The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
Hello everybody, and welcome to the second episode of The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress. Joining me as always is Sean Daeley. How you doing, Sean?
I’m doing well, I’m looking forward to this episode.
Yeah, as am I. It’s been a while since the last one.
Oh, about a week, if you’re paying attention.
Well, we didn’t have to put that out there. We don’t know when we’re gonna release it.
I don’t know, well, we’re still trying to work on that. I mean, I know plenty of people who do like quarterly podcasts or, I mean, it’s as often as we… No, I know, we want regularity.
Our fans demand it.
Right, all of our fans are clamoring for another episode already.
So, in the last, since we had our last episode, let’s talk about some of the things that have happened to us, either good or bad in the career path. You can start.
All right, well, I’m really excited because I found the best place to record in my house. And I’m actually back at home visiting family for a while. And my mom’s walk-in closet is the best sound booth ever.
I love it. I’m literally just, I’m just using a Sennheiser 416 into a small preamp slash interface into my MacBook. And this is some of the best sound I’ve had.
I’ve had in my entire career. It’s amazing, really. And we’ll talk more about that.
So what about you, Paul?
Yeah, I’d have to agree, first of all, knowing the different permutations you’ve gone through with your setup, it’s by far the best sound you’ve ever had. And it’s so simple that it amazes me. So from my end, I released a new demo this week.
And I was pretty excited about that.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe you signed with another e-learning company?
Yeah, I mean, signed is a relative term. As is with most Asians or rosters, it’s a non-exclusive thing. But yeah, I had the demo produced by the incomparable Terry Daniel, who I believe you’ve worked with as well.
Yeah, he’s a great coach.
Yeah, great coach. And the demo came out fantastic. So never wanted to sit on my laurels.
I started submitting it immediately and contacted a bunch of e-learning companies. I went to elearningindustry.com, if anyone knows that website. I saw the top 10 lists of companies there and of course contacted them all.
And somebody got back to me right away and said, yeah, we’d love to have you and we’ll send you something soon. So I guess proof is in the pudding. The demo came out pretty well.
I think so. And like you said, never sitting on your laurels. You already had a couple of clients and a couple of demos out there, but you felt the need to make another one.
So, and it already seems to be returning on that investment.
Yeah, well, I was looking for a genre specific demo for narration and e-learning. I had a pretty decent commercial demo, but the ones I had out there for e-learning and explainer videos were done by me. And we talked in the last episode about how that can be a pitfall to potentially overcome.
So now they have one that’s professionally produced. I feel pretty good about the way that sounds as compared to my commercial demo.
And then there is a ton of work to get. I mean, majority of the work I do is corporate or educational narration. And I feel like it’s one that your voice is suited for too.
Yeah, hopefully we’ll see how that goes. So on a related note, I just finished up a couple of jobs with some clients, also e-learning. I was doing the English voice dubbing for a yoga instructor.
That was kind of fun. And also some guided meditation sessions. I think we talked about this last episode too.
But I just finished up that project. So I’m looking pretty hard at some new projects coming up and we’ll see what happens with this new demo. Hopefully that can help.
Very cool. I recently reached out to some local production houses and studios and talent agencies in Washington and still waiting. The waiting is kind of killer, but I’m very happy with how my cover letter turned out.
I didn’t be like, hire me please. But you just tell them your qualifications and then show them the best way to get ahold of you and try not to pander them and have them a little bit more individualized cover letter. And most people will get back to you.
And so far the response has been positive. I did hear back from a couple of studios, they’re like, hey, great demos. If we need you, we’ll hire you.
So there you go.
Yeah, that’s something I want to talk about actually. And to your point, my cover letter is pretty simple as well. It really has about three sentences about where I’m from and how I’m looking to help them.
And then my demo, and that’s really it. I think simple is best in that case. Somebody recently asked me that, another voice talent about what my cover letter looks like.
And I tried to explain how to keep it simple, I think helps. I know as a hiring manager in other walks of life, I hated long cover letters and really convoluted resumes. All I wanted to see was the qualifications and get to the point basically.
Absolutely. So think of it like a good essay, you know? Intro, body, closing.
And that’s about, I mean, you can do that in three paragraphs. I mean, this can be as short or as long as you want it. But if you want some good templates, actually the online voice acting school I work for, the Global Voice Acting Academy, we have a great video on our YouTube channel called Success With Agency Submissions.
So if you want to pop over to our YouTube channel, you can find that video. It is a free video. And you can get ideas on what you should do when you’re demo ready and how to reach out to talent agencies or production houses with your materials.
Yeah, that’s great. Definitely check that out. So there was something I wanted to bring up about reaching out to people.
