day workshop?
I think so.
I think it was a two-day workshop. And that was a lot of fun, working with a lot of people that we knew and a few fresh faces. And then how this came about is, originally, we were thinking, yeah, we should probably just do a, everybody is doing podcasting these days.
Maybe we should do a podcast about Voice Over Studios. And then I’m not sure why we decided to do it as a TV show. I think it’s because you thought you could.
We were talking about how we love car talk. That was part of it as well. Remember the car talk show?
I mean, it was the way the report of those guys had, and they made it really funny and fun. And we’re like, we could do that. Maybe people would want to listen to that.
So we wanted to do it live. We knew that. We wanted to do it live.
We didn’t want to have to edit it and post. That was a big… We’re like, if we’re gonna do this and commit to it and do it every week, we can’t have a lot of post time.
So that’s why we did it live. And since we’re doing it live at the time, when did we start, 2000?
March 11th, 2011. March 22nd, 2011.
Man, I’m so glad I have Dan.
Yeah, that’s about all I remember.
He has a memory. But, and I was like, well, we’re gonna do this audio, but then we’re gonna have our webcams. Let’s just have them anyway.
And at the time, Ustream was the only way I knew how to stream it live. So we were like, let’s just turn on our cameras. It was really incidental.
The cameras were really not the focus. It was more about the audio, but the video stuck. And I’m regretting it ever since.
Because it just gets more and more complex.
It’s so complicated.
And then we did it for five years. I was in… Remotely, I was in Buffalo.
George was in Santa Monica. And occasionally we would get together, which was always a lot of fun, especially when we would get at FAFCon or something, and we would have a live audience.
The VO Peeps, we did it at one time?
Twice we did it there, yeah. We did the anniversary show there, and then we were over at the VO Peeps. There’s like 40, 50 people at that.
You guys actually built a booth in Anne’s room.
Oh, yes. That was great. That’s a classic video.
That is classic.
And actually that booth, I think somebody else is using that now.
It will live on.
It lives on, as does the studio suit that it was based around. And then for a number of reasons, my family had to move out here. It had to.
We really wanted to, but we had a good excuse to come out to California. And now George and I are 20 minutes apart. And…
There’s a no brainer to do it here.
To do it here.
Because Dan has a studio.
Yeah, the studio here is really nice. It’s cool.
Well, you really lucked out on a house too. I mean, I know you guys had a very specific criteria for it, but wow, it’s a gorgeous studio and house. So well done, Dan.
Well, thank you.
Yeah, I mean, they nailed it. Being in LA, your chances of finding a house with a studio are slightly increased.
Well guys, I know you didn’t want to rehash that story, but even though I’ve watched all the episodes, there’s still some great nuggets in there that I didn’t know about and I’ll bet our fans will appreciate. But we would like to move into some of the more juicy questions we had. So Sean, I know you want to start us off with a question you had for the guys.
Well, yeah, I mean, both of you have been working with recording and broadcast technology for decades. What are some of the biggest innovations you’ve seen that still kind of blow your mind?
Innovations that have blow our minds.
Well, I mean, the first…
Dan’s been around longer, so there’s more innovations that he has seen than I have.
There was the advent of magnetic tape.
And then DAT, and then…
Internet.
Yeah, well, yeah, the internet is clearly, that’s the most mind blowing thing.
Absolute game changer, right?
It is, and it’s really what makes the voice over business what it is today. And it’s, that more than anything else is really driving what goes on and how people communicate. And the fact that people are communicating using the internet is what’s driving the voice over business because everything has to be narrated or somebody has to physically talk about something.
It’s created more opportunities and more talent all at the same time.
Yeah, well, opportunities, talent is another question.
Talented parties.
Yeah, it’s a plural talent. Yeah, it’s an actual name of something.
But I don’t know, in terms of like, you’re probably thinking more of technology, I’m assuming, Paul. Is that what you mean?
Gear? That was actually Sean’s question, but…
Oh, yeah. Oh, Sean, sorry. And it could be like, but that was something that I hadn’t considered.
And it actually kind of moves on to my next question. How do you guys, because of the internet, people are allowed to do this from home, how do you feel about the fact that a home studio is pretty much a given necessity now?
We think it’s absolutely freaking fantastic.
From our perspective, it’s people that make a living designing, setting up, troubleshooting, you know, all that stuff, sooth saying.
Yeah, and teaching people how to use it. It’s fabulous for us.
It’s a good thing for us.
Because honestly, well, go ahead.
No, I mean, you can speak to it from a voice actor’s perspective. For me, my entire business is based on the fact that people have to have a home studio. I would not do what I do without it, from a voice actor’s perspective.
Well, from a voice actor’s perspective, it’s tremendously, you know, it gives you a tremendous amount of freedom. It allows you to be, you know, an entrepreneur, you know, that sort of thing. So, but you have to know, it’s one of those important pieces of your voice over business.
You know, you’ve got to be a good business person, understand marketing and bookkeeping. You have to have talent. You’ve got to be a good voice actor because there’s no room for not knowing what you’re doing because, you know, your auditions are going to get round filed when they listen to The Slate.
And it’s important to have a good sounding home studio that you have rapid access to. And not something it’s like, oh, I got to take it down. I got to set it up again, take it down.
You want some, you want a permanent recording space that’s dedicated in your place of residence. And whether it’s an apartment, you know, your home, you know, a motel out on Route 66 somewhere, you’ve got to have that. And you’ve got to know how to use it right.
There’s a few basic things that if you understand, you can succeed at it. But you’ve got to understand what’s behind those basics. And that’s generally what George and I like to teach.
I mean, we physically set things up, but we like teaching people how to use it. Although I don’t know, maybe you don’t teach them as much. So in case something goes wrong, you’re the one they have to call.
I know you guys are far more noble than that. But since we’re on the topic of education, what are some sort of misconceptions that you are always trying to steer, like a new talent away from?
You need a mic preamp. Yeah, you need a TLM 103.
You need a tube mic preamp.
Tubes, yeah, I want to use tubes. Why?
You need a mixer.
Yeah, you need a mixer. You need…
You need a compressor.
Yeah, front-end processing. I got an Apex 286. It’s like, why?
Just the other day, I told someone to unhook their Apex channel from their system.
I do it all the time. Yeah, it happens to me at least once a week. And the thing that we do, and as troubleshooters, and the way you troubleshoot, and I learned this from Mr. Soman, my eighth grade power mechanic shop teacher.
You gotta ask questions and you gotta go in the order of how things work. And maybe we don’t think about that, but troubleshooting is, why are you doing this? Why are you doing that?
So most of these questions are very cart before the horse mentality is what you’re saying.
Exactly. A lot of people are getting information off the internet and YouTube. And the factor I like to mention is that, somebody may be an expert in a home studio, their own.
And the fact of the matter is, every room is different, every voice is different. People talk louder, people talk softer, the materials, the room that you’re recording in is different. And there is no one set thing to make something, to make your audio up to a professional standard in that particular room.
And it really has to be done in a customized way.
Well, with that in mind, I know how you guys like to keep it simple. What would you say are the bare minimums somebody needs in order to start a home studio?
I mean, quiet.
What?
I mean, quiet is expensive.
Ultimately.
Yeah, it can be very expensive unless you live in the boonies and you just start it out somewhere really, really quiet. Yeah, if you happen to live in a very quiet area in a quiet home with no animals and children and a very quiet air conditioner, Or furnace, depending on where you are. Whatever it is, then you’re lucky.
You’re like way ahead of the game because noise is the enemy of recording. And it’s, yes, there is software that takes noise out pretty effectively, but still to this day, we really wanna have clean audio and noise is the problem. So if you start out with a place that’s quiet, the rest is gravy because you can get, and I’m gonna say it right now, a USB microphone that will sound really freaking good.
We’ve done USB microphone shootouts and I know that they can sound good. I’m not saying it’s the way to go, but for some people who are really technologically averse, which seems to be everybody. Like we know for a fact that Maurice LaMarche uses an Apogee mic in his walk-in closet, right?
He told us that on the show.
And his car, yes.
And holding in his hands.
Yes, yeah, this is happening.
But he’s Maurice LaMarche, he can get away with that.
Well, I mean, that’s something else to talk about, but I mean, a USB mic or a very affordable Audio-Technica mic, I don’t think there’s a mic from the Audio-Technica line that is bad. Like even the least expensive…
The 2020 can be a little noisy.
It’s okay, it’s not the…
You go up to the 2035, and I’ve been recommending that to people.
The non-USB ones. Right, yes. The USB stuff can be a little noisy.
Non-USB, you can start with a 20 or a 2035, I love. That’s one I really like to recommend. In fact, I made a custom package with B&H that has a 2035 and the interface is a Steinberg UR12, which is like 80 bucks.
And that’s a really clean starter setup that works beautifully well. And then a good, decent pair of headphones.
And like we were talking about before, a lot of people, they want to reach for the industry standards like the 103s and stuff like that, but that setup’s already past $1,000. You just listed off a $200 setup that sounds perfectly professional.
Right. In the right environment.
Right, in the right environment. Yes, yes, exactly. So that can be as inexpensive or as expensive as you make it.
Right, well, I’m of the belief, and I repeat this a trillion times a week, is that 95% of the quality of your audio is dependent on the acoustical signature of the room that you recorded. Absolutely. And it’s not the microphone.
And another 20%, we’re gonna have 130% when we’re done with this, but another 20% is the mic technique, placement and technique.
Right. And those are the factors that really affect audio. And when you say words like industry standard, my immediate reaction is, what industry are you talking about?
Yeah, and if you’re talking, I think people have a big misconception, especially if they are experienced talent but haven’t recorded on their own before, they think that they have to have a nice room with a couch and guitars hanging on the wall and windows and a couple of fabulous babes hanging out or whatever it is that goes on in a recording studio.
Yeah, those commercial studios are there to impress the client and really wow them and make them feel good about spending $300 an hour for studio time. And your home studio is designed to do one job really well and that is make you sound really clean, accurate, and well, as Dan says, like you, sound like you.
And I think people get, they have a misconception about what it is that they’re trying to do. And the fact of the matter is, is nobody needs to see how the sausage is made. They only hear it.
That’s right. I love the sausage making analogy. It’s one of my favorites.
It makes complete sense.
And is there a point guys where having what’s so called an industry standard is actually a bad idea? Because my personal situation, you may have heard the last episode, I got a TLM 103 in here with me and it was a mess because it was way too sensitive and did not work at all for my space.
Right.
Right.
When you’re using a mic like that, that was designed for being used in a studio environment, you know, really high end productions. It is extremely sensitive and it has a pretty wide pickup pattern. So you have to have a good room, very low noise to get a good sound out of that mic in most cases.
The other air quotes again in his true standard mic is the Sennheiser 416. But that became an industry standard because of the use of it in promo by Ernie Anderson in the 70s. And that mic just sort of stuck around because of his use of that mic in the 70s.
And it was just became the Hollywood promo mic and trailer mic.
It just has some interesting mic technique that’s involved to make it sound good. And you have to be extremely on mic. You can’t get sloppy with mic placement and get off to the side and it sounds really bad really quick.
So those are two mics that have arguably become industry standards, at least in the promo trailer commercial world. But it doesn’t require those kind of mics to get good voice over recordings.
It’s not in the least. And it’s not the mic. There’s no microphone out there that enhances your performance.
There’s nothing that’s going to… You’re going to turn on the mic and suddenly you sound like Jon Hamm. It’s just not that you can’t read like or sound like Jon Hamm, yet people believe that.
Because they watch YouTube and then it’s like, well, this is the best mic for voice… There’s no such thing as the best or… From my point of view and probably from George’s, there is the worst and then there’s everything else.
There’s a lot of bad mics, which we don’t need to get into the bad mics, but there are definitely a number of bad ones that just don’t work. I’m going to name one, because it’s been a punching bag for years. The Blue Snowball.
Oh, the Snowball.
It’s a pretty bad USB mic. But let’s also have some context. It’s also one of the first.
Right.
I don’t know if it’s the first. I think the Samson…
The CO1U was the first….
is maybe the first. They’re both rather lousy, but they’re also over 10 years old, I think, now, in terms of when they were designed.
I had one in 2006.
Yeah.
And people are still buying them for some reason.
Because they’re sold at like Apple stores.
And Best Buy and… Yeah, for nothing. Yeah.
You know what’s fantastic, and you guys heard it, is that that Blue Raspberry, as far as the USB mic goes?
There’s an example of evolution of technology, right? The Snowball, old technology, noisy, no proper gain control. The Blue Raspberry is an evolution of an evolution of USB mics.
They’ve had many, many mics in between those two. Yeah. And the Raspberry is like…
Again, I haven’t tried them. We haven’t gotten one yet to try, but I know you have, Paul.
So Blue is listening, which please send this one.
Send this one over. We’ll give it the rundown.
I’ll take another.
It’s a great mic. It’s a really surprisingly good mic, if you know how to use it.
Yeah. In fact, last week, I had a directed session where I used it because I was messing around with my gear and wasn’t set up with the interface. So I used the Blue Raspberry that was sitting right there in the booth and the client loved it and it’s on the web right now.
There you go.
Go for it.
If the mic is low noise and it’s reasonably accurate, you’re good. Put it in a good booth or a good acoustical space, put it in the right spot and talk.
Yep.
You’re good. There we go. That’s it.
Good night, everybody. Can we sell that last sentence for $9.99?
Sean, you had some questions about industry events, didn’t you?
Oh, yeah. So I was just curious because I know you guys love going to NAMM and NAB and other conferences with lots of new innovative audio tech. Is there anything that’s coming out this year that you’re really excited about?
Well, it’s expensive stuff, and whether it’s relevant to Voice Over or not… I mean, to geeks like us, especially George, he loves going to that stuff because it’s cool and it’s fun and it’s at a very professional level. And if somebody’s at a professional level, that kind of gear is kind of cool.
Well, I’m going to name one thing that if it wasn’t so dang expensive, I would tell everybody to go out and buy this thing, and I’ll back that up with an actual review of the product when I get one because, again, I don’t like to cold, like just write out and out, say, buy this thing until I’ve really used it.
Can I guess what it is, George?
Go.
Ahead. Is it the MixPre, the sound devices?
We were very impressed by that.
That’s not what I was going to say, actually. It’s really awesome. The thing that was the most innovative to me and the most amazing was the Yellowtech, it’s called the PUC Mike Lea.
It’s a weird name. It’s made in Germany.
Is it like a mounting system, right?
No, no, not at all. The PUC is an acronym for something. I don’t know what it stands for, but it’s an audio interface.
But what makes it stand alone that I’m aware of is it has the most amazing automatic gain controlling system I’ve ever seen. Normally AGC or auto gain is horrible. It’s not good.
If you’ve ever used a cheesy… Well, actually almost any video camera where the audio goes up and down and the noise gets hissy and then it goes down, you know what I’m talking about about. But this thing intelligently adjusts the gain control on the fly without pumping up and down the background noise.
It’s absolutely amazing technology. Unfortunately it comes at a cost. It’s about, I think, 900 bucks.
There’s judgment after all.
It’s no joke. It’s the standard of college. If they ever decide to license the technology to somebody else, maybe someday in the future they’ll do that and it becomes a $200 unit, it would be just a killer device.
It is really amazing. It will de-stress the voice actor’s job of recording themselves tremendously. You literally set it to auto and that’s it.
You do not have to ever set gain after that. It’s really amazing.
So that’d be extremely useful if you’re doing very different energy reads or styles of reads, like an animation versus an audiobook.
Animation, video games, that sort of thing.
It would be awesome for video games.
Yeah, because usually what you have to do with video games, if you know you’re going to be doing a lot of loud stuff, and I have, the script calls for scream or you’ve got to do something very loud. You’re shouting to somebody across the street. Usually what you’ll do is once you learn good mic technique, you can back off the mic or you can hit like a 10 dB or 20 dB pad on your interface and some mics actually have a 20 dB or 10 dB pad on them.
But that’s something you have to do and you’ve got to plan ahead.
It’s engineering gymnastics. You have to constantly switch your brain from actor to engineer back and forth. It’s a lot to think about.
So you end up setting it… Yeah, well, you end up setting the game something, you end up having to set the game really low. So then it doesn’t clip when you’re yelling.
But then when you’re doing, so get over here, I’m going to rip your brains out. Lines something like that. It’s way down to like minus 30 or something.
And so it’s in the noise. So it’s difficult recording that stuff well. And this is going to make it, the technology like that’s going to make it easier.
But it’s just a little inaccessible. And it’s actually hard to get. It’s only carried by a couple of companies in the US.
It’s very, it’s hard to get. So I’m going to get one and test it out. But the Sound Devices Mix Pre-3, really cool in terms of its feature set, what it can do.
And again, another, you don’t want to test out in the real world, but that thing was really sweet.
Very cool. Well, since you, like, you really get the sense that you guys, you don’t want, like, you understand that everyone has a unique budget and you really kind of, like, you don’t encourage anyone to spend more money than necessary. I’m curious what sort of are your favorite recommendations at both like sort of a budget mind and an aspiration-minded equipment.
It can be mics or interfaces or both.
Well, you know, I mean, we already mentioned that, you know, we both like to tell people, look, you know, an Audio Technica 2035 and, you know, maybe, you know, the… Was it the…
Steinberg UR.
The Steinberg UR thing.
You have some others you like too, right?
Well, I like the Scarlett 2i2.
Still do to this day.
Still do to this day.
Version 2, I hear, is much improved too.
Much improved, I gotta go get one. A Yamaha, if, you know, for people who maybe be doing podcasting, a Yamaha AGO3 or AGO6, which George recommended to me, and I immediately ran over to Banjo Emporium and bought one.
Yeah, we both use those as well.
Yeah, and that’s my at-desk interface, because where I do webinars and stuff like that. It’s important to be able to play audio from your computer into the sound mix that you’re doing.
Back over to GoToMeeting or whatever it is you’re using.
Right, GoToMeeting or Zoom or whatever. And-
For what it does, I haven’t found anything as affordable or easy to use. It’s pretty incredible, actually.
Yeah, and for doing remote sessions, I mean, it’s great. If you’re doing it, you do it by Skype or Zoom or something.
I sent Rick Wasserman to Colorado with an AGO3 and some moving blankets and some PVC pipe. I mean, literally. He has a PVC pipe booth with some blankets, an AGO3 and his trusty Sennheiser 416, and he’s doing his Mad Men.
Well, that show’s not on the air, but whatever AMC thinks… He’s doing all of his AMC stuff from a house in Creed, Colorado, where he’s there for the summer doing Repertory Theater. Wow.
It works.
He was on the show a couple weeks ago when I wasn’t here, but I was on an airplane getting little tidbits of what’s going on on the show, and then he said… It’s my dog walked in and he goes, Tinky.
Even my wife laughed at that one.
He has an awesome voice.
He does. He really does.
Yeah. That’s the entry-level stuff. We mentioned to Mike that there’s the Harlan Hogan VO1A, which we’re using today.
We’re talking into that very, Mike, as we speak to you.
If you want to step up one level from the AT 2035, this is a little more expensive, but a beautiful sounding, really nice sounding microphone.
And Harlan designed it specifically for a voiceover. People don’t realize that most of the equipment that we use was never designed for voiceover. It was designed for recording music.
And it has a workflow. A lot of the software that people use has a workflow for recording music. Oh yeah.
Pro tools. Yeah, pro tools, which we could have an hour long discussion about. And I’ll just recuse myself from that discussion.
Well, I want to start another discussion because you do have some talent who, they start with pro tools and then they fight learning anything else. What do you think is the reasoning for that?
Because once you learn a system, and especially pro tools, which was exceedingly difficult to learn, I mean, there’s a learning curve on there.
It’s designed to be like an old school, multi-track-based studio with walk sends and everything else.
Right, with as many channels as you have. And I went to school to learn how to use a recording studio like that. And there are people who go to college to do it.
And it’s not a skill you learn overnight, and it’s not a skill you learn in a month. It’s a skill you learn over many, many years because there are so many little tidbits to Pro Tools and some of these other multi-channel DAWs.
It’s got a tremendous amount of tools that once you’ve learned to use them and you’ve kind of put them in your muscle memory, it’s very, very hard to abandon those skills or adapt those skills to something else.
Unless you really hate doing all the things that you have to do in Pro Tools.
I mean, if it’s all you know and it’s all you’ve ever used, and you’re good at it, and it’s reliable, and it gets the job done, why change it? But I have changed a lot of clients from Pro Tools. Pro Tools has gotten a lot more reliable over the years.
As of lately, it’s far less problematic than it used to be. Now every time I launch it, it just tends to work, and I have little issues now.
It tends to work?
Yeah, it does work. It does work very reliably now. Pro Tools 12 does.
But it was a real pain in the neck for a really long time. So we were all looking for stuff like Twisted Wave that demystified recording and editing tremendously.
Well, yeah, and I’m actually really grateful for when I decided to get involved with Voice Over because the equipment was far more accessible, and it’s easier to use than ever, and it was right around the time that Twisted Wave was released, and it’s my favorite DAW, easily. It’s just so easy to use.
Yeah, I mean, it has a reduced feature set, clearly. I mean, certainly a lot less features in Pro Tools and Adobe Audition.
But it has everything you need.
It really does have everything you need. I mean, Audition…
And I think it’s a lot more powerful than people realize. Like, you actually take the time to figure out all the features. I know Jack DiGoli has got a wonderful webinar on all the things you can do with it, as do you guys.
Yeah, we both teach it.
Yeah, I mean, I needed it yesterday. I did a very long narration that was about an hour long that had to be cut into 135 different slides.
Twisted wave is perfect.
It’s fabulous. You mark it, you can cut and paste the gaps.
Split by markers.
Split by markers. That’s process. What used to take three hours now takes, it took me an hour to record it, an hour and a half to edit it into that format and go split by markers.
Whoosh! Out the door, my client is thrilled as he can possibly be.
Massive, massive time saver.
Yeah.
We’re big on time saving stuff. I mean, to me, audio quality always is important, right? But next to that, it’s reliability and then how much time is it gonna save you?
You’re not getting paid by the hour, folks, to be voice, to be engineers. You have to be fast.
One of those things that I see a lot is people will send me audio and they’ll send me their chain and they’ll say, well, I record on this and then I transfer to that and then I transfer to this. So I’m like, and you’re doing this, why?
A lot of hoop jumping.
Because it’s efficient.
But if it is, I mean, there occasionally is an argument for using multiple programs and multiple systems that I’ve seen convincing, but most of the time, it’s an unnecessarily number of steps.
Right.
It slows you down.
Circling back to gear one more time, I don’t know if you’ve listened to the show, I think George has-
Paul, are you gear obsessed?
Yeah, that’s where we’re going.
With the questionable purchase of the wing?
