mic technique

Why You Need a Home Studio When You Start with a Coach

June 3, 2024 by Laura Schreiber

Getting Started in Voice Over

When people come to me for voice over coaching, they are at all different point in their VO journey. Sometimes they are quite experience but many are totally new to VoiceOver and are making the bold move to pursue their dreams. Building a strong foundation is extremely important, and my production partner Dave Scott and I work really hard to help our students learn things the right way from the start. Still, whatever regardless of when you plan to do your demos, it is really important to start practicing on an actual microphone with a preamp or interface in a studio setting for several reasons. Here are some thoughts to consider:

Learning Mic Technique

Good microphones are powerful. Whether you are starting out with middle of the road mics like the Rode NT1 or the Cad Equitek E100S, or investing in a more expensive microphone right away like the Neumann TLM 103, these microphones are condenser mics and will pic up all the sound in a large radius around them. You need to learn proper technique to best enhance your sound. Also, technique varies by genre. The way I work with my mic for conversational commercial reads or intimate reads is different. When I do video games I move around a lot and often back away from the mic, especially when I am shouting and doing effects. These are all skills I was taught and worked hard to hone, I did not wake up one day and just know how to do it. It takes time. And you do not want to walk into a studio for a job or worse for a booking and not have the skills necessary to rock that session!

Form Good Habits

Put simply, lessons are expensive. When you pay for a voice over coach or take a voice over class online, you are investing in yourself and your career. Whether it is the time spent with the coach in sessions, the time spent doing your homework in between sessions, or for daily practice, you need to be establishing good habits. You simply cannot do this without the pro equipment. You need to set up your studio so that you can prepare to be a professional. There is only one way to do this and you need to master your technique early on so that it is seamless when you launch your business.

You Might Have Diction Issues

No one in VoiceOver wants to have speech issues. Speech issues that I have had to deal with as a voice over coach range from diction issues, regional accents, articulation issues, plosives, and sibilance. If you only record on your computer and submit, it can be really hard for your coach to pick up some of these, or pick up the severity of some of these. Imagine speeding months coaching, getting ready for demo day, going to a pro-studio, stepping in front of a U87, and your coach hears a major diction issue they never noticed until demo day. What a disaster! This can, however, be easily avoided simply by setting up your professional home studio and working with your coach on real recording equipment.

The other side of this is that you need to become a critical listener of your audio too! You need professional headphones, or cans as we call them, that do not have a filter in them. You can not really hear how you sound without them, and you can not really hear what clients will hear or be listening to without them, so this is essential to your training!

You Need to Practice Recording and Editing

When you are working with a VoiceOver coach, you need to practice recording and editing they way you would when you would submit for an audition or a job. You can only do this if you have a functioning booth with a microphone, preamp or interface, computer with a DAW, and good cans. You need to practice editing your audio every day so that you get used to the ins and outs of your DAW and become efficient at producing pristine audio. Nothing else will suffice in this business. And it does not happen overnight, believe me!

Conclusions

I hope this has helped you better understand why you should not wait to set up your home studio! Timing matters a lot. While budget plays a factor for most people, even with cost in mind we can work with you to help guide your choices as your start to big gear for your home studio. It’s better to have it ready and get going and be well-practiced when your launch your business. For those of you thinking that you might get coaching, do your demos, then build your booth, that is not advisable. Read the blog again and re-think your plan! Now, best of luck in your VO journey!!

VO Booth Set Up Q and A

May 17, 2021 by Laura Schreiber

Q: What tweaks have you made to your set up that work well?

When I first built my professional home studio, I worked with my MacBook Air in the booth. For years I did this without issue. About two years in, I noticed that after very long recording sessions i had a lot of fan noise. I had gotten a great tip from Jack de Golia, a brilliant voice actor in Las Vegas, to always have ice packs handy, but after a while this became burdensome so I upgraded and put an iMac outside the booth and a monitor in the booth. This works MUCH butter. Here is a video made from a recent instagram story based on this very set-up question. If you can have this kind of set up, it’s great.

https://youtu.be/KGkESZa0X3o

Voice Over Both Set Up: Computer Outside, Monitor Inside (https://youtu.be/KGkESZa0X3o)

I also recommend having practical hooks in your book. I have a hook for my cans and a hook for my wires. It helps keep things neat and organized.

Q: What is your favorite way to connect for live sessions?

I have a new favorite way to connect: Zenncastr!! I have used this quite a few times recently, especially for long, guided eLearning sessions and it is great. There are no latency issues and it is very easy to connect, even easier than Source Connect. If only one person who is connecting has it, you can send them a link so it eases the financial burden as well. There are multiple price points, all of which are affordable. I love that when we speak during the session, all participants are recorded on separate tracks. So, if you are a coach recording a demo, or a voice over actor recording for a client, you never have to edit out any back and forth as you might on zoom. Then, at the end, you simply upload the audio.

I also do love having Source Connect. So many clients and agents require it. I occasionally need to have support sessions, and they do offer great support from Source Connect. Again, like with Zancastr, there are no latency issues. There are, though, sometimes quirks connecting. Sometimes people are confused with how to use it. If you are not both connecting with the same sample rate, for example, you won’t connect smoothly and it will be an issue, so that all needs to be decided ahead of time.

