 Hey, it's time for voiceover body shop tech talk number 76 76 The first time we did this. It's like, oh, okay. We'll try it this way. Well 76 episodes later Here we are still doing it and answering your questions and talking about Voiceover studio tech, which is really what people want to hear you and I talk about Because when we talk people just seem to listen whether we know what we're talking about or not, but it always sounds like we do Anyway, we've got some great stuff tonight. Yeah in your tech update You've got all sorts of cool stuff like well shields up. It's time to protect yourself from hackers Now more than ever. I'll talk. I'll give you a little checklist of things to look out for Ever heard of deity microphones? Are they the next Berenger? I'll tell you why I think I said that And then a couple other little gadgets and one I promise I I promise isn't my last personas revelator I owe 24 update. I swear Please I hope it is but yes my last update on the revelator and where I'm at with that Excellent, and I'm gonna talk about something that people don't even know what it is But they're gonna learn at the bottom of the hour I'm gonna learn because I don't know what that means either the nominal line Those nominal lining. What is the nominal line? I'm sure someone will say now. That's not what it is. I'm excited. Anyway, stay tuned for that It's time for voiceover body shop tech talk right now from the outer reaches. They came Bearing the knowledge of what it takes to properly record your voice over audio and Together from the center of the VO universe. They bring it to you now George Wittem the engineer to the VO stars of Virginia Tech grad with the skills to build set up and maintain the professional VO studios of the biggest names in VO today and you Dan Leonard the voiceover home studio master a Professional voice talent with the knowledge and experience to help you create a professional sounding home VO studio and each week They allow you into their world making the complex simple Debunking the myths of what it takes to create great sounding audio Answering your questions showing you the latest and greatest and VO tech and having a dandy time doing it Welcome to voice over body shop Tech talk Voice over body shop tech talk is brought to you by voice over essentials calm home of Harlan Hogan signature products Source elements remote studio connections for everyone voice actor websites calm where your VO website isn't a pain in the butt Vio heroes dot com become a hero to your clients with award-winning voiceover training J. Michael Collins demos when Quality matters and voiceover extra your daily resource for VO success And now live to drive from their super secret clubhouse and studio In Sherman Oaks, California Here are the guys Well, welcome, I'm Dan Leonard and I'm George Whidham and this is voice over body shop or VO be Tech talk tech talk Tech talk tech talk Tech talk tech talk Nice that you have a bathroom close by I gotta go into the house I Apparently wasn't close enough because in the 30 seconds I'm walking out of the room my web That was the strangest thing ever. I walk back in and there's no I'm like am I a ghost? Okay, it's like this. It was so weird Anyway, it's great to be here. Yeah, it's great to be anywhere But it's great to be here with all of you voice actors out there learning want to learn a little bit more about How to record your audio properly? Because that's what George and I do There are a lot of people out there that are you know, they've been voice actors for a while Yeah, here's how I record you need one of these you need one of those and you got to have this that and the other thing by this $800 overly complicated piece of gear because that's what I use. That's right Oh, by the way, it took me 20 years to learn how to use it Yeah, that's a big mistake a lot of people make is they tend to invest in their equipment before they have a chance to understand what equipment they need and Even more important how to use it because having it has nothing to do with how good you sound if you don't know how it works So if you want to learn Properly from the ground up from guys that understand voiceover audio better than anybody You can contact us because that's what George and I do we teach this stuff And if you start there you put yourself way ahead of everybody else who's using a USB mic and you know Or two tin cans in a string Which I've seen by the way If they you want to work with George all you have to do is go over to George the dot tech. That's my home on the web. My name is my address That's the name of the company and that's how you can find me and actually our little team now That we're starting to grow over here at George the tech I've added another to the crew named rich green who's the brave one who seems to be more open to taking on Windows audio problems Which is nice. Thanks gonna be a busy guy. I told him I was like get ready But it's it's we provide a lot of services anywhere from the good old classic sound check Where you send your audio and I give back my notes on your tech on your sound to? Designing studios and setting up processing chains and then webinars where we try to teach you how to run all this stuff So that's what we do over at George the dot tech Do we get in jerseys by the way? It's you know, it's about time, isn't it? It's about darn time Once we get our new colors and our new logo sorted out Maybe I'll be able to do that But Dan does a lot of the same kind of thing in his world and that's over at home