Interrup…what the h#%@! was that? Distrac…oooh, look at that!

Today, I am not talking about being distracted by amusing kitty videos on Facebook, although I did see at least one funny video that distracted me so far today.

And I’m not talking about the constant flow of email that comes in that – of course – needs to be handled immediately (even if it DOESN’T).

Nor am I talking about being interrupted by the dog scratching at the door, or the cat sliding across some papers which are now all over the floor and need to be picked up before the dog actually gets in to trample them with dirty paws.

And I am not talking about the frequent helicopter flyovers – both routine (the gas’em up path is over my house) and not-so-routine (the circling helo’s looking for whatever mischief is being sparked by semi-high density housing and a bad economy).

No today it is interruptions of major proportions – but an interruption with a shining light at the end the alley.

Today, the back hoes and diggers are punching through the patched concrete in preparation for laying new concrete and getting the heck OUT of my alley where rotating crews of gas company and water department and contractors have been grinding and digging and filling and repeating for the past three (yes 3!) years.

I managed to sneak in a couple of auditions today while they were on break and will be able to finish a project a bit later on after they leave for the day.  Although my limited booth time was interrupted by two phone calls – one a robo-call. (And people wonder why I am not always my bubbly self when answering the phone…)

Some distractions we can stop. I don’t HAVE to have my Facebook page open all the time. Or my Skype account. I don’t HAVE to check email constantly. Or see what is happening with my peeps on the VO-BB (wait, I do have to do that).

Some interruptions can be reduced. I can turn the ringer off on my phone (a possible problem in that I would likely forget to turn it back up). I can keep the door closed to the cats and train the dog not to scratch.

There is plenty of paperwork to do during those time when I can’t actually record. In fact, I just went through my In Box sorting and filing and found a couple of little things that almost fell through the cracks. And, of course, there is a great big outdoors that would love to spend more time with me.

Interruptions and distractions are a fact of life. But it will be so nice when this work in the alley is finally completed.

Does This Mic Make Me Sound Fat?

There is no one size fits all when it comes to microphones. No one price range that will guarantee that a mic will sound wonderful with your voice. It all “depends.” It depends on your own particular physical characteristics. It depends on the room that you are recording in.

But it is always SUCH a huge topic of discussion with passionate opinions on what mics are BEST. It gets as bad as the PC vs. MAC debate.

But it is still interesting to listen to the differences (or lack thereof) between the various mics and their price points – and that is why I am forwarding these links.

Poke around on the net and you can probably find more mic shootouts. I am pretty sure there was another comprehensive blind shootout, but I must not be using the right key words. If you know of others, please post a comment and the link.

http://www.vocalimpactmedia.com/SoundStorage.html

http://transom.org/?p=7517

http://recordinghacks.com/2011/02/26/vo-shootout-u87-l36b-cm87-at4047mp/

Check the Mute Buttons!

So, I had a phone patch session recently with a new client. It was a no audition job through one of my agents. Love those. But instead of ISDN, it was a phone patch project using my Gentner.

The client called into my system and he could hear me fine, but to me he sounded like he was calling me from Mars – a tinny little voice way in the background.

My eyes crossed as I tried to figure out what the problem might be. I checked the sketch the engineer left me the last time he was here. But with the client on the line, my stress level was such that I was not going to figure it out. We agreed on a short break to see if I could reach him my engineer. If I couldn’t figure it out, we would use a work around, which is not my preferred way of working.

A couple minutes later, after a quick phone call, everything was working correctly – my client called back in and our session went great from that point.

So, what happened? Cats is what happened. Try as I might, I simply cannot banish the critters from my studio entirely. So at some point, in the process of trying to crawl behind the equipment cabinet to a nice warm spot, my little Lista must have depressed a couple of mute buttons.

While I can record broadcast quality sound in my home studio, I do so miss the days of going to someone else’s studio and letting them worry over the technical issues. An engineer can see those depressed mute buttons with his eyes closed.

And while I want to THINK that I will remember to check the mute buttons, the next time something like this happens, I can’t say for certain that I will. That’s why I keep the phone number for Pro Sound and Music handy.

VO – Just Part of the Total Package

Any video production is a team effort and there are times when all of the elements work so well together, you need to show it off.

I did the VO for this spot produced by the Arthur Agency for New Life Weight Loss Center at Herrin Hospital in Ohio. I give it a thumbs up on creative and execution!