And it’s a question that I had in my mind. I don’t think I’ve asked anybody else yet, but it’s a burning question that I wanted to talk about. When you send out your information, is there a good response that’s still saying no?
So if an agent gets back to you and says, thanks for your submission, it’s not a good time, or thanks for your submission, we have a lot of voices that are already similar to yours. Does that mean they’re just being kind? Or does it mean that getting an answer is a good response as opposed to being completely ignored?
I’d say it’s a good response because most agents are incredibly busy and the fact that they respected you enough to get back to you is, I think it speaks volumes. And you can always resubmit. I mean, usually, if you get something specific like, oh, we already have someone of your type, just wait like six months, that might be different.
People move, people change agencies. You just have to keep a note in whatever record-keeping software you use. It could just be an Excel file and you just have notes about the people that you’ve contacted and just be like, oh, they got back to me.
They have someone like me already. Try again in six months and then follow up on it. So don’t get too discouraged.
I mean, rejection is probably the largest part or the largest hurdle and a giant part of this industry. Someone who’s, I think, is a quite talented voice actor just wrote a whole blog article about… You mean me?
How… Well, you as well. And another British voice talent named Jay Britton just wrote a blog article about…
Yeah, I love him too. He’s really like, he’s a real mensch. But wrote a great blog article about facing rejection.
And it honestly doesn’t matter how talented you are. The world is filled with a lot of talented people and you will not be selected for plenty, for more gigs than you will be selected for no matter what. So build that thick skin as early as you can.
Which is why we sort of talked about the importance of being receptive to feedback in our last episode. Because if you… I don’t want to, like bullheadedness could be a good thing if it pushes you forward, but you need to be open to feedback and you need to not take it so personally that you won’t try to implement it.
You need to not be annoying too.
And not be annoying too.
Another talent was discussing with me today about when’s too soon to follow up. And again, referencing my years as a hiring manager, I was saying what I always liked was a quick follow up once or maybe twice, but then to stop. The person that emails every week or every day or every couple of days is really pushing the envelope.
So you have to have that fine balance between following up and being forward thinking and then also just being annoying. But I’m glad to hear you say that about the response because that was kind of the way I took it too. This happened to me obviously a couple of times in the past few months where I got that response from an agent and I thought, well, at least they responded to me.
So that must be a good sign.
And it definitely helps to have a positive outlook and like a glass half full mentality.
Yeah, definitely. And bulletproof skin. But that comes over time.
Probably more so than me. I mean, we were talking about before, you just keep throwing tactics at the wall and seeing what sticks. And like there’s a lot of bravery in that and I admire it.
Yeah, and that comes with time. For me, it’s not necessarily in the voiceover business, but I spent a lot of time in different careers. And one of them was a financial advisor where I was cold calling people.
This is when you were actually allowed to cold call people back in the early part of the century. And it would be nothing to make 100, 200 phone calls a day and just hear the word no, no, no every single time. Ironically, the shooting percentage of getting a client was probably about the same, but you’d have a lot more quantity of rejection.
So that’s how I developed my thick skin. But if you’re just starting out in the voiceover career, you will build that up over time. Or you can sort of fall back on other experiences you’ve had that are similar and use that to push you forward.
And cold calling is, it’s not dead. I mean, there are plenty of people who don’t like it either receiving it or doing it as a marketing strategy. But if it’s something that you’re comfortable with or want to try, you should just be prepared, have a nice little script, don’t waste people’s time.
And like you were saying with those follow-up emails, keep it short and sweet, because people are busy and they will call you back when they’re ready.
Yeah, and be respectful of people’s time. Do the call, do a second call, and then wait, like at least a month, or what a lot of people say is to have a tickler file of three months. So you put that person’s name in either a revolving, what we used to call a Rolodex, or this day and age you use a contact management system.
And then remind yourself in three months to call them back, and sometimes that works. So that’s a little bit about what Sean and I have been up to since the last episode. We’re gonna move into our Tech Talk segment, talking about microphones specifically.
But first, we’re gonna introduce a new segment we have called The VO Meter Schtick. It’s gonna be a small little anecdote or a comical story that we have from one of our VO friends this week featuring John Roorda.
Okay, everybody, it’s time for The VO Meter Schtick.
What did he say?
It’s time for The VO… Oh, never mind.
The VO Meter Schtick?
Oh, got it.
Hi, VO friends, John Roorda here, with an interesting little story about how small the world can be. So, my name is not very common, and when you do a Google search on my name, you’ll start seeing very quickly, perhaps even on the first page, hits for a Jeff Roorda, a no relation, a St. Louis County law enforcement official. It’s been pretty active in the media lately.
