 Hey, it's Monday night time for the OBS, right? Sure is okay. Good. That's what we want to hear George's in Seattle, Washington on the Puget Sound with Shawna Pennington Baird and the Seattle voice over Academy so This is gonna be a very interesting night. We want your tech questions You've got some tech for us tonight. I do a little summary of things that stand out from the last year outstanding And of course, we want your tech questions and your questions about the Seattle voiceover Academy and all sorts of cool stuff coming your way tonight on voiceover body shop right now two men twin sons from different mothers with a passion for voiceover recording technology and The desire to make recording easy for voice actors everywhere together in one place George Whidham the home studio engineer to the stars a Virginia tech grad with an unmatched knowledge of all the latest gear and technology in voiceover today Dan Leonard the home studio master a voice actor with over 30 years experience in Broadcasting and recording and a no-holds-barred myth-busting attitude for teaching you how easy it is together To bring you all the latest technology today's voice over superstars and Leading the discussion on how to make the most of your voice over business This is voice over body shop Voice over body shop is brought to you by voice over essentials comm home of Harlan Hogan Signature products source elements remote connections made even easier Vio to go go dot com Everything you need to be a successful voiceover artist J. Michael Collins demos award-winning demo production voice actor websites dot com where your voice over website won't be a pain in the butt and voiceover extra your daily resource for V.O. success and Now live from their super secret multimedia studio in Sherman Oaks, California Here are George Whidham and Dan Leonard Good evening. I'm Dan Leonard in the south and I'm George Whidham in the Northwest. All right, and this is voice over Body shop or Vio Bs little kickback to the past there When we was the east and the west My how we have progressed since then so George how things in Seattle aside from wet Yeah, it is damp and cool here It is it's great. I this is you know going to become a new satellite office slash home for me now My daughter is now living in the area and I have a very good reason to come here on a regular basis And I'm glad I mean it's a it's a really cool Progressive area with a lot going on. This is one of the only places the only place right now where you can get a lime pod So what the heck is a lime pod? I was about to ask. What is a lime pod? So if you see a car along the street, that's a lime car. They're fiat 500s by the way great cars You can hire the car the same way you would hire a lime scooter Oh Sir certain like issue. Yeah, okay scan the QR code The car will unlock and you get it and you drive it like a zip car. Yeah, they're testing that here I was I got a little thing I prompted my phone today asking if I wanted to try it So a lot of new tech is tested here in Seattle for good reason We did this city basically should be nicknamed Amazon town Because they pretty between Amazon and Microsoft they pretty much own Downtown Seattle like them and it's the area is quite amazing. I was I'm staying in Capitol Hill Which is about 300 feet higher than downtown Seattle and I know that because I rode a lime bicycle Down the hill took a spin class and rode it back up the hill again Just for the heck of it Yes People think I was insane for attempting to climb that hill on a lime bike And I can see why because when you're going up the hill that steep if you shift by a mistake It the pedals just to slip and you almost die But it's it was a beautiful experience to that's the way to experience Seattle is By bicycle if you're a bicyclist like I am and it's it's just really fun to be out here for a while Great. Well stay dry Now tonight we're our guest is Shawna Pennington Baird and she started the Seattle Voice Academy out there And you're in their studio tonight, right? Yeah, they were totally gracious I I ran into Shawna at the WoWoCon and It just the thought of you know I told her how it's gonna be coming out here more often and it'd be great to visit the studio and now with me here on a Monday night She was able to throw a lasso out and ring up some of her your voice over faithfuls And they're sitting in this alive studio tonight and they're faithfully sitting out there Yeah, they'll be able to be taking questions from them But it's so nice to have a facility to to work from that's an actual studio and Really well designed and I'll later on we'll do a little walk-around tour with my my mobile phone And you guys are good to see you know some of the clever Solutions that Shawna and her husband came up with when they designed this facility It's it's a really great place outstanding. Well, we're looking forward to that Well, we'll get to some more tech in just a little bit, but right now it's time for Okay de-stress the holiday the holiday season we're now in is fun Joyous and a big bit hectic Well, it's more than a bit hectic as we rush to meet all our VO deadlines and wrap up the year-end business stuff So Anne Otterbeck or Utterbeck a speech specialist who focuses on voice actors and broadcasters steps in to suggest that we Slow down Seriously because it may in fact increase our productivity and enjoyment of the holidays and it's not complicated You already know what to do, but we need to this reminder of three ways to de-stress the holiday season okay, number one Exercise don't even think of giving up exercise now because it's one of the best stress busters unless of course you get stressed about doing it and You don't need to work up a sweat going crazy on the elliptical machine Just take walks that way you'll combine exercise in nature It'll free up your mind to think about gifts and people and new ideas for your businesses We actually think more creatively when exercising next take new breaks Take a few minutes or more every day to get away from digital devices TV radio and newspapers When you look at the news or emails the first thing in the morning You deprive your mind of creative thought and if the mind is stressed the body is too So take a break and while they're focused on number Three I got that right breathing It sounds simple, but just concentrating on your inhalation and exhalation for a couple of minutes can have a Profound effect on your body of course After your break check in at voiceover extra comm for more on Ann's advice and for hundreds and hundreds of additionally Helpful VO career articles and happy holidays from voice over extra And that is the news one last time Alrighty well one of the things that we're gonna do in our new format starting January 7th is we're not gonna Do the news we're gonna spend more time on tech and we're gonna start at 5 o'clock. Are we not? Pacific time and Tonight we probably should have spent a little more time on tech before we went live because We're only coming on the left channel tonight and for folks listening to the show and headphones That could be a little a little annoying just just turn turn your head That's all and when we put the show out on the air We will make sure that the recorded version we get the audio remixed to the center So for those watching it live tonight, we apologize for that misstep We'll we'll fix it in post as it were but they can hear us. So who cares? Yeah, it's fine I mean we care, but I mean it's but that's that's audio. You never know what's gonna happen There's if people only knew what goes into creating the show not only that we had this extra layer of complexity tonight because You're a couple hundred miles up north Yeah, exactly and I'm doing the show so what I'm doing from this end tonight is I'm Mixing the audio feed that goes into our production system called V mix but whatever reason we changed audio interfaces last week and The new audio interface is only showing up a left input only in V mix So that's why folks watching it live tonight are only hearing the left ear So if during the show our intrepid technical director suit figures out How to now mix that into both channels? Then you'll hear it in both ears But it's something that was a you know a curve ball thrown at us tonight. So yeah, I mean we reconfigured a pile of things last week We did I mean I can help fully mix all of the sources for the show the playback in the studio The back mix for zoom everything I can do now remotely over our remote access system and it's really cool and It's just it's just incredible what we can do now the three of us no matter where I happen to be as long as there's good internet and Knock on wood We can pull off the show from just about any place so it's a it's a lot of fun Yeah, so you were going to talk about some of the great tech stuff for voiceover specifically that that really came up during 2018 Yeah, well, I guess you know tip of the hat to first of all because it's in front of me right now So I'm thinking about it tip of the hat to the center and for making that mixer face device a reality You know, it's I have I do have respect for what they are doing and having to Build a product and then using a platform like an Indiegogo or Kickstarter to help fund it It's such a double-edged sword for them. It's such a huge risk to Ask people to invest in a product Without being able to guarantee it ever making to market and when you're a brand that's already established selling product asking for people to help in essence Take donations it's because that's what that's what they're doing when they're when there's when they're using Indiegogo or Kickstarter It's a company asking you the public to make a donation in faith That they will be able to follow through with this product design and everything and get it to market And it's there's never a guarantee and how many years how many years did they work on that? It was the better part of four years Since it was first announced right and in those four years the complete Industrial design of the product completely changed. I mean it has a whole different look than the original version I mean it went through so many iterations And one reason it was so difficult for them was because the ability to have it be natively supported by an Apple iPad or iPhone is Definitely non-trivial it is very difficult to get to get your product to work native Lee with Apple without having to use any crazy adapters, you know and It or you know to be able to work at all is quite a challenge So that was a thing that really set some delays for them But the product now that it's out in the wild. I'm using it tonight actually with