I also do still like to use zoom for the ease of use. Sometimes, even with the latency issues, it is great to just throw up a link and go! Especially this year, everyone knows how to use zoom, and it is nice to have a stress free connection for a live or guided session.

Q: If you could change anything about your studio, what would it be?

This might sound trivial, but it is not meant to. My booth is a rectangle and I have all this wasted space behind me. I could have saved a lot of money by making it a smaller square. The space behind me goes unused and is just a waste. I have to work with an acoustic board behind me, so I don’t even get to enjoy the roominess.

I have blogged about this before, but I would also choose a different color foam if I had the option. I hate that my white aurelex foam has turned yellow. I would either do panels or grew foam next time around.

Q: Can a voice over coach help with your studio set up?

A good voice over coach is still not an audio engineer. While I love to talk about gear with other voiceover actor and with students, it it is fun to talk about set up, I did not go to school for sound engineering. I do not have a degree in audio engineering. Everything I know about my studio, I know from having training with various audio engineers. As a voice over coach, I do work with students on microphone technique, but that is NOT the same thing is telling you how to set up your studio. Dave Scott, who do demo production with, can give you expert advise on how to set up your booth and guide you about what to invest in and how to actually set it up.

Q: What do you wish you knew when you first started your voice over studio?

I wish I know how important a good travel rig is. It took me five years to get my travel rig to sound as good as my home set up. That is WAY too long. If you are just starting in voice over during the pandemic, I realize it is hard to imagine actually packing up and leaving home, but when we do, the rig matters.

I wish I know how important my website was. I spend so much time working on inbound marketing through my website now, but my business was going for several years before I figures that out.

Preparing for VO Commercial Auditions

October 13, 2019 by Laura Schreiber

The Audition is the Job

As a full-time, professional voice over actor, we all know that the audition is the job. Whether auditioning for an agent, for a pay to play, or directly for a client, booking is based entirely on how good our audition read is. Sure, people who have connections can get doors to open but, ultimately, voiceover is a tough industry with a lot of really talented actors and your auditions have to be really good to stand out against the crowd. Often, hundreds of people will even submit for jobs with minimal pay, so when you are going after the coveted commercial gigs, you really need to wow your clients. It’s nice if you ask for feedback; but, ultimately, if the listener does not hear what they want in the first four seconds, you will not book that job. That’s it. As someone who has done more commercials than I can count, you need to nail your audition reads. You have to stand out in the beginning. If there is nothing unique about your read, yoo will not book. So here are some things that I think about for commercial reads:

Who is the Client?

Both the person casting and the end client matter. If the client is a well known luxury brand asking for a sophisticated voice and the person casting is an established ad agency with an abundance of options who has asked for a young adult voice, do not go in with your most sultry Kathleen Turner sound hoping to stand out. They want what they want. And when they want sophisticated luxury, don’t give them bubbly and upbeat. I also DO read the specs. I have had people tell me not to read them. Why on earth would you not read something that the person casting the job has spent time writing? I actually stopped working with a well-respected Los Angeles coach again after that person advised me no to do this. I thought it was not a good idea. In this scenario, they are the boss and we are the potential hire. Sometimes the clients ask for two reads and want very different takes in each read. If you don’t read the specs, you won’t know. Now, we all know that sometimes there is a great disparity between what books a job and the end result, so give them the read that books and do not worry about the end result until after you have booked.

Microphone Technique Matters SO MUCH!

In this pic you can really see the back side of my Neumann TLM 103, but the position in my booth matters so much! I cannot move it from that side to the other or the sound and audio quality completely changes. In my reads, proximity to the mic also matters a lot!

There are so many good microphones, and most good microphones are very sensitive. I have a Neumann TLM 103, and the placement of my mic in my booth matters a lot. My proximity to the mic matters. I have learned that my proximity can be used to evoke very different moods and create a sense of closeness and intimacy. I also have learned that I have to be careful not to fidget during a read, because shifting from side to side will cause irregularities in sound and my mic with pic it all up! A good coach teaches this technique. A good talent listens to their work before they submit. Make sure you listen to your recording and you can hear these subtleties. It would be such a shame to nail the read but lose out because your audio quality is less than pristine. Audio quality is everything, and you are only as good as you sound in this business. If you want your commercial auditions to book, they must sound excellent.

Sometimes the client Just Wants Good Samples- SO GIVE THEM WHAT THEY WANT!

Four times this week I was emailed for jobs that either wanted very specific demos or samples of work I had done in a specific genre. All were new clients. This is awesome! Either you paid to produce a demo that showcases your best abilities, or you booked a spot because you killed it! Either way it’s a win, so respond immediately before someone else does and show this new client exactly why you are the right one for the job! I keep a lot of such samples accessible via drop box, so that even if I am out and about, I can get them right to a client and they do not have to wait. More importantly, their end person does not have to wait!

Lastly, I want to broaden your thinking of what an audition is. Anytime you put yourself and your voice or samples in front of a client that is an audition opportunity! A phone call, and of course a cold call, gives a client a chance to hear you. A direct email to someone you have met with your demo likewise gives a client a chance to hear you. Meeting someone at a conference or a networking event and talking about why your service is different from that of other voice actors is an in-person audition: you have their undivided attention, they hear your voice, and you are speaking! An audition is not just a read with a script or a demo submitted. Always be prepared with you 30 second elevator shpiel and be proud of who you are and what you do. Sparkle!