So, I’m signed up with a production house that sends me bookings based on my demo with no auditions. And to the client, this is completely blind. They see me as a number, not a name.
So, I was quite surprised a couple of weeks ago when I actually received a booking for the promo for Jeff Roorda’s new upcoming book. So, strictly by coincidence, he had no idea who he was booking, or if he thought I was a relative, he just saw a number, not a name. So, small world after all, right?
Just an interesting little coincidence that I thought I’d share. Thanks for listening to The VO Meter Schtick.
Once again, that was John Roorda, another great voice talent, and listen to that bass. Thanks a lot, John, that was a lot of fun to listen to, and we’d love to have you back again. So right now, we’re gonna talk about microphones.
Dun, dun, dun.
Because I feel like this, we both feel that this is a topic where a lot of people have those pitfalls, and we certainly had a few of them ourselves. So Paul, do you wanna start or should I?
Yeah, well, I have a litany of microphones I’ve used as I mentioned in the first episode, but I’ll talk about what I started with, and maybe that can give somebody some insight into what might be a good starter set. So I started with the Scarlett Studio, which is a package by Focusrite that comes with a USB interface and a microphone. It actually comes with a stand too, that you can, a tripod stand that you can put the mic on.
And I used that for a couple of days, typical to how I’ve done everything with the career, but I only used it for a couple of days where I thought the microphone was just picking up too much mouth noise, too much sibilance specifically, and sounded a little tinny to my ears. Of course, this was back when I first started, literally the first week, and I probably had no idea what I was talking about, but it sounded bad to me. So what I did was I kept the interface and swapped out the microphone.
The microphone, by the way, is called the Scarlett CM25. I was trying to look up some information on it, but they don’t make the microphone by itself, so it was a little hard to figure out. But I did pull up the information from our friend’s guitar center.
And from what I can tell, the microphone’s frequency response was 20 hertz to 20 kilohertz, which is pretty common, a common range. So the frequency response should have been fine for my voice. I have found that my voice has a lot of energy down in the even 40 to 50 hertz range, which is kind of uncommon, but you can probably hear that it’s pretty bassy.
But it seemed like this microphone was not picking it up.
The frequency range, Paul is just saying he’s got a very low voice. And the smaller the number, say like the, if you have a two-digit number, like 40 or 50 hertz, that’s much lower on the frequency scale. And most microphones will have a 2000 to 20,000 kilohertz rating.
So Paul’s is definitely is on the lower end of that spectrum.
Yeah, so you want to find a microphone that fits in that spectrum. And there’s different ways to find out where your voice energy is. But that’s a little bit more in depth than where we want to get in this conversation.
But make sure…
The episode requires. I said it’s a little deeper than the episode requires.
Yeah, exactly. But just make sure when you’re looking at microphones, you read those tech specs to make sure it’s something that fits. And what you can do is compare the different specs from each microphone.
And that’s what I ended up doing when I was purchasing other microphones. So anyway, Scarlett Studio CM-25, it’s a great starter set. I think the price at the time was under 200 bucks.
And it served me well for a couple of days.
Well, I mean, I love that story because for two things, I mean, you weren’t afraid to send it back and you got a kit, which is a great way to save money, because especially now, firstly, I wouldn’t recommend having sort of a branded item, like Focusrite did, but you can find a lot of inexpensive condenser microphones bundled with an interface and some other mic accessories, like a stand or cables, and they’re not always poor quality stuff either. So definitely do your research, and if you’re trying to save 50 or $100 here and there, a recording bundle is a great way to do it.
Yeah, I should say, I actually still use the headphones. Those are, in my opinion, fantastic. So the headphones that came with the Scarlett Studio, I still use to this day.
Very cool.
So you want to talk about one of the mics you started with or…
So yeah, I think if you don’t mind, I’ll just give you a short history because my list is a little bit shorter than yours. So my little personal pitfall was starting with the USB mic. I know we kind of shot that down last episode, but hey, I was young, I didn’t know any better.
But, and you’re gonna hate me for this, but it was actually the Blue Snowball, which is like a $60 mic. It’s great for web conferencing or Skype and stuff like that. And it’s actually really good at not hearing the ambient noise of a room for just focusing on…
Of course I’ve tried it, by the way.
Oh, of course you have. And at that price, it’s definitely lucrative, but I didn’t know any better. And I was a broke college student, so I got it.
And then that’s all I had for a very long time. And before I moved to Japan, because I was getting a new teaching job and I wanted to start recording in my new apartment when I got there, I got two things. One of them was the Porterbooth Plus by Harlan Hogan.
At the time, it was about $180. And that was before he made his sort of travel-friendly bag, which is like another $80. But sometimes you can find them for cheaper in a bundle.
