Voice Acting For Dummies
Page 32
Screen Actors Guild-The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA): Go to www.sagaftra.org for more information about the union, about joining, and about other details.
Alliance of Radio and Television Artists (ACTRA): Check out www.actra.ca for more information.
Actors Equity Association (also called Equity or AEA): Refer to www.actorsequity.org for additional information.
SAG and AFTRA recently merged, and the new union is referred to as SAG-AFTRA. Prior to their merger in 2012, the two were the dominant players in the North American marketplace. Now that they are merged, SAG-AFTRA jointly provides services for different kinds of actors and artists. Many voice actors were members of both unions before the merger so it made a great deal of sense to bring these two entities together.
Part V
Establishing Your Home Recording Studio
In this part . . .
This part includes some more advanced and yet important material. Here you can discover how to create your own professional, yet cost-effective, home recording studio. We introduce you to the basics of audio recording, and we explain important pieces of equipment you should invest in to make your studio complete.
We also discuss the important skill of editing. Editing is a big part of making your voice-over recording sound polished, including editing out mistakes, long pauses, and breaths. We also cover other topics, such as mixing and mastering. As a voice actor, your customers will have certain expectations regarding what you can do for them in the capacity of an audio engineer. Although you may not be an engineer, having some of these skills tucked away for when you need them is helpful.
Chapter 17
Creating Your Own In-Home Recording Studio
In This Chapter
Discovering more about home recording studio basics
Recording with your personal computer
Buying the necessary equipment
Obtaining other odds and ends
New technologies and the Internet have removed many practical obstacles that used to thwart the paths of professionals in any number of fields. More advanced tools and processes are available now than ever before. Equipment has become more affordable, and millions of people around the world enjoy the benefits of working from home. Most professional voice actors are in many ways living a dream because they’re able to work from home while doing what they love.
When you start a voice-over business, you need to make a modest investment of say $2,000 in your equipment given you already have a modern computer; however, that being said, you can’t just buy anything and expect that it meets your needs and the approval of those in a position to hire you. Depending on how tech savvy the people are or clients are, they’ll know in one look at your profile, or listen, what kind of equipment you used to record your voice. Perception can make or break your studio because people in the know are going to notice.
If you don’t have a studio at home, you can record at a local studio, but with a home studio, you’re positioned to record whenever you need to do so, and you don’t have to check in with a studio all the time for availability. In the long run, you’ll save time and money by having your own studio.
Furthermore, having your own studio at home is also one of the best and most convenient ways to develop your audio engineering skills. Chapter 18 on recording and Chapter 19 on more advanced audio engineering skills, such as editing and mixing, can provide you with more direction and information about the use and operation of your recording equipment. In this chapter, you discover how to set up your home studio and all the tools you need to stock it.
Constructing Your Home Recording Studio
Building a home studio is a great way to work from home and record at your convenience. You can set your own hours and have the flexibility to record custom auditions for clients. Although purchasing a home studio is a considerable financial investment, in the long term, it saves you time, resources, and money, particularly when you have to record revisions for a client.
In this section, we guide you on selecting your room and making it your own space.
Selecting a room
You don’t want to choose just any old room in your house for your studio. Typically, a spare bedroom or home office is a perfect location. The room should have the best possible recording conditions, so take into account these considerations:
Walk around your house or apartment and listen for street noises, loud air conditioning units, or other ambient sounds.
Find a room that’s quiet and free from these noises (if you can), or choose a room where you can easily block out those noises.
A second floor typically works better because you’re more isolated from foot traffic, floor squeaks, appliances, and other noises common to a family home.
Choose a room with several electrical outlets and one that provides space for your recording equipment.
Soundproofing your room
There’s actually a whole science dedicated to soundproofing and room treatment called acoustics. Short of filling another book, here we stick to the critical points as they relate to soundproofing your home recording studio.
The primary goal of soundproofing is to prevent unwanted noise from bleeding into your recordings. These unwanted noises can range from a rumble of trucks outside, sirens of emergency vehicles, or kids playing in the background. Even more subtle is the buzzing of an air-conditioning unit or the furnace humming in the background.
There are actually some very low-cost techniques for minimizing external sounds. These techniques include the following:
Hang blankets on your walls. The blankets help absorb unwanted sounds.