voice over studio Dot-com yeah head on over there. It's just days away from being a new website It's gonna be a lot easier to find my specimen collection cup where you can send me your audio and I will analyze your audio Talk to anybody that's worked with me on this and you'll know that you'll find out that I'm extremely thorough I'll be very honest with you and After five seconds generally I know exactly what's going on in the room you're in and what corrections you need to make to make it sound Seamless, I think that's the thing George that people don't understand that when you send out audio It should be seamless for the person on the other end meaning they don't have to do much to it unless they are Qualified to do something to it if it's for a commercial They've got to add the compression to it So it'll float on top of music and all the other things that go on Which you don't have to do as a voice actor and that's one of the things that I really enjoy teaching is Don't be intimidated by all this technology Yeah, it's a computer. Yeah, it's a microphone, but the best way to look at it. It's a cassette recorder and It's play. It's record. It's stop keep stop thinking about it Is this complex thing with all sorts of scripts running in it and and and all those the drivers and the software Just hit record and go and that's what I'll teach you how to do and make it easy for you in the long run Anyway, it's time for George's tech update because he scours the internet every Monday at about 3 30 And to come up with some stuff to talk about. No, you've been looking at this stuff all week It's all you do is you're on the internet finding cool stuff. What do you got for us this week? It's not always cool stuff Yeah kind of scary stuff well What am I one of my favorite shows that I listen to for news about tech is called this week in tech and On Sunday, they kind of rang the alarm and said shields up Shields up. It's kind of time if you if you have a computer and the internet You may want to make sure you've done a few things to be Let's see in the best of health when it comes to preventing infections of the internet kind Because we are we have not yet quite seen the onslaught of what kind of Things we might expect from Well, let's just say Russia, okay You know, it could be other countries too and there's a lot of government actors and non just chaotic You know Anarchists out there looking to make a quick buck on us, but here's a few things to kind of just get those shields up be ready And have the best things in place to prevent yourself from being easy target and be exploited and being exploited by hackers First thing on my little bullet list here is are you running the latest security update on your computer? Whatever that is Windows or Mac make sure you're on the most current security update on on a Mac That means clicking on the Apple the top left and clicking on Looking at the word system preferences, or if it's an older OS it might say updates and Clicking on the word words if it says one update Click on the software update icon and then see what update is waiting for you Now there's two main kinds of updates some of them are going to be operating system updates and some of them are going to be security update and It's important to to differentiate An operating system update may bring along with it a change to your system that you're not expecting So those you want to be a little more cautious about it be a little bit more prepared to understand that okay If I update my operating system It could cause an issue with a sound driver or a software. I'm running so keep that in mind But if you see another update that specifically says Security update that's the one you want to check and make sure you do an update on also if there's updates for web browsers Make sure you're updating those as well. So if you use Safari Run the latest Safari because it's gonna have the latest security as well as features So that's important. Make sure you're on the most up-to-date security Here's one that you've probably never thought about Because when they mentioned it, I realized well I hadn't thought about this in a long time and that is make sure you're on the most up-to-date Firmware for your router Yes, your router the router is the thing in your home. That is the gateway Literally, it's what they call it the gateway to the internet and if your router has old really outdated firmware or if Warsaw if you're using the Generic default password for your router like password That's your password You want to be up-to-date on you want to update the password So it's not the defaults and you want to make sure that if there is a firmware update available for your router That you install it because that's your first line of defense to being exploited or hacked so you really want to make sure you're up-to-date and That's a reminder for myself because I haven't checked my routers software update in a long time So I'm going to be doing that myself very soon But that was a something they said many people don't check that and sometimes their routers firmware is years old And it's an easy place to get hacked because think of your router as a server that connects you to the internet Now if there's no updates available at the very least reboot your router If there's anything running on that router that shouldn't be there that you didn't put there that you don't even know It's there chances are by just simply rebooting it or unplugging it turning it off cat to 10 plug it back in Will have wiped that thing out of