Yeah. So have you guys had any questionable gear purchases of your own that you regretted either immediately or after using for a few weeks in your own studios?
That’s a hard question. I mean, George is an engineer and he buys gear, and he plays with it and stuff like that.
Well, I know you guys have to try a lot for your clients too, to test it out and stuff like that.
Things that I’ve, maybe the things that I’ve recommended and regretted later. I recommended WaveLab by Steinberg to one of my clients. And I recommended it to her.
She’s on Windows. And at the time, I thought it was the best simple recording solution. And I used White WaveLab extensively a long time ago.
But then when I have to now teach it to somebody and troubleshoot it, remotely years later, I realized bad choice. It’s great software, it really is, but it’s just in many ways mind-numbingly frustrating. It’s just, it’s very German.
And it’s very… And it’s just overly… It’s basically Twisted Wave took the WaveLab thing and made it Mac friendly and way less complicated to use, and then puts all the right tools in the right places.
WaveLab doesn’t, it’s a little harder to use. So that’s one thing I’m kind of regret recommending.
Yeah, of course, Ocean Audio came out, which is really cool, but that’s not something we would ever regret, because that’s a really cool little program. It’s free. It’s free, which is why we also like it.
It’s free.
Audacity has its back.
Gear wise, I do a lot of research, and I do a lot of testing. I don’t have a lot of regrets, but I used to recommend a DBX 286, which I know you have now, Paul, you’ve been playing with.
Actually, I tore it out, based on…
Oh, you tore it out again.
You finally sold me.
Didn’t it go in and out, then in, again and then out again?
Like the who? The old you now?
Yes, it did, actually.
It’s not a bad piece of… I mean, I used to recommend it pretty widely, but I’ve kind of moved away from that one. Man, I can tell you about video streaming equipment that I don’t recommend anymore.
And that’s a whole nother deal.
I won’t go down that route.
That’s been our current curse.
Well, it appears you guys are just efficient. You’re just too efficient and I’m clearly diseased. So we’ll just leave it at that.
We can’t help you with gas, Gear Acquisition Syndrome. We really can’t help you. If you won’t listen to us, what are we gonna do?
I always listen to you. It just takes several weeks.
I mean, gear is gear. And again, as George said, does it make you more efficient as opposed to, does it change who you are? Does it change you from voice actor A to John Krasinski?
John Krasinski. It’s not gonna do that. It’s got nothing to do with it.
And people are just lost on that. So there’s never been a piece that I’ve regretted having. There’s stupid stuff I bought because it was like cute, but I never intended to use it for Voice Over.
But I know you’ve, because I remember you had a lot of the Apogee stuff too, like the one in the, did you have the duet too?
I never had a duet. I’d like the Apogee mic. I still have mine.
I use it when I’m on the road, if I record on the road.
I know you have very firm opinions about doing it on vacation.
Yeah. And yeah, I’m on vacation. I don’t want to do Voice Over.
I mean, if you can do an audition on your iPhone in your car, who cares? But you’re not going to be able to produce, add to something that you did in your own home studio somewhere else. It can’t be done.
You’re not going to be able to match the ambiance. Even if you’re as good at it as I am, it’s really hard.
I call it the black diamond level of voiceover recording. Trying to do it from a hotel remotely or something. It’s much harder.
Yeah, you can’t do it.
I guess another piece of gear that comes to mind when you mention Apogee, I did use to recommend the Apogee One a lot.
Yeah, that got kind of quirky.
But I found it to be quirky and I didn’t like the little proprietary cable it has, the dongle thing. And then their drivers started to get unstable sometimes and that drove people crazy. It just got too flaky.
And I stopped recommending that thing because of it.
Interesting to note though, but one point about this is that when I was at Voice 2010, I think, and I met the president of Apogee and I had a One and I really liked it. I was running it through the Eureka without the compressor and he was just using that as an interface. And as a preamp.
And he’s like, you know, we spent hundreds of thousands of dollars developing the preamp inside the One, go naked. And I’m like, excuse me?
So he was one of the first guys that really said to you, plug your mic into this thing.
Right, just plug…
And listen.
Right, just plug the mic in.
I won’t argue with that. The Apogee preamps and converters are stellar. Like they really are a gold standard.
You know, no doubt about it.
And so my belief is that you don’t need any front-end processing, just a good preamp interface and your microphone. And that should be the extent of your chain. And every time we pull people away from front-end processing or a channel strip, like an Apex, it just makes such a dramatic difference in their audio.
And usually it’s like, God, it sounds better.
And there’s sanity.
Yeah.
It sounds different. But like you were saying, I know you’re always like, get the gear that makes you sound like you. Not that makes you sound better or your best self.
Like we want accuracy, not flattery.
Right. That’s who they’re hiring you for you. What is unique about you?
Not, you know, does your booth sound better than this guy’s booth? And the booths don’t sound good. Booths just exist to make you sound like you.
If that makes any sense.
No, it makes perfect sense to me anyway.
Drop the mic.
Yeah.
Don’t drop the mic.
Nevermind.
All right, so thanks again, George and Dan for being here with us today. Before you leave, how can people get ahold of you if they want to use your services?
Well, they can, you know, my website is homevoiceoverstudio.com and I’ve got a contact button there that you can, you know, email me directly. But I also have the Specimen Collection Cup. And it’s actually, you go to the page, it’s like, son of a gun, it’s the Specimen Collection Cup.
If you want to send me some raw audio, five seconds of open mic silence, read something and give me 10 seconds of silence, open mic, so I can hear how you’re addressing the mic, hear the acoustics in the room, hear how much background noise you have. And if I think it sounds great, I will tell you so, and I do on occasion.
Refrigerators running?
Oh, refrigerators?
It’s like, I now know the difference between what a refrigerator in the next room sounds like in a ceiling fan or an air conditioner. It’s amazing the noises that dribble into people’s homes. And if you look at it on a spectrograph, you can generally tell what it is, whether it’s electronic or whether it’s something mechanical.
But you can send me a specimen if I think you need some help. Then we can set up a consultation and we’ll get your booth sounding the way it should.
And I am available through my parent company, which is Edge Studio. There’s a website, edgestudiotechnology.com, and I provide services like Dan’s. I kind of go a little nuts with the options, so I have a lot of different flat rate services and different ways you can work with us.
One-on-ones, do the webinar thing as well. You can send in a sound check as well for me, a similar process, and you can have me make a processing template for Twisted Wave, which you should really only use for auditions, if at all, unless the client asks otherwise. And a whole bunch of different ways to work with me.
I also get to design studios from time to time, and right now I’m actually in the middle of seven different studio build-out projects in different stages. A couple here in LA, a couple elsewhere. And that’s actually where I’m going.
Immediately after we hang up the source connect is running over to Burbank to check out a studio that’s been under work since… Oh man, I think it’s been a year. Yeah, a year.
So, I mean, George and I are literally competitors.
Yeah, but we’re not.
I mean, we…
It doesn’t sound like it.
We are and we aren’t.
We are and we aren’t. I mean, we consult with each other. Nobody knows more about home studios on God’s green earth than the two of us.
And we don’t say that from an egotistical point of view. We just know this is… We’ve been doing this longer than anybody else and we understand the environment.
We have different styles. We have different personalities and we have different, you know, just backgrounds and people tend to gravitate to one or the other. Sometimes people bounce back and forth.
Yeah, that’s happened a few times.
Like both of us have.
Well, George said this. Well, Dan said that.
What the heck is he talking about?
You’re killing me, Smalls.
Dan said it was okay. Well, again, guys. Drop the mic.
Yeah, really. Again.
And they’re out of mics.
It’s been so awesome to have you guys on. I can’t believe you agreed to it. Not sure what you were thinking, but we really appreciate it.
And hopefully we’ll get a chance to talk again soon.
Well, we know we will. We love you guys. You guys have been devoted fans of ours and it’s just been a lot of fun to see you guys put together a show and kind of follow in our footsteps in a little way.
It’s been a lot of fun to see it. I do listen to you guys pretty regularly in my podcast, Blair.
Yeah, George is a podcast addict.
I’m in the car a lot, so I do listen to a lot.
Well, PAS is a lot more affordable than GAS, so…
Podcast Acquisition Center, very nice, exactly.
It’s been our pleasure, guys.
Thank you guys so much. I know you have to get out of here for some other appointments, but I know Paul and I have benefited a great deal from your podcast, and…
Tell me everything I know. I’m fond of saying…
Except for trying out gear you don’t need. Well…
We can’t help you with that.
Yeah, if you’ve got the budget to do it, and you enjoy doing it, do it.
Is this your hobby? If it’s fun… Yes, it’s fun.
It’s for the…
It’s for the fans.
It’s for the fans.
It’s for the fans.
There you go, Paul. Is that what it says on your tax, on your schedule C?
I paced it to the window of the Whisperer.
For the fans. Again, yeah. It’s perspective.
If you’re buying the gear because it’s fun to you and it doesn’t stress you out, it’s actually fun trying to go for it, right? Have fun.
Go out and play. I mean, and that’s something that I tell people when I work with them and I teach them some of the initial things that they need to do with software. It’s like, here are the basics.
Go out and play.
Once you know the rules, then you’re allowed to break the rules.
Break the rules. Absolutely.
All right. Wow. Thanks again to Dan and George for that awesome interview.
Once again, you can check them out at vobs.tv or you can go to their Facebook page at VOBS and request to become a member.
Yes. Thanks once again to George and Dan. Like I said, it was a dream come true.
They are my VO idols and I’m so glad we were able to get them on the show.
Well that’s going to wrap us up for this episode of The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
We hope that you’ll stay tuned because we’ve got some great content coming up. We’ll be interviewing a very successful voice talent and coach, Paul Stracquerda.
And another future episode, we have Terry Daniel coming on. A voice over coach and voice over talent out of Minneapolis. That should be fun.
Excellent. I can’t wait for those guys. I’ve studied with both of them and they’re incredible talents and I’m sure they have a lot of great strategies and tips for our listeners.
So join us next time for episode 12.
That’s it for this episode. Have a great day everybody.
Bye everybody.
Thanks for listening to The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress. To follow along, please visit www.vometer.com.

Episode 10 of The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Hi everybody, and welcome to episode 10 of The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
So this is an interesting episode. We’re gonna actually revisit a topic that we’ve talked about before on the podcast, and that is acoustics. So we have our guest, Adil Aliev from Vocalboothtogo, coming up in about 20 minutes.
But I feel like acoustics is certainly deserving of another podcast. What about you, Paul?
Yeah, there’s never a reason to stop learning about acoustics in my mind, and I’m sure Adil will agree.
And it’s one of those things that you can easily make small adjustments to as you continue to improve your space and improve your sound.
And as we talked about, it’s probably the most important part of your audio recording chain, so it definitely is worth revisiting.
So, before we start talking about our topic for the day, why don’t you tell us what you’ve been up to, Paul? You’ve said you had some exciting announcements you wanted to share with our listeners.
So yeah, number one, I finished my longest audio book to date. It was just under nine hours, eight hours and like 55 minutes, and it was pretty exciting. I also did it under a pseudonym, so I won’t give away too many clues, but for any of our listeners that are Simpsons fans, if you remember the episode where Homer decided to get into corporate America and gave himself a new corporate executive nickname, you’ll be able to find me.
His slogan was, I found it on my hairdryer.
I’ll just give it away, why don’t you?
Well, you know, the Simpsons are a little bit…
It had a very entertaining guest spot by Bill Clinton or a Bill Clinton impersonator as well. I think that’s enough hints for that one.
So Easter egg for the audience, go out there and check that out. And then, let’s see, I had another audio book that I landed on freelancer.com of all places. And it was a paid per hour, paid per finished hour book and paid pretty well actually.
And I was surprised to get that. And then finally, so I signed on with a large e-learning company about a year ago. And they do all kinds of different e-learning projects and videos.
And I was on their roster, quote unquote. And we talked about what that could mean. And more importantly, what it doesn’t mean.
It doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to get work right away. So almost a year later, I finally got the call that they were giving me my first project. And that led to my first live directed session with a client.
So that was a lot of fun. I’ve done obviously remotes for the podcast and appearing on other shows like VOBS, but I’ve never actually done one with a client. And I’m happy to say it came off swimmingly and so much easier when you have somebody directing you that knows what they’re doing.
So yeah, that’s pretty much it for me. A couple of exciting things though and milestones for my career really.
Very cool. And so we’ve talked about remote recording on the podcast a little bit. And honestly, we could have a whole episode about it.
But just like the name indicates, you are talking with someone either through Skype or even a phone patch, and you’re being directed remotely while you record in your studio. So I know Paul has been trying to figure out an elegant solution for that for a very long time. So I’m curious, Paul, how did you get it to finally work?
Well, like you said, to explain a little bit more in detail to those listeners who may not be familiar, there’s a number of ways you can do it. What you basically want to do is be able to hear the person on the other end talking to you and giving you direction as if they were in the room with you. So you probably need headphones.
Well, you definitely need headphones unless you somehow have a magical way to hear through walls. And then you need a microphone that can do two-way communication. Ironically, because I was selling and purchasing a bunch of gear that we’ll talk about in a second in our Questionable Gear Purchases, I used my Blue Raspberry USB mic for this gig.
Because it was the easiest solution. I was a little nervous because it was the first time I was dialing into a client. I wanted to make sure I could get it down right.
And I knew that would be the easiest. It’s a USB mic that plugs into the computer. It has its own headphone jack.
So I said, you know what? I’m just going to go with the easiest solution so I don’t screw things up. The less switches and dials to mess with, the better.
And it worked like a charm. I used the Blue Raspberry. They said it sounded great.
They’re putting it together now, and it should be airing in a couple of days.
That’s great.
I mean, as we’ve said before… Sorry, I was going to say, as far as the technology, we just use Skype. I use Skype as a phone patch, and that’s a way you can have somebody talk to you.
So you could use your actual phone in here if you have an actual landline that can reach your booth. That will work. But I just had Skype playing through my headphones from the computer and then recording only my side of the conversation on my regular DAW, which is Twisted Wave.
Yeah, there’s a number of ways to do that. I have and I’ve seen other actors. I’ve actually had Skype up on my iPad, and then I used a little mic that plugged into that to improve the sound.
So the director could still get a very good idea of what I sounded like, and then I just had my headphones plugged into that, and that was sort of freeing up my computer from having to juggle recording and Skype at the same time. And depending on the director, usually they won’t mind if it’s not the exact same studio quality as your mic. Once you reach a certain level, you might have to get a more advanced setup where you can do playback without getting a feedback loop or maybe even using something like Source Connect or ISDN.
But that’s a topic for another day.
Yeah, and I will say, make sure that your sound is consistent. I happen to know this mic sounds nearly as good as my studio mic, which is why I have it in the first place, so I wasn’t hesitant to use it. But I wouldn’t recommend buying any old USB mic off the shelf just for this purpose and using it as your go-to live direction mic just because it’s a USB mic.
So I just want to be careful of what I said earlier.
I got to say, you’re very much a champion for the USB mic, Paul. You’ve had a lot of success with them, I’ve got to say.
Yeah, I mean, there’s ones out there that have really come a long way. I think the Blue Raspberry is one of them. We mentioned before I was on the VOBS episode with a sample, and I’ve used it for several auditions that have landed me gigs.
Well, I think, I mean, we’ve been at this point where I’ve heard people using AT2020s or Apogee mics or Blue Yetis for paid work for several years now. And the technology continues to get better, and those models are still considered professional enough to use for most projects.
Yeah, and I’ll throw this out there. I know he doesn’t mind because I asked him. Our audio coach, audio book coach, Sean Pratt, who has over 900 titles now recorded, they were all done on a Blue Yeti.
Yeah, you really don’t need to spend that much to get a good sound these days. But he also built a very good space to use it with. So keep in mind…
Hey, full circle. Back to the topic at hand.
And talking about consistency in recording, which acoustics play a big part in. So current events for me… As you know, last episode I talked about signing with an agency here in Washington.
And I had to do a number of signing contracts and filling out other acceptance materials. And I finally got all those mailed off today. And then last week, as part of signing with this agency, I had to get new headshots.
So, I mean, I had gotten headshots before to promote myself and to promote my business. And that was… I found a professional photographer, was in and out, had a pleasant experience in like an hour.
This one took like seven hours.
Oh my gosh.
It was a seven-hour shoot from like 1 to 8 p.m. And had to drive down to Seattle and back afterwards. I was just freaking exhausted. Tried on like maybe a dozen different outfits or ensembles, couple of suits and things that I would never actually wear in real life.
Did you get to do the George Costanza on the couch pose with just the boxers?
I am not in that kind of shape yet.
So did your agent pay for the shoot, or did you have to pay for that out of pocket?
That was out of pocket, but as you kind of transition into this on-camera world, you begin to realize that so much of this is tax deductible. I mean, since if you’re doing on-camera work, your body is sort of your calling card. All sorts of things that you might not have considered, like gym memberships or personal training, those can be written off as well, because it’s all about improving your instrument.
Always consult with your tax attorney or CPA.
Yes, we are not tax professionals, but we have played a few.
Is there anything else going on in your world?
Anything else? I’m currently working on a couple of very large corporate narration tours for a returned German client. They’re a very nice production company, and I love working with them, and I appreciate the work.
Other stuff, I’ve just gotten a lot of large projects in this week, mainly corporate narration or audio tours, so I’m really happy about that. Some of the language is a little difficult, kind of like verbal acrobatics, but other than that, it’s good work, and I’m really happy to do it.
Awesome. So as we mentioned, we will be getting back to our revisiting of acoustics and our guest Adil Aliev from vocalboothtogo.com. But first, we are going to have a VO Meter stick this week from Juan Esteves.
Hey, everybody, it’s time for the VO Meter shtick.
What did he say?
It’s time for the VO… Oh, never mind.
The VO Meter shtick?
Oh, got it.
Hello, VO friends. My name is Juan Esteves. I’m a bilingual voice actor from Puerto Rico, currently living in the suburbs of New York City.
I want to thank Paul and Sean for inviting me to be part of their podcast. Today, I want to share an interesting story about agents. Interesting because I don’t have an agent, or at least I don’t have a contract with one.
I do, however, work with an agent who sends me on auditions in Manhattan. Because of that, I’ve booked some nice jobs, so it has worked well so far. For the purposes of this story, we’ll call him Original Agent.
Recently, I got an email from the person who produced my commercial demo. Hey, I know an agent who’s looking for a bilingual actor. Are you interested?
Well, yeah, of course I’m interested. So I send them my demo. Their response is perfect.
I really like your demo, and I want to send you on an audition. Great! Then it gets better.
Do you have an agent? I say no, I don’t have an agent. Okay, then let’s see how the audition goes, and then maybe we can talk about representation.
The audition is the day after tomorrow. Everything feels good, very excited. So let’s call this one new agent.
The next morning, I get an email from old agent, which always puts a bounce in my step. He tells me he has an audition for me tomorrow. Tomorrow?
Wait a minute. Tell me it’s not the same one. Yes, it is the same one.
Ay, coño. I start getting a funny feeling in my stomach. When I write back and explain how I’m already going to this audition, well, let’s just say he doesn’t seem pleased.
We work so well together. And I always arrange your audition times so that they work around your full-time job, all of which is true. He wants me to go to the audition and sign in under his agency’s name.
Now I’m starting to feel even more uncomfortable. I don’t want to burn any bridges, so I explain as nicely as I can that I’ve already agreed with this other agent to sign in under his agency’s name. Of course, I do not reveal his name.
After some back and forth, old agent says, do what you think is right. I know Obi-Wan Kenobi said that to Luke Skywalker in the first Star Wars movie, but right now, I don’t feel the force is with me. But I’ve made my decision and I’m going to stick with the original plan.
It’s settled, right? Maybe not so much. Later in the day, I get another email from old agent.
The casting director for the audition says I need to sign in under old agent’s name, not new agent’s. It’s the casting director saying this, so it’s not open for discussion. Now, I don’t really know what’s going on here.
I have my suspicions, but what I think doesn’t matter at this point. It’s a mess and I need to clean it up. I see no alternative but to contact new agent about this situation.
His response doesn’t surprise me. All the people on their roster are exclusive and he doesn’t want to deal with all this territorial BS. Sorry, but it’s not going to work out.
I tell him I’m disappointed, but I understand and hope we can try again in the future under different circumstances. Now, I reach out to old agent and try to put things back the way they were. I tell him how much I value our relationship and that I hope we can keep working together as we have.
His next email is not about our relationship. It’s about the audition. It has been cancelled.
Of course it has. PS. After all that, things are back to normal with old agent.
The audition was rescheduled and I did go and signed in under his agency’s name. I didn’t get it. Ay caramba.
I just want to do VO that sounds so bonito. Doh.
So once again, that was Juan Esteves. Thanks so much, Juan. That was a great story.
And a cautionary tale that makes sure you have all your ducks in a row before trying to look for a new representation.
So I was actually really, really happy to hear this. Paul was telling me the fact, we had a really large information-packed episode last time with the wonderful Julie Williams. So we actually cut out our questionable gear purchase segment to make more time for her.
And people actually wrote us saying, what happened? Where did it go? So apparently a lot of people are enjoying our sort of foibles.
And I’m wondering if we’re sort of helping prevent, or people are sort of living through us so they don’t spend any money themselves.
Yeah, I’m gonna go with that as the reason that I keep buying stuff.
But I mean, we’ve joked about it before, but now we totally can. We could totally rationalize any purchases we make from now on. Okay, we are just about ready to delve into our topic of acoustics revisited for this episode.
But before that, we have our…
Questionable Gear Purchase.
I can start. And it’s bad. It’s really bad.
I went interface shopping and that sent me down a rabbit hole where I bought a whole bunch of interfaces, once again, trying to look for ways to make the podcast easier. So I bought a Scarlett 6i6 on Amazon, I think it was. Tried that out, it was okay.
It didn’t sound the best and I was having trouble getting enough gain for the dynamic mic I was using. So I sent that back, got a RME Babyface that I found used at Guitar Center for a great deal. And that has this Total Control software, I think it’s called, is it the brand name?
Total Control, I believe, is the… Total Mix. Total Mix, yes.
And it was just dizzying with all the inputs and all the different ways you can route stuff. It was so paralyzing to me that I couldn’t even figure out how to monitor the headphones on a single input. So having several jobs going on at the same time, which by the way, when you have jobs going on, it’s the worst time to switch gear.
And I just seem to never learn. So in order to simplify things…
Or if you would at least hold on to some gear to record with.
That may help too. So in order to, because I don’t do that, and I just jump into things with two feet all the time, I needed something that I could actually record with. So I had the RME Fireface and I went and bought another 6i6 locally on Craigslist.
So all within like the same week because I knew how to use it. So I went through the job I was doing. I think it was an e-learning gig.
