New Paradigms | Dave Courvoisier's Blog

Speak Text For Me

December 12, 2011 By CourVO Leave a Comment

The issue of Synthetic Voices has garnered as much or more attention on this blog as any other one topic.

There are unique challenges and advantages in this area to the voice actor. I’ll get to that in a minute.

First, a little backstory: I’ve blogged about this at least 6 times in recent years:

*Synthetic Voice: Revolutionary or Repugnant?

*‘Touched a (Synthetic?) Nerve!

*More Writing On the Wall

*Synthetic Voices — this time with digital code!

*This VO Issue Won’t Go Away

*Convert Text Speech

Well, here comes another one.

Speak Text For Me.com and the Speak Text iPhone app lead you to the same service…a software solution that claims to read out loud anything you highlight on a website or a document in 20 different native languages, and that can translate from English to 30 different languages.

Google translate offers much the same functionality, but not spoken (that I know of).

Certainly the technology exists, and it’s better than ever. The best examples of this sit at the top of a long history of software development that essentially defines the best of artificial intelligence based on powerful algorithms. Dragon Naturally Speaking, now owned by the Software company NUANCE, is advanced in this. From the start Amazon’s Kindle has offered the feature of text-to-speech.

But Speak Text For Me seems to go one better. From their site:

Innovative Features:
1. Speak & translate the touched words on web pages and documents.
2. Speak & translate the whole page from start or touched words to the end sentence by sentence.
3. Search and speak the whole page from matching words to the end sentence by sentence.
4. Switch to available Google or Microsoft translating service automatically.
5. Support powerful speaking repeat, pause and speed options.

Features:
- Speak & translate web pages and documents
- Web pages
- Microsoft Office: Word, Excel, PowerPoint
- Apple iWork: Pages, Numbers, Keynote
- eBook (epub)
- Text, RTF document

Why VO’s should care:

#1. Growing acceptance of synthetic voices may cut into our services. These new innovative software products often feature outright computer-simulated human voices, replacing the need for a real human voice. Critics claim listening to these artificially-created voices becomes monotonous and tedious. Others listeners like it for it’s neutrality.

#2 Growing acceptance of synthetic voices may create more VO opportunities. Example: Siri…the new artificial intelligence app in the iPhone 4s. In every country where this app is sold, a voice-actor was contracted to speak the thousands of responses.

#3 These programs can aid in quick pronunciation help. Sometimes in audiobook work, I spend valuable narration time doing research for foreign or difficult technical pronunciations. A program like Speak Text For Me can be invaluable as a resource in this task.

What’s your take on all this?

CourVO

Filed Under: New Paradigms, Software, Technology, Trending Tagged With: artificial intelligence, Dragon Naturally Speaking, Nuance, speak text for me, speech-to-text, VO, voice, voice acting, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice talent, voiceover, voices

AudioBook Wisdom

April 7, 2010 By CourVO 3 Comments

Everyone pretty much agrees that AudioBooks are a bit of a different animal among the panoply of niche voice opportunities that stand before the working voice actor.

The general word right now is that the AudioBook Publishing industry is fertile ground for new work, ’cause the medium of audiobooks (helped along by iTunes) is booming.

A newsletter the other day from James Adams offered an especially cogent assessment of the AudioBook Publishing industry, and I’m repurposing most of it below, with the express permission of Mr. Adams.

Here’s his resume’: James Adams is the former Managing Editor of the London Sunday Times, CEO of United Press International, founder and CEO of iDEFENSE, a cyber intelligence company, Board member at the National Security Agency and NCIS, author of 13 bestselling books on warfare and intelligence and currently Chairman of ADRevolution http://adrevolution.com.

Yeah, I know…pretty impressive. You’ll concur after reading his articles below.

Please pay special attention to the final article: WHAT PRICE NARRATORS?

Thanks James!

CourVO

The Whole Pie

March 2, 2010 By CourVO Leave a Comment

Anybody know who first coined that term: “PIEHOLE”? (usually associated with the phrase “Shut your PieHole!”)

Regardless….in this case, PieHole is asking you to open yours….uh, your piehole, that is.

OK, wait-a-minute. PIEHOLE is the name of a company based in Ireland, that among other things, seeks to match voice talent with clients.

Here’s the unique link, though: PieHole makes the connection through copywriters…not that uncommon in Europe, I understand.