the memory. So there's not really storage on most routers It's all just something that's running in its memory and when you shut it off and reboot it Whatever that thing is that's running is usually wiped out So that's another thing to do reboot your router or unplug it and plug it back in Another thing and this is another one It's a little bit of the more geek side of things so some of you will know what I'm saying and some of you won't if you know What an IOT devices and I'm paint then I'm talking to you and if you don't know what an IOT devices You better learn what this means an IOT device is an internet of things device and this can be as simple as a Power switch that plugs into the wall that talks to an Amazon Echo so that you can say Amazon turn on my lights That's an internet of things device a security camera is an internet of things device a ring doorbell a Smart Wi-Fi controlled light bulb is an internet of things device Make sure that if you're using anything that's questionable you bought it really discounted online You're not really sure where its country of origin is or who owns the software you're running That's something you want to be more aware of and you may want to discontinue using it. So be careful about IOT Also, just make sure I mentioned earlier safari updating your browser Or of making your browser is updated in Safari if you're on Mac If you're on Windows or Mac and you're running Chrome your Chrome browser might say update in the upper right hand corner If you see that word update Click on it now Don't do it right now wait till you're at the end of your day not watching the show But update your Chrome browser because Chrome is always updating to patch Security issues and etc. etc. Make sure you're on the most up to date Chrome browser now Here's something a little scary. So there's a bunch of different Security-based tools out there mainly we think of them as you know anti virus applications And there's one that's been popular for a very very long time called Kaspersky didn't get into all sorts of trouble or something when they go nuts or something and I don't know about Kaspersky I do know that Yeah, I know what you're talking about. There's another another developer of a very famous Anti-virus that somebody is gonna know McAfee McAfee. Yeah. Yeah that guy did go that guy did Do some bad things But anyway Kaspersky it turns out well, he's Russian And that's not inherently bad But there's a lot of people on his team that may be under the influence of the government whether they want to be or not and So it's it's risky enough now that the FCC has officially warned that Kaspersky poses a national security risk There's a PC mag article about this so you can go look it up on PC mag calm and it talks about the details here I'm not gonna get into it if you're one of those people. There's and there's hundreds of millions of Installed Kaspersky anti virus apps out there So one of you guys out there watching the show is using it You might want to be aware of this and try something different at the very least just if you're on Windows Just use the Windows Defender. It's pretty darn good It's always updated by Microsoft and you're probably gonna be fine with that If you're on mac os and you keep your security updates updated There's almost nothing to worry about. I have not ever run A uh antiviral malware application on my max Knock on wood never been a problem. Um, and it's it's been pretty secure. Anyway, yeah moving on Um There's a company I got to meet the owner of last week called deity microphones Now deity is interesting. You've probably heard of some of their products Maybe if you've been searching around for less expensive alternatives to already inexpensive stuff Um, that's what deity tends to do. They tend to look at what's selling from Road and others and say maybe I can do that better and maybe even do it for less money That's what deity seems to be doing out there And they have some very interesting products like Here's a transmitter that plugs onto a microphone Like right onto the base of the microphone that you might see a reporter use That's also a recorder So it's a two for one you can record and you can be on wireless Interesting idea the fact that you're backing up everything you're doing recording. That's not a new idea But he's doing it with a product that's way less expensive than what's what else is out there He also has like a really cool mic. It's called a d4 duo It's a video mic that goes on top of a camera. That's a duo mic. So it's picking up It's more of a shotgun pattern In the front and like a cardioid pattern in the back So now you're able to record yourself And whoever it is you're interviewing at the same time. So that's a really interesting product But anyway deity is a really interesting company. They're really out there trying to Make innovations and make them a lot less expensive. Now. I can't vouch for any of their products firsthand But having talked to the fellow that runs the company and seeing how aggressive he is at like getting new things out there that Kind of break the price performance You know Barrier It's really interesting. I see Ron M in the chat saying I really like my deity S mic to shotgun mic. So there you have it There's a there's a someone that's had a good experience um Another little thing my dad at my request took something that already existed which is a A mic mute switch. This one's one. This one's made by whirlwind called the mic mute ppd And he made a little modification. Okay, not so