Finished that and then got rid of both of those interfaces and bought an Apigee Duet 2 because I had been looking for one of those because I had heard that it had this loopback feature that made it easy to apply virtual inputs to, again, playback over the internet that we could use for the podcast or for a live direction. So I got that and figured out it really doesn’t do that, at least not to my knowledge and with me digging into the software. Now I will say the Apigee Duet does sound great.
It did everything I wanted to do sonically. It has enough gain to power dynamic any condenser and it sounds great, but ultimately it wasn’t solving my software problem. So I went as far off the deep end as I could find, at least without getting into the over $1,000 range and bought an Apollo Twin Solo, which a lot of people use and look to as a really good upgrade once they’ve established themselves and they’re ready to take that next step.
And that’s what I’m using right now.
Can I just gush about the Apollo for a second? So for people who don’t know, like there’s almost like this accepted tier of interfaces for people who are sort of looking to move away from the Focus Rides or the Steinberg units. And you may never actually come to that point, but these three units seem to be the most popular.
The three I just bought, you mean?
Yeah, the Apogee is definitely one of them. Or the Apogee, the Babyface. Those are great sort of more portable units, and they’re a little bit older tech, but they were still certainly very high quality.
And, but nowadays you’ve got ones like the Audion ID22, the Apollo Twin Solo, which like the Audion is supposed to have super clean preamps, but it’s sort of its own beast because it actually is, it’s got this integrated DSP system or digital signal processing. So basically you’re able to sort of emulate all sorts of preamps and other analog gear like compressors or limiters or equalizers within the box.
And that’s the reason I also wanted it because we’ve talked about this rumble problem I have, and I tried a channel strip that ultimately got kind of noisy. Oh, I should mention that, the DBX I talked about in the last episode, gone.
I mean, that thing that you loved more than any other piece of gear you’ve tried.
I did love it for a while, but I found when I was messing around with all these other interfaces, probably because they’re better quality, that it was introducing a hum into the recording that I did not think was there when I was using it with some of the more entry-level interfaces like the Focusrite and the Yamaha AGL3. But I found out that…
Oh, so you’re saying that the higher-level interfaces might have been quieter so that you could actually hear the inherent noise of that.
Exactly. Which I have to give credit to is what George Widom and Dan Linder were telling me was happening all along, and I just didn’t believe them. So I found out it was there.
So like you said, this internal DSP processing has been a godsend because all these classic preamps have been used in the industry for years are now available in this sort of virtual way. Like I’m using a Neve UA610B tube preamp right now, which is…
And that’s one of the free ones that comes with it, right?
It is, and it’s doing a great job. But then there also are some built-in channel strips or virtual channel strips that I plan on using. I have a call in with George.
He’s gonna help me set it up so I can get it right the first time without screwing things up too badly. And I think that will help me a lot with my processing out the rumble.
And that’s probably the main reason why I didn’t get the Apollo. As cool as it looks, I mean, it’s a shiny little silver box with a very bright or volume meter on it. It’s like got shining lights and everything.
But basically, if it was something that I need assistance to figure out, I was like, I probably don’t need it. So, but I’m happy for you. I mean, you deserve good gear.
And I’m glad that you’re having George help you out with it. What’s that?
Right, so there is one other selling point, and it’s Thunderbolt. So, it doesn’t go through the USB bus on the computer. So, if you have a lot of other things plugged into the USB bus in your computer, like a lot of us do, you know, webcams and maybe hubs or microphones.
Like sometimes I plug in my USB microphone. If you can get your interface not on that same bus in the computer, it helps a lot. And my Mac…
Oh, I had to get a new Mac, by the way, in order to make this work. So, more questionable gear. So, I have a new shiny iMac as well with a Thunderbolt connection.
So, now that’s how the Apollo is connected.
Very cool. And like in most modern Macs these days really don’t have very many USB ports, maybe like two or three at most. But they do have at least two Thunderbolt ports.
So, like you said, it’s a great way to free up those other ones.
Yeah, that helps. So, there’s a whole rabbit hole of microphones this past couple of months too. Do you want me to go through that or do you want to take a turn?
Well, I’ll start with the microphones.
Maybe you can tell the story that involves me as well.
Oh yeah, yeah, we can sort of bounce it back and forth. So, you guys know how I feel about the American-made CAD E100S. A lot of voice talent find this to be an amazing, popular microphone.
It got really popularized when VO blogger Paul Struquerda wrote a very stellar review of it. And since then, there’s been a couple of waves of voice talent who have bought it, who’ve been very happy with it. And unfortunately, when I ordered mine, I was in Japan and I finally got it after waiting like six weeks.
And then it was noisy. And this mic is supposed to be dead silent. It’s literally like they actually, in their marketing materials, they say lowest noise rating in its class.
And so basically any noise would have been unacceptable. But no, it was noisy. And after troubleshooting it for a couple of days, I decided to send it back.
And so they told me they sent me a second one and then a month goes by and they just tell me like, oh, we don’t know what happened to it. So it’s probably somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. And then my third one…
Wasn’t that around the same time as Fukushima?
Oh, no, that was a few years after Fukushima. You’re terrible. That’s awful.
Sorry.
Awful, awful, awful. Yeah. When is it?
Not too soon. But anyways, so that one got lost. And then they put in another order, but it never went in stock again.
So they just canceled it and gave me my money back. And then so I was very bitter for a couple of years. And then somebody was selling theirs, like a gently used one.
They had it for about a year without any problems. And they were selling it for $200, which is more than half off. And the lowest I’ve seen it for Mike in that condition.
So almost on impulse, I said I’d buy it and I did. And it was almost, I just wanted to know what it sounded like when it worked basically. And so I put it up with all my other mics.
At the time, I had like a big four mic shootout. It was that one. It was my Jay-Z J1, which I got as an alternative to the CAD.
And then my 416 and my Blue Mouse. And it actually scored pretty high. It was pretty much the second place next to the 416.
And then…
Yeah, I actually listened to that. And I think I thought it was the 416 before you told us.
Yeah, that’s right. Because even though I had said in my email… It was sort of a blind test, but Paul just assumed that I was listing them in order.
Right.
But yeah. And no, it sounded quite good. And I see why it’s often compared to the 416.
But it is a little bit darker. And it’s a little bit less aggressive. So it would be good for like long form stuff or like longer narration.
But anyways, so I had two good mics and then two okay mics. And I finally accepted that I was never going to get the amazing sound out of the mouse that I had always dreamed of. And Paul, I remember that you were interested in it.
So we decided to do a trade.
Yeah, because Paul’s a psycho. And I had just made a trade with a fellow voice talent to trade away my Sennheiser MKH 415 for a Neumann TLM 102. It was a Facebook post, and this talent said, hey, I had this 102.
I’m looking to trade for a 416. And basically my salesmanship skills talked him into taking the 415, which I think sounds pretty similar and maybe even a little better.
Well, to your credit, I feel like from everyone who’s recommended it or used it, they’ve said it sounds as good or better than the 416. So I don’t feel like you really, like, you didn’t jip him or anything.
No, I don’t think so. So we made that trade, and TLM 102 was a disaster in my space. It sounded, it picked up way too much of the boominess that I had trouble with, more of that rumble.
It was way too sensitive. So that’s when I called you up and said, let’s try and make a trade ourselves.
Yeah, and so, like, the costs are about the same what we paid for it, and so I was like, and the 102 was a mic that I always wanted to try. I mean, it’s so tiny and cute, and it’s an ointment. Like, I had never tried an ointment in my space before.
So I was like, why the hell not? And then a couple of days go by, and then it arrives, and I’m like, oh, wow, it’s a little bit bigger and a little bit heavier than I thought it would be.
And why was that?
And then I put it away, and then I’m like, now, wait a minute, it doesn’t… If you look at the 102, it’s got this very distinctive sort of like chrome metal ring just underneath the headbasket. And then, and that sort of sets it apart from other models like the TLM 103 or the TLM 49 and all the other stuff in the 1000 plus range.
But I was like, wait a minute, that didn’t look right. And then so I got the mic out of the case again, and then I looked at the side, and it says TLM 103. So not only did Paul not realize he had an industry standard in his booth that he hates, but the person who sold it to him didn’t realize they had a 103 instead of a 102.
And I mean, he hasn’t contacted you, right? He seems like he’s happy with his trade.
No, he told me he loved the 415 and was super happy with it.
I’m not sure if it was a typo, because we didn’t actually talk on the phone. We just emailed back and forth. So maybe there was a typo.
Maybe he always knew it was a 103. Maybe I’m an idiot and just didn’t read. I don’t even know.
No, I saw his post, and he didn’t even have pictures of the mic itself. At least if he did, I think I actually told him. I said, that’s a 103.
But I mean, I’m happy with it because I had been looking for a decent condenser for a long time. And I think the 103 does sound nicer on my voice than the Blue Mouse did. But it brings with it its own set of sensitivity issues because it’s a very sensitive mic.
And while I can use it occasionally in the space I have now, it is far more sensitive to ambient noise. And honestly, I don’t feel like I could use it consistently until I get an isolated booth.
Yeah, that was a problem I had too. Even though I thought it was 102, it was way too sensitive for my booth, where it was sucking up every possible low-end frequency. And it sounded maybe the muddiest mic I’ve ever had in here, which is saying something.
So that brings us to what I’m using now. We went ahead and made that trade actually a two-for-one deal with a little bit of bartering on some work going on, where you sent me both the Blue Mouse and the CAD E100S.
Well, yeah, because now I had two industry standards and a mic that I don’t really need. And I will say the CAD was pretty close. Basically, I just kept the 103 because I thought it would look better on paper.
And I wanted the CAD to go to someone who could actually use it and benefit from it.
Yeah, and I’m using it right now. And it sounds great. I actually really like the way it eliminates mouth noise for me.
I’m not sure why, but it’s the best condenser I’ve used to help eliminate some of the mouth clicks without having to do a whole lot of post-processing. Maybe it’s the way I positioned it.
I think both the mouse and the CAD sound really good on you. And I think something that they offer that I haven’t heard so much in other mics is that it’s very clear, but it’s gentle. It’s a little bit softer.
It’s not like right in your face. And that might be whatever levels you’re using right now. But I think it sounds like you, and it sounds nice.
Yeah, I agree.
Please hold on to these for a little bit, at least a little while.
Yeah, so we’ll see what happens. But at least we can say that there weren’t really many questionable gear purchases. It was more questionable gear bartering.
Maybe we’ve learned something.
Maybe we’ve. So you got me to relax and sell some things and get rid of some things. And hopefully.
And I saved you. I don’t know.
Well, fans, I hope you’re happy that we brought the segment back just for you.
Yeah, I think we’ve just opened up like a whole new tier of expensive things to try. Like, we’re going to get like an Antelope Zen desk or whatever. It’s like a $5,000 interface.
Yeah, I will say it was kind of ridiculous when I was thinking to myself, from where I started with the Vocalboothtogo Blanket Booth and the AT2020, to now being in a Whisper Room holding a TLM 103 in my hand, it just kind of blows my mind.
Well, yeah, I mean, I was about to say, it sounds like you’re doing pretty well. I mean, like, I’m able to reinvest in all of these crazy purchases. I’m not going broke yet.
So that wraps up Questionable Gear Purchases. Talking a little bit about our topic for today of acoustics, Paul and I have actually been doing some experimentation in our booths, because we’re constantly trying to make it either more ergonomic or have a more logical workflow or a more efficient workflow.
In my case, it’s always different equipment.
It’s always different equipment. But there’s different ways to change or improve the sound without actually changing the equipment. You can actually get just the positioning of items within your booth.
So for example, and this is relating to acoustics, I swear. So right now, I have my mic and my iPad screen, which I’m reading off of, sort of buried in very close to this wall of clothing. And so right now you’ve got about seven inches of absorbing material that’s sucking up those waves and anything that does bounce off the back wall has to go back through that and then it has to go through clothing on the other wall.
And so it sounds quite dead in here. But I wanted to kind of move everything out into the center more so I could have the mic a little bit closer to me and then I could have the iPad be level with my eyes. And so just like better for my neck and my body when I read.
And so I got a mic stand and then I got some accessories so I could put everything on one mic stand and have the mic sitting down and I moved it to the center of the room. And it sounded terrible because one thing that you actually can’t hear right now is there’s actually a full wall mirror behind me that doesn’t… yeah, you would never guess.
But when you move about five or six inches back into the center of the room, you hear that flat surface. And it was even worse when I was using a large diaphragm condenser like the Blue Mouse or the CAD or what have you. So it just did not sound as dead.
And all I changed was the position of the mic in the room by less than half of a foot. So that was a big wake up call. And I know you’ve been experimenting with sort of acoustics in your booth as well, Paul.
What have you been up to?
Well, I had a very similar situation actually. I wanted to try and get to a point where I was using one mic in one position because I had these two sort of mic stations, one standing up in the corner and one sitting down the other corner in a very small space. I have a four by four whisper room.
So there wasn’t a whole lot of room for gesturing or moving and acting when I was reading. So I thought it would be easier to have the mic in one place. So I took everything out, including the chair and the stand I was using for the mic, and put the boom arm that I have drilled to the wall right in the middle of the whisper room.
And then I had the chair, the little tiny bar stool I use right next to that, and I thought this would give me more space, and I do everything sitting. And like you, it sounded awful. It sounded like I was in an echo chamber, and all I did was move the mic maybe three feet from the corner to the middle of the room.
And I tried it in all different positions, but what I discovered is that there really are only two sweet spots in this room. There’s the top right-hand corner and the bottom left-hand corner. And if I don’t have the mic right there, it sounds awful.
So I had to go back to where I was before, and that’s where the cat is now. It’s on the boom arm in the far corner with a blanket, one of the vocalboothtogo.com blankets, and a corner bass trap and two bottom bass chunks. And that’s the only way I can get a good sound.
So it goes to show that once you find that sweet spot, just sort of stick with it, and it may be the only place you can actually record that’s going to sound that good.
Yeah, definitely. When you’re trying to find the best sound when placing equipment in your booth, you definitely want to take notes or take pictures so you can easily replace it if you accidentally move it to a place where it doesn’t sound as good. But like we were saying, you really have to experiment and fine tune, whether it be adding more treatment or adding a bass trap or even putting a little mat or a towel on your desk.
But there are all kinds of things that you can do to improve the sound. For example, downstairs, I have, like you guys know, my famous blanket booth from Vocalboothtogo. And that one sounds great in there, but since I just had his portable version, the Carry On Vocalbooth available too, I decided why not put that in there too.
I’m not sure if it really needed it, but I can tell you it is super dead in there now. But an interesting thing about that space is it works great with a mic, like a shotgun mic, like the 416 or a large diaphragm condenser, like the Jay-Z J1, which has a slightly narrower pattern than similar mics. But I would never use the 103 down there, because it’s in the center of the house.
And so you’ve got plumbing above it and underneath it. So if anyone takes a shower or goes to the bathroom or turns on the dishwasher or the washing machine downstairs, you’ll hear this rumbling in the walls. And it’s summer right now, and we’re kind of out in the woods.
And so we’ve got all sorts of animal sounds, like dogs and birds, and you’ve even got a donkey next door who honks every now and then.
Really?
No, it’s really bad. It’s really, really bad. It’s like the same time every day at like 8 p.m. But the point I’m trying to say is if you have a directional mic, like a shotgun, then those might not be an issue for you.
And you can be a lot more… You have a lot more options when it comes to finding an ideal space in your home to record. But when you’ve got something with a wider pattern, like the 103 or another large diaphragm, then you have to be much more selective about finding a space because acoustics and ambient noise is that much more of an issue.
Right. So there are a number of ways you can treat your space from very simple to full-blown soundproof booths. And our next guest can cover your bases, whatever you need.
So without further ado, let’s take it to the Zoom room, and we’ll get to our interview segment with Adil Aliev from vocalboothtogo.com. We are now so excited to welcome Adil Aliev, and we’re really excited to have you on. So thanks for being here.
Oh, thank you. Thank you for having me. And I’m also excited that, you know, you’re the customer, and you came in this, that you got the booth, and you gave me that positive feedback that makes everything going.
And Sean also, you know, is the carry-on.
Adil, for people who may not be familiar with you and your company, could you just tell us a little bit about the history and how you got started?
Sure. Well, I used to have a moving company, and then I started selling moving blankets. And at one point, one of the customers actually, I kind of noticed that I have musicians and producers buying the blankets for the purpose of acoustics.
And some of them said, listen, can you design the blanket that would give, kind of beef it up? So it would give more acoustic properties and special. I said, sure.
And we did that. We actually beef it up, put more padding in, change things. And then I started to look into that, how they use it.
So over the time, we changed the… So it’s not a moving, it’s maybe looking like moving blankets, it’s not the moving blankets anymore. We changed the inside filler to make it pure cotton, because at one point we had issues with the smell.
People would say, oh, it’s smelling. And we realized that that was because of certain impurities that come with the stuff that they use for moving blankets, a lot of synthetic fiber. So we made it all pure, and we tested and tested it at 80% sound absorption, which is great.
And that’s how it is. And the guy said, don’t do anything, just it’s perfect. And then at some point, and at that time, I wasn’t really kind of into that much, but James Alberger in Santiago, he runs the Voice Acting Academy, they invited me for the Voice Over Conference.
And that’s when I went over there, and at that time, I already made up the first kind of prototype of the Caryln Boost. I showed it up over there, and I received very, very good, very nice positive feedback. And more and more I started to improve on the products and add different ones.
And that’s how, over the time, the Vocalboothtogo actually kind of taking more and more time. Basically, it’s now 70% of what I do, I think maybe even 90%, and always designing new products. The idea behind it is Vocalboothtogo, because I realize that the voice actors, they want to be mobile.
Then musicians, practicing singers and everybody else, they also want to be not really mobile, but they need the solution that would be effective and still easy to use. So they can put it in the apartment, take it down if necessary. If you have to go to the client, you can take it with you.
So these two things, the mobility and efficiency, is kind of like a cornerstone of all the designs that you make. And yeah, so that’s how it develops. So now we have more and more products coming out.
Very good.
Are you using the Carry On Vocalbootht right now?
Yeah, it’s a Carry On Vocalbootht.
The Carry On Vocalbootht. And we actually use that to do episode 3 of the podcast in the middle of the trade show floor for the Mid-Atlantic Voice Conference. And it works fantastically, where some of the interviews sound better than some of the ones we’ve done over Zoom.
Oh, yeah, absolutely. And I can’t believe how well it sounded like in the middle of a lecture hall. I mean, obviously, you’re going to hear the noise of the people and the other attendees, but the audio quality itself was quite good.
And it works very well for on-the-site news gathering or kind of podcast or live recording like that. So it worked out very, very well. Actually, what I wanted to go on, because you talked about your history and like about continuously making new products, do you have any new things that you’re excited to talk about with us now?
Like any new products or modifications of current products that you have?
Well, one product that I’m working on now, the product I’m working on right now is a soundproof sound booth. The very first… Well, one of the very first, not the very, very first.
The very first of this sound booth, what we call SPB33, had Velcro on it. So actually when people would get inside, the hair would get caught on that. And it was not pretty.
But people liked it anyway because it worked well. It was very comparable with other solid shell sound booths. But there was a problem.
So the current that we have right now was with a zipper. So we did away with the Velcro and put the zipper in there. So it’s better.
It’s better. But it’s still not good because, let’s say the audiometry people, people who do the test hearing tests, they’re using the product. And for them, they say, open it up for 30 people a day, it’s not convenient.
And Paul requested that I do the swing open door.
I did.
Yes, he did. So if Paul requested that, I had to do it. And this is what I’m currently working on.
So the new modification of the soundproof booth will come with the open door. So I made it. I made the frame for that.
I designed the opening. Also, that new product will be a little bit different. It’s going to be different because you can actually use the same parts and modify it in different sizes.
For example, right now we have it in 3×3, 6×3, and 6×6. But with that new modification, you can extend it, make it 6×12, 6×18.
Oh, wow.
Yeah, you can kind of… For voice actors, that’s probably not important. But if you have a recording band, like drummers and a couple of more instruments over there, so if they want to jump together, then…
Fill out the whole garage.
Yeah, that would be something to use. So, yeah.
That’s very exciting. We talked about that in Atlanta. I did bring that up to you in Atlanta.
I said, you know, I had the booth and I liked it. It sounded great with almost no modification. My one concern was the door.
And the reason because I have my computer outside the booth, so I can minimize the noise as much as possible. So every time I need to go edit or look at a file, I have to go out the door. So sometimes when I’m doing an audio book, I’m out the door, you know, 10 times during a session and like you said, the zippers can be cumbersome, it works, but it’s not for someone who moves around a lot.
If all your stuff is in the booth, then it’s probably okay. But I really appreciate you taking that to heart and actually trying to innovate.
I try all these comments to heart.
I take all the time. Once the prototype is done, I’m going to go out there and do some video maybe, try it out. Sure.
That’s a question I want to ask you, because I talked about how you’re a local company to me basically. I’m just outside Baltimore in a town called Lutherville, and you’re in Frederick, Maryland. How is the market in this area, the DC and Baltimore metro region, is that a big market for you, or is most of your products shipped outside of this area?
Well, we mostly do it online. We mostly do it online. We actually did not approach the local market, so to speak.
And if I look at the sales, I think about 60% of the sales go to California. Yeah, 60% go to California. Maybe the other 30 go to New York, and the rest is the rest of the country.
And do you have a lot of international sales?
We do have international sales. We pretty much send all over the world. We send to Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Japan, all over Europe, Portugal, Brazil, Mexico, everywhere.
In Mexico, we have this Jehovah’s Witness company in Mexico. I think they bought by now 30 carry-on booths.
You say Jehovah’s Witness?
Jehovah’s Witness, yes.
What were they using it for?
That’s a good question. That’s a good question. I meant to ask them, so once they get it…
Because they ordered once five, then they ordered another five or six, and then they ordered one. And I said, listen, the shipping to Mexico with all the customs and duties, they’re really expensive. If you want to order something, order two.
So she took a week to think about it, then she ordered 15.
I don’t know, maybe they’re using it for missionary work or, I don’t know, recording sermons.
Well, yeah, recording sermons, the recording, I don’t know, they also do the podcasts. Yeah, they do a lot of different podcasts on the radio, and it works well. It works well for podcasts.
So, yeah, Canada, Canada is a big market. We send a lot of Canada. And I think we did send to Russia, we did send to Norway and Sweden, and yeah, I think each and every country we sent to Turkey.
We even sent to Afghanistan.
We sent to Afghanistan, we sent to Dubai. Yeah, I can’t really think. India, India got a couple of booths.
By the way, the other aspect, I think it will be interesting for us to talk about is the rental opportunity. Because our booths are so compact that you can pack them in a bag and it’s small enough, we can ship it anywhere. And for example, we have voice actors who come from United Kingdom.
