So glad to play a part in these clever, funny spots currently airing nationwide. Thanks to all involved!

Visit the official site.

You’ll be able to hear me on its promotional teasers. You know, those spots that bookend the episode in which they show you clips of upcoming shows to entice viewers to tune in, to check out their website or catch them up on the storyline.

The show follows a group of young ladies living la vida loca in Atlanta and exploring ideas about modern relationships. The cast includes Stacey Dash, whom you may remember as Dee, best friend to Alicia Silverstone’s character, Cher, in the movie Clueless.

My call time was 10:30 a.m., so I arrived early, took a few deep breaths and proceeded past the food trucks, picked up a Granny Smith apple (often used by VO types) and some water. Then, I was taken into the little city that is the set. You see, unlike on-screen talent, it’s a rare treat for us voice-actor types to be on the set — we’re most often relegated to cozy booths (or padded rooms). But for many live-action TV shows, it isn’t that uncommon, as this is the epicenter of production. After all, they are paying a lot to have this great, big space and all the producers are right there. In this case, they were editing the show as it was being shot to save time, so there was an entire post-production crew on site, too. I saw this in Los Angeles when I recorded voice-overs for another VH1/Bling Productions production, Acceptable.TV.

To record a voice-over in this setting, the sound crew sets up an impromptu voice-over booth on the set, around one of their nice directional mics, then encloses it with moving mats to dampen the sound. Also, no cans to hear yourself. Old school, baby! That’s how they rolled in the Golden Era!

After meeting and talking with the show runners, I was on.

“All quiet on the set”, a girl named Robin resounded. “VOICEOVER!”

A big shout out to all the fine folks on set with whom it was a pleasure to work, including Stacy A. Littlejohn. She co-created the show with Queen Latifah, and is its main writer, as well one of its executive producers. The others are Queen Latifah and Alex Motlaugh. Alex and I had a mini-reunion, as we’d taken a drama class together back in school. After a fascinating set tour, courtesy post-production coordinators Julie and Marsha, we did the paperwork boogaloo and that was a wrap!

So, listen out this season — Single Ladies premieres 9/8c this Monday, May 30th, 2011 on VH1.

“Next on Single Ladies …”

Have you been told that you have a good voice? Have you thought about doing voice-overs but just weren’t sure how to go about getting into the field? By far, the most common question people ask me when they learn I work as a voice-over performer is: “How does someone get into that?”

I do not claim to be a voice-acting coach nor do I make any guarantees. My goal is to provide a basic overview of the voice-over business and offer some steps you can take to get on your way.

PRESS PLAY!

I know it’s difficult to believe but voice actors used to use tape! But since audio went digital and we have the Web, it’s easier than ever to hear what the pros are doing. You’ll want to spend some time IMDb-ing, YouTube-ing and Googling your favorite voice actors. Check for demos on Video Voicebank. Do a bit of research.

If you are new to acting or recording, the first thing to do is just start practicing. Narrate real life! Read articles and books that interest you aloud. Record yourself and then play it back. Edit parts out that you don’t like. Rinse. Repeat. Put about ten of your best bits together to compose a “scratch-tape” MP3. You can play this for others’ feedback, particularly voice coaches’.

I recall someone asking me if I got paid “just to talk“. “Yes” was the easiest answer to the question. If people ask what I do, I say “voice-overs”, but otherwise, I use the term “voice-over actor” — as opposed to “voice-over artist”. No doubt there is an art to voice-overs, but to be more specific, doing voice-overs is a kind of acting. Many people think it’s all about having a good voice, and still other people haven’t thought about it at all. What it’s really about is using the voice that you have.

To pursue paid voice-over work, you go about it much like you would any acting career. Although VO actors probably spend more time alone in a booth or an editing suite than do actors of the stage and screen. And while you don’t need to be a professional audio producer, you do need to know basic audio-editing techniques to compete in today’s voice-over environment. There are easy-to-learn audio-editing programs available for free download. Audacity is probably the most widely used at present.

STANDING ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS

The next step? Find a coach. Why do you need a voice-over coach? Well, a trained and successful working professional who is willing to take on pupils will be able to give you helpful feedback from the field and his or her own experience. With a coach, you will not waste time trying to reinvent the wheel. I cannot stress this point enough. You can get valuable feedback from those who currently deal with voice-over and industry people in your market. You will gain perspective about where you stand, what you need to address, as well as advice on how to achieve it. Look in your local actor’s guide or research online.