a 416 Feeding into it to do the show The proofs in the pudding sound quality is great. It's got enough gain Headphone amplifier is plenty powerful enough, you know has good output And it is something that will plug into an iPad or an Android with the right cable runs on Windows runs on Mac Runs on batteries. It's completely portable You can plug it in and run it as just a standalone mixer without even plugging into a computer If you have a need for that maybe for doing sound for a video So it is really quite a versatile look versatile little product for about 300 bucks So that's been a big deal coming out this year. I think that's going to be nice for some folks Other things that really have stood out this year in terms of product that's going to help the voiceover folks out there are basically Evolving software Audacity again haven't had a chance to try it yet, but audacity did finally release Proper punch and roll which I announced last week That's nice to see how that software being open source Non-profit, you know, this is something that's made and developed and supported by by the the the user base They're listening to the users and adding features that voiceover people want and that's punch and roll So I give them props for that. So if you haven't tried it yet download the new version. I think it's 2.2.2 and See for yourself How that feature works? in the Plug-in realm Isotope is something that we're always, you know, it always comes up when we talk about plugins and There are x7 is there quote-unquote best yet It's got excellent mouth declicking functionality that people have come to rely on it has a deep-breathing algorithm which Definitely the word is out the word still out as to whether it really Works for everyone and anybody that's using any deep-breathing plugins for their voice over workflow Chime in let us know we'd love to know if it's if it's working for you and what systems you're using But that tool just keeps getting better and better So isotopes been a big deal this year With their release of RX 7 on The computer audio interface side we already mentioned the mixer face The latest Apollo now that's Thunderbolt 3. It's called the arrow that thing is I'm not going to say it's a game changer because it's sort of an iteration of what they've already released with the Apollo twin But now having something that's a little more portable that will plug right into a MacBook MacBook Pro anything with Thunderbolt 3 now the new MacBook Air can do that Is pretty compelling because of its capabilities and what it can do While recording live with source connect or IPDT L and that kind of thing And I can't forget mentioning Apple I'm so happy Apple did release some new computers that for what we do are actually helpful their new Mac mini is Really truly a great computer by all accounts Even its base base model is fantastic, but it's the i5 6 core version is fantastically powerful It's really good for just about anybody the only ones that may shy away from that and make the big step up to a MacBook pro Or an iMac Are people needing to do really heavy-duty graphics stuff? The Mac mini doesn't have a hardcore graphics adapter, but it's still powerful enough to plug in I believe Three 4k monitors so you can you can have three 4k monitors plugged into a Mac mini now That's kind of my modeling and why would you want three monitors for for something like that? One scenario can think of is maybe you have one monitor in booth and then you have dual monitors at your desk now Dual 4k monitors is a ridiculous amount of real estate to have available to you But you know you get accustomed to something you get spoiled and now you know now you say you couldn't live without it Right, so that could be something some people can't live without but so it was a great year for tech in what you're saying then Yeah, I mean the new iPhone Not I didn't think that was the new iPhone was all that exciting. It's it's just another iteration of what they're already doing I do love my new my Android LG G7 phone that thing blows my mind with the picture quality of the camera and Other than project Phi now called Google Phi being kind of a mixed bag It's getting better. It's becoming more usable for me. It's getting more reliable now that Google has Graduated it from a project to an actual product. So that's cool. And lastly I Would say The only thing that really is totally not new is room acoustics. I haven't seen anything innovative That's changed the way we deal with our voiceover booths acoustics. There are still rules that really can't be broken Tuning a room is still tuning a room the way we've done all along There are more companies now than ever making acoustic panels and there's more products available to us For example, I did do a studio for Roger Rose and we ordered all the panels on Amazon Prime and had them in two days That's pretty awesome that you can do that now but otherwise Good audio still requires a good room Good mic placement those rules have not changed yet. So Stills may make sure you pay attention to the basics. Absolutely and on that note that's tech for this week and We'll be right back with more stuff and your tech questions put them in the chat room right now jack Daniel is standing by Waiting for your orders Here on voiceover body shop. Don't go away This is Bill Ratner and you're enjoying voiceover body shop with Dan Leonard and George Wittem V obs dot TV. Hey, it's almost the new year thinking about how to make 2019 different fresh and successful instead of a new mic. How about a new? Mindset a new way of thinking. We all have thoughts like I'm not good enough to be doing this professionally I'm just faking it. I need to join the union as soon as I can. I'm too old to get booked I can't get started until everything is perfect I hate auditioning because I never book anything Sound familiar? If only you could change your mindset and get rid of these ridiculous rules Well, vo to go goes david h. Lawrence the 17th has just what you need He's completed a 21 day journey with nearly 100 voiceover and on-camera talent Just like you called believe 2018 and he recorded every single session Meaning you can take this journey now at the pace you want and change things for the better Get the success you deserve by destroying your limiting beliefs and replacing them with powerful productive enabling beliefs and do so on your own schedule Here's the link go get the 25 hours of video and audio the daily chat logs and more and begin your own journey The link is vo to go go dot com Forward slash believe that's vo to go go dot com forward slash Believe it's ridiculously cheap and it's ridiculously effective. Once again. It's vo to go go dot com forward slash believe As a voice talent you have to have a website But what a hassle getting someone to do it for you and when they finally do They break or don't look right on mobile devices. They're not built for marketing and seo. They're expensive You have limited or no control and it takes forever to get one built and go live So what's the best way to get you online in no time? Go to voice actor websites dot com like our name implies voice actor websites dot com just does websites for voice actors We believe in creating fast mobile friendly responsive highly functional designs that are easy to read and easy to use You have full control. No need to hire someone every time you want to make a change And our upfront pricing means you know exactly what your costs are ahead of time You can get your voice over website going for as little as 700 dollars So if you watch your voice actor website without the hassle of complexity and dealing with too many options Go to voicehactor websites dot com where your vo website shouldn't be a pain in the you know what And we're back here on voiceover body shop george wittem is in seattle washington at shader shawna pennington bairds voice Academy that's what it's called right the voice academy So if you look it up on on on the internet it won't say that until they update the website, right? All righty Okay, we know you're there george. Can you hear us? Yeah. Oh, okay. There you go. We're just looking waiting for a response Well, I didn't you weren't really throwing to me. You're saying Whatever all right, so uh, if you got a tech question throw it in the in the chat room It's been an interesting week working with people, uh all over the fruited plane and uh in here in la Uh people are looking to I I think what I got a lot of this week was I don't want to do it that way You know, I'm used to going into my agency booth And doing it there. I don't want to be an engineer. I'm Talent I don't know. I have a little bit of a problem with that You know, it's one of those things where you know, I spent a career being talent and engineer And some of the responses were well, I like to concentrate on being on doing what I'm supposed to do But I think you'll probably agree with me george that it's a matter of set it forget it hit record And forget about being an engineer, you know, I don't want to you know people like I don't want to edit I don't want to do that kind of stuff. I just want to perform but I think the process of editing and learning this technology makes you a much better voice actor Because it gives you the ability to fix mistakes and make them sound like they were never mistakes What do you think? Well, I you know, there's two ways to think about it I mean because I come at it from an engineering production standpoint, so I can be I can fake it A lot better because I can comp together seven takes And make it sound like one Smooth take to the listener the problem with that is that that's fine If you do only self-directed voiceover like if right everything to do is is just comes to your inbox and you record it at your leisure And you send it off and if that's all you ever want to do No problem You don't have to have a good cold read. You don't have to be able to string together a sentence smoothly Off the cuff, you know cold read But as you get better as a voice actor Your cold reads and your ability to read a script and interpret it within the first take or two That's gonna improve And then you don't have to be Such an incredible editor So that's the problem like you have two learning curves as voice actors You have the Voice acting curve and you have the voice production voice over production learning curve Right then too much time on the voice over production side of the learning curve Your voice acting side of it's gonna Suffer right and right delicate balance right and that's why you hire guys like george and myself because That's what we do. We can help you Understand that it's not