For example, they come for a week to LA. We ship them the booths, they go over there, they record there, they send it back, they go back to UK. Netflix, Netflix got two booths for rental for like six to 12 weeks.
Whatever they do with that, I don’t know, but it’s good. Microsoft recently bought one soundproof booth to take on the tour. So yeah.
I did one and I came to the warehouse and picked it up in the back of a Nissan Versa. So it’s really compact. For those of you who don’t know, the Nissan Versa is like the smallest car in Nissan’s lineup.
It’s basically the size of the SB33 when it’s stretched out. I was able to take the whole booth in the back of there and drive it back home.
And I love that kind of flexibility because for people, especially voice actors who are starting out, getting a booth of any kind can be a very large investment. So people want to be sure that they either get the right one or they can get a good return on it. And you just letting people rent it out for a temporary amount of time just takes so much pressure off them if it doesn’t work out.
So thank you very much for offering that unique service.
That’s true. That’s kind of… It’s kind of rent before you buy.
So people would rent it first and then you usually keep it. Unless it’s a business. Business, I think, they go on the project.
So let’s say if they go to the trade show, they take the booth to the trade show and then they return it. But people who want to test it, they rent it for a week. And actually, I understand that all the voice actors, they, you know, one army, one person army, their own business.
So we do have some financing options, too. We work with a financing company. And they right now actually offer 90 days no pay deal.
So basically, you get the product. For 90 days, you pay nothing.
So 90 days is cash type of deal. That’s great.
Yeah. And after that, you can pay in installments to them.
Is that for both size booths, the 6×3 and the 3×3?
It’s for any product. It’s for anything over $1,000. I think they have a threshold of $1,000.
Anything over $1,000, they offer that financing. Well, we together offer that financing. You know, there’s a button over there, Financing.
If your cart, overall, gets more than $1,000, the button will appear. And you just click there, fill out the form. And it is convenient.
They go through the approval process, of course. It’s very convenient.
Very cool. So do you have any other exciting products or other developments going on right now that you’d want to talk about?
I do. But that product would be a smaller version. It’s even a smaller version than the carry-on.
And what it’s designed for right now, the working name for that is YouTube or Vocalbootht. So it’s designed for something small, like a smartphone or video camera. And one of the kind of stimulus for me to make that product, some photographers call in and say, you know, can you have that booth that would open on the back?
Because, you know, when you take a video, you need to look at the viewfinder, and you look at something, so you have to have a see-through, so to speak. And then you cover from all sides, so it protects from the wind and noise and everything else. So that’s the product comes in.
That comes, when it’s folded, it’s actually the size of the laptop. It’s that flat, it’s about an inch thick, maybe, I mean, maybe an inch and a half thick. And it’s going to be about 14 inches by 16 inches, by one inch, that small.
Wow, very cool. So that’s similar to sort of your carry-on tracking booth that you used, I think it’s a discontinued product, but you used to have it a few years ago. So it’s going to be even smaller than that?
It’s going to be even smaller than that. It’s going to be, the design is totally different. Yeah, but it’s going to be kind of like that, yeah.
Very cool. I’m excited to see it. And maybe send me a test unit when you get it.
Yeah, I have a working product, but I just need… It’s marinating, as I call it, marinating, because I usually make a design, and then it has to sit for a while, so I can think of some improvements to make.
Until somebody complains to you at a trade show, and you decide to go with that idea.
Well, something that I was… Speaking of that, Adil, one modification that I was very happy to see is… I mean, I’m actually currently using your carry-on vocal booth inside of your hanging acoustic vocal booth right now, and I love this booth.
It’s probably my favorite portable recording solution, but one thing I did notice is that occasionally, if you’re in a very reflective space, all of these portable acoustic solutions, whether it’s yours or someone else, didn’t really have an effective dampening thing behind you. And then I saw it via Atlanta. You would actually fix that problem.
What did you do?
Oh, yes, that’s right. Thanks for reminding me. You see how it is.
Once the product is finished, it goes back in my mind, and I concentrate on something that is new. Yeah, that’s right. It’s already been sent to production.
What we did, we created the hood, and I call it surround sound hood, because it kind of goes over your back and over your shoulders. You might have seen on other booths that they have a little black piece of fabric that you pull over and throw behind yourself and kind of sits on your head. No, we have the whole blanket, the same sound absorption blanket, and there is a support structure designed so it doesn’t sit on your head.
Your head is kind of free to move, and the booth is just being supported in the support structure. And yeah, that surrounds completely. And if you go on the website, actually Rachel Naylor, she’s running a voiceover network in the United Kingdom.
Yeah, we both…
Yeah, we met her at VU Atlanta, yes.
Yes, yes, yes. She did to VU Atlanta, and she needed to do the urgent voiceover for Virgin Atlantic, because she is the voice of Virgin Atlantic.
Oh, wow.
And yeah, so I gave her that booth with surround sound, and she did the work for Virgin Atlantic. They were very happy with that.
Excellent.
So, Adil, one question I had that everybody asked me actually, some fans of the podcast. So you see where I am right now, I have your blankets behind me.
Yes.
Should I have them the right way? Should they be white side out or black side out?
The white side in. The black side out, yes.
I have them backwards, huh?
Well, from an acoustic point of view, it doesn’t matter. Okay. Either way, it’s going to do the same job.
But from claustrophobic… It’s better when you have white around you. It’s kind of…
It looks more spacious.
Well, it reflects light very well. So if you like to do…
It makes it lighter too. That’s right.
Yeah. Like you said, it helps with claustrophobia. I occasionally make videos in here either for like on-camera auditions or just product review videos for fun.
And it definitely looks more professional than having an actual studio, you know?
A good friend, Juan Esteves, who’s actually doing the VO Meter stick this episode, asked me that very question. He said, I think I have mine backwards because you and Sean have the white side out, but I’m glad to hear it. It doesn’t really matter.
I think it’s all personal preference, you know?
That’s totally fine. He wants to use the black side. I’m glad that it’s reversible.
Never heard of that. But you’ll learn.
All right. That pretty much wraps up our questions for Adil. I just want to say thank you so much.
You’ve certainly helped Paul and I create a much better sounding space in our own respective spaces. And we hope to have you on again, because I know you’re constantly developing new products and modifying existing products. So if you have any new announcements, we’d love to have you back, Adil.
Yeah, basically it was our start in getting a great sound.
Yeah, thank you, thank you. And I’m really happy to be on the show. And the more I know, especially Paul and Sean, always coming in positive, always coming in these constructive comments.
And that’s exactly what I need. And you were saying before how the idea that I treated your comment about the door seriously, I treat all the comments seriously. All of them, because they all kind of give me what people need, and I like to solve those problems.
Well, it’s really funny that you mentioned it, because I’ve been watching your products for about four or five years now, and you see an actual evolution in the quality and the effectiveness of the product, even little things, like the cool little travel bag that the Carry On Vocalbootht is a part of. And you are constantly making things better and better at a pretty affordable price. So thank you very much.
Thank you. Thank you.
We look forward to seeing what’s new and upcoming soon.
All right. Maybe next month. Thank you.
So once again, that was Adil Aliev from vocalboothtogo.com. Thanks again, Adil, so much. I’m so glad that you were able to join us today.
Paul and I have both benefited from a number of his products.
We’ve talked about them so much.
Almost every episode. But I highly recommend them, especially for beginning or aspiring talent because it’s a reasonably affordable and highly customizable solution for a variety of spaces.
They’re a great company and he’s a great guy. So thanks so much, Adil.
So that about wraps up episode 10 of The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
If you guys have any questions or if you have any ideas for topics you’d like us to talk about, just hit us up on Facebook at either Sean Daeley or Paul Stefano. Or you can post right here at vometer.com in the comments section. Thanks a lot, you guys.
Have a great day.
Bye, everybody.
Thanks for listening to The VO Meter. Measuring Your Voice Over Progress. To follow along, please visit www.vometer.com.

The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Hello, everybody, and welcome to episode nine of the VO Meter podcast.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress. We have a great episode coming back. We’re really excited to be back after a bit of a hiatus there.
And we are here with voice actor and coach, Julie Williams. So I’ve been following Julie online for several years now, and she has graciously agreed to be on the podcast and share her wisdom. And I’m really looking forward to it.
So moving on to current events. What have you been up to, Paul? It’s been a couple of weeks since we’ve been able to do this.
Yeah, a couple of things. I finished up my longest audiobook to date. I was pretty proud of that.
It’s a 9.2-hour book, and that was pretty exciting. And let’s see, I just recently, in fact, yesterday, was found for the first time via Google search, at least to the best of my knowledge. I had gotten into some Google AdWords, if anyone has ever looked into that, and put some advertising money behind my website.
And it looks like there were some immediate results. Within a couple of days, I had an email to info at paulstofano.com, which kind of shocked me, and I thought it was a phishing scam at first.
Oh, no.
But it was a legitimate job. The client needed a video resume done. I did a form, and as I was responding and talking about a quote, I said, out of curiosity, how did you find me?
He said, I did a Google search on voice actors. I think he said agency-free. I’m not sure why he was searching for that and why that popped my name up, but regardless, he found me via Google search, and that was pretty exciting.
Like I said, to the best of my knowledge, this is the first time anyone has found me just by searching for voice acting or voice over keywords.
Oh, I remember when I got one of my first voice over clients. We had sent a few emails back and forth, and I was like, oh, wait, now that I think of it, how did you guys find me? Because it was still so new to me at the time.
And they had actually found me from my Bedalgo online casting site profile. And so the first of many. So I mean, I love Bedalgo.
Armin, if you’re listening, thank you very much. Because the Germans love my voice for some reason. It’s like David Hasselhoff.
Yeah, love me some Armin Hirschtetter. He’s a great dude.
Yes, way to say the name right. But anything else that you’re happy about?
Nothing else going on right now. I’m in a bit of a lull. That job yesterday was the first one, first quote unquote real job I’ve done in a couple of weeks.
I’m kind of in between audiobooks because I finished this long one and frankly I just needed a break emotionally. And I’m really busy personally doing a lot of youth sports coaching and some traveling. So I’m in a bit of a lull between books and I hope to pick up another one pretty soon.
How long does it take to make a nine hour book?
Well, the deal was signed in January, if that gives you any indication, and I just finished.
Wow.
That includes about a three week hiatus where I was really sick. I think we talked about that on the one episode we did, episode seven with the agency round table. I was really sick during that and then for like basically the next whole month.
So I couldn’t record anything long form.
Oh man.
So I guess it’s about a three month process.
Well, good to know, especially for anyone thinking that audio books is a good way to make a quick buck.
Yeah, cause you were saying you were just starting to delve into that for reels as the kids say, right?
Yeah, it’s hard. I mean, I’m used to doing long form. Like I’m used to regularly recording hour to three hour long narration projects.
But the amount of effort that goes into an audio book between the prep and the research and the communication with the author, it’s a lot of work.
Yeah, it is. So one other thing I wanted to mention is I picked back up coaching with Sean Pratt. That might have been news to the listening crowd since the last episode.
And I’d taken a brief hiatus just because of personal stuff and we’re back on the train moving forward. And one of the things that he has you do is try to work on branding. And I was hoping to solicit some help from the audience about how they might help me with that.
So the exercise without giving away too many trade secrets is to find a couple of descriptive words that describe your voice or your character. And you ask your friends and your family and people you know, workmates. So I thought maybe I’ll ask the audience.
If you have a comment, something you could use to describe my voice or personality, whether you’ve seen me on video or just on the podcast, I’d love to hear it. Give me a shout out in the comments either on the Facebook page or on the VO Meter page itself. And I would really appreciate the help.
Very cool. What a great idea. And not to thread, Jack, but if you wouldn’t mind saying a word or two about me, that’d be great too.
Right, because you’ll be doing the same exercise soon.
Yeah, probably. And I’ve heard it used by a couple of different coaches. I think it’s a great exercise because you want to know how…
I mean, we’re so subjective on our own voices. You want to know how you’re perceived by the outside world and what in different social circles, whether you’re friends or close friends or what have you. So I think it’s a great exercise and way to drop it on our audience, Paul.
There we go. Hopefully, hopefully we’ll get some feedback. So what’s going on in your world?
Well, I’m a little sad because I just got back from Hawaii a week or two ago and just kind of getting over the hump of like going, returning back to normalcy, you know. I was actually visiting my girlfriend in Oahu. She’s a theater teacher over there for the Honolulu Theater for Youth.
And so she was working a lot, but we still managed to go to the beach and go hiking and had some wonderful adventures together. And then, so after all that was said and done, it’s back to the grindstone and I don’t know, just makes me more determined to work hard until I can see her again, you know.
Yeah, I know how you feel. I’ve been to Hawaii once. It was my honeymoon, which was coming up on 13 years ago.
And I still wish I could go back every single day. It’s one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been.
It is gorgeous. And you wonder how people get used to it over there, you know? This is just the place that they live.
I’m sure it happens. I’m sure it happens like everywhere else.
Oh yeah, you’d be amazed. Same thing with Nagasaki. It’s absolutely beautiful place.
And then, but you get used to it. So it’s nice having a visiting boyfriend come over and be like, hey, you live in an amazing island paradise. Let’s go hang out.
Yeah, we often get the same comments here in Baltimore. People consider, people call it a paradise.
Oh really?
Ba-dum-bum, psh, no, of course. No, it’s a joke.
Well, I was giving you the benefit of the doubt, man.
Waiting for the punchline. Their slogan for the state, actually, is the land of pleasant living. I don’t know if that’s a joke or not.
That’s what they call it, the old national beer company. That was their slogan for the national Bohemian beer. From the land of pleasant living, Baltimore, Maryland.
Maybe they’re just being polite. They’re like, um, it’s pleasant.
Right. Is there anything else going on in your world?
Well, yeah, I actually got offered representation by a local agent. They’re Colleen Bell Agency over in Bellevue, Washington. They represent voice actors, as well as on camera and modeling talent.
It’s funny, even though I’m interested in doing voice work for them, they insist that I get headshots made. And I had some headshots made a while ago, but I wouldn’t call them competitive. It was more just to have a professional picture.
Right.
But yeah, and it’s crazy, because they want me to have all these different outfits, be like, all right, we want you to go for sort of a skater hoodie vibe, and then maybe a rock star leather jacket vibe. And then of course, the well-dressed corporate vibe, and then out on the town vibe. But it’s all, I don’t know, it’s just making me think more from a different industry’s point of view.
So it’s really interesting as well.
Well, that’s awesome. Congratulations.
Yeah, thank you very much.
Hope that works out for you.
I hope so too.
So we will be back in just a moment with our featured guest, Juilie Williams. But first, we have a VO Meter schtick from someone in your neck of the woods, Sean, Jeff Bugonian. Take it away, Jeff.
Hey, everybody, it’s time for the VO Meter shtick.
What did he say?
It’s time for the VO… Oh, never mind.
The VO Meter shtick?
Oh, got it.
Hi, Sean and Paul. Thanks a lot for letting me give my little VO shtick. And what I wanted to talk about is something that maybe a lot of us have to deal with, and that’s family.
And not in a way where they’re interrupting our recording, but in a way that we can involve them in what we do, especially our kids. Now, I have two kids that are eight and almost 10, and they just seem to be so intrigued with my booth, with my microphone, with my whole technical setup that I have. But of course, we know we can’t let our kids just go there and play with our knobs and jump up there and scream into our microphone.
But there are times when we can get them a little bit involved, get them in the booth, have a little bit of fun. And I do that with my kids sometimes, and it creates a lot of funny moments. Like this one.
Did you just fart in my booth? Oh man.
Oh, pew. Excuse me just a second. And in case you can’t tell, my son ripped one right in the booth.
Or, another thing I’ll do is sometimes let my kids get in the booth and just we’ll create a story. And sometimes I’ll go in there and pretend that they’re in a cave. And they’ll start telling a story.
And I’ll go in later and add some reverb, maybe some echo. And come up with something fun and enjoyable. Kind of like this.
I hope there were no monsters in here.
Or there are other times when they just get interested in what we’re doing. For example, I’ve got about 20 plus years of experience in the healthcare field, as a pharmacy technician and as an EMT. And so right now I’m kind of testing the waters into the world of medical narration, and I’ll be cutting a demo with that soon.
But as I practice for that and rehearse for that, they’ll pull out my EMT textbook or other medical textbooks, or we’ll talk about words, like transesophageal echocardiogram or coletocholithiasis, or medication terms like esomeprazole or phenopropanolamine. And that kind of gets the kids intrigued. They have fun with that.
And they surprised me one time. Last week I got this audio message from them on my phone.
Pneumo-ultra-microscopic-silovolcanoconiosis. Pneumo-ultra-microscopic-silocon-volcanoconiosis.
Hi, Dad, we love you. Hi, Dad, we love you.
The word they were saying was Pneumo-ultra-microscopic-silocon-volcanoconiosis, an inflammation of the lungs from breathing in volcanic silicate. Now, I have to tell you, that made my day, because what it showed is that they’re interested in what I’m doing. Perhaps even one day, they’ll be interested in trying their own hand at VO, but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.
So what is the end of my VO shtick? Get your kids involved. They will love what they’re doing.
They love to get in the booth. They love to record here on our microphone, because whereas you might spend a lot of time here, isolated in your booth, surrounded by padding, by all this foam on the wall, getting them in here with the booth with you or next to you will really draw you closer together. And that is one of the beautiful things about VoiceOver.
So thanks again. This is Jeff from Pacific VoiceOver, and I hope you all enjoyed my VO shtick.
Once again, that was Jeff Bugonian with our VO Meter shtick. Thank you very much for that story, Jeff. That was pretty hilarious.
Yeah, I can relate to that completely, having three kids myself, and they’re always knocking on the door. In fact, just now, I turned around and thought I saw my daughter in the corner of the booth, but it was actually my own reflection. It freaked me out.
That’s some creepy Blair Witch stuff right there.
Exactly.
But it actually reminded me, having your family support is absolutely crucial for work like this. And something that was kind of cool that I’ve got to do recently is, I actually did a medical narration class with my dad. Oh, awesome.
Yeah, he’s actually a retired pediatrician, and he’s got public speaking experience as well. So I mean, he’s very articulate, and he actually doesn’t make a lot of mistakes. He’s a good cold reader as well.
And he’s got all this great knowledge of medical jargon that just rolls off his tongue. So I thought it’d be great if we could do something like that together. And he was totally interested in it.
I thought he did a great job.
So is he going to do more voice overs?
I hope so. I might have to keep encouraging him, but we’ll see. I think he’s fine for it.
I think he’s great for it.
If nothing else, you have a built-in partner for dual point of view narration.
Oh, yeah. I didn’t even think about that. That’s great.
It’s part of my secret hope to get all of my family involved with it, so I can kind of hire out a stable of family narrators.
Or not hire and just pay them in roast beef.
I always thought it was a source of cheap labor, like a family. All right. So, Julie will be coming on in a couple of minutes, but since we are on the topic of coaching, Paul and I just wanted to kind of lead you through our own coaching journeys and sort of help kind of narrow down your search for possible reputable coaches that you can work with.
So I’ll go ahead and start. And when I started my VO journey about four years ago, I researched everything I could voiceover related for about a year. And then one of the coaches that impressed me was a man named Terry Daniel.
He’s a coach out of Minneapolis, Minnesota. And he’s actually got a Facebook group called The VoiceOver Camp for beginning journeyman VO talent, much like our audience. And so I found him online.
I found his articles on VoiceOver Extra. He’s also got a great podcast called… He’s actually got two.
He’s got The VoiceOver Cafe, which he does with a number of other great voice actors. And then he’s also got his short VO sermons or VoiceOver sermons, where he talks about the importance of coaching and having a quality demo and not getting started before you’re ready. And so I found out about him.
I reached out to him. And then we agreed to work together. And he’s got an incredible…
He’s definitely one of the most affordable coaches that I’ve researched and worked with. He’s got a wonderful package. He includes demo production for a commercial and narration demo.
And once you’ve coached with him, he actually gives you access to all of these recorded webinars that he’s created on different aspects of VoiceOver. And you’re welcome to attend any of his weekend script reading classes. So he’ll switch back and forth between having a script reading class and some kind of educational webinar, whether it’s like how to make a fully produced spot in Adobe Audition, or he might have an agency guest and do a Q&A.
So if you’re listening, Terry, thanks a lot.
Terry’s great, and I’m sure he’ll really appreciate you saying he has a wonderful package.
You want to redo that one? All right, are you sure? You sure you want to leave that in?
If you know Terry at all, you know his sense of humor, so that’s why I went there. But in all seriousness, he’s a great guy and a great coach. I actually did some work with him as well.
Yeah, aside from a crass sense of humor, he’s very professional.
Yeah. So I did work with Terry for my second demo, going a little out of order. But Terry, in the production of the demo, also did some coaching, obviously.
It doesn’t just leave you out to dry and set you to record. So he coached me through the demo production, and that came out great as well. I’ve had great results from that.
But my very first coaching experience was a little different. I was looking for… Well, I was looking for any opinions out there on where would be the best place to start as a complete, quote, unquote, newbie.
And I had some training going back decades, but when I was actually venturing into VoiceOver to actually look for business, I wanted to get some VoiceOver-specific coaching. And I solicited some opinions from other voice talent, put out some feelers on the VO BB, and got a recommendation for Edge Studio. And the way they approach things is sort of like a classroom approach.
It can be in person in their studios in New York or Los Angeles. They have one here in the Baltimore, DC region. Or they have Skype sessions as well.
And they have a pre-set program where it’s set up sort of like a university where you have a curriculum of classes that you need to go through, or you can sign up for and be part of a package, or you can choose things a la carte. If you do that package, there’s a price break, and then it helps you to sort of figure out where you need to go with your training. And that was really beneficial for me.
That’s exactly what I wanted. I know there’s other companies out there that have a similar approach like the GVAA, which you can talk about in a second. But for me, that was a good approach because I really didn’t know what I needed.
And I was able to get that preset curriculum and included a demo production at the end of the program. So they will not let you do a demo unless they think you’re ready, which I think is great. It was another thing I was looking for.
I didn’t want someone who was going to push me out the door without the right experience. So I even was like champing at the bit with the coaches and saying, am I ready yet? Am I ready yet?
And they said, hold on, pump your brakes. We have a few more classes and then you can do the demo. So I really appreciated that.
And when it was all said and done, I had the demo, I was an edge approved talent, which is a little logo you can put on your website. Had my demo done and within weeks was signed with three agencies. So I really was happy with those results.
Excellent, well done. And that is a smart way to format it, is sort of like a curriculum because any good coach will give you a sense, like a sort of timeline, or I mean, nobody can guarantee your success, but they’ll give you an idea of what your progress is and goals to reach and give you a level of preparation for the various stages of your VO career.
