My friend Curt Yengst is one of the best audio engineers I’ve ever had the joy of working with and knowing. According to his site, he’s now been certified by the Society of Broadcast Engineers as a Senior Broadcast Engineer.
Curt has a first class recording studio in Eastern Pennsylvania, on the off chance that you ever need a place to record in that part of the country.
(edited to fix typo in title)
Rodney Saulsberry was interviewed a year ago about his most recent book, Step Up to the Mic. The title of this post is one of the key points Rodney makes in this interview.
If you’re interested, you can get Rodney’s books at Amazon.com.
Chris Clausen died Tuesday, July 29, 2008 of complications from a stroke. He’s remembered in this report from Atlanta’s Fox affiliate station.
My friend Adam Creighton provides a guest podcast on gaming at the Emergent Game Technologies Podcast site.
I have been quite remiss in my own reading of the voiceover blogs of my friends and peers of late; so even though this was posted quite some time ago, I commend the excellent comments and thoughts of my friend Liz de Nesnera to you on the parallels between tennis and voiceover based on her observations following the finals at Wimbledon earlier this month.
John Florian, the driving force behind the excellent VoiceOverXtra site, has (for reasons known only to him) decided to feature an interview with me (this is part1 and this is part 2) on his site. Now, part 3 of my interview with John is now available.
Subscribe to VoiceOverXtra and you’ll get a bunch of interesting and useful information for your voiceover career.
My friend and mentor Philip Banks is a writer of strange short fictions (at least I assume they are fictions), which he is posting on his Voiceover Universe blog at a steady pace. If you have a few minutes to a few hours, drink deeply from the strange well that is the mind of Philip Banks.
My friend Bruce Miles is the narrator for a new audiobook box set called For the Love of Country. The linked page includes some audio clips if you’d like to sample before you buy.
There’s a study weekend coming up in September (Saturday and Sunday, the 6th and 7th) in Dallas with Bettye Zoller of VoiceVoices.com. The weekend will cover four areas of focus …
Tuition for the weekend is $495.00, which includes breakfast buffets, catered working group luncheons, a festive cocktail reception, and take-home packets. The Two-pay plan lets you enroll with $295 deposit–balance of $200 due on or before August 25 non-refundable.
For more information, visit Bettye’s home page.
This evening I met up at The Cheesecake Factory in Tukwila, WA with my friend Jeff Kafer. We had a wonderful dinner, as is pretty much always the case there.
Our server was nice enough to snap a shot of both of us with my phone’s camera. As we you can see, we were in a slightly playful mood …
I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation which wandered across all kinds of topics including, but not limited to a recounting of my visit to the legendary Portgordon, UK (to visit my friend Philip Banks), Jeff’s work testing games for Microsoft, some of my personal thoughts and reactions to my weekend of studying with Marice Tobias (the reason I was here in Seattle), our families and a host of other subjects. All in all, a truly wonderful evening. I’m very grateful to Jeff for going to the trouble of driving all the way to Tukwila for our dinner.
(edited to fix typos)
I’m in Seattle this weekend, for a two day voiceover workshop with Marice Tobias that includes 12 of my peers in the voiceover business. Then I’ll have a private session with her on Monday morning before I head home.
If the subject of voiceover work interests you, but you haven’t really started, there are many different people with whom you can study. You can read books (there are a bunch of them linked on my Recommended Books page), you can take seminars, you can take group classes, you can do private coaching in person or on the phone. There are hundreds of choices. Maybe thousands.
And some of the people doing the “getting started” training, also do seminars and workshops or private coaching for working pros, too. But there’s something unique about working with a coach who is focused on helping people stay in the voiceover business rather than get started. That’s Marice. To study with her you need to come with a professional recommendation. And your career has to all ready be in motion.
I strongly believe that real professionals know they need to keep studying and growing.
Joe Cipriano’s newest video release in the Ask Joe series.
Find more videos like this on voiceover universe presents…
If you have trouble seeing the embedded video, check it out on Voiceover Universe. I understand that you need to join the Ask Joe Group in order to see the videos.
Michael Minetree emails with the link to video number 4 in his on-going series as he builds he new voice isolation booth.
Thank you, Michael. It’s looking great.
It’s been a while since I posted one of these solid gold nuggets from Bob Fraser. Here’s the 19th in the series.
WHERE TO GET MENTORING
by Bob Fraser
As most actors who read my scribblings know, I’m a big fan of quotes. There is a good reason for this; I think that it really helps to have advisors, as one pursues a goal. And it’s always been my experience that wise advisors are the best advisors.
Now, many wise people have come before us – that is indisputable. Most have left behind some instructions, cautions, insights and advice. My attitude has always been, why not make use of, and benefit from their experience?
One of the wisest people of all time is Anon. No one knows who this Anon person was or when he or she lived, but Anon had some great things to say.
