If you have to tell people you're cool, are you cool?

Why do so many people who do what I do, refer to themselves as "a professional voice artist"?  Or better yet, "a full time professional voice artist."

With any other profession inserted in that sentence, it would sound ridiculous. "I'm a full-time professional accountant" for instance. 

Except "stripper". That might work.

Joe Cip, Randy Thomas talk to Ted the Homeless DJ

Really cool to hear Joe Cipriano & Randy Thomas talking with Ted Williams, the homeless VO/Radio guy this morning on WNCI in Columbus. AND they presented him with an amazing offer. To hear all the fun, click here and skip ahead to 3:50.

You may have seen this...

If someone in Columbus gives this guy a chance, I might be in trouble. Nice pipes!

Getting the best performance possible

The talented folks at Pure Advantage in the Netherlands have written an insightful three-part blog about how to get the best out of your voiceover person. If you produce VO, it's a must read for how best to deal with us divas. Heh.

Click here to read. (Parts 2 and 3 are linked at the bottom.)

Headphones - love 'em or hate 'em, part 1

I'll admit, I've always been a sucker for headphones as far back as I can remember. I love discovering the nuances and subtleties of music and spoken word that can only be found when you're that close to the source. My trusty Sony 7506's were my constant companion as I ventured into broadcasting and eventually, voiceover. These days, three out of four voice coaches will tell you to get used to not wearing headphones in the booth. In theory, it's good advice. I'll paraphrase how it's been explained to me by my coach.

We hear ourselves talk all the time, a combination of the sound waves that comes out of our mouth around our cheeks and into our ears, and the vibrations we feel rumbling through our chest cavity and beyond. In normal conversation, our voice sounds far different than it does when we hear it from a speaker. It's why when many people first hear themselves on a voicemail recording, they freak out. Because in their own head they sound completely different.  Since "normal" and "conversational" are both words to describe what many of us are trying to achieve in our reads at this place and time, replicating it means getting things out of our way that inhibit us from authentic communication. When we talk to a friend, we typically don't give a rip about how we "sound." We don't worry whether we're coming up or down on this word or that, punching a certain phrase or ending our sentences with a nice bit of growl. Ha. If we did, we'd sound ridiculous and fake. Truth is, we give each word just the right feeling and emphasis automatically without even thinking about it, simply by keeping our mind on the message of what it is we're saying. It's so simple, and yet amazing.

But when performing with headphones, it's as if we're broadcasting to ourselves over a little radio. And let me tell you, I can be very critical of me when my voice is put under that kind of auditory microscope. Where every little nuance is noticed, every flaw magnified. The result is that we tend to edit ourselves in real time not even realizing we're doing it. We constantly make little itty bitty changes in delivery based on how we think each word is sounding -- a completely subconscious thing but it comes at a cost. Since we're listening to our voice and our performance so closely and so loudly thanks to headphones, we're actually disconnecting a little from the message, putting that energy instead into figuring out if we're sounding like we think we should sound like. Authenticity gets lost and the performance isn't as strong as it could have been. One thing I remind myself often is that it's not about my voice. It's about the message I'm communicating. My voice doesn't matter. My point of view does. My opinion does. My voice will just carry that point of view and opinion.

All that being said, often during a session, a producer will be listening in on the phone (which of course will be tied into your mixing board and headphones via a phone patch.)  So you'll need be able to communicate with them somehow. Many suggest taking a pair of earbuds, putting one of them in your ear and turning it up when the producer talks. Or leaving it very low. That way, you aren't hearing a booming voice in a closed-ear set of cans that make you want to force things a little more, but you'll still be able to hear a producer giving you direction.

Now, here is where I stray from that train of thought a bit and my coach actually supports me in it. If you can teach yourself to ignore your voice in your headphones and break through that stumbling block with a sharp mental hyper focus entirely on the message in the copy, that's a pretty powerful ability that can make you and your reads even stronger. And sometimes, you have no choice but to wear headphones, particularly in the promo world as audio often gets piped down the ISDN line while you read along with it. Are your reads going to suffer because you aren't used to hearing yourself through headphones? I think it could be a little dangerous to go back and forth between taking them on and off, session to session. So to stay consistent, I choose to keep them on all the time. For me, it works.

-Joe

At home with Scott Rummell

Trailer master Scott Rummell is featured both in print, and in video, by the OC Register. Yes, headphone hair affects us all.

Article:
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/rummell-233771-voice-movie.html

Video:

Admit it: you're trying your hand at the warm up he does, aren't you.

What take are we on?

I play drums for fun. Coordination between arms and legs and brain has never been a problem for the most part. Yes, I can walk and chew gum. On a good day, I can even pat my head and rub my belly at the same time. So why is it that in the voiceover booth, when I'm the one doing the slating of each take (audibly announcing a take number before the read so the producer can keep track) and performing as well, I can't remember which number I left off on? The ones, two's and three's are easy enough to keep track of. But usually by take four, we're really diving deep and my head is fully in the read. I finish the last line of the take, hear a bit of direction on where to go from there and prepare to slate the next take and end up skipping a number, repeating the last number or going completely blank as to which number we're on. A complicated session can easily go into the 20's, 30's and beyond. And then there's the dreaded trilogy of the "ABC" (three in a row of the same line, usually packaged under one take number.) Thankfully, there's never usually a D, or we might be in trouble.

What I need is a little gadget I can tap or a button I can push every time I slate that counts the takes and displays a number. That way I can glance down, see the number and know that's what my next take will be.

Any ideas?

Joe

Let's play "Guess the Celebrity"

I'll admit, I did terrible at this, but it was still fun. How many celebrity VO's can YOU identify?

Put the product first

Anthony Mendez really hit the nail on the head, over at his Post-Amp. For VO actors and other creative entrepreneurs, this post is a must read.

A couple of key insights:  1: There are no blanket rules in voiceover. OK maybe one. and that is 2: without a solid product, the marketing won't be productive.