CLASS ACT

One of the best ways to get started is attending group classes. This is a great introduction to the business. First of all, group classes are less expensive than private sessions. You’ll also practice under experienced pros, and meet others with similar aspirations. You might get a referral to a good private coach. Such instruction is invaluable and will move you light years ahead in your performance.

DEMOS

After you’ve progressed through some classes, you and a coach or demo producer will move toward producing a set of recordings that demonstrate your voice-over abilities — your “reel” or  ”demos”. VO people usually have at least three or four demos — one for each sort of voice-over work they would like to get: commercial, promo, animation, industrial, IVR/telephony, etc. Demos allow agents to decide whether or not they want to represent you. They then allow clients to decide whether or not they want to audition or hire you. You’ll need to collect script ideas for your demos from magazines and the media and then you and your coach can write them up. Your coach or producer will probably know of a studio that will produce your demo, so make the investment and get it done right.

AGENTS AND PROMOTION

To get work, you’ll need an agent. To get an agent, you need to distribute your demos. In your local actor’s guide, look up the agencies that represent voice-over talent in your market. Contact them and ask if they are accepting submissions for new talent. If so, they’ll provide you with instructions on how to submit your demos for consideration. Don’t expect to hear anything back anytime soon or at all. Agents in major markets get mail by the ton. I got the call from my first LA agent more than six months after mailing him a demo CD.

HOW TO MAKE IT – WORK!

If you want to do this, be prepared to stay in the game for a while. It’s unlikely voice-overs will instantly become your main source of income. Do it because you love it and try to get better at it. Some actors wait tables while they work for their big break, others pull weird hours at strange jobs. Some do auditions and shoots on mornings or weekends. Still others have court-awarded settlements, insurance claims or trust funds. In my opinion, it’s best if you have your own business or if you work at a job which allows you to be as flexible with your time as possible. Industry jobs are also beneficial for equipment-usage possibilities and free food. These are things to keep in mind as you work to support a voice-over habit.

Whatever your situation, along the way, you have to have make certain investments in voice-overs to realistically expect them to pay you back.

My closing advice is to listen with both your ears and an open mind to others and yourself. Imitate voices that you like. Keep the faith, and eventually, you’ll find your own voice. Once you do, get others to listen to it.
Oh, and it never hurts to know a few famous people. Break a lip!
—

This blog article is an abridged version of the e-pamphlet Getting Into Voice-Overs. To get your copy, just fill in your e-mail at the bottom of this page. You can learn more about the voice-over industry and home studios by reading these recommended books and this earlier blog post.

Originally published as a Google Knol.

—
Smith Harrison is a voice-over actor, announcer, narrator, copywriter and student of communication. His voice has been heard in the multimedia content of Viacom, Cartoon Network, NBC Universal, Walt Disney Television Animation, PBS, Mevio and Rockstar Games, as well as in company projects for Intel, GE, Johnson & Johnson, UBS, BlackBerry, Comcast, Cox Communications, The Home Depot, Harrah’s, Ford Motor Company, GlaxoSmithKline, KIA, NVIDIA, Turner Studios and many more.

©2011 Smith Harrison/VoxOffice VoiceOvers™

Photo: Chestnut Studios, London

Hello! Yes, I know. I haven’t been around blog-town recently. Seems I’ve been tweeting more about my activities, truth be told. But it doesn’t mean that I don’t care!

So, what have I been doing? I’ve been taking care of business. The order of the day-to-day. When you’re the sole proprietor of a business, you just have to dive in and “get her done” when priorities pop up. Only later will you remember to look at the clock and ask “is it really that late?”

Recording and editing voice-overs from my home studio, as well as from other studios (like Doppler or White Dog), has been keeping me happily bobbing along. That’s a blessed (pronounced as in “Brian Blessed“) thing, for which I am thankful. This job can be flexible, but it requires the same of you — to be able to turn projects around at the eleventh hour. That’s largely due to the fact that voice-overs are part of the post-production process and usually among the last things to be finalized.

Then there’s the bottom line. When an agency doesn’t do all the legwork, I rather enjoy invoicing, although that may be due to my peculiar affinity for copyediting. It gives closure and provides a moment of reflection upon a job well done. And also, it gets you paid!