little a big modification This big box on the bottom has converted this switch and just being a standard microphone on off mute switch you can Right turns my mic on and off Into having another interesting feature and that is a wireless remote power switch Transmitter so think of this as an amalgamation of a mic mute switch box And a transmitter that transmits an on off signal to one of those just you know, this christmas tree light switches Right that does it all in one thing and we and he literally Did a mind meld between one of those remotes and this box with some electronics inside this box and makes all this work So why the heck? Did we come up? Why did I come up with this idea and why did I make it? Well, wouldn't it be cool if anytime you want to use your mic a light or several lights somewhere around your house All wirelessly turn on and turn off whenever you turn on your mic There's the mic on That's that lamp back there is hooked to a wireless switch on the wall Well, there could be one down the hall There could be one in the kids room There could be one in the kitchen or the family room wherever there's people in your house That makes noise that's interrupting your sessions on a regular basis This sure beats screaming down the hall i'm recording Which uh now becomes an on off switch thing just a single flick of a switch And all those lights in your house can turn on or off So this is a very much a prototype But if it's something of interest to you Let me know just email me at george at george the dot tech about the remote wireless power switch box And uh, I'll let you know about when we might be uh actually producing one of these things It's a very early stages product proof of proof proof of What do you call it proof of concept? Yeah proof of concept But it works as you can see and it's really really cool Um lastly before I go a final personas revelator i o 24 update I am doing the show with it tonight As you can hear at the beginning of the show is able to play The v o b s jingle a voice from jeff All of the sound ins and outs the mix minuses and all that stuff are totally sorted out And it's been working great ever since I did the last firmware update I had to relearn how to use it because they changed internally How the sound drivers work and they made a few pretty fundamental changes to the unit So I will warn you if you have a working revelator It's in your studio and you're using it day to day and you're happy Do not install They'll for more update if you do chances are it's going to break the unit the way you're used to using It's going to change the way it functions So be aware of this now that I've gone through it It's been working fine and I understand it and I know how to make it work And if somebody else has is in the same boat, let me know I can get it worked out for you But um it is now working fine and it's working the way I think that it should so That's it for my tech update. I want to learn about the nominal line from Dan. Yeah, thanks. I mean People have different words for it. This is what I call it and it has to do with Editing your audio whether you're using audacity or twisted wave or adobe audition When I'm editing I want no clicks between my edits, you know, some of you might be using You know punch and roll or literally roll and punch why they call it rolling I'll never know But there's a crossover point where the edit takes place automatically where the the audio is is dropped in And you're going to get a thump Reasons for that are when you edit you want to be able to edit from where there's no noise And I guess the only way to demonstrate this is to show you in twisted waves. So I'm going to share my screen here So so so hit record. Yeah, I'll hit record. So here's some audio. Okay, that's always There's the thin blue line. There's a thin blue line, which was a great movie by the way Yeah, um, so zoom in really tight like right to the end of the where the waveform is Like right there And zoom in tighter zoom in really tight Center that up zoom in really tight. Now you see Where it crosses the line right there That's your edit point And you know, it's it's a it's a crude little thing But it makes such a huge difference in your ability to edit. Well, here's one more secret If you're using twisted wave and you have the select mode called auto extend to zero crossing crossing It does it zero cross for you. So when you select this range right here Watch what changes So what it's done is adjust the selection so that when that edit happens those two meet at The zero crossing or as dan is calling it the nominal line line same idea And you're looking at this going well, wait a minute. I didn't want to make a selection that long Folks that selection is five a nanosecond of a second It's a very very very short period of time So you can seamlessly go in there and make edits like that and have them Completely disappear. You can remove a mouth noise. You can remove a plosive You can remove all kinds of stuff this way and have the edit be completely Seamless if you use that rule Right, absolutely. So it's some call it the zero crossover Somebody told me it was called the nominal line. They lied to me. I don't know But it's that blue line in the middle. It depends is to his teaching And I guess, you know, because it in every app calls it something different That's probably part of the problem. So nominal line seems like something you can carry from app to app Okay, then I will continue to use that How can we use it too? Well, there you go. Well, see