And then I got the Blue Yeti Pro. Now, a lot of people use the Blue Yeti, which is about $150, maybe $100 new now. It has gone down a little bit.
It sounds great.
Yeah, I still love that mic.
Yeah. At the time, I mean, it’s still one of the best sounding USB mics out there, but it’s like five pounds. It’s huge.
And it’s really meant to stay on a desktop. And you can put it on a stand if you want, but it’s massive and it’s got a giant shock mount if you want to get that with it too. But even still, the reason I got it is because I did my research, I listened to reviews, and I made sure they were from audio specialists working with voice actors.
One of the review videos was by some audio guy, or Juan Carlos Bagnell, who is a audio aficionado and a voice caster, a voice director. And he said, I wholeheartedly recommend this mic. And so I did, I got it.
Even with my inexperience and lack of audio knowledge, I was able to get some great sounding material out of that for two years before I upgraded. And then what I did is it was around Christmas, and I knew I was going back home, so I wanted to take advantage of eBay. So I was perusing for microphones.
And when I was interested in was the Sennheiser MK4. And that’s mainly because it looks cool. It’s got this champagne body, but the mic grill is black.
So it’s a very unique looking microphone, very attractive one. And it’s made by Sennheiser Neumann, who Neumann make industry standard, whatever that means, microphones for voiceover and vocalists, such as the $1,000 Neumann TLM 103, and the $3,600 Neumann U87. But it’s made in the same factory.
And there are people who actually like the MK4 better than say the Neumann TLM 102 or the 103, because it’s got a flatter, more accurate, more honest, more transparent frequency response. And this is a microphone that costs two or three times less than these higher models and works with a larger variety of voices. So once I figured that out, this is a $300 microphone, by the way, I was just looking on eBay for deals and I found one for $200.
There was nothing wrong with it at all. It was new. Maybe the box was a little bent, I think, but the mic was fine.
And around that time, I was also an avid follower of the Voice Over Bulletin Board and somebody was selling another industry standard microphone, the Sennheiser 416. And this is another $1,000 microphone, but they were selling it for half that, for 500. So, yeah, I mean, at the time, like nowadays you’ll find more, there’s even a sale right now at BSW, Broadcasters Supply Worldwide, where they’re selling it for $700, which is 200 off, which is great.
It’s the microphone I’m using right now and in a well-treated space, you can tell it sounds pretty dang good. But anyways, this person was selling theirs and so I picked it up. And then after that, I used both of those back and forth.
I actually preferred the MK4 for a while because a lot of the work I do is narration. And I just want what you put out is what you get back. You just want to hear it as is.
I hadn’t known how to properly work the 416 because it’s got a narrow pattern. It’s got a bit of a sweet spot. You don’t want to overcrowd it or you can sound a little distorted.
Just let it breathe like most microphones and you’ll get a decent take that way. But anyways, so I wasn’t happy with it for a long time. And then my MK4 actually got wet from a ceiling leak in my studio.
So I had to replace that. And I was originally hoping to get this one mic that was really famous at this point because a number of voiceover artists had started using it and started blogging about it called the CAD E100S.
Ooh, tried it. Yeah.
Oh, would you like to talk about the CAD?
No, you can go ahead. Finish your story.
All right, so this is an interesting mic because it’s supposed to have a very similar sound to the 416, but it’s a large diaphragm condenser, so it’s got a slightly larger pattern. It’s been favorably compared to mics that are three, four, five times more expensive. And a lot of people…
Do you have the 100S?
Yes.
One of the things I like best about that is it’s also made in America. Woohoo! Woohoo!
Made in America. All right, well, don’t… There is a sad part of this story too.
But anyways, at the time, I was registered for this online company called Massdrop, which is a really cool community. It’s like a lot of people passionate about sort of niche collector items. This could be like audio files or people who like collector’s watches or pen sets or crafts and stuff like that.
And what happens is that they… People put in a vote for an item that they would like to purchase. And if there is a large enough following for that vote, Massdrop will contact a distributor and get a reduced price.
So this could be $50 off, $100 off, $150 off, and you get a really unique price. And anyway, so I was really excited, found a great price for that, less than $300, about more than $100 off. So I jumped on it and I was like, all right, new microphone, woo-hoo!
And then I finally get it like six weeks later, and it’s noisy, like shh, noisy. And this is terrible because this thing is supposed to have one of the lowest self-noise. Self-noise is the electrical noise that a microphone has.
It’s inherent noise because it’s part of the microphone. And you want something that has a very low noise because we’re just recording voice. I mean, if you have a music bed, you can hide those imperfections, but if you’re just doing straight narration, you can hear it.