rocket science and that if we can get you set up to set it and forget it and hit record I think some people get lost because they think it's like it's a computer. I don't like computers The best way to really simplify it for yourself is like it's a cassette recorder record stop play Rewind It's just a slightly different variation on that and if you could do that That's all you really need to do then editing is more like working with uh, you know with word processing So I think it's important that uh, you talk to people that actually know What they're talking about when it comes to recording in a home studio and that can be a musician It can be a recording studio engineer or it could be george or i because it's a totally unique environment that It doesn't exist anywhere else and didn't exist say 15 years ago I mean some guys had you know, they had a home studio and they you know, they had reel-to-reel tape decks or or a beta max or a What was the other little tape machine in adat? And they would record stuff put it on reel-to-reels put it in these envelopes and send it off fedex to do uh promo and stuff like that one little Tiny little area of voiceover and uh It's you know, they had they had nice little studios where they could do that But now with the technology with the ability to record at home It's not that hard and if you need help Doing that You can talk to george right if you want to work with george Where do they go? It was the longest build to a plug ever. I know You can find me at george the tech dot com where you can hire me by the hour by the 15 minute chunk or the Flat rate depending on what you need if you need processing stacks or studio design services Those are flat rate services. It's all right there at george the tech dot com But since i'm in the tech world here, we like those short nerdy domains So people in seattle, you can find me at george the tech. Maybe that might make more sense to you Dan, how about yourself? Where do they find you for your brand of tech support? You go here to uh home voiceover studio dot com You know, or actually, no, it's this way home voiceover studio dot com And uh, you'll find my uh My specimen collection cup Where you can click on that and for 25 dollars, I will analyze your audio and we'll see if it's up to snuff if it's sounding the way it's supposed to sound like whistle I just love saying that just to drive you nuts. Um But there's a way it's supposed to sound and remember You don't hire you. So if you're trying to achieve a sound that is pleasing to you You're you're not cutting it. You're maybe Satisfying your own ears But some guy who's listening on a pair of laptop speakers who's casting that next commercial or biggie learning job is going to go Boy, that's really busy Uh, or uh boy, this guy loves the sound of their own voice It's not the idea the idea is questions. We got a tech question. So We'll answer those questions so far. All right, and the question is First one's from get fred's voice. Hey fred um My cs 5.5 which basically he is saying is adobe audition. Yeah, um cs5, which is the It's what locking up locking up on me. Is there a standard way to track down issues? um not with five No, I hate to say it fred, but it's it's um The problem with using legacy versions of software like 5.5 is your support your tech support is basically there is none Um, the adobe is gonna have the the standard answer, which is well You need to update um, and that's unfortunate you can update to version six maybe cs6 and That may still have current support. I'm not exactly sure, but um It's gonna be very hard to get support for anything older at this point because adobe it's not in their best interest They don't want to support an eight ten year old version of their software Um, and that's not their business model. The business model is the creative cloud now and So I hate to say it that's you're not going to get a lot of help on that What I would probably do is do a fresh install of your system Nobody likes to hear that It's kind of like what I would do is floss Nobody likes to do that either No, but if you want a clean system that runs the way it did when you installed cs 5.5 Guess what have a clean system Clean it back it up Wipe the drive reinstall windows and reinstall mac or whatever is on there Reinstall it and get a fresh start and reinstall your 5.5 95 99 percent sure that's gonna solve the problem You're gonna you're gonna be back to a clean system and that's really the only surefire way to Fix really odd bugs that just tend to haunt you and possibly get worse over time right or Bite the bullet and go with with cc with their their cloud version, which is really excellent I mean it's like well, I want to use what I want to use as opposed to I want to use what works I I I never understand that But there's an argument for both I I suppose people why they use version 3 and even 1.5 I I get it, but boy when things don't go right you're let you're really on your own I mean you can go on the facebook groups You can look in chat rooms and look around the net for people that have the same version There is an autobie audition facebook group That's pretty active You might check there, but otherwise you're really on your own when you're not using supported versions. Absolutely All right, did we have another question? This one comes from our buddy jack daniel jack Uh jack says uh, george. I mentioned the mac mini. Yes, I did Um, I might have to buy a new box soon. I'm assuming he means a new mac Um, I use an iMac currently But does I think the mac mini is a much better choice? um Jack it really comes down to how married how in love are you with the 27 inch 5k iMac uh screen um If you love the 27 inch 5k iMac screen Then buy another iMac Um, it's going to be as good if not as good at least as good as a mac mini depending on how it's uh specced um Right now the mac mini because it's the newest generation of hardware that they released It has the newest generation of parts in it. So Currently the six core i5 mac mini Is probably the fastest mac This side of the iMac pro that you're going to find Um, if you want full on pedal to the metal performance Then you want to step up to the iMac pro um That's a starting entry point of about five grand So if you really really are going to be doing a lot of heavy-duty processing and video editing That's the way to go But um, if you like getting some really cool 34 inch super ultra wide lg curved monitor or something cool like that instead of your plain jane 5k 27 inch screen Then maybe get the mac mini. Yeah, so it depends on What it is you want to have on your desk at the end of the day Can we get a fleet price on those? I mean, you want a new mac mini. I want a new mac mini Sue wants a new mac mini Oh, she already has one. Okay, but Put a report out or put a uh A little apb out on people I know with mac mini hookups or or apple hookups and see what uh Look at a price break on it. You know, we can get a group buy and buy five of them. I don't know Shawna has a school. Let's get the student discount. All right So We know all of us, you know, we might be able to get a deal Alrighty well speaking of Shawna Pennington Baird We're gonna go over to the Seattle voice academy in just a minute after these important messages including from source elements In a world of audio two men knew what they were doing or at least they have you convinced They put the bs and v obs dot tv Oh, this is where I get to talk about source elements. Yay. Yay Source connect What what can I tell you that you haven't already heard source connect? Is really a fantastic tool for connecting with studios around the world as a voice actor If you don't have it in your arsenal if you've had five plus years in voiceover and you don't have source connect now in your arsenal You're you really should consider it. Um, it's going to open you up to a new level of auditioning If you're at the point where you're seeing that on auditions must have source connect Well, duh, you know, it's definitely time at that point The good news is you don't have to buy a license. You don't have to buy out the license you If you the kind of person that wants to own a license you can do that You can buy a one-time fee and now that software will work until someday you must upgrade because of computer upgrades but if you prefer to have an ongoing Expense and a subscription as you were because it's easier for you to Amortize the write-off or you always want to be up to date with the latest version You always want to have current support Then you might want to do that and you can get a source connect subscription about 35 bucks a month um ongoingly and You can have source connect in your system. Um source connect standard is the version you want to look at primarily Pro is available as well. Definitely targeted towards Professional recording studios, but the standard version is perfect for voice actors And in the future there will be integration with source connect now Coming out next year probably so there's going to be a whole new way for these systems to work together Which is really cool But if you want to give it a try go over to source dash elements.com You can get a 15 day free trial get it up and running get familiar with it Get your network prepared for it so that the day comes when you need it You already know how to use it and you're comfortable with it. Thanks again source elements They've been backing us up now for almost three years on this show and we really appreciate it We'll be right back with the the whole gang here at the seattle voice academy right after this Are you confused about how to set up and maintain a professional quality voiceover studio? No wonder the information out there is mostly Mythology This is the best microphone to use. You'll have to have a preamp. You need a soundproof booth This software is the best your audio must be broadcast quality Consult with someone who knows the truth someone who's been there in the trenches doing voiceover for over 30 years Someone with unparalleled experience with voiceover studios Who's worked with hundreds of voice actors and designed hundreds of personal studios He knows how to teach and cares about your success In one of the harshest environments known to voiceover your home Dan Leonard the home studio master Separate myth from fact and get a handle on your personal voiceover studio Contact the home studio master at home voiceover studio.com and we're back here on voiceover body shop our last show of 2018 Boy it's gone on for a long time But now it's time for the holiday season So we thought we'd do something cool and go to somebody else's home studio Uh joining us