2009 April | Dave Courvoisier's Blog

EQ for May

April 30, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

'Latest issue of EQ online is out, and like those before, this one is a treasure-trove of information. EQ hits the center of the target for Musicians, audiophiles, studio engineers, and others in the music industry. But the next ring out from red bullseye on this publication is voice acting.

Keep an eye out in this edition for 'THE GREAT BIG DAW ROUNDUP"….an exhaustive look at all the many quality sound-editing and production software packages out there.

Also look for "MIXED ON A LAPTOP is no longer a criticism". Great!

Click HERE or on the pic above.

CourVO

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: commercial voice, ISDN talent, Las Vegas voice actor, Las Vegas voiceover, Male ISDN talent, Male voiceover talent, narrations, Podcasts, Source-Connect voiceovers, speaker, speaking, voice, voice actor, voiceover

LaFountain of Giving

April 30, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

Don LaFontaine was so so much more than the raspy movie-trailer voice he became known for. His giving, mentoring, and pace-setting raised us all before we even knew it.

Adam Caplan gives words and personal remembrances to the genius and innovation that was Don LaFontaine in a wonderful article being posted now on Voices.com's blog.

Click HERE.

My thanks to the Cicarrelli's for providing this info, for running the best subscription service on the planet, and for being online innovators in their own right.

CourVO

Filed Under: VO Community Tagged With: announcer, announcing, artist, audio, Audio TX, Audiobooks, Demos, documentaries, ISDN, ISDN talent, male voice, male voice artist, male voiceover, narrator, Podcasts, source connect, speaker, speaking, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice overs, voice talent, voice work, voiceactor, voiceover, Voiceovers, voices, voicing

More Punch

April 29, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

My friend, voice actor, and voice coach Deb Munro wrote to tell me her experience with VoicePunch — the focus of yesterday's blog.

Deb says:

I have no personal experience yet either.

I did sign up. It cost me $130.00 for two years so I’ll DEFINETLY be critiquing
and letting you all know.

So far I’ve seen nothing in the email as far as auditions, but I haven’t gone back
to the site yet. Problem is I’m too busy to do any of these sites, but I wanted
to know how it was before I could recommend it to anyone.

Thanks so much for posting something Dave.

No no….thank YOU, Deb!

CourVO

Filed Under: Subscription Services

Special Rain

April 28, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

My friends at Rain Recording are running some specials on equipment, and there might just be something that tickles your fancy.

I've written some articles for Rain, and they have done work for some of my voiceacting friends on the East Coast. Plus, they've contributed to the sound system of some Cirque shows here in Vegas, most notably "LOVE"…the new Cirque show developed around the music of the Beatles.

Yeah, I think they know what they're doing, and they honest businessmen and women to boot.

See below for their flyer.

CourVO

VoicePunch

April 28, 2009 By CourVO 1 Comment

There's a new guy on the block, and his name is VoicePunch.

I have no personal experience with this site, but like many of you, I did get a promotional offer by e-mail.

There has been some questions about them in a couple of online VO forum threads, but nothing definitive. Most voice actors seem to be in as much of a knowledge vacuum about Voicepunch as I am.

One voice actor who posted on the forum DID say when she tried to use the promotional code to register on the nascent site, it became crystal clear right away that the code was only good for a $30 discount, and the the potential subscriber would have to pay the balance of the subscription.

That same person pointed out that such sites usually (or should) offer a "honeymoon" period of high discount, or free memberships until they prove their chops in SEO, marketing, and internet positioning. A good exampe of that is Bodalgo, which made early free subscriptions possible for a lot of people, then recently extended that period another 6 months.

So…check it out, and report back. Maybe your experience is different, or you have some personal knowledge of the people behind this new site. We need to know!

CourVO

Filed Under: Subscription Services Tagged With: announcer, announcing, artist, audio, Audio TX, Audiobooks, Demos, documentaries, ISDN, ISDN talent, male voice, male voice artist, male voiceover, narrator, Podcasts, source connect, speaker, speaking, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice overs, voice talent, voice work, voiceactor, voiceover, Voiceovers, voices, voicing

Auditiioning for Pay-to-Play Sites

April 27, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

Love 'em or hate 'em…Voiceover subscriber sites feature the profiles and demos of thousands of voice-actors — many of them seasoned pros.