this is how we compromise. This is how we collaborate This is how we get your audio perfect And we want your questions and we got a ton of them and we're going to get to them Right after these really important messages. So don't go away We'll be right back This is ariana rattner and you're enjoying voiceover body shop with dan lennard and george widham v obs.tv The harlehogan v o 1a microphone Now, perhaps you didn't know this but almost all of the equipment we use in voiceover was designed for making music The v o 1a is the only microphone specifically designed and tuned for voiceover and you're hearing me on it right now Now, obviously the v o 1a is very popular at voiceover essentials.com and harlan has been running low until now Until now harlan placed an order for a new supply of v o 1a's from mxl quite a while ago Now manufacturing them wasn't an issue but getting them to the u.s Was between covet and shipping constraints and of course skyrocketing costs Well, happy day voiceover people mxl informed harlan that his order had arrived in long beach and was going through required quality control testing of each mic Today and by the way, although it's difficult harlan is keeping the price the same despite inflation and logistics costs So if you've wanted one now's the time to order your harlan hogan signature series v o 1a voiceover mic today Go to voiceover essentials dot com Hey, it's time for our source connect spot because they are sponsoring The parent company of source connect is sponsoring our show source elements and we really appreciate it And why would you want to know about source connect and who should know about it? Well Why is the reason why is because the best best paying gigs Generally are going to be using technology like source connect Why because this is a tool that allows the production to run like a well-oiled machine As though you're actually physically at their studio But you don't have to be you can be at your home studio and as long as you've got good audio quality You've got control over the environment. You don't have a lot of noise interruptions from outside And you've got good gear reasonably good. We're not talking about thousands of dollars worth of microphones But a good sounding signal chain that you can rely on You can do source connect sessions now. You want to have a good solid internet connection really An ethernet connection is preferable over wi-fi For sure and you might even be requested to have ethernet But that ensures that there will be no wireless interruptions to the audio And you're going to get the most reliable connection possible This is going to let you be directed remotely recorded remotely And even sit in on the post side of the session where they end up editing the session And getting approval from the client while everyone waits It's pretty cool And it really ensures that everybody hears and gets what they want out of that session By the time they say goodbye Really great technology if you want to get a promo discount You can do that or you can just get a demo head over to source dash elements.com 15 day free trials are available. You don't need to have an iLock dongle to do it You just have to have the free iLock account And get yourself set up and running so you're ready to take on the big sessions Anyway, let's get on to the show those questions to be answered Right after this 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 Smart it's a phone. It's a smartphone, 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 red 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.com now if they will stop waxing this mustache for a minute. We'll get back to the show Hi, this is bill farmer and you are watching voiceover body shop. It's great The technical perfection continues here on voiceover body shop Anyway, we have a ton of questions here. This is what makes this show really fun You guys get to ask questions. So let's start off With grace newton says what does one typically mount their road arms to? The road arms mine is currently mounted to the desk where my mac and interface are But last tech talk george said that that's not advisable because of bumps and etc stuff like that Always best to mount it to the wall, isn't it? Yeah, if you can and if you have a wall close enough to where your mic arm is going to go Mount it to the wall. There is actually wall mount brackets available Hile h e i l Makes a wall mount bracket and there's some other company that's not known well known But if you look on amazon or look around online, you'll find wall bracket mounts for your microphone arm Where you can actually They're they're real until the universal like i've seen very few variations on the way these are designed so If you get the generic one that you'll see on amazon or the high the hyal product that was out of stock for a long time Maybe it's back Attach it to any wall closest to you And and you're going to be much happier because you're going to get rid of that desk collision hard drive vibration Thumping problem pretty effectively that way. Yeah, I it's always a problem. I mean I can tap on my desk You know and it's not you're not going to get That's why you mount it to the wall. You do not connect it to your desk Usually usually the best thing is to have a floor mounted stand or if you've got a retriculated arm like this one best to mount it to the wall and So that's the best answer for that. Uh, and that's why we always say that You have the one from patricia Hi patricia, uh, what's the best way to to to set the