It’s an idea that’s working. Here’s the operative quote: “…we stalk and harass advertising agencies to hire our voiceovers…”

PieHole is a fixture in the European ad market…expanding now into the UK and Canada, and – yes – they are seeking North American talent.

I was so intrigued, that I asked the founders – Priscilla Groves and James Kennedy – to offer a few quick answers to some pointed questions.

The result is below. Click on the pic above to go to their site.

CourVO

Social Media: Got Time?

February 26, 2010 By CourVO Leave a Comment

At 3:54am PST, I ponder this issue.

How much more of my personal time can I afford to give over to Social Media?

That simple question begets a rash of other questions that belie the complexity of the issue.

First of all is the question: “Can I afford NOT to give that time, if I want a successful freelance Voiceover business under today’s new internet paradigm?”
Secondly: “Is it really a burden if I’m having fun?”
Thirdly: “Is it really a waste of time if it’s bringing me clients?”
Finally: “If I DO draw a line…WHERE do I draw the line?”

(There are even more caveats, but again, you have to draw the line somewhere.)

RETURN ON INVESTMENT

I’ve been especially pondering this issue on behalf of the upcoming attendees of June’s VOICE2010 conference in LA. Along with voice-actor Terry Daniel, I’ll be expounding on the ROI of Social Media for VO’s in a morning general session, and I hope to have some darn good answers for people who paid good money to learn something.

‘Trouble is, Social Media is such a moving target these days. There’s a lot of flailing around in a pushing-the-envelope environment that sees trial-and-error success and failure in weeks, days, sometimes even hours.

Yet, in this new frontier, there are gold mines to be found. Luckily there are also volumes being written daily…mostly in the blogosphere…to help.

RESOURCES

HERE is an extremely helpful, informative article entitled 10+ TIPS FOR USING TWITTER TO GROW YOUR FREELANCE BUSINESS.

And for those of you brave enough to take on Google’s latest Twitter challenge called BUZZ, HERE is a primer for getting around, called HOW TO DO EVRYTHING IN GOOGLE BUZZ (INCLUDING TURN IT OFF).

Will you be there in June? It really will be fun and worthwhile. I hope you try to make it. See the registration site HERE.

CourVO

Filed Under: New Paradigms, Social Media/Networking, Training/Education, Twitter, VOICE 2010, Web/Tech Tagged With: social Media, Twitter, voice, voice actor, voice actors, voice artist, voice artists, voice over, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover talent, Voiceovers, voices

The Trouble With Taji….

February 24, 2010 By CourVO Leave a Comment

….is really no trouble at all…’cause he constantly brings a fresh look – a fresh perspective on the business of voiceover.

His “Frankenstein” idea (see blog here) garnered attention from some of the major P2P sites, and the exchange of concepts led to some significant revisions in the plans for David Ciccarelli’s new Beta roll-out of Voices.com.

See more about that HERE, including a chance to participate in that Voices.com Beta site.

***************

But Taj’s latest brainstorm (although not entirely novel) has likely never been applied to VO in the sense that he states in his latest blog TAJI’S BIG IDEA.

Oh, no…I’m not going to summarize it here… you have to click on the big tent, or the link in the line above to read all about it yourself.

Then be sure to comment at the bottom of his blog to further the conversation.

Yeah, we need more trouble like this. Nice going Taji!

CourVO

Filed Under: New Paradigms Tagged With: Taji, Taji's Voice Emporium, voice, voice acting, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover artist, Voiceovers

Audition by iPhone

February 9, 2010 By CourVO 7 Comments

This is an intriguing concept, absolutely do-able (in theory), and probably will be common in the future.

I’m sure something similar could be done by Android, BlackBerry, or other smartphone, but follow the bouncing ball, while I explain how it could be done on the iPhone.

First, you need a microphone. Amazon now sports a number of mics that plug into either the charging port on the bottom of the phone or the earphone plug on the top of the phone.

The Blue Mikey is a particularly nice addition from Blue Microphones. They’ve actually come out with a new model that has stereo recording capabilities, 230-degree rotating design, and a USB pass-through, not to mention it’s own carrying pouch and headphones. It vericorder has the same hi-fidelity 3-gain selection switch features of the original Mikey.

See also the Vericorder mini-mic, (left) a nice companion to the software I’m about to describe below by Vericorder.

