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.
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.
This weekend, on a glorious Saturday morning, I was walking my dogs around our block. I was looking at the Cherry blossoms and lilacs in bloom, and thinking about how even though I had some editing to do and a coaching lesson to plan, I had so much time that day. Time to enjoy with my husband. Time to enjoy with my kids. One of my nieces was in from Toronto and was coming to visit. Weekends are precious for working moms, because even if we still have some work to do, we can revel in the joy of the freedom that the weekend typically brings.
If your goal is to build a successful, thriving business in voice over and earn a consistent, sustainable income, working long hours is the only way to do this. There is no magic bullet or secret sauce. According to Jennifer Cohen’s article in Forbes, James Cash Penny, better known as the founder of JC Penny, once said, “Unless you are willing to drench yourself in your work beyond the capacity of the average man, you are just not cut out for positions at the top.”
Every single week I schedule at least two pilates sessions. I find that in addition to keeping me fit, they help me to relax as well. Jennifer Cohen explains the connection between fitness and success in Forbes:
When someone brand new to voiceover calls or emails, after our initial consultation, I like to send them an audition script to read to get a baseline idea of where they are starting. From that, I can best assess approximately how many sessions it will take to get them demo ready. Some people are fast learners and they only need a handful of lessons. Others take substantially more time. Here are some factors that influence how quickly you can get to your demo:
In the past month, I have had two clients with acting and entertainment experience who were new to voice over reach out for demos. Again, both were given baseline reads to asses. Both were amazing. You’d think they’d been in voice over for years. Even without coaching, as one had stage and vocal training and the other had on-camera tv experience, their instincts of what to do with the script lead to a natural, authentic, solid read that would be bookable if they submitted. 
When a working voice talent needs a demo, again, we can move forward with script selection and a process that showcases their range and strengthens their business’ brand. I work hard not only to bring scripts that enable voice actors to target aspirational clients and showcase their capabilities, but also to have the demos be a reflection of what the talents value, care about and matter. The demo prep process is collaborative and the voice talent’s personality and opinion matters greatly. 
It happens, even in the time of covid, we leave our studios. As a professional voice talent, we have work we can predict, and the joy of work we cannot predict, that comes in at a moment’s notice and can have a pretty tight turn around time. As a working mom, whether I’m home or traveling I’m always juggling my responsibilities as a small business owner and my role of a mom, this year more than ever. This year, my high school juniors are looking at colleges. And as if looking at colleges for twins is not challenging enough, their interests do not overlap at all. Emma is targeting schools with Speech programs and STEM programs. Jack is looking for International Relations and Russian. So, we are doing two completely different college searches at once. What does this mean for me as a voice actor? It means I’m leaving the booth for the first time in a year and I need to be prepared. Voice over work should never prevent travel, it just means you need the right set up for your voice over travel rig and to take the necessary steps when planning.
The point of the travel rig is to sound like you sound in your home studio when you are on the road so that you can provide clients with a continuity of service. I have tweaked my rig quite a few times over the years, and finally invested in a quality set up that I am pleased with. I now bring:
Depending on which voice actor you ask, you’ll get a different answer to the questions “What’s the best DAW for VO?” I have used Audacity, Adobe Audition, and Twisted Wave. I may be proficient in all of them, but I LOVE Twisted Wave. To be clear this does not mean that other DAWs, from Reeper to Pro Tools don’t have immense value, but for me, I am quick and good on Twisted Wave. It serves my purposes well. And when I have a client who needs total production with music, I hire a professional engineer to mix it down anyway, so I really can do all that I need to do on Twisted Wave. Some of my favorite features are the shortcuts, multiple effects stacks, and ease of file splitting.
When I am in my booth, I turn my iPhone and Apple Watch to airplane mode. I do this because when I develop a good flow, I do not want the phone ringing to interrupt me. I do offer one word of caution: if you are doing a live session and you coincidentally cannot connect with your client, and have all your devices in airplane mode, it can be quite frustrating if they are unable to reach you. So, while you may not want your phone in the studio for a directed session, perhaps before you silence everything you should make certain that you connect.
Like many in voiceover, I am constantly revising my business plan, shifting my focus from commercials to explainers to elearning to targeting specific industries. As I revise my plan, my goals change. While I have a planner or agenda that I love, I find that mapping out my strategy for the week helps me to keep my mind on the big picture. As auditions and work pours in, it’s easy to get caught up in the little things and push off the tasks that we think can wait, but in doing so, in pushing off those marketing emails and that LinkedIn outreach, we are pushing off the pursuit of our longterm goals. It is so important to always have an eye on your “why.” If you lose site of that, and you are just buys submitting audition after audition, you can easily get stuck in a rut. 
If your fan makes noise,
producers. If you want to catch the attention of both agents and thus who will book you, I urge you to invest in professional demos for several reasons. First, demo producers have a sense of what current trends are booking NOW. Trends do change. Next, there are certain standards that those who cast expect when listening to voice over demos. Trust them. Lastly, people who produce demos direct your demo session. They will bring out your very best reads and take your best takes, or blend together your best takes to make an awesome demo. They typically produce demos both because of their knowledge of the industry and their ear. You need someone who can bring our your best and push you beyond your own limits. It is amazing what a good director can bring out.
This depends. This depends on where you live and what your goals are. I happen to be an LLC. I live in the United States and I wanted to be able to bid on government contracts. In order to do that, you have to be an LLC. Being an LLC also protects your personal assets, so there are certain advantages. So, since every one of us as solopreneurs is in a unique situation, whether or not you incorporate depends on both your goals for your voiceover business and your family’s financial situation. Consulting either an accountant or an attorney is helpful.
P2Ps, or Pay to Play websites like voice123, bodalgo, cast voices and others are a great way to bring in business. Sure, there are plenty of voice talents who build their businesses without P2Ps. I am on voice123 and cast voices at present. I have built lasting client relationships from my vast bookings on voice123 and am thankful for the opportunity they present. Cast Voices is new to the scene and is in the launch phase now. I am extremely excited to see what comes of this new platform.
Yes. While it’s great to be on a Pay to Play or to post audio on YouTube, it’s hard to market yourself to clients with only these options because you are automatically sending them to places where they can immediately find other voice talents. It’s far better to have a website that you set up as your store front. This is your chance to make yourself stand out and shine. There are a lot of really good people in voiceover, so the question is, why are you different than other talents they could work with? Your website is your big chance to show prospects why they should hire you and look no further. You should have your demos, your contact information, and any stand out details obviously displayed to make it easy for those who cast to find you and hire you. Your demos on your site should be downloadable. 
Agents are wonderful and present you with the opportunity for work. Agents do not guaranty work. Just like with Pay to Plays, agents are a source of auditions. The auditions that agents send are typically more lucrative. The catch, though, is that the competition is much stiffer when auditioning for agents. Agents are far more selective, so it is less about getting on an agents roster and more about staying on an agents roster. Every agent is looking for something different, but at a minimum they want to see that you have trained and continue to pursue work on your craft, that you have a professional set up, that you can offer live sessions via Source Connect and/or ipDTL, and that you have solid demos that will appeal to your clients. Building a rapport with your agents is helpful, and doing quality auditions in a timely manner matters a lot!