twisted wave For voiceover. Hopefully there's more to this question. Well, yes, there is So we can't edit the loud portions after With twist a wave sure you can um Yes, you can you absolutely can I use an Apollo solo and sometimes i'm a newbie I don't know what to do after I normalize To minus 3db etc, but then some loud portions are still loud Okay, that's question one so Here's the thing like if you're doing auditions Some compression is going to be a little bit helpful. So compression is that thing that allows you to control the dynamics a bit So the loud loud loud Isn't so darn loud over the quiet parts and that I think is more helpful for animation stuff Where you have these very wide swings and dynamics If you're doing commercial auditions or anything narrative that's just spoken word Don't worry about it like those dynamics. It's part of your performance It's just the way you're acting Um, if you want to control it You can control it through your performance If you really need to adjust it in post Dan and I can train you on how to do production We can teach you how to record how to edit how to control levels How to use a compressor all that kind of stuff if that's something you want to get into but All that absolutely can be done in twisted wave in adobe audition It doesn't matter what audio editor doll you're using You can do those things. There's just steps in the process to doing it and we can show you how Yeah, and they're not and they're not hard. I mean there It's really important to really understand What all those dynamics are I mean we were just talking a little bit about, you know, where you know the crossover points and stuff like that But what is amplitude and how do you how do you control all that and uh, you know My thing is generally there are physical ways to make sure that you do it right And the the more you can do physically to prevent problems The less problems you'll have on the other end But if you you know normalizing is one of those things that is horrendously misunderstood You know, most people think if you record too low, why you just normalize it? But you also increase the background noise considerably Uh, she also had a question about mouth clicks. What's the holy grail to prevent them? I go with this stuff I actually had to use this today because I had a very spicy lunch Um, but it's called alcohol. You can get it over the counter at your pharmacy Mix a 20 to 1 with water spray about 10 sprays into your mouth use it, you know find a sprayer And uh, just don't use a mouth numbing sprayer because the stuff is still in there and spray Anyway, yeah, that's not a joke Yeah, but no, it's happening. Lannocaine, lannocaine, any cane stuff makes you Yeah, stuff does not wash out of the bottles for some reason, but this stuff works It is miraculous for for alka Lol for the podcast listeners out there Yeah, lol for for whatever Uh, okay TJ, let's see here. TJ mezzacapo voiceover. Hey, dan and george. That's us I'm using a rhodent one in the audio and id for with mogami gold cables Great for some reason though. The audio is super low and has a lot of interference hiss What can I do to fix it? Thanks. Well, not enough specificity there Uh, it could be all sorts of things If you've got a good mic and nt1 you've got an audio id for which is an excellent interface mogami cables, which are Cables standard. Yeah, right Uh, why is it low? You got to turn up your gain if you've got it cranked all the way Perhaps you've got something choking it off like a 10 db pad or something, which is not on the nt1 Nor is it on an audience id for So where is your gain set? And all mistakenly set to gain way too low in an audience id for right You've got to really crank it up to about over 80 Uh to make the the id for work. It's got a A a logarithmic scale that gives you much more gain in the upper 10 15 percent Then in the lower parts, but remember All of this stuff was designed for recording music And lots of dynamic changes and loud audio Where you're going to be turning it down and you know, if you're playing a trumpet into a microphone Yeah, you don't have to have high gain, but voiceover, which is much more conversational. You got to really crank it So that is probably the issue. That's my best guess. I mean, yeah, if it's something beyond that then there's a technical flaw In one part of your equipment Um, uh, he said he sent in the audio. So at some point we'll be taking a listen to it, I guess Right, um, but yeah, I mean if there might be another technical flaw If you don't have an alternative piece of equipment because when you're doing trouble shooting You have to swap things out one at a time, right? So if you don't know why you're getting this result, you have a lot of things to swap you have computers You've got usb cables. You have the interface itself You have the mic cable, which I think in this case is the least likely culprit, but who knows and you have the mic So being able to swap out each thing one at a time until you narrow down what's causing it Is part of that process so Keep that in mind You might want to get another very very basic interface As a backup or an alternative to your id for yeah at the end of the day If you rely on your gear to make a living you should have a backup for each thing that you use Um, you know having multiple microphones in multiple interfaces Is not that big of an expense if you didn't overspend in the first place Good boy. So, you know, you should have that available to you said the gains two to three o'clock That is