So you want as quiet a setup as possible. And so I knew something immediately was wrong with this device, and then I emailed them and I sent it back. And then they’re like, all right, we’ll send you a new one.
And then a few weeks went by and I was like, hey, where did it sit? And they’re like, oh, we lost it. We don’t know where the heck it is, yeah.
Testament to American shipping. And they just lost on a boat somewhere. And so they’re like, all right, we’re gonna put in an order for another one.
And then another month goes by, I’m like, all right, just wanted to check on the progress. And they’re like, oh, we’re just gonna give you your money back. I’m like, what?
I wanted a fricking microphone.
Oh, it’s terrible.
But the funny thing is, is since I was waiting for that mic, I bought a less expensive alternative. And that one is called the RODE NT1. So I will say that one more time.
NT1, not NT1A. They are similar microphones, but one is black and one is champagne colored. And the reason I make this difference is because no matter how many times I point it out, I’m always asked, did you mean the NT1 or the NT1A?
I’m like… How many times do I have to say? I even have a review video for it on my YouTube channel.
You just type in Sean Daeley wrote NT1 voice over review.
They all help themselves with all the different naming conventions. They make it hard on consumers because they’re all iterations of the same nomenclature. So there’s the NT1, the NT1A, the NT2, the NT2A, then the Rode NTG1, NTG2, NTG3, NTG4.
It goes crazy!
And I don’t even know if NT stands for anything or if they just want it to be rodent.
Good point.
And, right? Because I think it’s AKG does the same thing too with their 414, which is like it’s a multi-pattern mic. It’s about a thousand dollars and they’ve had iterations of it since the 60s.
But they have so many and they don’t sound the same. So you’ve got like the 14 XL2, the 14 XLS, the 14 XL2B, the EB, the BULS, the ULS. And I’m like, what are the differences?
Are they even worth… I mean, some of the rare ones can be quite expensive and if you can find it, then hold on to it. But that’s outside of my pay grade.
But anyways, going back to the NT1, this is a great sounding mic and it’s got a higher output than the CAD and almost the same self-noise. So that actually balances out better because you would have to crank up your preamp or interface using the CAD as opposed to using less gain with the Rode. And on top of that, it’s got an incredibly ruler-straight frequency response, which means it’s flat.
It doesn’t boost or dip. It doesn’t increase or decrease frequencies in any given range. So it’ll be about as accurate as you can get for that price.
And I loved it. I loved it more than the MK4. I liked it more than the 416 before I knew how to use it better.
And I sent comparative files to audio engineers that I trusted. And they’re like, that mic does not sound $800 less than that mic. So there you go.
I mean, nowadays, that’s kind of the end of my little history. So just wrapping up, we’ve got some amazing equipment right now. And it used to be that you had to spend $1000 on a mic to get professional sound.
But then a few years ago, it was $500. And then a couple years after that, it was $300. And now, if you spend $200 or more on a mic, you’re probably set for a good while.
Yeah, and that’s new. You can even do better than that if you find a mic that retails for $200 or $250. You buy used or refurbished, you can do even better than that.
Absolutely, yeah.
So wow, that’s a lot of research you put into all of your mic purchases. I tend to have gone the other way, where I see it. I’m like a five-year-old kid in the candy store.
I see it, and I think, I want to try it. So I usually just go buy it. Or, that rhymed, actually.
I see it, I want to try it, I go buy it. Or, like I mentioned in the last episode, sometimes I have borrowed some. So I’ll just quickly run over the giant list of the ones I remembered.
I was putting together a list before we started. Yeah. So I’m sure I’ve left some out.
So we talked about the Scarlett Studio. I then went to the Audio Technica AT2020, the XLR version. There is a USB version, which I’ve also tried.
But both of them sound fantastic.
Just out of curiosity, did they sound different, the USB versus the XLR?
I didn’t do any scientific testing, but to me the USB sounded a little bit brighter, which is kind of what I was looking for. I’d have to look and see if they were any different on the inside. I don’t think they are.
But in either case, I’m not using either of them anymore. The AT2020 did serve me well for a while. I did several of my first audiobooks with it and a lot of my first auditions, and it did sound really good.
That’s wonderful. I mean, the XLR version is about $80, right? And then if you get the USB one, that’s all…
Right now on Sweetwater, it is $99 new. But as I mentioned, you can probably find it cheaper for other places to refurbish or use, for sure. So that one worked pretty well.
And then I got this bug in my head that I needed a dynamic for narration because some reviews or people I talked to said, well, I use a dynamic for narration because it’s less sensitive. And there is some truth to that. And it can be a good tool to have in your toolbox.