So, to semi-justify my extended absence, below are a few projects to which I’ve lent my voice of late:

Disney show Fish Hooks guest spot

Announcer for Muscle Milk radio [MP3] (Thanks to Idiom)

Narrated a KIA 3-D Movie to motivate sales teams, a fun thriller/movie trailer/narrator read

Narrated a video introducing Cox Media Group, a new entity from Cox Communications

Pennington Seed video describing new marketing strategies to distributors like Home Depot
Time Warner Cable Business Class industrial modules

Seems that taking care of business is the name of the game. Whether I’m talking about the business of marketing, acting, invoicing or talking for the client’s business itself. This is what I do: give ideas, attitudes and roles distinctive voices with which audiences will be able to identify and in which they can believe.

The Vox Office is hustlin’ and bustlin’ with some new and exciting projects, so thanks for dropping in and I’ll keep you posted on all the latest developments.

Follow me on Twitter!

Stay busy doing what you love, and I’ll talk to you soon!

The original entry was somehow deleted, so please bear with me while I reconstruct it with links … Sorry to those who left comments. Please leave them again.

]]> http://smithharrison.net/vovo/wordpress/?feed=rss2&p=620 0 http://smithharrison.net/vovo/wordpress/?p=561 http://smithharrison.net/vovo/wordpress/?p=561#comments Wed, 12 May 2010 18:07:36 +0000 Smith http://smithharrison.net/vovo/wordpress/?p=561 In a twist of irony, as I sit to write this blog entry, I am actually rewriting this blog entry — from scratch. I had it saved somewhere, but due to a careless click or two, it was deleted.

It’s appropriate because, as a Chicago copywriter once told me: “Writing IS rewriting”, meanly that is the majority what you’re going to be doing. Sure, sometimes you hit a groove and spin some pure gold, but I’ve heard writers say over and over that the first draft is the hardest thing but then, it’s all about refining.

In the worlds of entertainment and advertising, a vision is most often an especially collaborative effort — with clients and creative teams doing a little dance, giving some back and forth. When the client isn’t happy, it’s literally back to the drawing board. After all, sometimes after we see what we thought we wanted, we tend to see things we missed on the first go. I used to work in editing full-time, so I am intimately acquainted with the revisionary process. Shucks, I rejoice in it!

Why? It’s fun to be a part of the corrective creative process. Plus, you get paid all over again! An account exec once told me that “[rewrites] keep the lights on”.

Yep, as players in this madcap game, VO people are often called back for retakes due to changes in the script. In fact, I have been called back three and four times for a single page of copy, when alterations occured, due to concerns or shifts in emphasis, and other input from clients. This worked out nicely for paying bills and that sort of thing.

Viva la difference! Viva la rewrites! That’s my lifeblood.

Here’s an example of a great Georgia Lottery spot I voiced (and was on the set of), where the end VO changed and the direction was changed, to better effect:

Happy New Year! Know will be a fine and prosperous one for us both.

Oh, speaking of, listen to these Ford radio spots I voiced for JWT for the F150 and the Focus.

Speaking of commercials, while watching TV tonight, I became intrigued by this commercial:

Click here to view the embedded video.

I don’t know anything about J. G. Wentworth, but as commercials go, this is a good one. No, it might not win a CLIO Award, but people will remember this number. For every business – but especially one that deals in “cash now” – it’s all about the numbers. Plus, c’mon! What wonderfully big operatic voices! They add an air of fun, as well as grandeur, to what is a fairly dry and worrisome topic. It seems it’s a running thing that J. G. (or the actor that plays him) does the tag line himself, but just maybe if he’d given a wink in close-up from the conductor stand on this one, and they’d dropped in a proper, professional voice-over (ahem), it’d be even more effective.

In a burst of free association, I’m thinking a VO might lend some of that “Geico aesthetic”. I’m reminded, of course, this legendary ad that introduced the late, great Don LaFontaine’s face to a broader audience (than the VO and film crowd to whom he was already legendary) who knew his voice but not his name:

Click here to view the embedded video.

The thought that might not be the real J.G. up there gives me occasion to revisit this amusing series of ads from the ’80s that put unmistakably friendly faces on a product (those of the actors as folksy CEOs):

Click here to view the embedded video.