“Most people miss opportunity because it arrives looking like work.” Anon.
This is an important piece of advice because it goes right to the heart of the “I need an agent” (or manager) plaint that we hear (and say) so often. Deep down we know that getting our faces in front of people who hire actors is very important and yet we all fall prey to the rather silly idea that there’s a one-step solution to that problem – one that skips the hard work part – and that ‘brilliant’ idea is to get someone else to do it.
Believing that you need an agent to get started is bass-ackward. In the real world, you need to get started in order to attract the attention of a good agent. Believe me it is pointless to have a top salesman for your product if your product is still in the planning stages. 99.9% of agents know this. You can’t fool them.
When I tell actors this, they often respond with another complaint. “I’ve tried to get started on my own and it just isn’t happening.”
There’s a quote for that:
“Character consists of what you do on the third and fourth tries.” ~ James Michener
SKILLS, ATTITUDES AND TENACITY
A successful acting career is mainly the result of skills, attitudes — and, most importantly, the ability to keep showing up (tenacity) despite the rejection that we all face. No matter what some people say, talent is not a skill. Using your talent to entertain for a living – that’s a skill.
However, in the absence of a good attitude, learning the skills of a professional entertainer is almost impossible. And without tenacity, even the best set of skills will never see the light of day. If you want to be a professional actor, have a gracious attitude, a willingness to learn new skills and never, never, give up your quest.
I am often asked “when is the best time to start? Pilot season? When I’ve saved enough money? When I turn 21? After the kids are grown? September?”
I’m no expert, but here’s someone with a very clear instruction on this “when should I start” matter:
“Whatever you want to do, do it now. There are only so many tomorrows.” ~ Michael Landon
GOOD ADVICE IS FREE – IF YOU ARE WILLING TO ACT
See why I like quotes?
Because someone, somewhere has already dealt with my problems and found a solution. And many of them have been kind enough to write it down. All I have to do is read, understand, and begin to use all this great advice.
I urge all actors to start collecting quotes, find a few favorites, and make little signs. Stick them up on the refrigerator, computer or bathroom mirror.
These little “reminders” can have a beneficial effect on your career. You will be astonished at the education you will get – and the results you will achieve – when you start listening to your “advisors” and start “doing it.”
============================================================
PERMISSION TO REPRINT: You may reprint articles from Actor’s Tool-Kit, on your website or electronic newsletter.
However, in order to comply with my copyright, you must also include the following paragraph with your reprint:
“Reprinted from ACTOR’S TOOL KIT, the email course just for subscribers of Show Biz How-To — The Free Actor’s Monthly. Get your own free subscription by going to: showbizhowto.com
Copyright © 2006 Bob Fraser Productions All Rights Reserved”
============================================================
Yesterday I posted about a BBC online article featuring a video and comments about training a British journalist in how to do an American accent. And I promised to follow up with a link to the callers from around the UK who left messages with their best efforts at a US accent.
You can read the background information in the online article, and then listen to the callers either on that page, or here.
And then a bit further down, you’ll find British voice actor Stuart Smith, offering a quick US accent masterclass.
Again, my thanks to my friend Rowell Gormon for pointing out this link in the first place.
With thanks to my friend Steve Stone for passing along this link in an email today, you’ll find at least a few solid, actionable suggestions in this list of ten things a voice actor should do on the Back Stage site.
I’ve added Wendy’s Actor Inspiration site to my blog roll, after reading this article.
With thanks to my friend Rowell Gormon for posting the link on the VO-BB, you’ll find an interesting video here from the BBC on coaching a Brit how to do an American accent.
Update: Don’t miss the article below the video. Here’s a key quote …
You mustn’t play an accent,” Berkery says. “You must play a character who has an accent, but you must never play an accent.
And …
An authentic accent will be “second-nature” to an actor, Berkery says, likening it to fluency in a foreign language where a person doesn’t have to think about the process of speaking.
Good stuff. I also notice there will be a number of attempts at American accepts posted sometime tomorrow. Should be great fun to go back and listen. (Probably about as much fun as the Brits would have at our expense if we attempted a “British” accent and put it on the web for all to hear.)
In the interview John Florian did with me at VoiceOverXtra (part 1, part 2) I mentioned one of my ongoing projects, to get the “radio” out of my voice. On that subject, there’s a very interesting post at Dan O’Day’s blog. One of the hardest things in the world is to hear ourselves as we really sound. What are you doing to avoid or work through your challenges? I’d love to hear. Comments are open.
So much changes when we get a new perspective. I’ve been meaning for a few days to point you to my friend Rowell Gormon’s Clogged Blog for a very well written post that, I suspect, will help you get a new perspective on things; even though it has very little to do with voiceover, at least directly.
My friend Andi Arndt emailed me with a really cool link to a PDF file illustrating directions on how to build sound baffles (put enough of them together and you make a booth) made from carpet samples.