Now, you need decent software….or not. You could probably stop right here and turn in a pretty decent soundfile to that client waiting impatiently to hear your dulcet tones on their new project.

But I know you better than that. You need something more than what is available for 99-cents in the appstore. You need Poddio.

Poddio used to be inexpensive. Not any more. But, if you’re serious about this, you’ll need to get Poddio. It’s an unbelievably feature-rich audio editor in the palm of your hand.

Virtually anything you can do with Sony SoundForge, you can do in Poddio (almost).

Visit VeriCorder yourself and see the specs…I’ll not bore you here, but this is one slick software app.

Since it’s inception late last year, Poddio seems to have gone through some developmental growing pains…it certainly jumped its price about 400%…and you can’t get it by just doing a search under Applications on your iPhone. You have to visit Apptism, or the Vericorder site itself.

Poddio even lets you upload/share your finished audition to a server through WiFi or 3G so your client can download and hear it.

Again, pricey….but hey, you want your audition to sound good, right?

Why would anyone want to audition by iPhone? Any number of scenarios come to mind. Maybe you’ve just left your studio for the day to go with your family to the museum, and while you’re there, your favorite client emails and dangles in front of you, THE spot you’ve been hoping to get. You grab your iphone, your Mikey, and head for the nearest mainenance closet you can find… read the script off your iPhone screen, while you voice it into the mic, then send, and wait for the email from your client that it’s just what he wanted to hear…. oh, and BTW, thanks for the excellent qualiity audition!!!

Honestly, this only miniaturizes the mobile equipment you probably take with you when you travel anyway. I wouldn’t think of cutting the final product on the iPhone (not yet), but this absolute minimum configuration is convincing enough to fit the bill in a pinch.

CourVO

Filed Under: Mics, New Paradigms, Technical, Technology Tagged With: Apptism, audition, Blue Microphones, Blue Mikey, poddio, smartphone, Vericorder, Vericorder minimic, voice actor, voice artist, voice overs, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover talent

Chinese Chutzpah

December 13, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

In the never-ending juggernaut that is the Chinese economy we began to see imports first in our apparel and other low-budget items, then hard goods, Lenovo bought IBM laptops, a Chinese car company bought Hummer. You get the drift.

Now voice-overs.

See below the exact verbatim I found in my e-mail box today:

————————————————————-
您好：

Hi There,

我们是博凯佳音配音工作室，我们可以提供优质的中英文配音服务，

This is BoKai Voice Over Studio, we can provide good quality chinese and foreign laguage voice products for you!

详情可以登录网站www.peiyin666.cn

Please check our website www.peiyin666.cn/english.

欢迎致电：+86 28 66686660 +86 13880740931

you can call us at +86 28 66686660 +86 13880740931

顺祝商祺

Best Regards

中启文化博凯佳音

Bokai Voice Over

————————————————————-

Bokai Voice Over!

Should we fear this new import?

At this point… probably not. I tried checking out the website: www.peiyin666.cn/english and immediately got a virus warning from my AVG internet security software.

I do know that there’s practically nothing clever Chinese entrepreneurs can’t copy in mass quantity.

This is the vanguard…it won’t likely go away.

CourVO

Filed Under: New Paradigms Tagged With: China, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover artist

T.N.N.T.

November 23, 2009 By CourVO 2 Comments

The Next New Thing

In the late 60’s if was FM radio. Around the mid-70’s Datsun became “Nissan”. By the early 90’s it was this strange new phenom called “the internet”. After that, everything started approaching light-speed.

Today TNNT is born, lives, and can either survive or die within days, sometimes even hours.

Google WAVE is past a few months of life, now, and it’s likely to stay through the sheer force of it’s corporate support.

About two weeks ago, I got my Google Wave invitation, and was ecstatic, ‘cause for weeks and weeks, about 100,000 other geeks had it and I DIDN’T. That’s like denying Harry Reid access to The Next New Taxpayer.

OK, so now I have WAVE, and yes, it IS pretty cool….but the learning curve seem fairly steep (I’ve been swamped lately), and I’ve found maybe…10-15 contacts I know (Kat Keesling among them)…and most of them don’t seem to be using it.

So, how ‘bout it? Got Wave? Contact me. Just do a search for DAVE COURVOISIER. or use my e-mail: courvo<at>gmail.com.

