1. New “bridges” is live

    Posted October 25, 2011 by Bob

    Four times a year, I am delighted to work with the Office of Science and Technology at the Embassy of Austria, preparing podcast versions of a number of articles in their online journal “bridges.” Vol. 31 is now published. All of the podcast articles are collected together on this page.

    Category: General | Comments (0)

  2. Quote of the week

    Posted October 23, 2011 by Bob

    From Trent Hamm’s Simple Dollar blog:

    Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.
    – Thomas Jefferson

    Category: General | Comments (1)

  3. Sorry for the silence

    Posted October 20, 2011 by Bob

    It’s been over a week since I posted here. I deeply regret this long silence, far and away longest I’ve gone without posting in the move than 6 years I’ve been writing this blog. I could offer all sorts of exuses, but I don’t like excuses so I’m not going to do that. I have been working on more of the Inviting the Avalanche posts and will get back to posting them shortly. Thank you for your patience.

    Category: General | Comments (4)

  4. Invite the Avalanche – part 2

    Posted October 10, 2011 by Bob

    The power of accumulated time is something most of us don’t understand or if we do, we don’t really want to. My friend Dan Friedman blogged today about this subject with great eloquence in a post called The Most Difficult Part to Being in Voiceover. I’ll wait a minute until you’ve had the time to read and absorb what he said. When you’re done, click the “back” button and we’ll pick up again.

    Good, but a little difficult to swallow in some ways, isn’t it? We don’t want to have to wait, but Dan’s right. Waiting is part of the deal. By the way, the waiiting bit is true for those of us who have been doing voiceover for years, just like it is for those who are just getting started or who’ve been doing voiceovers for a short time. And not just in looking back. We all have to wait, sometimes for a long time, in lots of different ways. It’s part of the deal.

    The cool thing is that there’s something you can do to make the time pass a little more quickly. It’s to harness the power of the magical little E.L.B.s. You can read about these magical little creatures in the archives of the Monday Morning Memo, if you’d like to know a bit more. But, here’s the short version.

    Every day, every single day, don’t go to sleep until you’ve made at least one step forward on your journey. It doesn’t matter how big or small the step. It doesn’t matter if it’s publicly visible or something only you know about. But every day you have to take some kind of action, move at least some tiny bit in the direction you’re going. If that’s success doing voiceovers then that’s the direction you need to head.

    And the cumulative power of those little steps, taken one day after another, day after day will amaze you because it’s not one day’s action added to the next day’s and the day after that and so forth and so on. They don’t just add one to another. They begin to compound and multiply and before you know it, you’ve made an amazing amount of progress.

    For 26 years I worked on voiceover as much as I possibly could, and things have gone pretty well for years; but it wasn’t until just the last 5 years or so that things have really taken off.

    If you really do want an avalanche (remember I’ve all ready warned you it’s not fun to be sitting until that avalanche when it falls on you), you’re going to have to work at it every day, one little bit at a time. Unlike a real avalanche, which can be accelerated by explosions and the like, the avalanche of work has to be started one little bit at a time.

    Are you ready to do the work? The only thing necessary is for you to start.

    Category: Career Advice, General, Getting started in Voiceover | Comments (2)

  5. Invite the Avalanche – part 1

    Posted October 6, 2011 by Bob

    At Faffcon, I’ve talked about what it means to me to “Invite the Avalance.” In other words, to be so buried in work you’re not sure how to deal with it all. I’ve thought about this subject quite a bit in the last 9 months or so. I like working and I love telling stories for people so having more voiceover work is something I am always ready to welcome.

    You may or may not agree with me about the ideas I’m going to present over the next few blog posts and that’s OK. These are simply my ideas. If you’re able to take something from them, good. And if not, then I hope you’ll find your own path to an avalanche of work.

    The first thing to mention is that when you’re standing at the bottom of a mountain and an avalanche falls on you, it’s not fun. In fact, it’s a very long way from fun. If you survive the experience, it’s going to take a lot of energy, effort and time to dig your way out. The same can be said about an avalanche of work. If you take on more and more work, to the point that you’re buried in it, you’re going to have to work very hard to get it all done on time.

    And may I insert here that one of my cardinal rules is that I don’t miss deadlines, no matter how hard I have to work. And if it appears that there’s a risk of missing a deadline, I keep the lines of communication wide open with my client so they know exactly where we are and how things are going. Being cavalier about deadlines is one of the quickest ways to ensure you will never be buried in an avalanche of work. Or never have a second such experience if you do get there once.

    So, invite the work. Welcome the work. But make sure you’re going to be able to deliver the goods or the work will go away a lot faster than it came.

    You might also want to start making plans now for how you’re going to be able to deal with the avalanche. Do you know some people who can help you with digging out? In my case, I hired my oldest son Eric to work with me on audio editing for the many long-form projects I narrate. Audiobooks. eLearning. Corporate narrations. That kind of thing. Eric has been working for me since before he graduated and continues to work with me all the time.

    Then, when things got even more busy, I added my daughter Karen into the mix. She does a fair amount of content direction which has saved both me and my son Eric a ton of time on editing because we catch nearly all of the mistakes on the first pass. We end up with very few fixes. Which saves us all a lot of time and unnecessary work. And I’ve added a few more members to the team over time to make sure we meet our deadlines and deliver excellent quality work, consistently.

    So, invite the avalance; but understand it’s not going to be fun. Not at first and maybe not for a very long time. And prepare some help before you need that help, otherwise you’re going to have to scramble to deal with both an avalanche and not enough help at the same time.

    Category: General | Comments (2)

  6. The sum is greater than the parts

    Posted October 5, 2011 by Bob

    That phrase I used as a title for today’s blog post sums up, to the best of my ability, what I think of Faffcon. It’s been a bit over a week since I returned home from Faffcon 3. My head is still buzzing and swimming from all that I experienced and learned there. It’s almost impossible to explain Faffcon to someone who hasn’t attended at least one, because from the outside it sounds like it would be chaotic. I mean, you show up and there’s no set agenda? You don’t even know who is going to be speaking, much less what they’ll be talking about?

    Exactly. And this is a big part of the reason that the sum of Faffcon is greater than the parts. Each of us who was there at Faffcon 3 had something valuable to contribute; but the value received (at least for me) was far more than I expected. The sessions that I attended were all enlightening and helpful. I took copious notes and have all ready been putting into practice a number of the things I learned.

    But, as has been the case with each of the previous Faffcons, the top highlight experience for me took place in a personal conversation away from the sessions. Other highlights took place while helping behind the scenes to be sure that things were set-up and running smoothly. Another joy was watching my son Eric and my daughter Karen pitch in and volunteer to help every place they could.

    Watching and listening as people shared what they knew, or what they hoped to learn, was gratifying. Seeing virtual light bulbs burst into radiance again and again as people found nuggets of wisdom or gave nuggets of insight. These are just some of the things that make Faffcon the unique and wonderful experience that it is.

    At the heart of Faffcon is the amazing Amy Snively. Yes, there are lots of people who help, most especially Pam Tierney and Connie Terwilliger; but it’s Amy’s vision that got this thing rolling and her amazing grasp of what it needs that keeps it moving forward.

    Faffcon 4 will be March 23-25, 2012 in Ventura Beach, California. If you’re a working professional in voiceover, I hope you’ll start making plans now to be there. Yes, it really will be that good.

    Category: General | Comments (0)

  7. Another recent project

    Posted October 4, 2011 by Bob

    I always enjoy working for Pikewood Creative. A recent project I recorded for them is called This City.

    Category: General | Comments (0)

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