So I tried the Shure SM7B. That was on borrow from a friend. And it didn’t work for my voice.
It was way too muddy. I don’t know if the frequency response was less, but it definitely did not pick up what I wanted out of my voice. Oh, it actually is much less.
I have it up here. Its lower end is 50 hertz. So as we were talking about, you want to have something that you know fits your voice.
And I think I mentioned that my voice does have some energy in the 40 and 50 hertz range. So now I see right now by looking back at these specs, it wasn’t picking up those frequencies, and that’s why it sounded so muddy.
So if you don’t mind me stomping you right here, I just want to kind of clear up some of the terms that we’ve been using. Earlier, Paul mentioned bright, and that means a mic that tends to emphasize the upper frequencies. So for someone like Paul or myself, who have a little bit lower voices, that could be good.
I mean, you can use your voice to help you figure out the kind of mic that you might want. You got a deeper voice? Balance it out with a brighter mic.
Got a higher voice? Balance it out with a darker mic.
No, indeed. But make sure that the mic you’re using can actually do that for you. So in my case, I needed one that actually had a lower frequency response that was a little bit darker.
And the Shure just was not doing that because of the way it was set up. So along the dynamic trail, I tried the Rode Procaster and the Rode Podcaster. The difference between those is one is USB and one is XLR.
And they worked pretty well, but I found they had really low output. And it just wasn’t working in my setup with the output I needed from the mic. So I abandoned both of those.
Tried the RE320. That is another dynamic mic. And that one I initially kind of loved.
It sounded great. It did exactly what I wanted it to do, where it limited some of the mouth noise that I heard during long-form narration. And I used it for quite a while.
But the only reason I abandoned it is because I was using an interface that had two inputs. And I went to one that only had one input. And I didn’t want to use two mics anymore.
So now I basically just stick to the AT875R that I talked about last week. But the RE320 is a great dynamic microphone if you want to use it for narration or if you have a less than ideal space. It does work well for that.
It was great at keeping the sounds from the lawnmowers and the landscaping outside my house, out of the recordings, because I use it almost all summer.
Good to know. And it’s a broadcast podcast mic too, if that’s something you’d like to use it for.
Yes, indeed. So, moving on. I did try the NT2A, the Rode NT2A.
That was borrowed from a friend, and that was way too sibilant. Going back to explain terminology, sibilance is when you have a unpleasant sound when someone says, s’s. And I have a problem with that anyway.
You probably can hear it even in this mic, but with the NT2A, I sounded like a snake. It was basically like the Jungle Book.
It was sssssslowly…
Exactly. So another mic I tried was the Blue Yeti we talked about. And I still like that mic a lot.
If I was going to use a USB mic on the road, I’d probably still keep that with me. I decided that it wasn’t something I really was interested in pursuing, is doing auditions on the road. Once upon a time, I thought that would be a good idea, but the Yeti, as Sean mentioned, can be a fantastic starter mic.
Like I said, if I can caution you, though, I hate the design of it. I hate the size. It’s just awkward.
I mean, it worked for me, but we have better stuff available now. And honestly, I won’t go into too much detail because I’d like to save this for next episode, but USB mics, you can use them. I’ve heard of talent who use the Yeti, who views the AT2020 USB version for either auditions or audiobooks or e-learning or even the Snowball.
Or I’ve heard talent recording audiobooks on an Apogee mic, which is a mic that I personally hate and don’t get the hype of.
I’m actually using a Shure MV51, which is another USB mic. It’s a little bit newer. I think it’s only been out for a few months.
And I use that for narration now. And the only real reason is that I mentioned my interface only has one XLR input. So I use the USB mic for the narration so I can not have to switch them back and forth.
It’s really that simple.
And have you gotten any good feedback on that one?
I have a couple audiobooks that have been released on ACX using it. So it’s passed the muster for that with no problem. And I think it sounds pretty good.
Very cool. I haven’t used it myself, but I know that voice actor Crispin Freeman recommends it now as a great mobile solution. It’s sturdy.
It works with just about any device. iOS devices, Android devices, and of course, Mac and PC. And it’s just really compact.
I mean, you could fit it in… Well, maybe not in a pocket, but you could easily fit it in your hand.
But it does look really cool, which is what I like about it.
It’s got kind of that like Elvis Mike look to it.
Yeah, exactly. Like I actually toured around with doing a YouTube video when I first got it, because I had it on the tripod stand. And I was doing a little Brian Setzer and the Stray Cats in the booth to warm up.
I toyed with putting that video on YouTube, but in the end, I just got a little lazy.
Don’t want to make a bad impression.