Don’t have wave? I have about 3 or 4 invitations I can send out (Google awarded me 8 when I got my account). Let me know, and if I have any left, I’ll send you one.

Do I smell a VO group on WAVE?

CourVO

Filed Under: Networking, New Paradigms, Social Media/Networking, Social/Professional Networking, Technology Tagged With: Google, Google Wave, voice, voice actor, voice artist, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover artist, Voiceovers, Wave

Voice Synth…not just in the future

October 25, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

article video robot …nope, it’s here. But you knew that right?

All that expostulating about the computer-generated voices infringing on the markets we all work in as voice actors was just a mental exercise, no?

Huh-uh…

‘Don’t believe how this is ALREADY being offered as a feature on business enterprises (besides iPhone and Kindle)?!

See ‘ARTICLE VIDEO ROBOT’.

Their choices, for you, the customer:

1) upload your own .mp3 voice
2) record your voice on their site
3) choose from any number of voice synthesis characters (with unassuming American-sounding names like “Craig” and “Jim”)

The voices sound…well…robotic, but for the budget-minded entrepreneur looking to publish his article on the cheap…it works.

CourVO

Filed Under: New Paradigms, Technical, Technology Tagged With: article video robot, synthetic voices, voice actor, voice artist, voice overs, voice synth, voice synthesis, voice talent, voiceover

More Writing On the Wall

October 21, 2009 By CourVO 1 Comment

Insecurities are not one of my strong points…

…and by that I mean I’ve worked hard, found a certain measure of success in my family life and my professional career. I have lots of friends, and food in the fridge. At 56, I find self-assurance comes easily, ‘cause I feel I’ve earned it.

So when I wrote the blog about Synthetic Voices recently,I really wasn’t trying to sound the death knell of Voice Acting…nor was I terribly troubled by its implications.

JUST OVER THE NEXT HILL…

But that, along with other things happening in the world right now could almost begin to convince me that there may be cause for concern – long term – for opportunities in voiceover.

Here’s why: yesterday, 4 more good people lost their jobs in our newsroom. TV news, and TV stations in general are REALLY hurting. Our General Manager likes to quote how many millions of advertising dollars are just “gone from the market”…and the number is in the tens of millions. Car dealers (the core of TV advertising support) are folding. Revenues at TV stations everywhere are down anywhere from 20% to 60% (conservative).

Have you listened to radio lately? Formulaic. Impersonal. Repetitive. Shrill. They’re hurting too…but they’ve had years to adjust to life-after-TV.

TV is just getting accustomed to the juggernaut incursion of the internet. (more like whacked in the head!)

So…have you listened to radio lately? I haven’t. Millions of commuters are listening to their iPods or talking on their iPhones instead of the drivel that passes for entertainment on (most) Radio stations.

CAN’T IGNORE “THE CRUX” OF THE MATTER

So, my point is: Radio and TV. Hurting. Ad dollars going away….and just where do you think the lion’s share of a voice-actor’s best jobs are? Yep. Radio and TV.

At least that’s the paradigm to which we still pay homage.

Folks…that paradigm is changing.

“Not to worry”, you say, “my bread ‘n’ butter VO niche is in medical narrations, audiobooks, and websites.”

God bless ya…I’m not talking to you.

YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE

I’m talking to the entire COMPLEX of agents, unions, casting directors, advertising & PR firms, buyers, media-as-we-know it. It’s all changing right under our noses! Sure…slowly…. no doubt about it, and in fits and starts, but if you’re into the world of social media at all, you clearly see the pell-mell change of stream-of-conscious thinking, sharing, and marketing that is New Media.

“Wait a minute, Dave,” you say…”This recession thing will be over soon enough, and we’ll all be back to profitability.”

AAaaaactually, no. It’ll never be the same again (my humble opinoin)

Because of the immediacy, the interaction, the I-want-what-I-want-when-I-want-it nature of social media and the internet, TV viewers are switching allegiances. Heck, the internet is where I’m getting MY news these days.

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE

Here’s the silver lining, and then I’ll shuddup.

Good content, quality writing, excellence of endeavour, and solid presentation will never go out of style…no matter the medium.

Your golden tones are still needed…but…well….you may just…maybe wanna start not depending on the promise of Radio and TV as much. Again, I could be totally wrong, but I don’t think so.

CourVO