Yeah, I really like that concept, like I said. I reached out to some individual coaches and it was sort of really nebulous as to when or where I’d be able to move on or get a demo produced and that structure, like I said, really helped me. So who was your second experience or what other experiences have you had other than with Terry?
Let’s see, the second coach that I worked with was a Canadian voice talent named Deb Monroe. And she actually came on the recommendation of another talent who I had worked, or who a friend of mine in Japan. And so I did a couple of sessions from her and got, it was really interesting, like it was mainly to get a different perspective and just to continue my training in some way.
And kudos to Deb, she has actually reached out, she has sent auditions my way. She has, she let me know about an international agency that was accepting submissions. And so got me my first Irish and international agent, so that was cool.
And so this is something that people, like another sort of unthought of benefit of working with a coach, is if they believe in your ability, they might recommend you for work. And so, and they can grant you access to some of your first clients. So just another benefit of working with a reputable coach who works in the areas that you wanna work in.
Yeah, that’s great. So as far as other coaches that I’ve worked with, I’ve done a bunch of free or one-time sessions because I’m still kind of looking for that next direction I wanna go. So I did a course with, or a session with Jason Linear-White, and that was a free session that I won at Mid-Atlantic VoiceOver, but nevertheless, it was a coaching session on character work, and that was fun.
And I’ve done one session so far with Val Kelly, who’s a voice actress near me in the DC area, and also is the organizer and founder of the Mid-Atlantic VoiceOver Conference. So I did her Character Development 1 class, which was a group class with some other talent. And then tonight actually is the next one, Advanced Character Development, where we’re going to work on some other ways to develop a character, and I’m really looking forward to that as well.
Yeah, that has to be a lot of fun, because I love Val, and character work is her element, so I’m sure she’s got a lot of great advice for it.
Yeah, and then I’ve also done a session with Everett Oliver, who has a business called myboothdirector.com, and what he does is allow you to work with him remotely, or I guess in person, if you’re in LA, and he will direct you through auditions that you have, either from your agent or pay-to-plays or anywhere you have an audition, he will direct you for a fee and help you work through the copy, and it’s fantastic. He obviously knows what he’s doing. He’s a veteran of the business and several big agencies, and he’s fantastic to work with.
Yeah, and I’ve worked with him. I love Everett. He’s seriously, he’s given me so much more confidence in my auditions, because I mean, until recently, a lot of the work that I do is corporate narration, internal stuff, which is a very different mindset.
And so I just didn’t, I felt like I was lacking the energy or like the connection, the same connection for the commercial stuff. And Everett really helped boost my confidence in that area. So now I’m just like, make all this work on something two or three times and then it’s gone.
Like I don’t doubt myself as much. So thank you very much, Everett.
Yeah, he’s amazing. I’ve heard him referred to as the VO Whisperer or the Voice Actor Whisperer. And it’s so dead on.
Within one session, he nailed me to the point where I told my mom about the session and what Everett had said and she said, oh yeah, he nailed you. That’s exactly you. So it was amazing.
It’s like the cheapest psych therapy you’ll ever get.
Yeah.
Just make sure that, cause he charges $20 per script, not per project. So keep that in mind. I once sent him, we worked together for about an hour on three scripts for one project.
And I misguidingly thought that it was going to be $20.
I think it’s actually 25, but yeah, I know what you mean.
Or 25, yeah, maybe he upped his rates. But that’s still, I mean, that’s nothing. Most coaches will charge about 150 an hour, which is a reasonable rate.
But I mean, if you just need some help with an audition or to impress a client, then definitely look up myboothdirector.com and check out Everett Services.
Cool. So the last coach and current coach I work with, and I think I mentioned it earlier in the episode, is Sean Allen Pratt or just Sean Pratt. He is a audiobook specialist or narration specialist with over 800 books to his name now as a narrator and a fantastic audiobook or narration coach.
He will take you from the very beginning, if that’s where you are, or he works with veterans as well. And he also has an established curriculum, like we talked about, where there’s point A, here’s the steps you’re going to take. He actually has a textbook that he sends you, and by the end, you should be much improved, and that’s what I’m hoping.
I’m about a quarter of the way through the program now, and I can already see results. He’s really helped me tremendously, so thank you, Sean.
And he really helped me find my narrator’s voice as well. Thank you very much, Sean. I think he’s great, and he’s very flexible to work with.
He’s got reasonable rates, and he’s just a great coach, and he’s a good cheerleader for your business.
And I would say, when you meet Sean in person, don’t be intimidated, because he is a large man. Just tall. He’s from Oklahoma, and he looks every bit like the red-blooded American country boy.
And I did not realize that when I was talking to him on Skype. He was sitting down, and I saw him at Mavo, and I was looking up, saying, wow, nice to see you all the way up there. And I’m not a small guy.
I’m six feet tall. He’s going now by the phrase or the moniker, Ginger Yoda, and it’s totally true.
Ginger Yoda? Oh, that’s… Coach you, I will.
Coach you, I must. But… But yeah, he’s great, and I enjoy working with him a lot.
These next two coaches that I’m about to talk to you about, I’m pretty excited, because these are some of my voice acting idols who actually got into coaching just because they… it’s something that they enjoy, and education is meaningful to them, and they’re excellent teachers. And the first one is actually Pat or Patrick Fraley.
And if you watch cartoons in the 80s, you would recognize Pat. He was the voice of Crang and Baxter Stockman in the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Let’s see, he has been in numerous…
like, he’s been in dozens and dozens of shows, aside from that. Those are just two of his more famous roles. And he’s got all of these wonderful…
he’s got this really unique coaching package where you buy a course from him, and it could be, say, creating characters or audiobook basics, advanced audiobook narration, documentary style narration, things like that. And then you’ll get a pre-recorded lesson, and then there’ll be an assignment. You record the assignment, and then you send it to him, and then he’ll give you an email feedback, and then you can progress to the next assignment for however long the course is.
And some people might be turned off by the fact that it’s a little less individualized attention, but he’s a very busy man, both as a voice actor and a coach, so I really appreciate him trying to make time for more students with a package like that. And it certainly helped me with my audio book and my narration reads, namely to slow down. But he’s great, and he’s always quick to respond to his emails, and he’s a lot of fun to work with as a coach.
And then there was also anime voice actor Crispin Freeman. So here’s someone who got into voice acting through a much more traditional onstage theater mindset, and so he’s very well trained himself, and he takes the craft very seriously. He’s very professional, and he’s very…
Like, even with all that, he can be a little intimidating presence-wise. He’s still a very accessible coach, and he gives you very usable techniques to have much more powerful character performances for animation and video game stuff. So I loved working with both of them, and I’m sure I’m gonna get more work with them soon.
So thank you very much, Patrick and Crispin.
Awesome. So that wraps up the brief history of coaching for Sean and I. And now we’re gonna talk to our featured guest, the coach and voice actor, Juilie Williams.
Okay. So we have now transferred to our Zoom room for our very first celebrity interview. We’re really growing.
But I’m very excited about our first guest. This woman has over 40 years of experience in doing voiceover in numerous genres and many decades of coaching under her belt. So we have an award-winning audiobook narrator, the publisher of the free VoiceOver Insider online voiceover magazine, and host of the free VoiceOver Insider podcast, Juilie Williams.
Welcome, Juilie.
Thank you. I’m still trying to get over the fact that you called me a celebrity.
Well, like we’re all unsung celebrities in voiceover, and you’ve certainly been in the industry for a very long time. So I’m very excited to hear your insight today.
Yeah, 40 years is a very long time, but don’t tell my clients. We can tell, you know, voiceover talents, but don’t tell my clients, because as far as they’re concerned, I’m 25 to 50. You know what I mean?
Yeah, you sound like it. I can see.
Your secret is safe with us.
Well, that’s good. I really appreciate you guys having me on today.
Yeah, I’m very excited. I mean, I’ve benefited from your magazine and from your podcast, so I’m happy to return the favor and have you on.
Awesome.
So with that, I’d really like to know, how did you get started in voiceover?
Oh, you know, I started like a lot of people did in radio. But that said, most radio people will not succeed in voiceover because there’s something that we have to have in radio, which is called the radio ego. And that’s actually not necessarily a bad thing.
I mean, you get treated like crap so much in radio that you have to have the ego in order to survive. I’ve had people call me up and say, how did you get your job on your back? You know what I mean?
Oh, no.
And then there’s the person that didn’t get the job when you did, and they’re calling you up or saying things about you. So you have to, when you’re in the limelight like in radio, you have to have enough of an ego, which took me time to build because I was not confident at all. But you’ve got to have enough of an ego.
And then what happens with that radio ego is because you do free commercials at a radio station and maybe a $50 spot for an advertising agency because it’s going to go on another station, you think, well, I know all about VoiceOver. And people coming from radio don’t realize that VoiceOver is a different industry. It’s not that they’re bad.
It’s not that they can’t do it. It’s just that it is a different industry, and it has different skills, and a lot of the radio skills will help. But, you know, there’s a lot of other skills that they need to get, and they think they don’t need training.
And a lot of them, unfortunately, become coaches because, you know, the radio ego thing.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
So what made you switch to VO?
Oh, well, I actually didn’t leave radio until 2000, I don’t know, 12. And I started VoiceOver in, well, you guys probably weren’t born back then, but 1977.
Hey, I was three years old.
So, I mean, that was… I started when I was in high school, so… But over time, see, back then, when I started, the VoiceOver and the radio industries were much more in sync.
They were looking for the announcer types, the good voices and all that. But over time, that changed. And I think that’s sort of the generational thing.
I think that, you know, GenX came along, okay? Which is now the old people, but it used to be the younger hip people. Thank you very much.
Hey, I’m older than you. I mean, I barely do, but I fall into, what do they call the older ones, the baby boomers?
Right, I still think I’m cool. It’s just my kids that tell me I’m not.
What happened at one point, and probably like starting in the 80s, but really in the 90s, where it really came to be, was that the GenXers were the ones who were doing the casting, and they didn’t want someone to say buy now. They wanted somebody to give them the information and let them decide if they want to buy now, because they didn’t want to be told what to do. So the whole industry kind of changed and became a more conversational and more telling, less selling type of industry.
But what happened in the radio industry is that didn’t change. And so that’s why I don’t even remember how we got on the subject of radio, but that’s how I started. But I had to adapt with the industry.
I mean, I was behind at one point in the 90s, and I don’t know if you guys know Dick Orkin, the most amazing man in the world from the Dick Orkin Radio Ranch. It was under his tutelage that I really became… He’s a good friend of mine, and I became a communicator in the 90s as opposed to an announcer, thankfully in time, you know, for the…
You know, a little bit behind, like maybe a year or so behind the times, but people were still hiring that announcer sound back then, so I was still continually working, but, you know, became that communicator. So, you know, that’s… We were going to talk about coaches today, and one of the things I would say watch out for is the coaches who have really had more radio experience than VoiceOver.
But at the same time, I don’t know, do you guys know who Bo Weaver is?
Oh, yeah, definitely big promo talent.
Yeah, he came from radio as well. I mean, he and I worked together in 1982 or something like that, and he helped me to put together my first actual VoiceOver demo. I was working already, but I didn’t have a demo back then and helped me to get in with my very first agent in Houston, Texas, way back in the early 80s.
And he is one who has succeeded, as have I, in transitioning from radio to VoiceOver. But that comes from understanding that it is a different industry and you have to adapt to it. And a lot of coaches that we’re going to be talking about…
I’m not naming specific names, but a lot of coaches come from radio and think that they’re great VoiceOver people because they’ve done radio commercials. And that’s just something you have to watch out for because they’re really not going to teach you well.
Well, it’s like you’re saying, it’s a different skill set. And I’m actually going to change the order of my questions a little bit because you proved to be quite the excellent student. You’ve got a lot of mentors who are very integral to your success.
So with that in mind, what do you think makes a good student a VoiceOver? Someone who comes in with an open mind and really is just open to any feedback and just wants to improve and become competitive.
Well, you know, it is the open mindedness. And the other thing is that I worked in radio with Bo Weaver and he was incredible back then too. So I was in awe of him.
So that’s part of it. And I was in awe of Dick Orkin. So I took them seriously.
And the other thing that really helps, and now this helped back with Bo Weaver and when I was first getting started, is that I wasn’t overly confident. I was in radio, but I wasn’t overly confident in my VoiceOver skills. And so I was totally willing and open to listening to what this, you know, god of radio, what was it that he used to say on the radio?
Like Tide was America’s favorite laundry detergent, he used to say, America’s favorite DJ. You know, I mean, I was basically in awe of him. And so when they taught me what they taught me, I had an openness to it because I knew that they were successful, and I didn’t feel like I know it all.
And unfortunately, that radio ego that is absolutely necessary to survive can make some people think, well, I know it all already. In fact, somebody… This is so funny.
Somebody mentioned a narration class, and they’d been screwed over or something like that, and I went on and I said, I’m sorry you hear that or whatever. And this other guy comes in and says, a narration class? What does anyone need about a narration class?
You just open the mic and talk. Yeah. I know.
I’m thinking, okay, so you get a job once a year? Okay, that’s good. You’re not going to make a living at this.
You’ve got to have the skills in narration and other things. You don’t just… Your mother’s brother might hire you, but for the most part, you don’t just open the mic and talk.
It’s like we were talking about before. There’s this misconception. We have all of these…
We understand that certain people at the top of their game, whether they be actors or models or athletes, they all have coaches. They all practice and train, and nobody bats an eye at that. But for some reason, we think this is completely accessible.
Anyone can do it.
Right. Chris Carmichael coached Lance Armstrong. Do you think Chris could have beat him on a bike?
Not by the time he was coaching him, but he was an incredible coach for him. And Lance became an incredible cyclist under Chris Carmichael’s tutelage. You know, I mean, I still do coaching with people for two reasons.
Number one, how sad would it be if my entire knowledge base and all of my skills were based exclusively on my experience, even though it’s been 40 years? You know, if I couldn’t go to Pat Fraley, who also has 40 years experience, and learn something from his experience, or go to Lisa Biggs, who has… I don’t know, 10 or 20 years experience, and learn what she’s learned, because we’ve all had different experiences.
And how sad is it if I had to spend my entire life with only the benefit of my experience in this industry? That’s pretty sad. So that’s one reason I coach.
And the other reason is because when I find someone who I’m coaching, that they’re just not getting it. You know, we’re all different. I have…
Fortunately, I’m a gifted teacher, and I credit God for that, not me. But there are occasional students that just don’t… I just can’t get there.
And I don’t know if they can’t get there or if it’s me. So I want to know what the other coaches are doing, so I can… You know, I have in my contract, I don’t give refunds, but when I can’t help somebody, I typically offer them a refund and refer them to another coach.
Someone who I know isn’t going to take advantage of them as like a predator, but somebody who’s going to try to coach them, and if they can’t, they’ll refer them elsewhere, you know?
Wow, that is really… That’s a great policy to have.
That’s wonderful. Well, I was going to say, it’s like people might think that you’re competing because you’re technically in the same industry of coaching, but it’s such a relative… It’s such a subjective thing, and you can’t expect every student to jail with every coach.
So we highly encourage people, if you can, to try a variety of coaches, like maybe just one or two sessions, and figure out if that’s a good fit for you first.
And there’s… You’ve also got to consider motivations. I mean, we’re all voice over talent or voice over coaches, but we also have life motivations, and I’m a very religious person.
And so my mission statement, which I’ve only seen one other voice over talent with a mission statement… They should read Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Anyway, my mission statement is to honor God by ensuring that all of my clients and students get more out of our relationship than I do.
And that’s not about business. That’s about my religious values, right? And so if that’s undergirding, if that would be the right word, my coaching, I have more than just my business to think about if I say, wait, this person isn’t getting better.
I’m not helping this person. I need to find somebody who can, and then I need to just walk away from it. I mean, then it’s out of my hands, but I need to try to find the best coach I can for them so that they can thrive.
And I’ve found that using that mission statement, it’s been about two people in ten years that I’ve had to do that to. Most of the others, you know, they’re working. And they are thriving because something happens, and I’ll…
well, I shouldn’t probably say this out loud because everyone might want one, but I’ll throw in an extra session, or for a certain person, I’ll help them get in with an agent, or for a certain person, I send them to a client. You know, it just depends on whatever their particular strengths and needs are, you know. But a lot of coaches aren’t willing to do stuff like that.
Well, you talk about what sets you apart as a coach. What do you think in general makes a good coach, or what should people look for when they’re seeking out coaching for the first time, or maybe even an advanced coaching session? What should people look for in a good coach?
Okay, in a good coach, what you want to find is a couple things. First of all, get lots of reference. Ask them for like 10 different references.
And check them out and go to those references, like their web pages. So you know it’s not somebody’s brother-in-law who’s going to be hired to say that. You know what I mean?
Go to the talent’s website. Listen to their demos. Because most coaches, like I, produce demos.
And listen to the demo and hear if it’s any good. You know, is the talent any good? Because you know what?
If the talent’s not any good and they’ve got a demo, that tells you something about the coach. Because if they’re willing to produce, for the money, a demo for a talent who is not ready to be competitive within the industry, I’m sorry, that’s not a good thing. And that’s one of the issues I have with certain people who are not coaches but just demo producers, is, you know, they’ll, a lot of times they don’t, they don’t coach the talent through the demo session and that’s actually very important as well.
So you go there and then you contact that talent and you ask them and get, again, at least 10 references. Or more. If someone’s a good coach, they’ve, I mean, I can’t even tell you how many people I’ve coached.
Off the top of my head, I probably send somebody if they’re asking six or seven or eight references, but I could go into my files and find another 20 references. And then they can make that decision. You know, another thing about a good coach is that they don’t just coach newbies, but they coach people who have been in the industry for a while.
And they coach them great. I mean, there’s a lady that I coach who did some national stuff, like a national, what was it, Sunsweet Prune Juice spot. And I know that because I did her demo and I put that spot on the demo.
Normally a demo is what you can do, not what you have done, but it was incredible, so I put it on there. And she is someone who is a direct competitor to me as far as, as much as anybody can be, as far as, you know, our sound, our age range and all that. When it comes down to it, there’s no one who’s a direct competitor, you, because there’s only one Paul and there’s only one Sean.
If they want a great guy, okay, fine. You guys could compete against each other, right? But if they want a specific sound, if they want Paul, Sean doesn’t qualify.
If they want Sean, Paul, you’re not going to measure up. You know what I mean?
We were just talking about that, actually, offline. We share an agent, we share an agent, and we both have the same audition sitting in our inbox. And I was trying to dissuade Sean from doing it.
They’ll know if they want my sound versus yours. They’re quite distinct.
Yeah, and see, that’s just it. Distinct, that’s what’s important. And a good coach will also find what distinguishes you.
So here’s what I do. First of all, I start with one curriculum in that for the first session or two, everybody is reading the same, what I call assessment scripts. Okay, and I am assessing them.
It’s not a test, everybody has strengths, everybody has weaknesses, I will find both. There is nobody that’s gonna come to me that doesn’t have any weaknesses. And there’s nobody that doesn’t have any strengths.
So I will find both. And then within a couple of weeks, then I start sending them individualized scripts based on what are their goals, and what are the strengths and weaknesses that I’ve seen so far, so we can work on that. And then after a while, I get into what I call golden tools.
And those are several, I start introducing several unique techniques to see how they do at those, to separate them from everybody else. And also what ends up happening, which is wonderful, I love being a part of this, is different techniques that I don’t even think about emerge from them. And those become the golden tools of that talent.
And that’s when it’s time to do a demo, when they’re doing great, because you need to, okay, Liberace was such a talent, but he had to have lessons too. And so you gotta think about stuff like that. He had to have some coaching, but then he became incredible.
But it isn’t just talent, it’s also skill that he developed with hard work and training, right? And so that’s incredibly important. But once somebody differentiates themself, and they’re not just any old voice, then they’re ready for a demo.
And you’ve got to, the coach has to know them well enough to keep in mind this person has this strength and they speak a little bit of Hindu or whatever. Is that the language or is it Hindi? I don’t know.
Hindi, okay, so they speak Hindi. No, they speak a little Hindi or whatever it is that you wouldn’t have even known, but you get to know the person. And you know what I’ll do with something like speak a little Hindi is I’ll throw one line in there for something and then if they need to do something in Hindi, obviously I’m not gonna be able to help them much in that arena, but at least that says one little line is in there or if they do a great imitation of somebody.
Okay, so I don’t do impersonation demos or animation or anything like that. I refer people out for that. But I might put just a little line in there to be as a bridge between their signature sound and their uniqueness, their golden tools, just as sort of a bridge so things don’t ever start to sound too much alike, too similar.
Wonderful, so that ties in with our next question. Because I mean, your first goal is to really get them to that competitive level and then kind of find that unique selling point that really distinguishes them from the crowd. What I’m curious about is you have so many different students coming to you with so many different goals and interests.
How do you help them sort of figure out what their niche is in the voiceover industry or their niches are? And do you ever find that a student might have a goal that you’re like, no, no, no, no, you’re not good for audio books. Now automotive demos or automotive spots, that’s your wheelhouse.
Well, you know, I usually don’t have trouble helping them with their desires. But a lot of times they’re like, well, I want to do this and I want to do animation, but I also want to learn e-learning. And I said, I can help you with the e-learning and then I will refer you to somebody else for this other thing.
And so that’s, I’m not going to tell somebody they can’t do it. I know the guy who told George Strait that he was going to never amount to anything. I know him personally and I’m never going to be that person.
Plus I’m never going to be a dream smasher. Just because they’re not doing well now, there was one guy that I told, I said, look, I know this is your dream, but I just want to tell you based on our sessions that it will take you a lot longer than most people and it is going to cost you a lot more than most people to become competitive within this industry. But I’m not going to say you can’t do it.
How do I know they can’t do it? And it’s not my place to say, give up on your dream, like a lot of people do. There are coaches out there who I’ve heard, and I’m not going to name them, but I’ve heard they basically, recently, I found out that one of my students had been told by a San Francisco coach, you just don’t have what it takes.
And then there are other coaches who treat the students like, how dare you come to me when you’re not good enough? And I’m thinking, yeah, duh, why do you think they came to you? You know, you had a reputation and they wanted to grow.
And if you can’t coach somebody who’s, quote, not good enough, what good are you as a coach? Because that’s what you’re there for.
That’s a great approach.
And I get everybody from busy working New York talent to the person who was told they had a good voice and thought it might be nice to do voiceover, or the person who is about to retire as a doctor and is looking for something to bring in money in retirement. You know what I mean? All sorts of people come.
But you’ve got to treat them with respect. You’ve got to look for their strengths and their weaknesses because once you get there, their weaknesses are not going to make them sore. Their strengths are where they can soar.
So you get their weaknesses and you bring them up to great. And then you take their strengths and you bring them up to, oh my God. And that’s when you’ve got a good talent.