now from seattle along with george is shana pennington baird Who is owner and creator of the seattle voice academy? Welcome shana and george It's great to see you there. So tell us a little bit about yourself and your voiceover career and what took you to what you're doing now So, yeah, we're up here in seattle the home of the tech tech studios and video game studios And I I fell into voiceover because I had 20 years of theater experience and I had a kid and did not want to do eight shows a week anymore and Was at a bar with other actors Who happened to be there with a person from disney who's working at the time and said hey Do you have a home studio? You should send me a demo reel Which created a phone call to a friend saying apparently I needed a demo reel for people at disney and I just fell down this rabbit hole Uh training right away built a home studio with my husband Ended up doing a whole bunch of video games and audiobooks right off the bat and then became very excited about creating a community in seattle And a lot of folks needed a place to record because they weren't able to really build Quality studios at home and that's how this sort of happened it morphed into classes and then the community and then building studios that were super super affordable And studios we could use to teach as well And that's sort of how the trajectory of the seattle voice academies Happened and we have an online ref an online resource page And I think a lot of it revolved around that I went to classes in new york went to classes in la And some of the classes were great and others I kind of walked out um Feeling like maybe a lot more was promised than delivered and I felt like it was the wild wild west And so we started making An online resource page of free information that was already out there That people could just find and they could read on their own make their own decisions And we're continuing to keep that updated all the time because the voice over world changes like a twitter feed So or an instagram feed now these days. Yeah, I mean it's we We want to do a little bit of online classes and things like that But to do it right we had to think about how to make it very very high quality and how to keep it current Because you can do online learning, but if you don't update it every two months It's not worth it salt So our big our our big push to do online learning was to make sure we had a team in place to update it every two months Excellent and of course you've been sending people to watch our show because we know you're watching the show all the time Yeah, yeah No, I I became a donor of your program. I don't know four years ago somewhere in there something like that. Yeah Well, we we really appreciate her name wrong every single month every single week How did your name end up being shana? Oh my mom. Well, she named me after shana alexander shana and then called me shana Right and then thanks mom. Yeah, and so people call me shana shana I answer to all versions and my aunt every year would give me five presents and spell it differently on every single present And she never got it right. She never got it right. My favorite spelling so far is s e a n a Shawna And I've also seen Was the other one it was a really cool gallic spelling gaelic a gaelic spelling of it, but any rate We'll get it right for now So it sounds like, you know, you you've been doing voice over for a while and And I think it's great that you you decided that you wanted to create An open resource for people and be able to do it What went into starting a school and getting all those classes going I wanted to take cool classes and so um in order to get those cool classes We really reached out to our references and and brought people in to teach And I wanted to be able to take To take classes with more people than just are in seattle worked with a handful of coaches here in seattle Worked with some people a few people down in la eventually bob bergen was able to come up a couple years ago Dave vanoy was up this year and I just started to learn more about like the voice studio in las vegas and and also the one and They get to voice tracks in san francisco. It's interesting how they're very similar and they're able to also bring in those guests Uh, so it's been really nice to bring people from the outside Up here to seattle right and it's also important to me that the people we have on faculty on staff here We teach each other. It's one of those places where We're constantly learning from each other as much as possible And all of us on staff here are working talent. So currently I I did something for There's a fitness app that I have was 4 000 files last year this year. It's only 600 files. This comes from being in seattle with all these startups right a lot of stuff from microsoft I would say the bulk of the work I do is microsoft or e-learning Every once in a while promo will fall on us here and I'll also fall on me And there's been enough work here in seattle that I hadn't really reached out too far But at this point with source connect and all the other ways and we want to get a much much better internet here I'm really glad the show is going okay tonight because our internet here is spotty Um, but once we get that short up then I really want to reach out Uh, some of the studios in LA. Yeah, so what kind of classes do you offer there? So a lot of it's beginning voiceover for the people that call and say I've heard that I have the best voice And that's where they're starting. How many times have we heard that one george? So we're starting from scratch basically what is it doesn't have a lot to do with your voice We definitely tell the people we teach voice acting. We don't say oh, we do voice work No, we call it acting everyone on stats an actor all of us have acting training And so we tend to the beginning class is like a It's a class a little bit about everything so we do the wild west speech which is protect yourself If it doesn't feel right, it probably isn't yeah, and then from there We go into commercial work. We go into video game work We go into promo. We'll do a little bit on medical narration And we basically say to people you're going to need to be very very good You need to get coaching beyond this class We do a little bit on home studios nowhere near enough. They just know just barely enough Just tell them to watch our show That's all they like to do Because that's where you should go and then you need a tremendous amount of coaching and training to become very good at that Don't try to be all things The vo2 class gets a lot more in the specifics and then after that we typically recommend private coaching For the people that want to dive into audiobooks We have special classes on that and the organization the acting it takes to really do a great job with audiobooks Yeah, but then we have some specialty classes, but for the most part we're just helping people who are brand new Make great choices as they move into the career. That's important to us. I would hope so. How many students do you have there now? Oh, jeez. Oh jeez. Well, it's been four years. Um I haven't added it up in a long time. I know we've taught over 200 workshops And we have tiny classes though. They can't be more than 12 people because our a our classroom is small But b it's very important to us that people are on the mic Yeah, they need to hear themselves and we have all different kinds of mics it's important for them to hear themselves On everything from a we have a blue snowball I don't like to set it up for camp for kids camp because the snowball is the worst thing ever But we have yeti's And then we have you know the caddy 100 and then we have a sure s mba and we have the sand hyzer We set them all up and let people hear themselves on different mics Which hopefully starts to lead them toward Hopefully they think about their space first We still get and I had two emails today saying what mic should I buy and my I literally have an answer I'd send now Which is That's not the question to ask. Where are you recording? How are you treating your space? And I think I got that from you guys So I mean that's like we literally have a version here and then come you can come test mics better yet Test them in your space because you got that puzzle your voice. What are you doing your space? Do you have a program where you let your students borrow a couple mics? Well, not for any money. People have definitely borrowed mics and they bring them back. That's great about that But we like to do sort of like with the mic shootouts Once we know how quiet their room is they can come in here and test quite a bit But I don't I would not be opposed to that as we keep we keep collecting more mics. So as well It's a studio. You're supposed to it's part of the job. It's all they're all right off But I think testing is more important than making a wild guess But when they ask me well, which mic's right for my voice? Well, I first of all, I'm not an engineer I'm a performer who knows just enough to be dangerous and I'm really good at button mashing on that side of the glass But I don't have a great recommendation That's where I was like, let's let's work with work with one sound person. Yeah, not four They'll all be right So choose one Yeah, everybody has their own way of doing things which I I think it's important for voice actors to understand that That there's no one specific way of doing things as long as you get the right result at the other end And uh, you know and everybody has a different way of going there and people have different workflows So, you know, if you've got different people showing people different ways, you'll find what the best way is If you're just joining a seren voiceover body shop Our guest is shawna pennington baird up in seattle washington and she is owner and co-creator of The seattle voice academy and if you've got a question for her throw it in the chat room I'm sure you all have lots of questions for uh, how she got this thing started And maybe you could try and do this in your own town if you've got a lot of experience in voiceover and Have access to a studio or want to build one that sort of thing So, uh, put those questions in there right now George, what do you think about that facility so far because we'll take a little tour in a bit, but Yeah, we'll do that after the after the break. Maybe um, I you know when I was pulling up. I was driving through it's it's um We call this neighborhood so Georgetown. We're soto Georgetown very industrial. Yeah, it's a very aptly named You hear yeah, you hear the aircraft approaching the airport. We're under the flight path for uh, king county airport It's