All of these spots possess musicality and are fondly memorable. When you are trying to stand out above the competition, those can be important traits to try to incorporate.

So, if you’re out there and want to give it a shot sometime, J. G. folks, kindly look/hook/book me up. Oh! It did win a few awards!

Okay, Jeopardy’s back on. Later.

Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas! – from The Vox Office.

It gave me some time to wonder where that one fateful microscopic transaction occurred. Was it punching in a PIN? Dropping off some mail? Who knows? But the resulting flu provided time for some reflection.

It all began innocently enough. It was a Friday afternoon. I was having to deal with a couple of challenges. But things began to really test me. I was getting hot under the collar. Literally! The nerve! Whoa, I was sweating?  As my head began to pound, I griped to my friend on the phone about the aforementioned glitches and how, on top of that, I felt lousy. It was cold out. I was sweating. As I spoke, it dawned on me this was more than mere agitation. Turns out, these are not uncommon reactions with this strain–to basically be a cantankerous mess.

I’d seen my cousin’s posting on Facebook about himself, his wife and their two kids coming down with it, but they were on the upswing. He became a kind of trip-master, assuring me I was indeed infected but it would be a ride, which would eventually afford me a stronger resistance to viruses. Soon thereafter, as I lay uncomfortably in my bed, armed with VapoRub, Kleenex and Advil in tow. Soon, I would question everything.

At the recommendation of my mother, I began Zycamming and taking powerful antioxidants (grape and grapefruit seed extracts). I think these helped, because the thing never did get into my chest (thankfully avoiding coughing spells that, while often lovely, I really didn’t have the energy for). I also drank fresh Arden’s Garden juices and chamomile tea, in an attempt to sleep through most of it. Ibuprofen helped immensely with the aches (head and body) and keeping the fever down.

When people said things about bacon or made a pun about “oink-ment”, suffice it to say I wasn’t in the mood for the “half-baked” jokes. Especially when so directed. Why does this strain exist in the first place?

In this case, it seems that to be a booming business for an unregulated and unkempt Mexican meat industry, where the strain appears to have been born before spreading to U.S. pig farms. If you aren’t familiar with the routinely nauseating practices of most of the world’s meat industries, they are something to think about next time you’re ordering a meal. “Consider the source”, they always say. This and this are both interesting articles on the connection.

Whatever a flu’s source, it serves as a reminder from Mother Nature. A forced vacation from the everyday, if you will. So watch out if you don’t sanitize or immunize. You can take a ride on this pig this Christmas – but I’d advise avoiding the roller-coaster of fevers, chills and aches. Else you too will have big fun with the flu–or it’ll have fun with you.

VERDICT: Flu? Boo. (Ah-choo!)

The home studio. We voice-over actors are in a profession that often affords us the blessing of working from home. That’s certainly nice—little less rat race, wear and tear on the vehicle, fewer raised eyebrows when you wear your PJs to work—it’s the flexibility of freelancing.

Home studios are an increasing necessity for today’s voice-over actor. Many jobs are recorded at professional sound studios, but more and more are not. Once upon a time, the client booked a studio for auditions and voice talent would stream in, but now almost all auditioning is done from home studios and submitted as MP3s.

A home studio’s an achievable goal for most anyone who has a little know-how, or is willing to learn or even someone who’s on a budget. You don’t need a special home with an underground bunker. That whole bunker thing has become kind of passé, anyway.

While it will take some investment to get it going, you can do this thing incrementally. Remember, it has never been easier or less expensive to set up a recording studio in your home. That also means more people have the means to do it. So, you’ll need to work at your craft first and foremost. The best studio in the world doesn’t guarantee you work, but it sure doesn’t hurt either.

Figure out where it’ll go. If you have a spare interior closet, that’s a good place to start. With modern digital equipment, you really don’t need a whole lot of room. You’ll need to try to soundproof and reduce sound reflection as much as possible. You’ll need a high-end professional microphone, acoustic foam and a good pair of headphones. Do your homework and read the reviews. You can save loads by shopping online. There are numerous options and configurations.

VO actor Peter Drew’s article describes how to build a bare-bones closet studio. Harlan Hogan and Jeffrey Fisher have written two fine texts on Do-It-Yourself home recording. You’ll find them available here, alongside my other Amazon voice-over book recommendations. Check ‘em out!

Have fun and break a lip!