The Opportunity Generator

I sure hope the gas line installation is going along on schedule and that the construction crews will be done soon (relative term). Right now the steady drone of a power generator is preventing any recording from taking place. I was able to sneak in a couple of auditions this morning. And one very short prompt for a regular customer who had forgotten to include it with his usual weekly order. My agent called with a re-work on a project from June that needs to be recorded tomorrow AM, so I am hoping to get a jump on it early and be finished before they even start work.

The good news is that  this “down” time is not really down time. Simply an opportunity to do some other things! I do have backup recording plan if I should actually need to record something at the same time the crew is working, but so far, I have been able to schedule sessions around the noise. And they don’t work at night! (Although the day we had the power outage, they stayed until dark because they knew that they would be facing the terrible traffic.)

So, while the concrete cutters and trench diggers do their thing, I will clean out my In Box – making sure my Contacts are up to date. I will contact some past clients to say hello. I will sort through the pile of papers that accumulate on the side of my desk. I will review class assignments and do a little lesson planning. I will pick figs and trim branches. I will cook something interesting. I will take my mom shopping for stylish clothes for her new assisted living community. I will volunteer at the local “soup” kitchen.

The bad news? Well, after the gas company is done, the water department comes through the same alley to replace the sewer pipes.

Popping Problem? Probably Positional Placement.

Every once in a while I’ll pop a “p” and have to do some editing to fix it, or even a redo, but plosives have not been a real problem for me. It is the sharp “s” that seems to be my biggest issue.

I have learned to hear the worst of my sibilance issues as they come out of my mouth and do a quick adjustment to my articulators (usually tongue placement more than anything else) and the next pass is usually sans-sibilance.

But the popping “p” doesn’t present itself until I listen to the recording. So preventing them from happening in the first place is the best plan of attack.

Dan Friedman, working voice talent and author of the book “Sound Advice,” is a frequent contributor to Procomm’s Voiceover Industry Articles. This one is all about that popping problem that plagues many voice actors.

Microphone Technique for Voice Over Talent

It includes a few pictures too – to help you find the “sweet spot” on your mic. Here’s one of them.

If you have a popping problem, read this article and experiment with your mic placement.

Talk about your work around!

Well, as I posted last week, stuff happens.

This week I started hearing a little BobCat driving up and down my alley. And when I poked my head out to see what was going on, I saw the tell-tale signs of upcoming concrete demolition. The road was covered with colorful spray painted arrows and initials detailing the underground path of gas pipes, water and sewer lines.

And a day later the truly irritating sound of a concrete cutter combined with a jack hammer – followed by large back hoes and dump trucks. Even when the concrete cutter wasn’t actually cutting, the generator truck was constantly running in the background.

I trudged down the alley yesterday to find the foreman to ask him what the “schedule” might be. Along the way, I navigated around and over large piles of dirt and was careful not to step in the new trough being gouged out along my side of the alley.

Well, like with so many things in life – there was only the barest suggestion of a schedule. “It depends.” If they run into a problem, they could shut down immediately until someone is able to figure out what to do next. If they don’t run into a problem, then they could just continue to power through from 8:30 to around 5. Lunch break? Again, that depends.

What he did tell me was that it would take 3-4 weeks! And after they are finished laying the new gas lines, the Water Department is going to follow and replace the sewer pipes in a completely different trough requiring another few weeks of concrete cutting and jack-hammering.

Hard to schedule a session in my studio around that.

So, back up plans are in effect. My portable recording gear is set up in an acoustically treated space in the main house (that sounds fancier than it is – trust me). And I have a couple of friends with studios on alert in case a client wants to direct and the construction is simply too crazy.

But for right now, during the daytime while the crews are working, I will be able to use the “inside” location. Everything is networked, so I can save to my regular recording tower, so that works. And I can always start work at around 4 PM when they usually are gone.

Sounds like everything is fine…yeah, right. Either my technical skills are deteriorating, or my stress level has started to affect my brain. I could NOT connect the dots yesterday while scrambling to get a phone patch session ready in my regular studio, and at the same time trying to get the back up system up and running in case there was too much noise.

The MicPort Pro is a very simple device and I have used it many times while traveling. I couldn’t find the cable – and to make matters worse, I was looking for the wrong cable – actually I was trying to use the headphone out jack instead of the mini USB jack and it wasn’t until I was wandering around Frye’s asking someone for a mini-plug to USB cable and finally LOOKING at the MicPort Pro that I realized I was a complete idiot. Left Frye’s with some M&M’s to cover my embarrassment. I was going to resort to using my dbx mini-pre, but somehow the power supply has disappeared.