awesome with a tin roof. Right, right. So you're thinking. Yeah, it's not it's not the airport It's not seat. No, no, no smaller one. Yeah, so you're thinking. Oh boy Um, how's that going to work out? But honestly, I'll tell you when I once I got into the iso booths in the space Um and saw the extent to which they went to isolate them from the outside Their studio is in the center most pretty much the center most part of the building um, it's well protected from the rest of the building And they they really did a good job of keeping these booths isolated from the outside noise. I mean You were telling me earlier Blue angels the blue angels. So yeah the f16s. Do they they take off this here? Well, it's every year for c-tech uh the or that c-tech the big seafarer They have they fly and so they will take off and land at king county airport And I remember thinking we're gonna have to close that day. We can't have anything happening And jody rothfield casting she casts here in our building the day of We were recording we had a session going on because I paid no attention It was in august and she came running in she opened the door. She's like, oh, it's ruined We're done for the day and we we turned and went what we don't know. It's happening. We didn't hear a blue angels So that's and I it's also pouring rain. So in the classroom where people are listening right now We can hear the rain, right? It's coming down to sheets, but in here. We don't hear it. So yeah, so they did obviously Your husband is a he's a proptism. I don't know. He's a state. He's a stage carpenter It's official his official title So he worked at the seattle children's theater for 15 years and then moved over to the fifth avenue musical theater So when he built this studio, he was still at children's theater and he did a whole bunch of research He well what happened was I went I went to that bar and I got the idea I should have a demo reel and to a couple classes did the demo reel The first one probably a hair too soon, but the other was I had samples ready and boom I got a nine-hour book and then I got 33 offers for books Which was too many which told me a lot about acx and told me a lot about the quality of samples Maybe on that website so but the first book my husband said you cannot record and he's like no He went he literally went downstairs that weekend gutted our closet under the stairs Read all about it and built a really nice studio for me at home. It's still where I prefer to record I mean, I love it in here too, but I love it in there. It's my own padded room Where did he draw a lot of his I mean, you know It just because you're a contractor or you know really good at building doesn't mean you're gonna stumble on building Space out where did he go for his information? Brendan Hogan's local here Brendan S. Hogan. Um, I know he was on there's two Brendan Hogan's in Seattle They're both sound designers so I know both of them So I know he was on both of their sites I know he went And we'd have to ask him I just remember he when my husband decides to do something He's very very good at doing it and doing a lot of research So my my panels at home is a lot of acoustic foam this The stuff behind us is now the big panels And so he'd read a lot more about panels would be isolated the floor the rubber underneath it He added sound board and then green glue and then sound board and so Really solid like at my home the dogs. I can't hear the dogs people can mow the lawn outside Maddie's voice can come through but she's got that eight-year-old sound but and I can hear her walking down the stairs So I can go what do you need stairs are tough stairs? But other than that he basically just did a whole lot of research and then tested And these studios We he did everything from the glass we had the glass donated for the booth glass And because I was going to buy it and they said hey, we've got some that scratched up. Would you like it for free? Yes, please And so he did the angled glass I mean, I don't even know all of the work he did to make sure Yeah, and everything's crazy corners near everything's a straight wall. I think it's a straight line Well, we right now we're in arguably the liest part of this room because it was the most spacious So we have to my left a door and a piece of glass So we're getting a little bit of the bounce off of those things right now But the other half of the room is totally dead and that's where the majority of the recording is going to happen in this space so Yeah, we'll show you around because I think there's some really interesting innovative. I think Rigging ideas for how to mount mics copy stands and everything else. They have very few Things that clutter the floor in these spaces. So we'll check it out later. All right, excellent well, we'll take a little break and then you can set up for taking that little tour and We'll find out more about the seattle voice academy with shana pennington baird and george wittem in seattle We'll be right back after this message Well, hello there I bet you weren't expecting to hear some big voiced announcer guy on your new orientation training for snapchat. Were you? This is virgin radio. Well, okay. We're not that innocent There's genes for wearing and there's genes for working Dickies because I ain't here to look pretty. She's a champion of progressive values A leader for california and a voice for america. It's smart. It's a phone. It's a smart phone But it's so much more. It's a the files are ready. Don't forget to pick up the eggs What time is hockey practice? Check out this song. It's the end of the road for rig This is your miracle when hope is lost the i8 from bmw Who said saving the planet couldn't be stylish? Hey, it's j michael collins. Bet you think i'm gonna try and sell you a demo now, huh? I think they speak for themselves, but I will give you my email. It's j michael at jmc voiceover dot com Now if they will stop waxing this mustache for a minute, we'll get back to the show Alrighty, you know harlan hogan said when he ordered their just arrived shipment of their acclaimed voiceover microphone Trade tariffs had not yet been implemented We and you lucked out and there's no doubt about it because he now has in stock A whole bunch of these guys the harlan hogan vo one a Voiceover optimized microphone that george and I use here on the set of v obs in our host studio It's a great microphone. It's designed specifically for voiceover, uh, and uh Get a great price point and there was a big backlog on them because he had trouble getting a bunch of them produced Well now they've all arrived And if you want one for christmas or you want to get one for your spouse for christmas If your spouse happens to be watching voiceover body shop at this time Now's the time to get one of these great voiceover microphones at a great price point Check it out go over to voiceover essentials dot com where you can get all sorts of cool stuff for your voiceover studio If you if you need it, he probably has it and if he doesn't have it you probably don't need it But go on over there because you can do all sorts of cool things with the microphone Like put your call letters on there v obs with our picture of pat sweeney who is recovering well in toronto We hope to hear from you soon pat but the vo one a great voiceover microphone great price Go over there now voiceover essentials dot com go to the bottom of our home page Click on that link with the picture of harlan hogan talking into a vo one a microphone in his portabouth pro And it will take you right there where you can order that and all sorts of great stuff for voiceover Thanks for being our sponsor for almost eight years We'll be right back with george and shawna in seattle right after this Hey guys, this is tom also known as the voice of spongebob square pants And you want to fill your ear holes and your eye holes with dan and george and the audio body shop Snails like it too All right, we're back and uh, you ready to do your tour there george Well, I've got the camera up here Let's see if we can get this camera to show up On your end because i'm not sure if there is a way for me to confirm that on this All right, first we'll start in here This is the room in which we're actually doing the show We have our fancy ring light that's putting light on us tonight a little halo on you there Yeah, but the primary thing I wanted to show you was some of the really nicely designed aspects of the studio Um, let me switch mics here so that we're only going to be hearing me through The primary mic, okay for now anyway Really nicely designed uh panels on the walls in this room like we've got Everything's done in owens corning 703. There's not a lick of foam in here They're all offset off the wall. So actually behind the panel You can't see but the the owens corning is offset. So it's out here from the wall There's an air gap in behind so that gets more performance Bang for the buck out of your panels. So that's a nice touch um They they said that recently they added the ceiling clouds and it's called a cloud because It's floating off the ceiling not actually flush to the ceiling And that is very effective at controlling reflection off the ceiling as well as low end sort of base frequency stuff So that's a good design Back in this corner in this room is a little cubby where Voice actors can bring and normally this tray table where i'm Set up is back there Voice actors can bring their own laptop and their own mic and have their own little kind of corner For them to do self repeat records So they can use whatever they've got and they have a nice quiet space to Record themselves. So I think it's a really nice Alternative service. There's a nice sm7b Yeah, right in front of me is an sm7b um The mic we're using tonight is this 416 Yay And the reason you're hearing a little bit of bounces because we have we're sitting in this side of the room with A window here and a door over there, but if the mic is brought back Into the dead zone, it sounds really dead. It sounds really great. Um another cool thing Awesome Now you should be hearing me from the mic on my phone. That's working. Does that sound okay? That sounds fine um Very clever things they've got like these pipes mounted to the walls Which I think is a really clever thing It's probably very common in theater to use pipe for lighting and everything So he put pipe all over the place to mount all sorts of devices like this mount that holds tablets Um is mounted on the pipe the microphone Rig over there that we're using that's a manfrotto Some kind of a manfrotto arm that can be repositioned by just releasing the clamp and then retightening it again