Yeah, it could be that. So ultimately, what I decided I needed was something for my space, because I have a whisper room, and it sounds pretty good, but it doesn’t keep out everything. And mostly it’s what’s inside the house I have problems with.
Having a couple of kids that are under 10, they like to wrestle and jump around and throw stuff on the walls. So that will get into my recordings when I have a mic that’s too sensitive. So I ultimately decided I wanted to use a shotgun to try and reject some of that backside noise that otherwise we picked up.
So for those of you that don’t know, a shotgun is, as Sean was talking about with the 416, it will have a very focused pattern. And that means that it will only focus on what’s right in front of it. And also, it will reject things from the back.
So I faced the shotgun now, the AT875R, away from the rest of the house, and it helps tremendously in keeping out that background noise. Now, I will say I did try an NTG-2 and a RODE NTG-3, the reason being people describe the RODE NTG-3 as sort of a clone of the 416.
A poor man’s 416.
So I decided I wanted to at least give it a try in the space. I found one from another VO talent actually locally who was selling it. If you’re not familiar, there’s a Facebook group called the VO Gear Exchange.
I think it was started by Stephen J. Cohen. You might have mentioned it last episode, Sean, but that’s a great place to look for used gear.
It’s other talent that are looking to get rid of stuff either because they don’t use it anymore or they have gas. Exactly. So I picked one up locally off the exchange and tried it out, and it was just way too sensitive.
It was actually exactly opposite of what I wanted. It was picking up every sound from inside the house and outside, and I couldn’t use it in this space. So ultimately, I went back to the 875R.
I’m trying to think if there’s any other ones that I want to mention. Probably not. There are a few others in there.
I had an Octava for a while, an MXL 990. I did try the Blue Snowball. But ultimately, I’m now settled on, at least for this week, on the AT875R and the Shure MV51.
Like I said, these be great times to be living in. We’ve got so many affordable options right now. Like we were saying, you can spend $150, less than $200, and get a great mic.
I know you’re happy with the AT875R, which is from Audio Technica, a Japanese audio company. Stephen, we were just talking about, is now using… so he’s using that.
And another one from Audio Technica called the AT2035, which is popular with voice talent and in audiobook narrators, because it’s got a very honest, flat response. And those are great.
Oh yeah, I did want an AT35 for a while. That’s the precursor to 2035. And I actually used that for most of the audiobooks I have released.
And it did sound really good.
And I liked it. I kind of like the silver better than the black, but they both look good. And it’s really compact too.
So if you have that in maybe one of the portable travel solutions or just a couple, like a duvet or whatever, it’d probably be a very good travel option. But yeah, these are less than $200 mics. If you go up a little bit higher, like I said, I use the RODE NT1.
If you want to hear how that sounds, you can see my review on it. I don’t process my videos at all. I like a clean signal when I make them.
And then that one is about $220 by itself. It also comes in a great recording bundle with a custom shock mount and pop filter for about an extra $40. It’s not much.
And it’s a great way to get started. And then some other mics that I’m kind of excited about but don’t really need for about $250. You get the Aston Origin.
Aston is a new UK-based company who… Everything is designed and built in the UK, which is kind of new. It hasn’t been that case in a while.
And they made these two very affordable mics called The Spirit and The Origin. And they wanted to make a mic that sounded as cool as possible without the price tag. And voice actor James Arnold Taylor bought two on the recommendation of a rep from Sweetwater and is now using them for a show that he’s making about voice acting.
And he was really impressed with it. And this guy can afford whatever mic he wants. So to get that kind of testimonial from him, definitely speaks volumes.
And it looks really cool, too. It’s got this like industrial steampunk kind of look with a purple badge and this really nice like tumbled steel look to it, which means it will not break. It cannot break.
And like we said, there’s all these great USB options, although we’ll talk about this more next episode. But I would really recommend saving… If you’re going to spend $200, $300 on a setup, get a less expensive condenser and a USB interface with a good preamp.
We’ll make some recommendations on interfaces and accessories next episode, but I would highly recommend that because if this thing sticks, if you build momentum with your career, you will upgrade at some point, and that’s okay. But if you have a USB mic, which is a device that has a microphone, a digital analog converter, and a preamp all integrated into one unit, there is no chain. That is a one link chain.
No part of it can be upgraded.
We’re talking about things like the Yeti or the AT2020 USB version or the Blue Spark Digital. Those are all the kinds of models you’re talking about.
Yes, absolutely. And these are great starter units. These are great alternatives or audition mics.
But if you want something that can stay as your primary recording rig for a while, then that’s what I would recommend. That was a mistake that I wish I had avoided back because I kind of feared the technology. But it’s just…
I mean, the simpler interfaces, the one channel mic interfaces, is just a little box with a couple of knobs. It’s very easy to use. It’s very easy to navigate.