Awesome. A lot of our talent…
One of my techniques is to… I do like an immersion technique, like I’m going to throw you into Mexico to learn Spanish. You know what I mean?
I’m going to throw you in the deep end, but I’m going to be there for you the whole time. And so I will throw eight or nine… I have about 40 techniques I teach.
And I will throw eight or nine techniques at a student in that very first session and the second and the third. But I’m going to be there with a lifeline the entire time and I make them record the sessions because you can’t get it all in one session. You have to…
Their homework every week is to listen back at least once, plus whatever else I individualize for them. And so I work with them with all of these things and eventually they become instinctive and then I build a little bit more as I go. You know, they learn these couple of techniques, but they’re still working on these other, but I’ll throw in another couple more.
And so they grow. One person said he learned more with me in one session than his other coach in 10. And I found that…
I was honored to find that out, but it’s the full immersion technique. It’s throwing them into the deep end. But of course, when you do that, you have to be there with a lifeline for them.
That’s great.
Yeah, that’s wonderful. And obviously, Juilie, you’re a coach who holds themself to a very high standard of integrity. I’m curious, and you’ve hinted at this before, what are some things that students should look to avoid or some red flags when they’re researching coaches?
We hear this term tossed around a bit. We call them predatory coaches, ones who actually prey on unsuspecting talent in their wallets. So can you…
I know this is a topic that you’re very passionate about. So can you talk a little bit about that?
Yeah, first of all, with coaches, I find four categories. There are predatory coaches, there are good coaches, there are incompetent coaches, and there are… What was the other one?
I can’t remember. But okay, it’ll come to me. So the incompetent coaches are people who mean well.
They just really aren’t qualified to be coaching, okay? And a lot of those are the ones I talked about earlier that came from, say, a radio background, which there’s nothing wrong with, but it’s a different industry, okay? So they shouldn’t be coaching in this industry till they’re working in this industry, right?
And then you’ve got the good coaches who are very reputable. And then you’ve got the predatory coaches who I can’t name or I’ll be in trouble, but it is such a shame that people like that are out there. And there’s one, for example, in San Marcos, California, there is a studio that I can’t name, but the man and woman who run it apparently did some voice overs in the 80s.
And they have an agent friend that comes in and fawns over everybody. And they have classes there. And when they do, here’s a couple of things.
They tell the people not to become friends with each other because your student is your competitor. That’s not our industry, I’m sorry. And my competitor friends, I have an infomercial client who said, you know, Juilie, I love you and I’ll always come to you first, but I’ve got this other infomercial that is a competing product from such and such.
And so I recommended another lady, VoiceOver Talent, who was a direct competitor to me, because that’s what they needed. You can be recommended for stuff. Plus, hey, man, this industry is way too hard not to support each other.
Absolutely. And as we’ve mentioned, I mean, the whole reason we started the podcast was to really pay forward that spirit of generosity that we see every day.
Exactly, exactly. And we get that online and we get that, you know, we don’t learn a whole lot when we go to places like VO Atlanta. And we don’t meet clients there, but we get the camaraderie, we learn some things and we get the camaraderie of other talents and we become known to other talents who could possibly hire us and have nothing else, you know, be a support system, answer the question, you know, do I use Source Connect or whatever?
You know what I mean?
I find that’s one of the hardest parts to get across to new talent is that the industry really is giving like that, especially if they’re in another entertainment industry like on-screen acting or radio. Because like you said, that competitive spirit has to be there in order to make it in those fields. When I tell people that VoiceOver is not like that, they sort of look at me with a stink eye and say, yeah, whatever, until they actually experience it.
And then it’s like a breath of fresh air.
Yeah, I’ve seen people… The first time I taught it at the Voice Conference in Los Angeles, I saw a lady who talked to me and said, she came alone and she was so afraid to come because she thought that everybody sitting around her was going to hate her because they were all competitors. And then she found out that she was received with love by everybody.
And everybody was willing to help each other. And that’s awesome within this industry. But when you’re looking at predatory coaches, here’s one of the things to look for.
Ask about their curriculum. If they have the same curriculum for everybody, for example, one company that I cannot name has such a bad model, if you would ask me. They have the same curriculum for everybody.
You pay $4,500, okay? You’ll get 10 lessons. Then you’ll get, I don’t know, one or two demos, okay?
And of course you pay in advance for them all. Well, I have had students that were even newbies that were ready for demos after four sessions. It’s not common, but it has happened.
And I’ve had other students that have been successful, but it took 15 sessions to get them there. And everybody is different, even when they’re new or whether they’ve been around a while, everybody’s different. So for 10 sessions and two demos, I would be like under $3,000, you know?
And so they’re charging a whole lot. Why I keep my demo prices low anyway, because people who need demos, they don’t have $4,500 to pay per demo, so $1,800 for one demo, as opposed to I do $1,700 for two. They just don’t have the money.
And they’re like mortgaging the house to get this.
Yeah, that’s a huge overinflation for that price. Like $1,700 is pretty standard, but $45,000, that is ridiculous.
Exactly, and that includes 10 sessions, but what if they only need three? What if they only need five? Okay, the other thing is they pay coaches a very low rate.
Like one that is such a scam pays coaches about $25 an hour. And I found through students that have come to me that are literally in tears, and I’m talking a whole lot more than one, because they went with this company. And I found with one that his coach was a woman who had been in voice overs for about two years.
I have no idea if she was working. And she made $25 an hour and coached 30 hours a week. So with her-
Where’s the bulk of her income coming from?
And yeah, and with this massive two years of experience, what does she have to offer? Well, I can tell you, not a whole lot. And then with this company, they send their students in for the demo, and the coach does not coach them, the engineer does.
Okay, well, an engineer, I’m sorry, very few engineers are qualified to coach. I’m not gonna say none are, but engineers can give you a beautiful, wonderful, high quality recording of crap that the only one who’s gonna love is your mother. And so if the engineer is coaching you, yeah, I would run away from that for sure.
And then coaches that have very little experience, again, like this one lady, you know? And I’m gonna tell you, if a coach is working for 25 bucks an hour, they’re not a good coach. Gotta tell you that because they can’t afford to.
You know, I could never afford to work for that. Coaching itself, I charge between 100 and 150 an hour, depending on what packages they buy, like five sessions, one session, five sessions or 10 sessions. And if they buy 10 and they’re ready after five, then we go and we do the demo.
And after the fact, we start working on what do I do now? And how do I get that agent and all that other stuff? There’s a lot more.
I consider myself a voiceover life coach because I’m not just there when they’re in a session with me. I’m there to help them with whatever they need, whether it be… I’m not on somebody’s payroll to recommend for branding or to recommend for websites or whatever, but you’ve got to guide people along because if they start stepping out on their own, they make a lot of mistakes that they didn’t need to make.
So, coaches with little experience don’t have that. But I got to say, even at $100 to $150 an hour, I mean, seriously, if that were a voice over that took you 15 minutes, that $150 is a bottom feeder job, and I leave it for my students. You know what I mean?
Yeah.
So, VoiceOver pays, by the hour, a whole lot more than coaching does. And so, when you’ve got somebody who’s $25 an hour, coaching, how in the world are they making a living? Well, it’s really easy.
They’re only making a living coaching as opposed to VoiceOver because, you know, that’s good money to them because it’s much more than flipping burgers.
That’s a great frame of reference.
Yeah. But if they were actually able to get money in VoiceOver, they wouldn’t be doing it for that price.
So, Juilie, going back to the types of coaching you do, one thing we want to ask, because a lot of our audience is newcomers, how does… When someone’s looking for a coach, what’s the first genre, if there is one, that they should approach? Or do you think that there should be more of a holistic approach?
Well, no, not a holistic approach. Not anymore. It used to be a holistic approach, but really not anymore.
But you know, that really depends on them. I mean, if somebody… Okay, take Bob Bergen.
He always wanted to be Porky Pig. So if he were to… And he is.
But if he were to go into LA and say, well, they said I should start with audiobooks, you know? That wouldn’t help them towards becoming Porky Pig. So you know, it’s basically…
And one of the things I do in my very first session, is I spend about 20 to 30 minutes, almost half the session, getting to know them and what are their desires. And then how can I help them with that? I usually do encourage a commercial and narration slash e-learning demo.
And here’s why. For some reason, even if you don’t want to do commercials, it’s still pretty standard that if you want to get an agent, you have to have a commercial demo. That’s what they ask for.
And so that’s kind of like, you need it. And then e-learning is so… It’s growing so fast.
I just posted an article on the e-learning narrator’s Facebook page that Jack DeGoglia put together. I think it’s going to be like… What did it say?
A $25 billion industry by 2025? It is growing so much. And so for people who are interested, it’ll take them a lot less time to be able to get money in narration and e-learning than it will take them to become Mickey Mouse.
Because you’re right. A lot of people aspire to be in animation. Some don’t, but some want to be the voice of this product or that product.
And I got this advice too when I started about four or five years ago. Commercial and narration is where a lot of the work is. Right.
I agree completely. That is where you start. And I was going to say, especially from a non-union standpoint, e-learning and corporate narration is a global industry.
So you don’t need to be a union affiliated to pursue it.
Oh, absolutely. In fact, I make more… It’s so funny.
I make more in e-learning than a lot of union people. I had a friend of a friend in the union that I was talking to, and we talked for a while, and he was saying… And this is a guy who had done a lot of very respectable work.
You know, things go up and down. This is a great guy. And he is like, I can’t get arrested in this town.
And then 15 minutes later, he’s saying, Juilie, you need to join the union. And I am not against the union at all. Don’t get me wrong.
But I’m like, okay, but my union friends aren’t working, and I am. So why would I pay, what, $3,000 or whatever when I’m getting work and I’m working for union type wages? I’m not doing the $150 bottom feeder jobs.
The only thing I’ll do for $150 is coach because I want to help people and because I really enjoy teaching and enjoy the, oh my gosh, the gratification you get when all of a sudden somebody gets it. I get so proud. I know that sounds stupid.
That actually comes into really well with our last question. And I just want you to kind of talk about some of the, like you’ve had a very rich and varied career in VoiceOver. What were some of the highlights for you?
Because I mean, I know in your coaching materials and on the VoiceOver Insider podcast, you’ve had some amazing celebrity guests and coaches that you’ve worked with to provide materials to your audience. So you’re welcome to just talk about some happy memories with a student or working with one of your mentors. Just some highlights for you.
Well, you know what? It is great meeting all these people and teaching at the conferences and stuff like that. But probably, I would say definitely hands down, the biggest experience for me in VoiceOver that is the most treasured moment came in 1996.
And that was when I was cast in a Pampers commercial with my son, who was six at the time.
Wow.
And we sat in, and it’s so funny, because that’s the first spot on my demo. And it’s a great spot, and also I love it.
And he’s got a brilliant mind, so he just memorized everything so quickly. But he was sitting on my lap, and we were sitting in the agent’s office. That was back when you went in for auditions.
And we were talking to the microphone, and we went through the whole thing, and there was such a connection, a mother-son connection there, because we were mother and son. And we both got cast in it. It was like magic.
And for me, he does not sound like that. He doesn’t sound like that anymore, since he’s 27 almost. But that was the highlight of my career.
And you got a little audio time capsule right on your demo. That’s beautiful.
Yes, exactly. And some people had told me to take it off, but you know what? When I had…
You have to have other people listen to your demo too, no matter how long you’ve been doing it, because you have to separate yourself from it. And Pat Fradley listened to it, and he was like, that’s the best spot on there. And he didn’t know at the time that it was my son, and we’d been cast together.
And most of the stuff on my demo are not jobs I’ve done, or at least I re-voiced them, you know, for the actual demo. But that one spot is one that I did, and I treasure it, and no matter what anybody says, I’m never going to take it off.
Your cold dead body, right?
So that was my most wonderful experience.
Does your son still do voiceover?
No, he doesn’t. He’s an IT guy. He did some voiceover and on camera for a long time, but it just wasn’t him, you know?
And I kind of, I don’t want to say pushed him into it, but I encouraged him into it.
Yeah, I think we all do that if the opportunity is there.
But it just turned out that that might have been one of the last things he did. I really don’t remember, but it just wasn’t him. He wasn’t excited about it.
I mean, he liked it when he made, you know, 100 bucks, 200 bucks here and there. He was an extra in a Maxwell House commercial. And, you know, they paid him in cash.
And we went out and bought a little tablet thingy as far as tablets were in those days. You know, I mean, he liked things like that. You know, that the money came in and he could go buy a toy.
But, you know, as far as doing the actual work, it wasn’t… he didn’t really care one way or the other. So I wasn’t going to continue investing financially and the time it took.
Because back then, we were going from San Antonio to Dallas because he had an audition. So we’re driving up there, seven hours, drive up there, stay at a hotel, come back. So it was a certain amount of expense and a certain amount of time because he had this audition for Walker Texas Ranger, you know.
Because he did on camera, too. Yes, love him. So, you know, it just…
he just ended up not really being the right person for that.
But that’s still so cool that you have that memory for him. And I love that the sense of ownership that you have with your demo. Because, I mean, you’re confident in it, and it’s uniquely you.
And, yeah, don’t change it.
Well, and that’s what I do with my students, is I make sure that their demos are uniquely them. And I’ll tell you when… you know, some people say, like, you’re like, well, when is it time to update your demo?
Someone will say, when you get the big job, or every two years, or whatever. I say it’s time to update your demo when I want to hand it to you and say, here’s my demo, but I’m really better than that. That’s when it’s time to update your demo to where you can be confident with it.
Even if the second demo isn’t really any, quote, better than the first one, you have to have the confidence. And plus, when you feel that way, it usually means that you have improved your skills to the point where you do need a new demo. Mm-hmm.
I know I’m going to work on that this year. But frankly, I still get new clients with my current one, so it can’t be that bad.
Exactly. And that’s the way I feel with mine. I mean, I redid it a couple of years ago, and I worked with Deb Monroe on it.
We kind of traded out. She coached me through my commercial demo, and I coached her through her e-learning and narration demo, because we each had to update those specific ones. And so, you know, I know I coach people through commercial demos, but I’m not going to do my own, because I think that’s stupid.
And when people do their own, I’m sorry, but I think that’s stupid. And Deb felt the same way. And so when it came to doing her narration demo, she came to me, because I specialize in that, and we did kind of a trade, and it worked out great for both of us.
I mean, it was just the coaching thing. I took care of the post-production. She took care of her post-production.
But the coaching itself, we did a trade-out, and I think we each got the best in our particular genres, and the demos attest to that.
But that is too cool. And maybe it’s my theater background creeping in a little bit, but when you have that actor-director relationship, you really can make something so much better than either of you separately.
Exactly.
And it really speaks to your integrity. You were mentioning before you never really… Like, you don’t coach people outside of your areas of expertise, and you refer to them to others who do.
Oh, yeah, I couldn’t do that. It wouldn’t be right.
That’s wonderful. Well, anyways, Juilie, thank you so much. I mean, you’ve just been a font of information, and you’ve got some great stories.
How can people get a hold of you or find your VoiceOver Insider if they’re interested?
Okay, well, the VoiceOver Insider is voiceoverinsider.com. And you can sign up on the upper right-hand corner where it says, you know, sign up or subscribe or something like that. And listen to the podcasts.
Just click on podcasts, and you can see there are so many incredible podcasts on there. I learned so much from these podcasts, so I know that they’re helpful for others because I learn. I mean, the most recent one we did was on CRMs, and I’m about to do one on ISDN alternatives, as well as, like what we were talking about, programs that you can use to record both ends like we need for podcasts.
So patching in remote direction, things like that.
Right. And if you want to…
I’ve learned practically everything I know from podcasts and webcasts, including yours, Juilie.
Thank you. And then there is, if you want to know about my coaching, it’s juliewilliamscoaches.com. And if you want to email me, it’s julie at voiceovers.com.
Got in pretty early, but not early enough to get voice overs without the hyphen.
That’s not bad.
Yeah, talent Bill Murray in Atlanta area or something like that got that first.
Yeah, I think Dr. Kell owns the rest. Everything else voice over related.
Oh, and if you forget, just voiceovers.com.
Yes, Juilie at voiceovers.com.
Perfect. Thank you so much, Juilie. It’s been a real pleasure having you.
Oh, Sean and Paul, it’s an honor that I got to be on your great podcast.
Thank you so much. Well, I mean, you really set a high standard of the educational and informational content that you put out for free, and I really thank you so much for maintaining that level of integrity and quality. So thank you.
Oh, thank you. I want to add one more thing. I’ve got this entire packet.
It’s an online packet. And the VoiceOver Insider used to be like a 40-page literal magazine every month, but I couldn’t keep doing it that way, so it’s not anymore. But I’ve got a lot of archives and I’ve got a lot of articles I’ve written that are about how to differentiate yourself from other people and all that.
And I give that packet to people for free. I just, you know, you send me an email and I attach it and, you know, say, let me know if you have any questions. So if anybody, any of your listeners, if you guys would like to email me at julie at voiceover.com and ask for my resources, VoiceOver resource packet or something like that, I will attach that and you will have umpteen zillion articles from the VoiceOver Insider.
You’ll have a handful of articles I’ve written. There’s just lots of stuff in there.
That is too cool. Thank you.
We’re not united by our dozens of listeners. We will push the envelope and try and get you some…
Well, you will grow. Your dozens of listeners. My podcast now have over 40,000.
Your dozens of listeners will grow because you’re offering good content and that’s what it takes. You know, offering good content and then letting people know it’s there and then word of mouth spreads.
Awesome. Thank you very much. Like I said, rising tide raises all ships.
So once again, that was the wonderful Juilie Williams and we’re going to take it back to the podcast studio right after this.
So thank you once again to Juilie Williams. That was fantastic information and a lot of it. So I hope you guys were taking notes.
Yeah, that was it. Thank you so much, Juilie. You are a true fond of information and inspiration.
So thank you so much. And once again, you can find her at voiceovers.com or just look up Juilie Williams VoiceOver Coach or in a Google search, and then you can find her website that way. So that wraps up Episode 9 of The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Thanks again for listening. We’ve got a lot of exciting episodes coming up. We’ve got the guys, Dan Letter and George Whitham, coming up in a future episode.
So we were featured on their show, VOBS, a few weeks ago. And now we’re returning the favor and bringing them here. We also have a VoiceOver blog writer, Paul Stracuerta, and as well as some local, or excuse me, not local, but In the Trenches voice actors, Stephen J.
Cohen and Jack DeGolia. So thank you all so much. If you’d like to contribute to the show, or if you have questions for Paul or myself, just check us out on vometer.com.
Thanks again for listening. Thanks for listening to The VO Meter. Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
To follow along, please visit www.vometer.com.

The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Welcome everybody to Episode 8 of The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
We are going to talk about lots of events today. We have a VO Meter shit coming up from Heather Masters, and of course, questionable gear purchases. But first, how are you today, Sean?
I’m doing all right. I’m actually in Seattle right now recording from a hotel room. So that’s why things, you might hear the occasional vacuum cleaner or siren outside.
But at least the acoustics problems are taken care of for the most part. I’m using the review unit that I got from Adil Aliyev for the carry-on vocal booth version 2.0. We can talk a little bit more about him later, but he’s actually working on a newer version of that.
Aside from having to deal with like less than ideal recording situation, I’m having a good time. What about you, Paul?
Things are good. Work every couple of days, if not every day. Couple of new agents signed with over the last couple of weeks.
That’s exciting.
Very nice.
And yeah, just plugging along as always.
Very cool.
So what’s in Seattle?
Some of you know I was an English teacher or an ESL. English is a second language teacher for several years. And my older brother is as well.
And there’s actually a TESL, or Teaching English to Speakers of Other Language Conference, going on at the Convention Center. So him being in Boston, I helped sort of coordinate the travel plans and booked the hotel and found a place that’s a wonderful location. It’s like a 10, 15 minute walk from the Convention Center.
But it’s also, that’s about all it has going for it.
Interesting. I didn’t know there was a way to properly pronounce that acronym.
TESOL?
Yeah. Interesting. I would have always just said T-O-E-S-L.
Oh no. Yeah, well, I mean, if you have to write it or say it enough, you’ll say TESOL.
Yeah, there’s a way to pronounce every acronym. It’s one of the challenges of working with certain industries. They all have their own jargon that you need to learn before you can actually converse with everybody.
Speak the language, yeah.
Yeah, exactly. So one other thing I wanted to mention is that you and I have actually been booked on another show. Do you want to talk a little bit to the listeners about that?
Yeah, that’s really cool. We’ve actually been booked on VOBS, that’s a voiceover body shop, starring audio engineer George Widom and the home studio master and voice actor, Dan Leonard. So this is, I don’t know about you, Paul, but this is really exciting for me.
You guys have heard us mention the show several times on the podcast, and honestly, almost everything that Paul and I know about audio was from these two guys.
It’s like a kid in a candy store. I can’t believe they actually asked us to do it, but we’ll do our best to impress and hopefully have some fun at the same time.
Absolutely, I mean, it’s gonna be way better than our earlier show. We’ve appeared a couple times on their fan round table, and I was in Japan at the time, so the internet quality was less than stellar, and the delay was just awful, but the guys were really great sports, and it was just fun to be there live.
Yeah, we’ll have to tease them, because two weeks ago, I think it was Anthony Mendez was on, and he was saying that he thinks he may be the most return trip guest, or the guest that has made the most return trips, and I was thinking, well, if you count our crazy round tables, you and I are gonna be on three times now.
Yeah, absolutely, well, I mean, but that’s a little bit different. They brought, like, he’s a paid guest.
I know, I’m just trying to make myself feel better. But anyway, that should be a lot of fun. And join us on April 3rd at 6 p.m. Pacific Time, 9 p.m. Eastern at www.vobs.tv.
Should be a lot of fun.
Okay, so that pretty much wraps things up for current events. We are actually going to get to our main topic, which is VO conferences and industry-related events in a few minutes. But right now, our good friend Heather Masters is going to entertain us all with her VO Meter shtick.
Okay, everybody, it’s time for the VO Meter shtick.
What did he say?
It’s time for the VO… Oh, never mind.
The VO Meter shtick?
Oh, got it.
I’m Heather Masters, and I have, oh, so many embarrassing experiences, but I shall choose one. When I was first starting out and I got my very first live session, I had no idea what to expect, and I’m all on my own up here in Alaska, so pretty much everything that I have learned has been via internet or via long-distance coaching. So I was all on my own and super nervous.
So whenever he called in, I had all my Skype accounts set up just right, which, by the way, I suck at technology, and that was in and of itself a feat for me to learn how to Skype and pretend like I knew what I was doing, which apparently I proved I didn’t because I had the video on. It never occurred to me. I didn’t even know you could turn it off.