with just a flake That's really cool The copy stand also mounted to the pipe So the only thing in this room that's cluttering it is really my fault because I have you know chairs and the Tray in the middle of the room, but normally there's very few things to clutter the room on the floor because everything's mounted to the walls Really cool. I love that All right, let's All right, let's Take a walk out of the large library Go through the airlock And now we're in the control room. How's it coming across now guys? We got you You're coming in good nail and this is All right This is the control room and uh, they have a Let me take a look at that. It is the focus, right? I think that's the 18 i20. I believe yeah, that's what that is On the scarlet interface Very good quality. It's got enough mic inputs that they can have multiple things going on at the same time They've got an iMac 21 inch Running the show over here with a second monitor attached to it And then we have the solo or the small booth Where they've got right now. It looks like a road in t1a or yeah road in t1a and More of that clever rigging. So this is a really good example of how that rigging declutters your studio Look at the floor. The only thing on the floor is a couple wires from the mics and the headphones That's it. No stands to trip on no booms falling over everything is Suspended from the wall on pipe I love it. I think it's really clever This room has another cool trick up the sleeve that shana showed me earlier If you really want to completely make the room dead and get rid of the window check this out You release this panel On the wall And it hinges Over the door cool Is that what? Yeah, very cool. I thought that was really clever I wanted that to be seen because I went, you know, there's some really clever solutions in this room in this studio This being one of them. I would have just said, I just hang a curtain over the door You're done But no he thought of an innovative way of doing it so that you can really make a super dry dead room What does it sound like over zoom? Does it sound really dry and dead? It sounds sounds pretty good Awesome. Yeah, so and lastly Let's go out of the control room and show you the classroom Where people are watching and listening to the show right now So i'm gonna have to turn off the monitors out here while I when I walk out or we're gonna have echo There we go. Oh quick on the draw way to go shana This is everybody. This is the uh the teaching space. You guys want to introduce yourselves real quick I'm sure hi. I'm dean teabooting. Hey dean from here. Hey, nice to see you Also, seattle gas fairer from burlington all right, and joshua richinson from la sierra Right on you guys. I really appreciate you braving the storm. Although. This is what a day in seattle It's monday But uh, this is a nice space and there's a big screen that we're watching the show on out here This is always a fun part only we can show ourselves on camera live So there you have it. So that's that's the space. It's a really very usable and Very quiet inside the booth. Um, and I'm really I'm really impressed with what they did with with the minimal amount of Financial resources up front just a lot of smarts a lot of research Excellent Well, we got a couple of questions for uh for shana from our audience and is she up to answering some of them Let me ask her because I made her turn off the uh I made her turn off the studio modders You have your monitors turned back up Now you can can you hear us now? We're gonna have you come on in or just do it from out there in the studio out in the classroom The echo is so hard to deal with I'll just have her in the air All right, so let's Switch cameras here I'll cut this mic. Okay This is quite the dance required to switch. But it's working. It's working. Okay, cool. All right We got a question from tammy j Anderson who says What is a lightweight studio option to put on a fifth wheels toy hauler? Actually, this is this is a question for us. Um It would be used for months at a time for for your information. It's a fifth wheel camper with it Uh, that has a toy hauler, which is a small garage in the back of it. Yeah, and he put a picture on there It's like this big trailer and george. It's like We know other people that have done that kind of stuff or who is it that lives in the trailer and was uh We had her on the show too Karen saltis might have been her and there was a couple of people people who go on the road in there And there's air streams and various other things and they can do that kind of stuff, you know what it's The hardest thing by a long shot is always going to be soundproofing Yeah, isolating that space from the outside world. Yeah, I wouldn't do it while you're actually going down the road That might be a little different Not a chance. Um if you A lightweight booth is not soundproof Let's get that clear like if you're gonna put something in there that's lightweight It is not going to stop much noise at all. So If the thing's got wheels So you're gonna have to drag it away from a freeway Down a country road and find somewhere quiet to record even if you do Put a booth inside your trailer, right that said You could get a whisper room. They're heavy, but certainly not nearly as heavy as a Side-by-side or whatever toy you're going to haul around in that thing Um, so you could put a whisper room type booth in there. Yeah, um Yeah, you know, you may not find it worth it though, you know, because it's still not going to be totally soundproof You might just want to hang acoustic old treatment in there and make a A padded room in the back with this. There's a picture of it There you go. Check that out. Yeah, that's that is a legit toy hauler that thing's got a fifth wheel That thing is a monster. Look at that thing. I'm jealous Well, D box adds on to that He says he would love to see a show on equipping alternative spaces for voiceover studios campers Toolsheds basements shipping containers, etc. And I came up with well, we'd call it tiny studio nation I love it. All right. Yeah Uh gets fred voice has a has a question for shawna He asks did she roll right into the school? Or did she start out with a meet-up or a work-up workout group? um Combination so I worked with coaches. I mean, I had a lot of coaching before teaching. Um I mean years. No, I didn't I didn't start teaching right where that would have that would have not been cool Um, and so I worked with several local coaches extensively Went and then I started working out with larry hudson's group. So wait. How long was that that was? Uh four and a half years ago. I mean, I was probably working out with larry hudson's I mean, I was definitely fast-tracked. So when I fell into it, I fell into the book got a video game right away Ended up with an agent about five months in local agent And so did not book with that agent for a year because they I'm older than I look and sound So I don't sound 50. I don't sound 40 when they finally put me up for 20 year olds. That was helpful but I Probably did workouts and coaches for a solid two to three years and even then I was very reluctant I was I was a reluctant teacher and I as I teach singing and I'm very comfortable teaching singing So that was great. So when the studio started up, I did a lot more teaching of studios I teach of singing students And we have other people on faculty and so other folks have been teaching all along as well So it's never just me. I was definitely the administrative glue So I was the one doing the website and I was the one creating which system was going to work and how could we Book private students online and not have to pick up the phone all the time. That was my job Jenner chief bottle rosher. Yes And then as I started doing more e-learning they were like, yeah, you should work with this person on e-learning and I was like, hmm Hmm And I think it helps that I've taught for years So I I taught with Missoula Children's Theater and I taught kids ages Five to 19 for years and ran theater companies and ran Performing arts center camps. So that stuff came naturally the first class of adults I was like it was it was different and I remember saying to them I have an inner chipmunk She gets very very excited and I'm going to talk really fast when I get really excited or you just might need to slow me down and so When we get to like animation stuff that just works out great But if we're working on audiobook stuff I have to dial it back And talk to adults, but I don't entirely I still have that little Muppet So I hope that answered your question. So no, I did not start to I did not I definitely worked with a lot of people ahead of time and then I don't stop coaching now Like I still work with coaches I will be going to classes till I'm 90 to learn more stuff because The learning curve for me because I was an actor, right? So I was going to rock this This was going to be easy of 20 years of acting So I was awesome for like a day or two and then I fell all the way down here And I've been climbing back up ever since because I then realized a common story Because that first audiobook I could almost talk out loud by like chapter four and by chapter eight There might have been some connection and then by book six. I was a narrator So, um, yeah, all right. Well, Larry Hudson is in the house He has a question. He says what's the number one misconception you see people see people come in with as a newbie Oh that it's all about their voice That it has anything to do with the voice Don't I have a great voice Yeah Because and I think the the roughest time I've witnessed Are the people that came in listening to their voices for so many years. I'm one of them, by the way They listen to their voice and they can't connect with the script because they're they're way too busy hearing the sound of their voice So they're not connected and they're trying to do it all technically and they're not in the story Yeah And so I always it's always interesting when a student comes in and they have 20 years in radio Or actually or a pastor someone who's been Or sometimes actors actors tend to take direction better because they've been we've been schooled and had to take direction But you give them a note And it just doesn't even go in Doesn't go in at all. So if I see the fourth or fifth note not go in Then I think okay, there's probably a better way to work with this person And sometimes by week six I've been able to change the nature of how I give the note because that's on the teacher and the same way that I Yeah, I think newbies it's they don't or they don't know how much work it's gonna be I mean, why shouldn't it be easy? And I think half the