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At the urging of one of the members of the MineWurx voice over community, we are now offering a Workshop Lesson: a more abbreviated, less expensive version of our full online voice over lessons. Click title for further details. Our normal online voice over lessons last 1 ½ hours and cost $100. Because the [...] A real world example of how one voice over talent completely modified his sound at MineWurx Studio – from 300 miles away. When I got a call from James, he was looking for advice on how to improve his sound. He had asked me to listen to his demos which I did, and then I offered my criticism as well as advice. Part of that advice was to go ahead and let me re-work his demos for him, which he quickly agreed needed to be done. I had a session scheduled yesterday with a large national client (MTV/Viacom). The session was one of those “maybe Monday or Tuesday” type bookings and when the client is of that nature, you make both days available to them. Comes with the territory. Anyway, it should have been as simple as: client sends copy, dials in on the ISDN line, talent reads copy, takes direction, reads copy again, studio in New York records talent, session ends…Everyone’s happy… It should have been that simple, but at 2:05 in the afternoon, I found myself thinking that had this day taken place earlier in my career, I probably would have cried… I must admit there are times when I am just as inpatient as my students when it comes to getting them trained and out into the marketplace. Though I have to stop and remember how long it took me when someone taught me this craft over a decade ago. 20 weeks would have been like a walk in the park. If you follow trends, you can tell that the Voice Over Casting business is turning to online sources. At the very least, it is becoming the most economical way for new talent to break into the market and get heard. Many of these talents venture into the market with home made everything; demos, packaging, websites, commercial copy, studio setups and the list goes on. They send out home made CD’s that they made in their home made studio, labeled with their home made labels and promoted on their home made websites. Not to frown on this, because it is the way that almost everyone gets started. Problem is now… EVERYBODY wants to be a voice guy or girl, which means the talent pool, or somewhat stagnant water for that matter, has gotten quite muddy with demo after demo after demo on the market from talent after talent after talent.. You get my point I guess. We all know how quickly an article about race, color or culture can spin out of control, so allow me to make a preemptive strike and announce right here that this is not an article about righting wrongs or correcting the world’s problems. If you suffer from hypersensitivity to racial issues, you may not want to read any further. Just understand that this article was derived from a collection of observations of race and ethnicity as they apply to the business of commercial voice over and nothing more. After 10 years performing voice over and coaching talent from all walks of life, these are some of the things I have seen and my opinions about how they effect multicultural actors attempting to succeed in this cross-pollinated society we call America. I have used this term (complete voice over talent) in the past figuring it would be pretty self explanatory, though for those who choose not to read into the words for what they are, I figured a definition was in order. When I use the term I am referring to a voice talent who when they enter the market place, is equipped and outfitted with all of the necessary tools this business requires. |
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