Some people have amazing success getting noticed and getting jobs on those services…others complain they audition and audition and audition, but nothing happens.

Apparently there IS knack to getting a return on your investment.

Bettye Zoller has a class scheduled JUST FOR YOU if you want to know the secrets of getting online jobs from those sites. See the notice she recently sent to me about this class. Bettye's an original! You can count on straight talk, and just the facts, ma'am!

CourVO

2 Must-Visits

April 26, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

At the risk of over-stating the obvious to some of the seasoned pros visiting today, let me just underscore two sites EVERY voice actor should subscribe to.

VO-BB. Voice-Over Bulletin Board. Administered by DB-Cooper, this is an unbelievable community of wry, giving, sharing and fun souls. Someone willing to spend the time gleaning the collective wisdom in the archives of this site, could publish and make a fortune.

Yahoo VO Forum. Often referred to as "TOF" on the VO-BB. "The Other Forum" is presided over by "Dave in Boston". I don't know how long it's been running, or how many subscribe, but lately, the back 'n' forth on topics like FiCore, Music Royalties, and whether VO's should use head shots in their promotional material is stream-of-consciousness GOLD.

You can sign-up for e-mail notices on either of these groups, so you know when some really-good threads are going down.

Number 3 on this list of two must-visits is, of course, the blog you're reading now… that means Bob Souer's Blog and John Florian's VoiceOverXtra are, what?..2.4 and 2.6. But who's quibbling about placement? S'all good, afterall — s'all good.

CourVO

Filed Under: Op/Ed Tagged With: announcer, announcing, artist, audio, Audiobooks, audiotx, Demos, documentaries, ISDN, male voice, male voice artist, male voiceover, narrating, narrations, Podcasts, source connect, speaker, speaking, voice acting, voice actors, voice work, voicing

Sweetwater

April 25, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

Let me just pass along the name and contact info of the person I often talk to at Sweetwater.

Sweetwater is certainly one of the top online equipment suppliers for the kind of stuff a VO/VA would want.

They're based in Fort Wayne, Indiana, they have a great reputation, and their prices are as competitive as anyone's. Often, they have "can't-miss" incentive sales.

I'll get a call once in a while from my contact: Tom Maxwell. He's always friendly, helpful, and not pushy. The calls are usually of a very helpful variety…and they get the needs of voice actors.

The last couple of times he's called, I've denied him any sales, and he still keeps a smile.

Below, see his e-mail from today, which gives a little personal touch, and here's his contact info:

Tom Maxwell
Sales Engineer
Sweetwater Sound, Inc.
Phone: 800.222.4700 x1313
E-mail: [email protected]

Be sure to drop my name when you call him!

CourVO

[Read more...]

2:48am

April 24, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

A lot of people point out that they see me posting stuff early in the morning. Yes. The hours of midnight to 3am are my most productive.

I then sleep till 10am (7 hours), go to work at 2pm, and am home at the end of my day again at midnight. I DO take a "lunch" hour somewhere between 7-9pm.

In the wee hours of the moring the house is quiet. The neighborhood is quiet. I can be in my studio with the door shut and no one hears me. I can blog with no distractions ('cept my wife snoring…oh, she's gonna kill me if she finds out I said that!).

Why am I telling you all this? 'Cause it's almost 3am and I'm bereft of any blog ideas…heck, I'm absent most initiative entirely!

I've wrestled with my primary computer (my HP Vista laptop) for many days, now, and finally decided to just recover to the default vanilla original set-up.

I used to have huge fear about that. Now I see it as a cleansing. Just back-up documents, favorites, and original-content files, and reformat. Now you've got a clean slate!

For over a year and a half, I've been loading every Tom, Dick, and Harry program on the poor laptop. Now I get to start all over. Clean. No broken links, no unregistered registry entries.

(Mac users may appropriately shake their heads in disgust now and move along…just move along now)

So my usual nidnight-to-3am creativity has instead been taken this day with a number of installs and rebuilds. I'm almost giddy with my "new" computer. Anymore, so much of what we use is stored online anyway, and isn't affected by the reformat.

Have you done this lately? It's cathartic.

Oh, and one more thing — totally off-topic. If you truly are interested in words and their interplay, check out THIS site. Very cool!

Uh-oh…the clock just struck 3….gotta go to bed!

CourVO