blogs out there say it really well They say if this were easy everybody'd be doing it well It's not right. This is like learning to play a piano concerto. You cannot step up and play tchaikovsky your first day at the piano You got to learn chopsticks You got to learn a finger placement and when it comes to something like one of my favorite people And I have not met him. So I'm gonna say his name wrong, but Dave Pettit Has the ability to take a script in five or six words and just Nail All the little nuances. So I tend to use his name like a verb So if you anyone knows david, you can tell him that so I'm like, you got to do you got to Dave Pettit that You need to like get into all the stuff you all the good stuff that you're missing So beginners miss all the good stuff And there's a coach Clem Clem Daniels here in seattle and he said that to me and I love that Beginners miss all the good stuff and the advanced people find it Alrighty, uh jack daniel asks Shawna other intrepid souls like you might want to start a school like yours in other cities Do you have any must-dos or must not-dos you've learned in getting your school running? Be ethical Be super ethical be really honest. Um, and that doesn't mean soul crushing but I think I think I went to a couple workshops where they're like, hey for ten thousand dollars You got guaranteed a demo reel and we'll hold your hand and you'll make a million dollars as an expat That's sort of why we exist because I got so mad because I was in the room with 20 people and about 19 of them needed a whole lot of training and you know a couple people could read out loud so I think if you're gonna It help people explore voiceover They need They need to know about self-direction. They need to know to look for all the sharks in the entertainment world right now If something doesn't feel right, it's not So that's where we we're based in that world and then Don't make promises and that's really tricky right because there's a great example A guy came to us and he's missing half his uvula This is like four years ago and I remember thinking. Oh, there's no way and then I stopped And I talked to my husband too about it. I was like, so he wants to do commercial work If missing half his uvula and so his r's are like, uh, uh, uh, uh, our r's missing So we played you know, here's here's what's gonna take to be competitive. Here are the professionals Here's where you are. He worked hard. He finished his uh video game demo Has an agent I don't know his directory of his job of his life right now But that's where it took him a year and a half to finish that first demo So the truth there is who are we to say? Oh, I'm sorry You shouldn't do voiceover for any reason The truth is can you do it? Can you Do you have the guts to to give yourself permission to do voiceover? And then can you get enough training that you can stand up there everybody else and do it really really well So I I don't like to tell anybody no now if someone comes in and says i'm ready for a demo And they're not We say no Because that's just that's taking money and then putting a bad demo on the market and doing a mis-service to them And it's just it's a combination of things there And so and I think oftentimes we will refer people out to the right people because the other thing is one demo Producers shouldn't produce all demos probably i'm sure there's someone out there who can but I think for the most part certain people are very good at certain demos So if someone comes in and needs a promo demo we can't do promo demos here That's hard I mean that's really really hard and so I we'd know we refer immediately if someone comes in is interested in an E-learning demo that's a little different. That's that's what we do here We do a lot of it So you know and then you get to the commercial then you go is it national? Is it Seattle Seattle has its own style of demos? For what that's worth. They tend to be a little more chill. There should be big crossfades in them So knowing your local market like that right if someone's local they should coming to a local studio and learning the local Style, yeah, that's you should know the national start place to start Well, maybe if it's starting there is a good place to start. Yeah, all right Uh got one last two-part question for from uh devox who's never sure that Then we can throw to some of the folks who are here as well absolutely, um devox wondering how that pipe that that you that they set the mics up on is mounted looks like it's just Screwed into the wall or oh it's screwed in the wall totally. He bolted. He basically bolted it Those look like bolts. There's like a there's like some sort of a pipe mount. I can find out Two bolts put on our website and the pipe threads into that Bracket it's definitely stuff that's going to be common in the theater Yes rigging world like the pipe that's in the system. This isn't welder's pipe. These aren't welder's parts. Right. These are theatrical Bits, right? So if you're in a city that has theater of any kind Yeah, you want to talk to the theater builders come from Home Depot. Um What I will do I'm looking at this in the theater department at Home Depot. Maybe let me go home to ben I promise to put it on our website So if you go into if if you go to Seattle voice academy It will drop you at this place called Seattle voice institute So go into the resource library the free resource library click on home studios and I will list The materials. Excellent. That's not hard to do. All right Uh, the one last question on that, uh, how much did you spend on the whole studio? Or is that a state secret if we if we skip labor? Yeah, because the labor was my husband. Oh gosh. Uh, hang on I'm adding up money all of the the panels the the fabric all came from 5th avenue Okay, we're not going to count equipment just the build, uh 200 400 probably 8 000 Maybe for two iso boots. Yeah, not bad Maybe maybe less materials. That's all materials. No labor to take that number and quadruple it for the labor You know, yeah, and we have a lot of speakers I mean the most the money we spent on equipment we bought studio monitors And then we didn't spend a lot on that 18 i 20 that scarlet's like 400 Yeah, and we bought things slowly it was not all purchased and we did a we'd actually did a good go fund me And for people who needed small iso rooms, so we raised a lot of the money that way Oh, cool. And then got a small loan like a micro loan So a lot when we when we finally spent down there everything spent was probably 13 grand, but that's including all the gear Cool All right, why don't we head out to the the main classroom there and you could there's some questions from you from your students out there Sure. Yeah, send in Anybody you'd like to to be In the booth live and in person So she's out there now grabbing somebody. Yeah, I'm when I look at the pipes The pipe joins into an elbow and has a set screw that holds it in That's how you can tell right away. This is theatrical stuff not Plumbing stuff doesn't mean you couldn't do it with plumbing pipe, but this is theatrical stuff. Come on in. I will. Thank you How are you? I'm good. Tell me your name again. Donna Donna. Thanks for coming in my pleasure Do you have any technical hang-ups questions? Actually, I do Awesome. We're in the right place. I've been using osan audio, which is a little tricky because there are no almost no Instructions. Yeah, and that's true. It's made by some students in South America or something. Brazil is what I think. Yeah, I think that's what I read anyway for weeks I would edit in osan and I would Um take up breath sounds or put in um silence, right? And I would do that and it would stay silent Now when I do the playback I don't hear anything But the waveform is not a flat line. The waveform Is a squiggly line I hate it. Okay. All right. What here? I I don't hear anything Okay, so sounds like a playback issue of some sort and uh Chances are sometimes it's have you tried plugging you and unplugging your digital interface? Oh No, I've been trying to find things on the osan menus So maybe it is that if it's the digital interface that should be pretty simple that happens that happens a lot What you're saying is that when she silences something using the silence using the using the silence function A flat line being there now. There's some some kind of a wave It's place right it starts out as a flat line right when I when I insert it. It's a flat line When I go to play it back. Yeah, it doesn't stay a flat line I don't hear anything there. You don't hear anything. Okay, but it's not a flat line. That sounds like a bug Definitely a bug. We've been getting you know, with yeah with with a lot of the the os updates and stuff like that There's all sorts of weird things you're cropping up. So it could it could be that Reinstall it mac or windows Mac uh windows windows Well, you could contact the you could contact the developers and and just send a message and say You know we're having this weird thing going on. Well, send them a screenshot and say, okay Trust me. These are geeks. They speak english, right? With with the portuguese accent. Yeah, it will get you send them a screenshot and saying when I do this This is what I see This is seems to be a bug I bet they'll want to fix it pretty quickly because it does sound like a bug in that case Okay, is it just started? Did you ever learn any other software? I had used I had been using audacity and when I learned from shawna About the um punch and roll. Yeah, I said, I'm I'm there. Well, if you're having continued issues with ocean, then get the new audacity Which does now have punch and roll. I understand that familiar with it. Maybe it's maybe it'll work better Maybe it'll be something you can use in the meantime or I don't know But that sounds weird the issue I the other the real issue I had with audacity was I was I am using a fairly small computer screen like a 13 inch screen and on windows The cursors Are so tiny. They are essentially invisible. Hmm. Okay and Audacity audacity people said yes, that's a known issue. Oh, yep. Use a bigger screen. That's Well, I know in windows you should be able to make your cursor larger You should be able to Right change the size of it or something right and I have for everything else But it doesn't affect the cursor, you know, that's you know what the common thread between audacity is an audio Why how much did you pay for him? Oh, yeah, exactly. Yeah, there you go That's right. That's all for tonight folks. We The problem with free software is it's awesome, but There's this problem I'm not saying it should cost money or it's gonna be good because it costs money but