Utilize dressing dividers and hang thick blankets, such as comforters or duvets, over them. Thicker blankets absorb more sound than a thin blanket, such as a bed sheet.
Create a portable studio. This studio is simply a box with foam lining the inside. You then place the microphone inside the box, which eliminates a lot of external sounds and gives you a nice clean recording. You can buy a completed portable studio from Harlan Hogan or for instructions on building your own, search online for “how to build a portable studio” or “how to build a porta-booth.”
Making it comfortable
You’ll be spending a good deal of time in your studio, so you may as well make it comfortable. Personalize your studio so it’s a place you really enjoy spending time. Some voice actors like to decorate their studios with photos of family members or add a few house plants. Others enjoy building a studio that feels like they’re in a production house.
However you decide to decorate, make sure that the design and decorations are conducive to audio recording and absorb noise — not create more of it.
Here are some additional tips:
Buy a good sitting chair and ergonomic equipment. You’re bound to spend long hours in your studio, whether sitting or standing, so make sure you’re comfortable. A number of voice actors go the extra mile to have special padding under where they stand to help them with posture and to increase their stamina for recording standing up.
Use bright lighting. Bright light helps you to read your script and minimize eyestrain.
Considering Start-Up Costs
Most people can build a decent home recording studio for a minimum of $2,000. To give you an idea of the equipment out there, professional recording studios are worth tens of thousands of dollars. The most expensive recording studios cost well over 1 million dollars to construct. But you don’t have to spend that much! On average, a professional-grade home recording studio costs in the neighborhood of $2,000 to $10,000.
Regardless of industry sector or creative background prior to the start of an imminent voice career, the purchase of a professional-grade home recording studio is the largest, most tang
ible investment that will be made in the life of your voice-over career. With the advent of new, more efficient technologies, the costs associated with building a top-tier audio recording studio have plummeted, making some aspects of the previously unattainable multimillion-dollar studios of a decade ago available today. Now, you can find that you can “plug and play” with the aid of simplified digital audio recording devices, specifically using USB microphones and cables.
For a quick analysis of start-up costs based on a professional home-based recording studio, check out Table 17-1. This table shows you the high-end costs; some of them you may not immediately need when you build your in-home studio. Others you may have already purchased.
Table 17-1Budgeted Start-Up Costs
Category of Expense
Cost
Accounting services
$500
Advertising and promotion for opening
$500
Cash
$1,000
Deposits for utilities
$250
Category of Expense
Cost
Estimated taxes
$250
Insurance
$150
Legal costs
$500
Licenses and permits
$50
Office supplies
$50
Print design and printing
$500
Rent deposits
0
Unanticipated expenses
$500
Website
$500
Total start-up costs
$4,750 (USD)
Buying secondhand equipment
A voice actor entrepreneur’s highest expense when getting started is the equipment to build his home recording studio. Ideally, a professional-grade home recording studio has a computer, recording/editing software, a professional microphone, a microphone stand, headphones, mixing board, speakers (to hear the balance of your mix with), and a proper room to record in. But this all comes at a cost, so what about secondhand equipment?
When you’re in the market to buy gently used recording studio equipment, the odds are in your favor that you’ll get a great deal and equipment in good condition. How can you tell if the equipment is worth the asking price and if it will happily meet your needs? Here are some tips:
Seek out photographs of the object you’re interested in. If you’re networking locally with someone, set up a meeting to evaluate the equipment in person, including a test-drive of what the piece can do for you and how it operates.
Check for scratches, dents, loose items, and quality. Brand names the likes of Shure, Neumann, and AKG are high-end, whereas a microphone from an all-purpose electronics store in the mall may be less professional.
Ask where the item was purchased, how much it was purchased for, and when it was purchased. Knowing these variables gives you the leverage you need to decide whether the price for the equipment is fair or way off base. You can also request a copy of the original receipt.
Ask for original boxes, warranties, and user guides. This documentation proves that you’re purchasing from the original owner.
Some manufacturers offer transfer of ownership, papers allowing you to benefit from free software and hardware upgrades or promotions in the future. The serial number would be registered under the purchaser’s name, making you eligible to receive bonuses and free upgrades by virtue of your business dealings. Your return on investment will be evident in good usage of your equipment. As long as you are learning how to use it, you will get something out of it.