And a lot of them sound great.
Yeah. So to wrap up the discussion about mics, I want to talk about the genesis of why people start looking for mics and whether that’s someone who’s new or someone who has been in the business for a while, I think the mentality sort of stays the same. And I’ll talk about where mine is.
For whatever reason, I’ve always had this sort of MacGyver mentality when it comes to buying mics. I know that the industry standard, so to speak, is the Neumann TLM 103 or the Sennheiser 416. But for some reason, I’m eternally trying to find that sound on the cheap.
And although I probably spent the price of a TLM 103 several times over in this quest, I keep doing it. And I’m wondering how many of you out there have the same sort of attitude where you’re thinking, if I could just get close to that sound but spend $100 less, I’ll just be gold. What are your thoughts on that, Sean?
Well, I still left lust after those mics myself. I mean, I was lucky enough to have… So funny thing about my 416, I didn’t like it for a long time, but then I actually won another one in a contest.
So not only did I get one at half price, but I won a new one.
That’s great.
And I’m like, all right, I think the powers that be are telling me something and I need to use this mic. And I think it’s really found a place in my current setup right now. I’m really happy with how it sounds.
But anyways, like absolutely, I’m trying to save money and I understand people who are, because budget is an issue for all of us. But figure out what you can afford. If you spend $300 on, or between $300 and $500 on a mic and interface, that’s a great start.
If you can spend more and you have an environment that is quiet enough and sounds good enough with whatever treatment you’re using, then why not? Go hog wild. But don’t go broke.
I know plenty of people who have used the industry standards and sold them because they weren’t the best mic. They’re great mics, but they’re not the best one for everyone. And some people who buy them just because they’re industry standards and they just want to be done with it.
So, this is your journey, but do your research. And if you can find ways to cut costs, there’s lots of ways to do it. Like I said…
I would say don’t try to force a square peg into a round hole either. Like I said, I had that NTG-3, which is about as close as you can get to the 416 without actually spending the extra 200 bucks. And it was a disaster for me.
So there was no point even trying to chase the 416.
And like I said, right now, a new 416 can be yours for the price of an NTG-3 thanks to that BSW thing. I don’t know how long it’s going on for, but check it out. But the point we’re trying to make is now there are very affordable ways to get started.
And you might never even need to improve. Or you might never need to upgrade.
Your equipment, yeah.
Yeah. So, I mean, that’s what you want, really, is the lowest, or excuse me, the longest time between upgrades. So, ideally, you would never upgrade.
But if you’re like me, eventually you fall in love and get addicted to gear and just like trying stuff out.
Yeah, that’s okay, too, as long as you don’t bank up yourself while you’re doing it.
Absolutely. And that’s what we want to emphasize first. Start a budget.
Okay, so you can use some of our recommendations. There are other websites that you can use. Like I mentioned, the Global Voice Acting Academy actually has a whole page of home studio equipment of varying prices.
So you can see some of those industry standards and you can see the less expensive alternatives. So make a list of what’s in your budget. If you can try out different equipment, that is the best solution because you can figure out exactly how it sounds on your voice in your environment and return what doesn’t work.
So you might have to pay a restocking fee. You might not, or you certainly have to pay a reshipping fee. But in the long run, you will be better off because you will have this sort of individualized equipment.
So…
Yeah, and have fun doing it.
Yeah, it can be fun. It can be intimidating, but look for the characteristics in a mic that you want. Look at reviews.
Watch videos. Look for a flat or accurate frequency response. And you have to be really careful with some of the descriptions that you read because if you read enough microphone descriptions, they all sound like the same damn mic.
Yeah.
Sounds good on everything. A workhouse of a microphone, or a workhorse of a microphone.
If you do have questions, feel free to hit us up in the comments section. We’d love to help out with any of your microphone or other equipment questions or anything at all about the voiceover career.
Absolutely. If you have questions, ask us. We can either direct you on where you can go or make our own recommendations.
And honestly, do your research. It’s fun. Enjoy it.
Don’t be intimidated. Technology is our friend. Well, that’s it for another episode of The VO Meter, Measuring Your Voice Over Progress.
I’d like to thank my host, Paul Stefano, and I am Sean Daeley of dailyvo.com. If you like the podcast, if we’re doing a great job, please like and subscribe. Add a comment if you would like to do a guest spot like our friend John earlier in the episode.
Just let us know. If you like the podcast, be sure to download us at vometer.com. Once again, that is vometer.com.
Thanks for listening.
Thanks, everybody. We’ll see you next time.
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