When you're using open source or freely supported software Getting support is really the big problem that you of course, of course So, but if that's all you're dealing with that's the worst problem you have and you're probably doing pretty well Yeah, do we have anybody else that has a question there? You know, if there's anybody else that seem to be Pass the baton. Yeah, we got time for one more question and then we gotta we gotta Roll out of here already. Let's see if anybody else Has a question. Yeah, it's great that now that we've actually got this remote working really well See and then I can I can actually be in your picture here. It's kind of cool I think we might have one more. I'm looking through the glass Up shot is on our way back in. All right Oh This is our last question in the show. So you get to take the you get the last one So isotope Rx7 The the the breathing is the breathing or the deep breathing the mouth clicking seems to be working great Someone wanted to know if you would correct a create effects tax In isobar x7. Yes, cool. That's on your website so we can figure out that Yeah, I don't have a specific Isotope Preset service for us because the isotopes a little complicated. There's an isotope standalone editor Yeah, which has its own a plugin architecture Which I have made a preset for that. Okay, but more and more typically It becomes a plugin used with twisted wave or addition or something And then I just incorporated it. But yes, okay, that can be done But you want to use it for deep breathing? Well is and is anything actually right now? I still silence. I'm a singer I'm trying someday. I'll take silent breaths, but I saw go. I'm still this incredibly loud breather And so I don't do it that often in an audiobook Well, I guess but you're not taking deep gasping breaths midphrase. No Not often. Um But do I still need to go in there and reduce those breaths manually? Not your book Not as long as it's not too much scraping the editors I've worked with mostly leave most of it in or they just reduce it a little bit Yeah, right. Uh, and some of that may be my placement and things like that But I looked at that deep breather and I played with it and I had disastrous results Well, that's the that's the thing about a piece of technology like that is it's got to be set perfectly In order for it to work properly I think with a deep breather if your breaths are too strong It can't really differentiate that powerful breath sound From something intentional, right? So if your breaths are on the softer side I think the deep breath or may work, but there's large gasping breaths You're still probably gonna be stuck going through and reducing their volume individual. Okay. I don't think yeah about 15 db It makes it sound a lot more natural. That's what I just create hockey's. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know For that. Yeah. Okay. All right. Well, shawna. Thank you so much for letting us invade your studio tonight and Thank you. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. This has been a total blast And I'm so glad that we were able to get a few people in to hang out with us. It's been really fun Excellent. Alrighty. Thanks for good. Thanks for joining us. All right. Well We got to say goodbye, uh, right after this and uh, and then we won't see you for a while But we will be back, but we will be back right after these messages. Stay tuned Your dynamic voiceover career requires extra resources to keep moving ahead Now there's one place where you can explore everything the voiceover industry has to offer that place is voiceover extra dot com Whether you're just exploring a voiceover career or a seasoned veteran ready to reach that next professional level Stay in touch with market trends coaching products and services while avoiding scams and other pitfalls Voiceover extra has hundreds of articles free resources and training that will save you time and help you succeed Learn from the most respected talents coaches and industry insiders When you join the online sessions bringing you the most current information on topics like audio books Auditioning casting home studio setup and equipment marketing performance techniques and much more It's time to hit your one stop daily resource for voiceover success Sign up for a free subscription to newsletters and reports and get 14 bonus reports on how to ace the voiceover audition It's all here at voiceover extra dot com. That's voice over x t r a dot com Alrighty. Well, that was that was fun. It's a a a pretty successful remote this time for a studio Far far away. There's a lot of technical things that happen But the end of the day you got to have solid internet right and it's not a given even in today's day and age Even in the city of seattle It's not necessarily a given That's right. Anyway Our resources. Yeah, well, it's the holiday season and as we've mentioned Next monday is christmas eve. The following monday is new year's eve. So Those are mondays when you want to spend with your family. So we want to spend them with our families too and So we're going to take the next two weeks off Meaning we will not return with the show until january 7th With the new format that you're going to really like that's going to really Improve your experience with our show and help you more technically And we want to bring in some big time voice people especially, you know, some of the big talents But also some of the big agents and the casting people and the people that can really help you with your voice over business And saying that our first guest of 2019 will be terror strong So Yeah, so harley quinn and all the characters that she brings to life We'll be joining us here at voiceover body shop. And uh, and that's on january 7th then on january 21st lara davis will be with us Which is and he's a he's a fascinating voice actor and a very entertaining guy Who really is a master of ad-libbing stuff? And just like let yourself go that'll be good ad-libbing and and and voice matching. Yeah, absolutely Uh, who are donors of the week? Donors of the week. Yeah, remember those you're gonna ask me that question Um, I'll tell you in just a sec after I open my proper email box that has all the donors But uh, if you give me a sec, I'll be right back with that while you're looking that up Well, I'll uh, you know tell people you got to get on our mailing list And uh, you'll get all of the updates on the show and uh, as we start the new format You'll get more instructions on how to watch the some of the different stuff that we're going to be tossing out there Uh in 2019 Also show us your booths. This is I'm not sure who's living room. This is but uh, nicely decorated Uh for the holidays, but we want to see what your home studio booths look like so send them in in Landscape not in portrait Uh, so we can get a delay the land of your studio and maybe we'll highlight it on the show So have we got our donors down? We do we have uh, you may know some of these names. I probably do Tracy H. Reynolds Yeah, uh, Andrew Kauffman Uh Eric Aragoni These are names that you I'm reading Every week and uh, we really really appreciate that. Um, sarah borges She's one of our monthly subscribers. Um, michelle blinker All right, michelle. Great to hear from you. Yeah, and uh ant land productions uncle roy Ant land productions. I got my ant land production shirt on Hey Our buddy roy. All right, ryan roush Uh, graham spicer. Thanks graham. All right jack de gallia Not done yet joseph harrison These are all pretty much all those are all people that donate on a recurring basis so You don't have to do that. You can make a single donation If there's a topic or a guest on that you particularly find helpful Just you can send a little bit of money. Let us know that way Or just watch the show and enjoy it. Just make sure you tell your friends repost You know that kind of thing. Absolutely get the word out. So we appreciate it. All right Uh, let's see what else your instagram is at george the tech Yes, all right. That is my instagram. Occasionally I'll post techie type things pictures of studios. I'm working on that kind of stuff All right now beginning in january. Well, oh, well, we still have to push that. All right. Go back to that Okay, if you want to work with george, you go to george the tech dot com Yes, okay, and if you'd like to work with me you go to Homevoiceoverstudio.com makes it simple. Uh now starting january 7th A program note. We will start the show now at 5 p.m. Pacific time, which is now 8 p.m. Eastern time So right after dinner if you're one of those late eaters you can watch the show then Hopefully this will get us a help us with some of the better guests that we can get here in uh in in la so they can go home for dinner and And so it might make the show a little more interesting and it's we want to change things up So on january 7th, we will begin at 5 p.m. So tell everybody with terror. That's right Uh, hey, if you want to be in our studio All you had to do is write to us the guys at v obs dot tv and say audience and what day you want to be here and uh, if we're doing a show that night because we're gonna go on every other week Starting in january. So we'll be on the 7th the 21st And then you do the math But let us know that if you're in the greater los angeles area if you want to come down and check the show out Go do it We need of course to thank our sponsors like harlan hogan's voiceover essentials voiceover extra source elements the otago voice actor websites dot com j michael collins demos All right, and of course the dan and marcie lennard foundation for the betterment of live webcasting Our producer catherine curidan for doing a stellar job of lining things up And all the great work that she's done all the years. She's been working with us jack daniel on chat room duty tonight and on youtube and our amazing technical director who just has it down pat sumer leno, uh, and of course, uh, lee pennie for being lee pennie. Well, that's gonna do it for us for 2018 Let us know what you want to see on the show write to us at the guys at v obs dot tv And uh, we'll see you in the new year. That's gonna do it for us tonight. Thanks george for joining us all the way from seattle You might see me from here again in the future. I'm very good chance of that happening. All right excellent Well, that's gonna do it for us Happy holidays, merry christmas. Happy new year and what or else you celebrate this time of year. I'm dan lennard I'm george widden and this is voiceover body shop or vo B s and remember if it sounds good It is good. All right. See I fit that one in there. Anyway, all right. We'll see you next year guys