Stocking Your Studio
If you love technology and appreciate gear, this part of your voice acting journey to stock your home recording studio may be one of the most exciting tasks to date. In this section you can find out what you need to get your voice acting studio up and running, starting with a modern computer onward.
Recording with your computer
One of the biggest trends in recent audio production involves merging digital recording with computer technology. The recording of audio onto a computer hard drive allows you to edit and manipulate your sound files. This data can be stored as a sound file such as .wav or .aiff.
When recording and editing your voice-overs by using your computer, you can realize several advantages:
Record long and uninterrupted narration
Digitally edit and remove unwanted background noise or embellish the audio track with music and sound effects
Add digital effects to your voice, such as reverb or echo, and master your entire demo for sonic clarity
PCs
If you’ve purchased your personal computer in the last three years and you’re running Windows 7, your system should be more than adequate to record an audio file with a microphone, and then save the recording as an MP3 file.
Look for these specifications:
Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor
Windows 7 or higher
15GB of available disk space
2GB of RAM (4GB or more recommended)
Macs
Apple is committed to the digital revolution with the latest updates of its iTunes and GarageBand software. A lot of other great software is available for the Mac platform. The all-in-one iMac desktop computer is a great starting place if you’re in the market for a new computer. The misconception that the Mac is simply too expensive or that Macs are only for students and artists is wrong. Apple even introduced the Mac Mini, a scaled down version of the Mac that allows previous PC owners to make the switch, but still keep their monitor, keyboard, and mouse.
Look for these specifications:
Processor: 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo
Operating System (OS): OS X 10.6 or higher
15GB of available disk space
2GB of RAM (4GB or more recommended)
Many studios run much older systems with slower processors, but they aren’t always compatible with the latest audio interfaces. To determine the capabilities of a Mac you currently own or of one you’re considering purchasing, click on the Apple icon in the upper left-hand corner of the screen, and select About this Mac, and you can see the processor speed and the amount of RAM you have installed. Click on More Info for a detailed list of all the features of the computer. If your present computer doesn’t have enough memory or RAM, don’t worry! RAM prices are at an historic low with 4GB of RAM for many Mac computers being much less than $100.
If you’re simply plugging your microphone straight into your computer, you need to use a preamplifier, also known as a microphone preamp. A preamp is a sound engineering device that prepares a microphone signal ready to be processed by other equipment. The preamplifier can give a boost so to speak to the sound as it makes its way through the signal chain (also called signal flow).
Recording with an audio interface
An audio interface is a piece of hardware that increases and improves the sonic capabilities of a computer. When choosing your audio interface, consider these points:
The method in which it connects to your computer: For example, USB or FireWire.
The quality and features of the preamplifier(s): A preamplifie
r is necessary to use with any condenser microphone. The preamplifier helps to boost how your voice sounds as it goes through the microphone, the microphone cable, and into your computer. Some preamplifiers are built in to the audio interface, while others are external and can be purchased separately.
The quality of the analog to digital converters: The quality of the converters affects the quality of your voice. Lower-quality converters lack detail and definition and can mask the qualities producers want from your vocal performance.
In this section, we give you a few specific audio interfaces that are our recommendations.
Mbox Pro and Mbox Mini
Another product to be aware of is the Mbox available in either the Pro edition or the Mini version. The Mbox is a professional-grade audio interface that allows you to capture sounds and record at the highest quality. The Mbox Pro has eight inputs and eight outputs, comes with two jacks for headphones, and connects to your computer using a FireWire cable. The Mbox Mini comes with only two inputs, two outputs, and a single headphone jack, and connects to your computer via a standard USB cable. The best part of the Mbox is that both versions come with the industry’s standard Pro Tools recording software.
Griffin iMic — USB Audio Interface
The iMic universal audio adapter adds stereo input and output to your Mac or PC through a USB port. You can connect any microphone or sound input device to your MacBook, MacBook Pro, or other Mac or PC with a USB port. iMic’s audio is better than a desktop’s built-in soundcard because it uses USB for the audio signal.
The Apogee One and Duet
In the under $500 category, two good channel models are the Apogee Duet and the new Apogee One.
The Duet is a two-channel audio interface complete with breakout cable and 48-volt phantom supply for both channels. The preamps are excellent, as are the digital converters.