And so as we were going in the session, he didn’t have his video camera on. And as we’re going through the session, I’m doing his directions. And there was one part of the section where he kept saying something for me to do, and I just wasn’t getting it.
I think I was just super nervous and I could hear it in my head, but I couldn’t do it with my mouth. And so I kept like having this weird face and making these like idiot, you know, faces because I was frustrated with myself for not getting it. And at one point he said, you know, maybe you should turn your video camera off.
And I laughed awkwardly. Oh, ha ha ha, I know, I make such funny facial expressions. Sorry, I’m really expressive.
Ha ha ha. I didn’t realize he was being serious. And I didn’t know how.
So I just left it on and we continued the session for a couple more minutes and then it ended. And I didn’t realize until later when I talked to some other VOs that you don’t turn your video camera on because you’re a voice and don’t nobody care what you look like. So I emailed him and said, oh, and I’m sorry about the session this morning and about forgetting to turn my camera off.
And then when you mentioned turning my camera off, still forgetting it. It was early on a Monday morning for me and I still hadn’t had my coffee. Smiley face.
Yeah. I don’t think he thought that was very funny. I never heard from him again.
And let’s just say, if I ever see an audition from this studio, I’m all steer clear because I felt really stupid. So, lesson learned, and it’s all part of the journey.
So, yeah, I love that story. Heather actually told us that personally a few weeks ago. Have you ever done anything like that, Sean?
Oh, any large mistakes like that?
With a client on the line, yeah.
So, actually, yeah, I mean, when one of my first coaches, Terry Daniel, like he just suggested just leave, whenever we talked, it would always be audio only, so. Which makes sense, because usually, a lot of us don’t have our computers near our mics, so you couldn’t see us if you wanted to.
Yeah, and actually, I don’t know about you, but when I’m listening to somebody else, I try to critique, I usually close my eyes anyway, because it helps me focus. If I’m seeing their face, it sort of messes with my head, and I can’t give a proper critique.
One of my favorite voice actors, James Arnold Taylor, has this great story. He’s been the voice of Fred Flintstone for almost two decades, but when he went to audition for the part, I mean, this guy, he’s a shorter guy, he’s like five foot five, maybe barely over 100 pounds. They would actually look over him, because they were like, are you sure you’re here for the right audition?
And the original voice of Fred Flintstone was actually listening to his audition. He’s like, will you just shut your eyes and listen to him? He’s the right guy.
And then the casting director did, he’s like, all right, you’re right, we’ll do him, we’ll do him.
See, it helps.
So it’s really interesting, even in an audio medium, how much the visuals can affect us.
Yeah, indeed. So once again, we will get to our main topic of discussion, industry events, in just a moment, but once again, because we just can’t help ourselves, here’s this week’s…
All right, so for this week’s Questionable Gear Purchases, I’m actually doing okay. So, but I do want to talk about that because I was looking at a couple of, I was looking at a new mic, so let me back up a little bit. I have about three mics right now.
I have the Jay-Z J1, which we talked about in an earlier episode. The Sennheiser 416, which is what I’m using right now. It’s a great travel mic and a great, great for a lot of things.
Great for radio imaging, great for promo, great for most commercial work. I know a couple of friends doing animation auditions with it as well. So it’s definitely a good mic to have in the locker if you can afford it.
And then I have my Blue Mouse, which is my fancy, pretty mic. But I was looking at more neutral options for say like e-learning or audiobook work. And so I sat down with some audio engineer friends of mine and be like, do I actually need another mic?
And they’re like, no Sean, you don’t. So it’s really good, like if you don’t know enough about this stuff, it’s always great to get an expert opinion. And who knows, you could save $500, $1,000 on a purchase you didn’t need to make.
Yeah, or even ask friends. One of our colleague, Mike Nordgaard, recently bought a new mic and sent the samples of an A-B test with his existing 416 to us. And my comments were basically, I really think it’s a waste for you to stick with what works.
Yeah, unless you don’t have a backup. Because I mean, these two mics sounded very similar. And…
On mic tests, you mean, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, on his test, exactly. And it was very difficult. There were a couple of parts where we were like, did he, is he messing with us?
Is he switching the samples? So, like, making it harder to guess? But yeah, I mean, if he doesn’t have a backup, he does now, or he can just sell it, and still be fine with the 416.
Yeah, at some point, you reach a point of diminishing returns, where what you have is not going to get any better.
It could, yeah, and you can fall under confirmation bias. You’re like, so you’re like, you wanna justify the purchase, so you’re like, yeah, it sounds great. But what about you, Paul?
Any questionable gear purchases?
Oh, yeah, oh, yeah. So, there was a couple of reasons, or at least rationalizations, that I’d make to myself for this, but I swapped out one mic, the mic I use for audiobooks and long-form narration, because I was looking for something less sensitive, and there was two reasons for that. One, I have problems with mouth clicks, as I think I’ve mentioned, and it helps to have something that’s not as sensitive for long-form.
And then also, I had an author friend who came into the studio, and I recorded her doing audiobook for the first time, where I was the engineer, and she was doing the narration. And she had maybe the worst mouth clicks I’ve ever heard. And in case she’s listening, I’ve told her this in person.
But this was just a normal conversation. So we sat down and we’re sort of talking to the process about how it works and how long it will take, and I said, wow, this is gonna be challenging. So I went out and bought an SM58 by Shure, which is a stage mic used for lots of music and on stage live singers.
And I put it in the booth and it sounds fantastic. It does have some background noise, which is to be expected with a dynamic mic like that.
So when you say background noise, you mean like the self noise in the mic?
It has some self noise, yes. You can definitely hear some self noise in the mic. It’s not the quietest.
But for what I needed, it was absolutely perfect. I put it way up high, almost to the ceiling for the author I was recording, and it almost completely eliminated the mouth noises, just physically. And it was basically a godsend.
And then I use it for myself now for audiobooks, same thing. The less sensitivity really helps. And then I run a little noise reduction on the files, and it sounds great at the end of the day.
And that’s something that I’ve learned. I mean, the more experienced you get with mic technique, you find all sorts of interesting tricks that you can do just with your position in relation to the mic. At first, you might be familiar with say proximity effect, which is where you get really close up onto that mic for that, those intimate reads.
Oh yeah. And then you automatically turn into Barry White or Don LaFontaine. But, but one thing that people don’t try is to actually back off the mic.
Like we, I mean, we have this generic sign. We say, we call it a hang ten, where you extend your thumb and your pinky. And then that helps you dictate about five to six inches away from the mic, which is a good starting point.
But lately, I’ve actually been backing up further, closer to 10 inches away. And say, with the blue mouse, my recordings have gotten a lot clearer. And with the 416 as well, it takes some of the edge off.
Yeah, that actually brings me to my next questionable gear purchase. I went out and bought a Sennheiser 415T, MKH 415T, which is the predecessor to the 416, so to speak. I heard some good recommendations about it.
How it’s like the 416, but less edgy, especially on the top end and a little bit warmer. So I found one at a good price and I just couldn’t resist. So I put it in the booth, I’m talking on it now.
And again, it sounds fantastic. I have to admit, all my… I know I sound like a complete hypocrite based on my last blog post and all my talking about less is more, but my gosh, it’s just like butter.
There are certain products that are worth the high price tag. So it’s unfortunate, but I mean, if you can afford it, then get it.
And one other thing I wanted to mention, because some people, some fans actually have reached out to me about this. Another thing I did was put in a channel strip into my signal chain. And it’s ironic because the very last episode of VOBS before the anniversary one, so basically the day after I bought this thing, George and Dan talked about how channel strips are a complete waste of time, that all they do is introduce extra noise.
And they mentioned the specific model that I had just bought, the DBX 286. There’s an A and S version, I bought the A. But what I’m gonna say is very specific to my situation.
I have highway rumble that I’ve talked about for every episode now. The trucks in the background on the four lane highway just can’t, I can’t block it out with after, with after the fact processing, and…
And you’ve been fighting that problem for like two years now.
Yes, so another friend of the program, Alan Taylor, actually suggested using the channel strip and specifically the 286 by DBX to cut out that noise before it gets into the chain. This particular model has an expander built in and a high pass filter. So I thought a good deal, it was 140 bucks with shipping, got it here and plugged it in, and it does exactly what Alan was suggesting.
I turned on the expander very lightly, so I took some time to adjust it to make sure I had the settings right, and it blocks out that highway rumble along with the high pass filter and allows me to turn the gain up a little bit more on the mic, and with the shotgun, it’s like it’s not even there. So it’s the cleanest signal I’ve had by far. In my particular situation where I needed it, it works well.
But as you can see, this is all evolutionary stuff. So I mean, Paul had a very specific problem, and then this one product offered the solution. You might be fine with just the mic interface combo yourself.
So don’t go running out and buying this DBX just because Paul suggested it.
Right. Somebody contacted me this week. It was actually the gentleman, I’m not sure if he wants me to mention his name, but the same VOBS episode where George and Dan were trashing the DBX, it was because this gentleman sent in a sample to them.
And they said, well, you shouldn’t have the DBX, that’s why it sounds terrible. So he was talking to me about it offline, saying, do you think I should get rid of it? And I said, actually, I just bought one.
So it’s different strokes for different folks, definitely know your situation, and I would say don’t mess with things unless you really know how to set them up.
Speaking of which, because you mentioned having an expander, and that’s something we haven’t really talked about before. I have a general idea of what that is and what that does, but I’d love to hear your description since you’re actually using it.
My description? But what I think it does, and who knows if I’m really accurate, is that it cuts out the dead space between sounds. So it’s basically a gate that will clamp down when the sound is not coming to the mic and then rise back up when the sound is coming into the mic.
Now, one of the reasons I like the channel strip is because it has actual dials. I don’t have to punch in numbers or settings on a plugin. I can just adjust the dials until it sounds good.
And that has helped a lot.
Awesome, very cool. One less questionable gear purchase. So as I mentioned, I have the 416.
And once you get all the big purchases out of the way, I’m a big fan of smaller ones to sort of improve your workflow or to help the things you already have work better. So I picked up two little things for the 416. One of them is this very discreet pop screen or pop filter that goes right onto the barrel of the mic.
So I hate dealing with goosenecks. I know it’s a traditional design and a lot of pop filters use it, but I’ve never liked it. I don’t even like the fact that they scratch up whatever mic stand you put them on.
So I mean, this one’s low profile. It looks cool. It works well.
It’s even portable. It’s great. And then the other one was a shock mount for it, which is also very small and low profile.
It’s actually from Rode, who has partnered with Rycote, who specialize in just making shock mounts. And they’ve got this really interesting, they call it their lyre system. So rather than having, say, rubber bands sort of form this web that wraps around a mic and detaches it from shocks, or like helps it absorb shocks, this actually uses sort of rubble, er, rubble, rubber.
Too many Flintstone references.
Barney Rubble, hey Fred. But anyways, it uses these little, they call them lyres, because they’re sort of like bow shaped, but they’re made out of rubber, they’re still very sturdy and lightweight, and it looks good with the 416. And if I wanted to, I could even use it on a boom pole, or like with a camera rig, or something like that.
So I’m happy with those purchases, and it wasn’t too expensive for both.
Awesome. So I guess the moral of the story is, there can be not so questionable gear purchases as well.
Well, if you put enough thought into them, none of them are.
There you go. All right, so let’s get to the meat and potatoes of the program. We want to talk about events.
So, VO Atlanta just wrapped up, and you and I were both there. Let’s talk about that. First of all, what were your expectations going in, especially as a second timer?
So, as a second timer, that’s a good point. So, my first year, I actually won attendance to come to the conference because Anne Gangusa and Gerald Griffith, the main coordinators of the conference, have this sort of scholarship through Anne Gangusa’s Facebook group, The VO Peeps. At the time, I was living in Japan, so I qualified for their international scholarship, and I won attendance to the conference.
I got a nice travel stipend, and I was able to come, which was great, because at the time, I couldn’t have afforded it otherwise. And I had an amazing time. I was just blown away.
The atmosphere is so electric and positive and encouraging. I met people from all walks of life, at all stages of their career. Everyone had something to offer, and I was surprised with how much people were paying attention to my advice.
And it’s funny, because this year, I’m pretty active on social media, so people are like, oh yeah, I know, I’ve seen all of your posts and your videos. Like, what cartoons are you in? I’m like, not quite at that level yet, but you’re so…
But it’s just so great to be able to connect with people that I’ve followed online for a number of years. And meet them in person and talk shop. It was great.
Awesome. So, as a first timer, I think I mentioned this in the episode leading up to the conference. I didn’t really have any expectations.
I was showing up as a sponge, basically, to absorb as much as I could and see what happens. So, I tried to do that, basically. I showed up and just waited to see what happened.
And that was interesting.
See, that was my plan, too, but then about a week or so before the conference, Cliff Selman, he’s an audio engineer and sort of automotive commercial specialist out of Texas. He and another audio engineer, VO, Dan Friedman, were organizing what’s called the Team Challenge. And this was their fourth one.
I believe the first event didn’t have one. But basically, what happens is you get nine teams who are assigned at random. You have team leaders who decided before the conference, but the teams themselves are decided at random.
And then they’re given a client, and then they have 24 hours to write a script, cast the script using the team members, record it in your hotel room with whatever devices you have available, and then mix it together, and then submit it, and hope for the best. So originally, I wanted to be like Paul and have a very, like, since I was so, since my schedule was so planned out the year before, and I had certain expectations being a scholarship winner, my original plan was to just enjoy the conference like a newbie and absorb everything that comes my way. But the team challenge is quite the time commitment, and it literally took up half of my conference time.
Yeah, I barely saw you. I mean, that was partially my issue, too, but yeah.
And when you did see me, I was usually sweating profusely and quietly saying expletives under my breath.
And holding your knees and rocking back and forth slowly.
Challenge. Exactly. But there is a happy ending to the story.
We did finish relatively early. I mean, yeah, it was half the conference, but there were some people working on theirs into the third day. But even though we were competing with each other and there was some joking jabs at each other’s expense, it was all good fun.
There was no real sense of cutthroat competition. Everyone just wanted to make a good spot. So it was a good event.
And I’m happy to report that my team actually won the challenge. So even though I missed half of this year’s conference, I get to go next year for free.
There are videos out there of Sean’s acceptance speech. You should definitely try and catch it if you can. It was pretty epic.
Oh, wow, I didn’t know that got recorded. And I’m all teary-eyed and emotional because I’m just running on three hours of sleep a night.
And also possibly concussed as you bang your head on the way up the stairs.
Oh, dude, I have pictures. I have this giant bruise on my shin because I was so happy. I was so excited.
First off, I looked like freaking Hugh Jackman because I’m like, yeah, when he’s about to go, Berserker Barrage, but I was just so happy. And first off, I never thought I could do what was required of the challenge before. And then we won first prize.
So it was a wonderful feeling. And so in my rush to get to the stage, I tripped on an audio cable and almost concussed myself on the railing. But thank God my spider-like reflexes saved me at the last minute.
Yeah, that was fantastic.
Oh Lord, thank God that wasn’t on camera.
But congratulations to you and the whole team. I know you worked really hard because I saw, I witnessed it. I actually crashed one of your sessions and ate dinner with your team.
Yeah, yeah. And it was quick because you guys had to go back out and work right away. So it was exciting.
But yeah, speaking of which, I hardly saw you at the conference. And I don’t think you got much of what you expected out of it either.
Well, yeah, speaking about expectations, my experience turned out quite different as well. And that’s because I volunteered to work as part of the conference team, specifically the audio visual team or ABS team. And that involved setting up all the audio and video for each of the presentation rooms and the main room.
So I had to be there on Wednesday and we had a team meeting. And I thought we’d just sort of hang out after that. But no, immediately, we had to take all the equipment.
We had it all stashed in one room, which is basically a staging room where we could inventory all the equipment to make sure we knew what we had and then assign it to each room. And it was the most crazy logistics plan I’ve ever seen. A great job done by Ron Minitry, who was heading up the logistics for that.
And a well-oiled machine. We set up all the equipment in that room and then we moved it to each of the rooms as we could. So the challenge was, and one of the reasons they’re moving next year to a new facility is that we didn’t actually have access to all the rooms, because there was another conference going on.
There was a Sisters of Mercy conference, of all things, in all the rooms, in most of the rooms. And the other half was filled with Chick-fil-A employees doing some sort of corporate retreat.
Oh, I did see that, that’s right.
So we only had access to, I think, one of the rooms the first night. So we put some stuff in there, ran the cables, ran the mics, set up the mixers. But then we had to get up at the Crack of Dawn the next day, and, or sorry, not even, that’s next day, we didn’t have access to the rooms until 11 o’clock.
So basically, as registration was happening, me and my colleagues were running back and forth like crazy people, taking all the equipment to the rooms that we could get access to. And then some, we had to take the equipment and move it to another room once the session was over. So for instance, the one session where Jeffrey Kafer was, once he was done on Thursday, or on Friday, we took that equipment out and ran it to the bar so we could set up karaoke with the same speakers and mixer.
So it was constant movement, constant work. It was not what I was expecting, but it was really interesting to see the conference from that side because there was a lot of fringe benefits involved. First of all, the most obvious is a discount on registration, so when you volunteer for the conference, they have a thing called the Ambassador Program.
And if you go to the website, you can actually register for this now, for next year to apply. You can get a registration for $250, which is half the cost of the registration. And as an ambassador, you only have to commit to eight hours of work during the conference.
And that can be maybe doing registration, maybe doing set up, maybe doing audio visual stuff like I was doing. It might be a room attendant, where you offer water to the presenter, or make sure they have the chair they need. Just eight hours of your time throughout the conference, you can get half off the registration.
So check that out if you’re interested next year. It might be a way to get to the conference that you might not have thought about. So that was one benefit.
And honestly, I could not have gone to the conference without that discount. So that was the one reason I did it. But the other, and I knew this would be the case from my history with other businesses, is that when you’re on the team like that, there’s a lot of behind the scenes contact that you get that really isn’t possible any other way.
So for instance, the first day, within seconds of being there, I was in the room alone with Mary Lynn Wissner and chatting her up. And I met Tom Pinto before anybody else did, same way I was helping him get set up with the microphone and the TVs that he was using to present. So that was cool.
The morning of the keynote speech, Bill Farmer, the voice of Goofy for the last 40 years. He was in the room, and it was me and Uncle Roy and Kerry Donovan, I think, and that was it, and Bill. So we just sat down and started talking about our families, and I was showing him pictures of my kids with Goofy.
So there’s really no way to get that sort of access without being part of the team, and that was really awesome. And I’ll share one story about how that went even further on the way out. I was at the airport on my way out of town, and I walked into the terminal, and there was really no seats at all, except for the one seat next to Tom Pinto.
So he remembered me, I said hi, I asked him if I could sit there, I did. And we had a half an hour conversation about nothing VO related, just about our families. Turns out that his ancestors and mine are from very similar areas in Sicily, and we talked about Italian heritage and all kinds of cool stuff that wasn’t at all related to business, but I got to know him really well personally, and that was awesome.
And that would not have happened if I hadn’t had the chance to meet him one-on-one in the conference room before it started.
And that’s one thing, that’s actually a really good point that I wanna bring up since it’s fresh, is when you go to these events, yeah, we’re all in a similar industry, and many people are happy to talk shop, but a great way to actually build a relationship is to not talk about voiceover, is to ask people questions about their family and what they’re up to. People are usually quite happy to talk about something else, cause that’s their job, that’s their nine to five. So sometimes it’s nice to move away from that.
Yeah, exactly. So just to wrap up the discussion on volunteering, I will say that Gerald Griffith, the organizer, is really about people getting the experience they need. So even though I was on the team, I was able to go to any X sessions I wanted to if I paid for them, and any of the sessions that I wanted to be in that were general breakouts, I could make sure I was in that room.
So for instance, I really wanted to be in Scott Brick’s session because that’s what I wanted to learn about. So I made sure I was running the audio board for Scott Brick. And same thing happened with one of my colleagues, Andrew Bates.
He really wanted to be in the room with Ellie Ray. And he was because we just switched. I was supposed to be in that room and he said, can I be in this one because I really want to be with her for this session?
So we switched. So whatever things I really wanted to see, I could still do that. And Gerald was totally on board with that happening.
And it was really, really gracious of him to set it up that way.
And for people who might not know who these people are, so Ellie Ray Hennessey is this amazing character actress who’s based out of Toronto. And she had this fabulous workshop. I was actually at the one that Andrew wanted to attend.
And as he said, I think that is the first breakout session I’ve ever seen where there was a standing ovation. Like everyone was so moved. She has so much energy and charisma and she’s so physical in her acting that it was very inspiring.
And that’s one of the, like it really encapsulates what these events are about is how inspiring they can be to help you sort of like to push yourself to new heights in your career.
Yeah, I can say that one was really loud because I was next door with Rob Sigampaglia who was kind of quiet and he was constantly getting drowned out by cheers and laughter. I felt bad for him.
Way to get his name right though. We mentioned a few other people. We had Mary Lynn Whistler.
She’s actually a casting director and voice talent herself. I did an X session with her last year at VO Atlanta. So you hear Paul and I mentioning X sessions and breakout sessions.
The breakout session is just a general session that is open to any attendee. It comes with your registration. And these can, even though they’re general sessions, they may not just cater to newbies.
Like Paul was saying before, Gerald does a really good job of offering differentiated experiences based on people’s experience level and their niche of VO and their interests. So, and then the X sessions are basically private workshops. They’re smaller.
Limited amount of attendees can register.
Limited amount of attendees, like maybe 12 or less. And there’s an additional fee. But honestly, if you look up some of these coaches or casting directors or voice talent services, it’s actually usually more cost effective to do it as an X session than a one-on-one.
So that’s a huge added value to the conference itself.
It’s a little less stressful too.
A lot less stressful too.
Because you have camaraderie.
Yeah, yeah.
One thing I want to mention about the X sessions, I was setting up Melissa Exelberth in one of the rooms, and in the middle of the room, she stopped me with all the attendees there and said, hey, I really heard great things about your podcast. I’m gonna start listening and check it out. So thank you, Melissa.
Hopefully you’re listening now. That was a really nice shout out in the middle of a crowded room. Thank you.
Yeah, it was great. She said the same to me afterwards. And she’s a talent at the top of her game.
And so just getting compliments and words of encouragement from her is huge for my fragile ego.
Yeah, me too. So we talked about what the experience was like. What was the biggest thing you learned or from who did you learn the most, you think?
Well, since Ellie Ray is fresh on my mind, probably her. So she taught me two things that were like, first off, she’s very, very physical. And she talks about how very, she’s got this great, sort of a podcast about just different vocal placements.
Vocal placement is just where the air flow is going through your instrument and what kind of sounds that makes. So I mean, you might be familiar with nasal. It’s in your nose.
You’re passing it through. But then you could make it even more complicated character if you push it through your sort of soft palate.