I was actually able to use the regular studio for an emergency session yesterday around 4PM, but somehow a “pad” button on my new mixer (don’t quiz me on what that is) was depressed when it should not have been and the phone patch was distorted. Why I could hear playback of a QuickTime movie and not of my recording is still a mystery. And then, after I finished the session, why was I unable to record an audition 10 minutes later? Apparently the software had decided to revert back to the computer’s sound card instead of my Gina.

But today, everything seems to finally be working – with a quick troubeshooting trip from the engineer, my regular studio has all it’s ducks in a row again. The back up studio has new foam pads for the Sennheiser 414 – new bungee cables for the Hamburg’s shock mount - and a selection of pre-amps – a Mackie mixer, the MicPort Pro, a Mobile Pre USB (thanks to a fellow VO friend!) and the dbx (if I can find the power supply).

So, I SHOULD be all set for the chaos of the next couple of months. Cross your fingers that I don’t lose any more brain cells, or that the stress level goes down a notch or two.

Hey, it’s cold here too!

A lot of my clients are snowed in. I can’t imagine how difficult it is to get around in all that snow and ice and just plain cold. It’s been a long time since I had to scrape a windshield. And this week I have had a number of sessions, calls or emails where the subject centered on them wishing they were able to transport themselves to sunny San Diego.

Please know that, while there is not 12 inches of snow on the ground – I did have ice this morning in a shaded area of my backyard – and I am presently sitting in my studio with a turtle neck sweater, a sweatshirt, scarf and gloves. It is pretty chilly here too!

In fact, the temps here in San Diego have been much cooler than normal over the past year or so and I have been thinking about moving somewhere closer to the equator – so that I can actually get in the water for some body surfing. I could work anywhere with a good Internet connection – couldn’t I? Ah – Italy!

OK – fantasy time over, I have to get back to work – there are voiceovers to do and maybe if I stand up in my padded room, the circulation will come back to my fingers.

When Software Burps

Workflow is a time sensitive thing. We have delivery dates for the work we do and part of our job is to anticipate potential time-sucking issues that may impact a timely delivery.

I am getting pretty good at balancing my daily forays into Social Media, but we all have other areas that need attention.

• Family (my increased time with my mom needs to be figured into the equation)
• Exercise (oh, brother, this is high on my list of things I don’t get around to – do my weekly tap classes count?)
• Home and Garden (my yard is a MESS - my counters are getting mightly cluttered – and there is a leak in the big bathroom that needs to be attended to – not to mention I am stripping an old door for a remodel project)
• Volunteering (my work with MCA-I has increased recently due to some major changes in the association requiring more time as webmaster, singing in the church choir is fun and challenging – and there is a play I’d like to audition for next month)
• Personal Business (refinancing too a huge toll on my time this fall)
• Marketing (just started up my quarterly enewsletter again after more than a year in hiatus)
• Bookkeeping
• General attention to email (how is it possible that there are still 200 emails in my In Box with all the sorting and filing I did this morning?)
• Actual Work

These are all things that we can generally anticipate. The things we can’t plan for are the little burps when your software (and/or hardware) doesn’t work the way it should.

Suddenly your delivery schedule looms when you can’t get your software to do what it is supposed to do. Is it the software? Is it your computer? Is it a networking thing? With each question comes more questions – more time spent – more time passing as the deadlines grow closer.

Somehow it manages to work itself out in most cases – especially if you have a backup plan – which is something that probably  needs to be on that first list of things to do!

I have multiple recording options if one fails, and have rarely, if ever actually missed a deadline, but it sure does put a kink in the workflow when something isn’t working the way you expected it to work.

Free Music

Is there such thing as a free lunch? Occasionally. And occasionally there is free library music suitable for production.

Just got the information about a Free Royalty Free Music website, where right now everything is Free. They just want a link on your website somewhere. They will have stuff for sale at some point, but there will always be some free stuff too.

http://www.JewelBeat.com/

A quick look at the titles on the first page shows some pretty dark themes! Angel of Darkness, Armies of Doom, Attitude Gone Wrong, Bad Consequences and so on. But dig a bit deeper and there is a lot of other stuff with some Country, Beautiful, Clubbing, etc.

They have some free “sound effects” too – which are mostly little musical stings using various instruments.

So enjoy some free music – and go buy someone lunch.