And then you could slow it down, bring it down a little bit and have a really dumb character.
That kind of thing. But yeah, that’s all vocal placement. And if you familiarize yourself with the different areas of it, you can create a pretty healthy stable of characters.
So that was one point. And then another thing that she said is that even though as voice actors, it’s important to practice diaphragmatic breathing, like breathing from the diaphragm, so you can have that resonance and power and stamina to help get you through four hour sessions, recording sessions. But the thing that was really revelatory for me was the fact that she’s like, your emotional core is actually in your chest, which makes sense, because that’s where your heart is.
But she’s like, go ahead and laugh for a second. Like, ha ha ha, ha ha ha. Where is that coming from?
It’s in your chest. And if you’re angry, or if you’re frustrated, or sad, it’s still in the chest, but it’s choked off. And that was huge.
The fact that negative emotion was just like a choking off of positive ones. And so that was really cool. And then she said one other thing that was really motivating for me, because it kind of ties up into another experience I had the week before.
But she just said, if I learn something from an experience, I can never fail. And so as a VO, as a new VO, you’re gonna make mistakes all the time. But if you learn from it, it’s not a failure.
You’re not, it’s not the end of the world. You can move on and improve. So that was pretty huge too.
What about you?
Yeah, I think the thing I learned most was from Rob Sigmung Pogli. And it was all about business acumen and how to protect yourself from possible lawsuits and make sure you’ve done all the proper paperwork. So one of the things he mentioned was that another voice talent is being sued right now for a picture on his website that used to be royalty free and now is being bought up or has been bought up by a company and they filed a lawsuit.
So Rob said there’s this whole new business out there of companies going around and buying behind the scenes pictures that used to be on royalty free sites, securing the rights to them, and then finding where they are on the web and just sending out lawsuits to people and saying, ding, ding, ding.
That’s ridiculous.
Horrible. And Rob said get ready because it’s coming in full force. It’s a whole new business model.
So that was eye opening. And he talked about talent agreements and how important those are, that basically you need to have a talent agreement when you work with a client to protect yourself, not necessarily them, but make sure you know what you’re getting into. So if they come back and try and misuse your voice, then you have that in place.
And the biggest takeaway from the session was that you always own your own voice recordings. So even if you do a recording for an audio book, you own the recording of your voice doing it, and you need to protect yourself accordingly. So make sure no one else uses that without your permission.
So if an audio book publisher, for instance, is using your audition to promote their book, that’s not okay unless you say it is, because that’s your property. So I found that really interesting.
Yeah, and I understand that contracts and actor agreements can be intimidating for many, but Rob actually wrote an entire book about it called Voice Over Legal, and he actually has templates for contracts and certain other agreements that he gives you permission to use. So if you haven’t picked it up, I highly recommend that. And you can find that either at voiceoverlegal.com or voiceoverextra.com.
It’s a big green book. It’s got little judge’s gavel on it, and it’s a fantastic read. So he really breaks it down and gets you to think about all the stuff that we never would otherwise, unless you happen to be a lawyer and on-camera talent like he is.
Right, exactly. All right, so we talked about what we learned and the overall experience. Let’s talk a little bit about actionable steps, things you should do after any conference, really, to make sure you get the most out of it.
So probably the biggest thing is follow up. Because when you go to these events, you’re gonna be meeting a lot of other voice talent and you’re gonna be getting a lot of business cards. So it’s always great to spread those out when you get home, enter everyone into your whatever database you use, at least their name, their email, their website and stuff like that.
And one thing that I feel like I need to remind you and remind people of who go to these events is because you’ll hear people who are on the fence about whether they should go. And usually it’s like, does it lead to any work? How does this help me?
And you really can’t answer that question for someone because there’s no guarantee. And you’re gonna be surrounding yourself with fellow voice talent who don’t necessarily hire voice talent. But still, honestly, I have gotten more work through networking, like this conference and almost any other avenue, just because of the dreaded word exposure.
But this is positive exposure. This puts face to a name. There are talent agents, there are casting directors at these events, and if you build up a positive relationship, it could lead to future work.
I happened, like this last year, I got an agent because they were so impressed with how the team challenge spot turned out. So, you really never know.
I will say, though, you have to make sure that while you’re there, you put yourself out there. You do something that either win the team challenge or put yourself out there as a volunteer, as a team leader, or like I did, be with a conference team, or get involved with any of the activities that are going on there. Maybe it’s just singing karaoke.
Get out there so people see you and you can leave a memorable impression.
And form a positive association.
Yeah, you’ve definitely done that. Everywhere I went, I would mention the podcast and say, do you know Sean Daeley? And everyone would say, oh, of course, we love Sean.
I honestly don’t know how I’ve developed this reputation for myself, but I don’t know. If you’re likable, it helps.
And the other thing about follow-up, I would recommend is to, when you send out an email, or if you’re gonna send even a personal letter, try and talk about something not VO related. Like something, a conversation, hopefully you had a meaningful conversation and you’re not just blasting everybody. That’s the other point I would make, is that don’t just blast everybody at once and say, hey, name, nice to meet you at VO Atlanta.
Hope we can work together sometime soon. Make it personal. And try to reference something that happened at the conference.
For instance, I mentioned Rob. I was talking to him later on that night about baseball, because he mentioned he was a college baseball player and I do a lot of coaching of youth baseball. In fact, I have a draft tomorrow night for my eight-year-old son’s team.
So we spent an hour talking about baseball. So when I sent him a follow-up, I said, it was great talking to you about baseball. That’s a personal connection.
Try and do that instead of saying, hey, it was great seeing you at the conference. What mic do you use?
Yeah, and honestly, it gives some people something to remember you by. So, like, they… Because there were, what, 500 people at the conference this year, and Rob was a presenter, so he was…
Might have been inundated by a numerous people talking to him. So just having something like, hey, we talked about this, or I met you at the bar, and had a great conversation. All of these things really help solidify you in that person’s mind.
And you never know. It might lead to, or they might be happy to refer you for a job that they’re not appropriate for. You know what else works great?
Bringing food, or buying food. I’ll be forever indebted to Fraser for buying me a drink that one night.
Oh yeah, no, he’s a good…
And Uncle Roy made a lot of friends by bringing bagels all the way from New Jersey to hand out to people. He got the joysy bagels. He had a carry-on bag just for bagels.
Hey, when I came from Japan last year, I actually brought bags of Japanese Kit Kats.
Awesome.
Because people may or may not know this, but Kit Kats are really popular in Japan, and they come up with all of these crazy flavors. Some of them are more tame, like strawberry, or strawberry cheesecake, or creme brulee. Some of them get quite original and very Japanese, like sweet potato or wasabi.
Wow, interesting, I didn’t know that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or pumpkin, they have seasonal flavors, they have all of these different things. It’s something like 42 original flavors at one point.
It’s ridiculous. But Uncle Roy still has them from last year because he’s just been rationing them out.
Awesome. All right, so that more or less wraps up the experience at VO Atlanta. I would recommend anyone considering or on the fence to go.
It’s the most fun you can have in a voiceover. I’m just gonna go ahead and say it. That was the big takeaway, is that everybody was so happy to be there.
Just big smiles on their faces, people giving hugs to people that they’ve only known from Facebook and so happy to meet in person. And it’s just a great way to commune with the voiceover industry as a whole.
And it’s a great, it’s a huge motivator because it gives you, you’re increasing your knowledge base, you’re working with your peers, and it’s just so much fun. It’s like everyone leaves exhausted, but really just accomplished, or feeling accomplished and content. And it’s just an amazing feeling.
Indeed. So with that in mind, let’s talk about some of the other industry events that are out there for voiceover that may be of interest to people. And any that you have actually been to?
Let’s see. So there are numerous conferences that crop up throughout the year. I’ve been to Via Atlanta, and we were both at MAVO, or the Mid-Atlantic Voice Over Conference in Herndon, Virginia.
Unfortunately, that won’t be returning until 2018, but there are a few other smaller conferences that crop up throughout the US. I’m actually looking forward to WovoCon, or World Voices Organization, and that’s going to be in Las Vegas in June.
April, actually. It’s coming up, oh wait, sorry, it’s last year. Sorry.
That was last year, yes, that is in June. So I think it’s the 23rd through the 25th. And so really looking forward to that.
This is sort of like, cause VO Atlanta is like an event. Like if you’ve ever been to something like Comic-Con, it has that almost, that similar level of fandom to it.
You’re right about the dates, by the way. Just wanna confirm, 23rd to 25th June 2017. Vegas, baby.
Yeah, yeah, Vegas, baby. And then, it’s a huge event. It’s sort of a formal planned event.
And WovoCon’s a little bit different because it’s much, you got a smaller level of attendees. A lot of the workshops are sort of peer-led. And I haven’t been to it, so I don’t know the exact procedure.
But if you’ve ever been to the events FafCon or FafCamp, these are just people at the top of their game who are willing to just sort of take on a workshop and then share their experience and expertise. Maybe it has to do with their marketing efforts or personal branding or studio help. So it’s really sort of like, it’s not so much like a newbie conference, like not to exclude anyone, but it’s just people who are already established trying to up their game.
Yeah, and FafCon actually, there’s another one coming up, FafCon 9. I think it’s too late to register. You have to, I’ve already been in by invitation only.
But it’s October of 2017.
Yeah, that’s unfortunate, because they’re only going to do a total of 10 of those, and that’s quickly approaching. So I don’t know if I’m gonna get an invite, because I hear, once there’s a wait list of 500 people, and it just, it books so quickly. So, I mean, that just shows the value that people are placing on the event.
Right, and the last one I wanna mention is APAC, the Audio Publishers Association Conference. And that is May 31st, with a pre-event on May 30th in New York City. So that’s specific to audiobooks, but I sat in the session with Amy Roubenet at VO Atlanta, and she raved about this, that basically this is what launched her career, was going to this conference with a concerted marketing effort to get herself out there, and it worked, apparently.
Very cool. Yeah, so once again, that’s APAC, the Audio Publishers Association, and that’s a great way to, like if you’re an audiobook narrator, and say you’ve been doing ACX projects for a while, but want to work with actual publishers, this is a great way to sort of like set up shop and then let people know what you do.
Yeah, and one thing Amy said, another takeaway from VO Atlanta, and it really makes sense for any conference, is don’t go there until you’re ready. Have a fantastic demo, know who you want to talk to, have business cards, be ready before you introduce yourself to a publisher.
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Because like I said, we want to make positive associations. So, like you don’t want to be remembered as the guy who is swinging from the chandelier after one too many drinks, you know?
Well, maybe.
Unless you did some really cool back flips afterward.
Yeah, exactly. So that wraps up most of the industry events, at least the ones of which we’re aware. Let’s talk about some sort of ancillary or related events that may be beneficial to your VO career.
You just went to one, right?
Yeah, I actually… So a little about me. I’m a big comic book fan, or geek or whatever.
I’m a big comic book geek. And love superheroes, love cartoons, love comics. So for the last five years, my dad and I have actually been going to Comic-Con together, because he’s a big Trekkie.
And so we can both kind of satisfy our inner nerds. So my dad and I have been going to this event and since about five years ago, there’s been a lot of… There’s been a call to have voice actors as celebrity guests, because they had popular TV and on-camera celebrities coming, but no voice actors.
And so that was a big draw for me. I mean, I’ve gotten more autographs and signed pictures from that event than anything else, but I’ve met all of my voiceover idols. And they’re actually like, just like every one of them we met at VO Atlanta, they are so generous with their time and their expertise, and they are so encouraging of new talent.
Rob Paulson was telling me, so if you don’t know who Rob Paulson is, he was Yakko Warner in Animaniacs, in Warner Brothers Animaniacs. He was Pinky from Pinky in the Brain. He was the original Raphael in the 1980s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and he’s now the current Donatello in the current Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
So, how often does that happen? Awesome. Yeah, and so when I told him, he was like, you’re doing all the right steps, and he’s like, and at some point, you will have to sort of lead the way for people who come after you.
And then I mentioned our podcast and how we’re trying to do just that, you know? So…
Did he say he’d be a guest?
Why? Oh, that was a perfect opportunity wasted. But, I mean, these things are great because to see people at the top of their game and if you ask the right questions, they are very happy to tell you some golden nuggets.
Because very often you have people who haven’t done their research, you’re just like, how do I get into voice acting? Can you submit me to your agent? And yeah, exactly.
I mean, even us, we’re like, oh no. They don’t… Like, first off, they do not have time to answer that question in a panel.
And there’s no way… Like, everyone’s journey is personal. There’s no right or wrong way about it.
Like, Jim Cummings, the voice of Pete, and Winnie the Pooh for Disney, like, he had all sorts of odd jobs. Like, he worked on a steamboat. He was a drummer in a rock band.
He, like, he helped build floats for Mardi Gras. Like, he worked in a strip joint, like, yeah, you don’t know. Like, who’s to say?
And apparently, it was all, like, it was all relevant skills for him, so.
Well, we actually have a clip of you asking the right question and with the right voice. So, let’s play that now.
I’m Sean, Sean Daeley from Fort Orchard, Washington. And I got two questions for Tress. First one’s a little personal and very important to me.
And believe me, I’ll pass along the word.
No, yes, Donald and Daisy have been engaged for 75 years. And so, it’s nice to have the question popped at home.
It’s a very difficult voice to do, the voice of Donald. I cannot do it. And I was so relieved when I was auditioning for the voice of Daisy, because you don’t hear of Daisy much at all in Disney cartoons until the mid-80s.
And I was so afraid that they were going to want me to be a female, you have to quack, like Tony, because I can no can do, in a very beautiful and feminine way, of course. So anyway, very, very difficult job to do.
So the actual question was, we were talking about this a little bit on Friday, but I’ve been doing professional voice over for about three years now, commercial and narration. How do you transition from that more straight stuff into animation and video game work?
Well, I take any job that they’ll offer me. And I didn’t know, and I didn’t specify. You want me to do an insurance narration, or an industrial, or a trailer, whatever.
It’s House of Tile, Bob’s Law School, all… Todd’s House of Formica. It’s all work, yes.
And you get better and better and better. You just fail up. And it’s practice, you’re being paid to practice.
So it never turned out any kind of a voiceover. I never say no. Yeah, I didn’t get a cartoon for the first 10 years of my career.
Yeah, and then slowly, just kind of, once I got my foot in the door at Hanna-Barbera, yeah, fix that up, I’m good. So, yeah. So gradually it transitioned, which is a very good thing for me, because I prefer the cartoons now, but there was a time when I liked the radio and television commercials better.
So I hope you guys enjoyed that. I mean, I’ve been a fan of Tress McNeil for decades. Honestly, she was like my first voice crush.
Like, I remember watching Rescue Rangers, that show with Chibb and Dale, and a couple of other rodent sidekicks, and she was Gadget on that show, and then she was Babs Bunny on Tiny Tunes. And she’s more than half of the female voices on The Simpsons, so this was just amazing to be able to say, Donald Duck. Or to her, you know, express my feelings like only Donald can.
Yeah, that was really cool.
Yeah, it was very unique. Actually, at my voiceover meetup group in Seattle yesterday, one of the other talents had seen that. So like, oh, did you go to that panel?
I was like, yeah, it was Donald Duck.
And she’s like, that was you?
Awesome.
And then that was televised, who knows? Maybe someone at Disney saw that and was like, we need more people, we need another Donald. So, not keeping my fingers crossed for that one, though.
Or at least, we need Donald in 15 years.
Yeah, we’ll see. Yeah, maybe I gotta work on that one. But yeah, it’s just, like, one of the reasons I love going to these events is that it really kind of reminds me why I wanted to get into voiceover in the first place.
It’s incredibly encouraging and they’re just fun. So, because, like, once again, you see people at the top of their game and you see what kind of skills that you might want to emulate. For example, improv is huge and is a very valuable skill for an animation or character voice actor to have because they might ask you to make a voice for a character on the spot, or they might ask you to supply dialogue.
So it’s very valuable. And so we’re gonna show you one more clip. So starting about a few years ago, they have this thing called Twisted Tunes at Emerald City Comic Con, which is a panel where all of the voice actor guests do a table read of a Star Wars film.
So when they started this five years ago, it was a new hope. So last year they did The Empire Strikes Back, and then this year they’re gonna finish off the original trilogy with Return of the Jedi. So they just go through the screenplay scene by scene.
They assign the actors roles to be read in character. And so it’s always very entertaining.
And not characters from the movie.
Yes, not characters from the movie. So for example, you might have say Dot from Animaniacs playing Luke Skywalker, or Kermit the Frog playing Jabba the Hutt, or Eric Cartman playing Yoda. So it gets really, it’s some hilarious stuff.
And so I thought we’d like to share a little clip from that for you. And I hope you guys enjoy it. Here it is.
This is the Animaniac scene, folks.
As the Emperor, Yakko Warner. As, all right, in this scene, we’re splitting, yeah, okay. Yoda, Whacko, Luke, Dot.
And we are going to have it narrated by Jim, Richard Pryor. What? And Darth Vader, Troy, is gonna be Patrick Warburton.
All right, whenever you are ready, start her up.
The next 12 pages have Luke doing a backflip on a plank. A flying hard solo comically taking out Boba Fett with his dangerous ass and a lot of princess skin being shown, you know what I’m saying? And a ship being destroyed, oh yes, and Luke went to Dango Bar.
Moving on to the Death Star and the Steel Rise, my friend.
The Death Star will be completed on its schedule.
You have done well, Lord Vader. And now, I sense you wish to continue your search for young Skywalker, am I correct?
My goodness, your head is gonna explode, isn’t it? Patent, my friend, in time, he will seek you out. And when he does, you must bring him before me.
Before me, he has grown strong. Only together can we turn him to the dark side of the Force.
Yeah, I’m not gonna ask too many questions about that, but as you wish.
Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen.
When the Emperor get done laughing, we’re finna be in the oldest house, y’all.
All right, so once again, that is from the Emerald City Con. And there’s a lot of those events actually around the country. And one that I wanted to mention, friend of the program and featured in this episode, is Heather Masters, who’s one of the voices in the Five Nights at Freddy’s Sister Location Game, as well as Andy Field, who I just met at VO Atlanta, are both going to be at the Connecticon, which is in Connecticut on July 6th through the 9th.
So check that out if you can.
Very cool. And congratulations, Heather, that’s wonderful. You’ve made it.
Yeah, that’s really awesome.
So yeah, so Comic-Con, you can sort of see the connection because you have animation voice actors coming there. And what was cool is there was another panel of local Seattle talent, like the voice of Gladys from the Portal Games was there. And then a couple, or Gin Hammond, a woman who does a lot of voices for Defense of the Ancients, which is an online multiplayer game.
And then, they were just talking about sort of breaking into the biz. And they actually offer classes through the Seattle Voice Institute, which I’ll be joining this weekend, actually. So for, gonna have a character workshop.
Oh, cool. So I’m really looking forward to that. And those kind of in-person workshops are another great way to get your name in people’s ear and to say, like, hey, this guy’s pretty good.
I got this video game that would be great for him. So moving away from like lesser, maybe less obviously connected events, Seattle also has this thing called PAX, or Penny Arcade Expo, which is a huge gaming conference. So, because we have a lot of indie developers in the Washington area, it’s something like 50, actually, and they all need voices for their games.
So that would be a great way if you could just buy, like buy a booth or a table for yourself and have your business cards out and some of your, or like maybe audio samples of your work playing at your booth and just explain to people what you do. And who knows, the connections you make could lead to future work.
Yeah, and that brings me to the last sort of related events I want to talk about. And it’s something that I’ve done in other businesses is to find the events for the industries with which you want to work that relate to your business. So, for instance, if you’re doing a lot of medical narration, then you may want to join some of the associations that are related to surgeons or the American Urological Association, for example.
A lot of these are based on the East Coast, particularly in Northern Virginia, but they have events all around the country. Or let’s say you want to do work for automotive dealers, then go to your local automotive dealers association and join that, or at the very least, see if you can go to their events and set up a table. And what you can do is, like Sean was saying, set up a booth, maybe offer to do recordings on the spot.
I’m actually doing this with a local networking group where I’m going to go to their event, set up a portable booth, and record messages for them on the spot. And send them out to them so they can have them. And it won’t be the greatest quality, although you never know, depends on what I bring with me.
But they’ll see what I can do and they’ll have that opportunity to contact me for future work. So, networking groups, chambers of commerce are great to look for. They also have events.
Other civic organizations, like the Police Athletic League, the Girl Scouts, the Boy Scouts. Any of those organizations need public service announcements, need phone messages, all the voice work that is out there. Join those organizations and be part of the community and you can get yourself out there as a trusted expert in the voice over field.
I believe it was Voice Talent John Melley. He’s got his own podcast that’s specific for marketing. And he’s got the series of articles where he mentions that he actually went to a dentist or a dental trade show.
And as you might guess, he was the only Voice Talent there and he had a booth set up and he actually made a commercial, like a sample commercial of like dental services. So…
Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about. I plan to do the exact same thing. I thought I created it, but I guess not.
Just great minds think alike.
So, I mean, once again, it’s like it’s just remembering to go to the places where people are hiring, not necessarily, like, I mean, don’t get me wrong. As you probably guessed, we love VO Atlanta, we love Voice Over Conferences. They’re wonderful places.
But there’s no guarantee that you’re gonna get work from that. But if you go to a place where you are the commodity, then, like, your chances are much, much higher.
Yeah, and sometimes you can actually barter the entry fee. So, I tried this time, it didn’t work out. But you may be able to say, if I do this service for all of your attendees, can you comp me the registration fee?
Or the table? A lot of times there’ll be a charge for setting up the table for electric and say, if I provide this service to everyone who walks in the door, how about you comp me the registration? And oftentimes that’ll work out.
So, just thinking outside the box for other events, ways to create business for your voice over business.
Very cool. So that pretty much wraps up this episode of The VO Meter. We hope that we’ve planted the seed for you to think outside the box with some of your marketing efforts, whether it be in person at a trade show, or the people that you reach out to.
Doesn’t always have to be industry or direct industry related stuff. Thanks again so much to our listeners. Thank you to Heather Masters for her great VO Meter shtick.
And thank you to Ann Gangusa and Gerald Griffith over at VO Atlanta for having another amazing conference. It literally gets better and better every year. And I’m really glad that it get to go again next year.
Anyone you want to thank, Paul?
I was gonna thank Ann and Gerald, but you stole it from me. Yeah, I want to also thank Ann Gangusa and Gerald Griffith for having me as part of the team. That was fantastic.
I can’t even explain the effect it’s had on me over the last two weeks. It was really fantastic, and I can’t wait to be back next year.
Awesome. So, this is Sean and Paul for The VO Meter.
Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Thanks again.
See you next time.
Thanks for listening to The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress. To follow along, please visit www.vometer.com.