still pretty low. You need to be about four to five o'clock On the id four to get a healthy Recording level that's been our experience. Yeah Uh play the voice real kids vio family great show follow up for a question for tech talk Is there a microphone you would say is better suited for young kids voice frequencies than others? I'll say a mic is a mic is a mic And You know, it's not it's not going to make a difference if you use proper microphone technique You're not going to book a gig or not book a gig because of the microphone You're using as long as you're using a good microphone Yeah, if you're using a good what what do you think? Well, if you're using a good standard condenser microphone, uh, like this, uh, at 20 1823 not this one. You just heard fall on my desk. This thing is like a hammer You don't want one of these this is a dynamic mic This is made for being sung into and you screamed at But if you're using a decent quality condenser mic like this one, one that's harland hogan vo 1a. It's above dan I'm using a shotgun mic called the ntg 5 from road Um, and this is a this is a hundred fifty dollar one microphone You're going to be fine because all these mics were designed to record except for the shotgun mics were really Specifically are more for dialogue All these condenser mics like this are music oriented and they're designed to record the entire spectrum of audible sound so Whether your kid's voice is this octave or in this octave or if they're down in this octave Any good modern microphone will record all of those frequencies almost essentially the same So it at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter any quality condenser mic Can record any frequency of a human voice Equally well and remember the more sense the more expensive the mic the more sensitive it is The more the acoustics of the room you are in come into play background noise that sort of thing Uh, you don't want a great microphone will not change the way you read copy I'm getting really upset with people saying you got to try this mic I'm not going to make a difference guys if you you can't read your way out of a paper bag. It's not going to change it Uh, you get bc's question Something about static Failed mic I'm thinking that tj's issue based on more notes that keep keep coming down the pipeline that he's got a bad nt1 Sounds pretty much like it to me. I've heard it happen since he's already swapped everything else out um Let's see. Sometimes there's uh bc says sometimes there's a static electric shock when I touch the mic. Oh, no Oh god, um, dan, you know how that feels right? You've dealt with that a little bit Um, uh touching the mic the mic stand The interface or my computer. Is that really bad? It is it can be very bad because that spark that static electric spark Can confuse things scrambled scrambled the signal in your computer It can reset things because it's like getting a surge of electricity And it can freak out your equipment. Um, it can make something reboot It can possibly make you lose data. I'm not sure if I've ever seen that happen for sure But there's a lot of things that you uh that are bad about that. So Yeah, to prevent that If you're in any standard home that has plumbing The best thing to try to do is to touch A sink or anything metal that is plumbing because your plumbing is going to be attached to the physical earth Below goes into the ground And that's where you get ground you need to ground yourself which will discharge the static before You touch your stuff If you don't have that capability You might want to shop for something called a grounding pad Or a grounding mat That plugs into the ground of your electrical wiring. That's the the small the the the pin at the bottom of the outlet You've got the two slots and then the the center hole in the middle That's the ground pin and that'll just start discharge the The electricity into the ground before it goes into your gear or into your lips Yeah I've had that one. We put a new rug here in the studio and there's been a couple of painful exchanges between me and positive and negative. It's uh Bang, whoa, it shuts off cameras. Oh, it's just weird stuff Static electricity is not a lot of current. It never it won't kill anybody. Right, but it's a lot of voltage It's actually quite a lot and that's enough to disrupt um electronics Last one part of the second part anyways, and if the power goes off prior To turning down the game sort of like a blackout or an operator error does that harm the mic? No, generally not. I If you have a mat bad electrical surge from a lightning strike That could that could fry everything that could fry a lot of things because that's a high power voltage surge But no, I think just shutting things down improperly or I'm plugging them in the wrong order Generally will not damage any modern condenser mic. So I wouldn't worry too much about that Yeah, not as much as a lightning strike on a radio antenna I've seen transmitters just Oh boy, yeah, that's yeah right in the middle of ratings too. Not a good thing Uh jonathan grant since you stop, you know, I don't get this since you stopped Recommending the focus right scarlet 2i 2 and solo. Do you have a comparable interface to recommend that doesn't cost 6.2 million dollars? I don't recall Not recommending the focus right 2i 2 and solo It's an option. That was a piece of my news two weeks ago What is tim friehlander was saying that some several studios some studios in new york So I I I'm not saying that it's a bad piece of gear I'm just saying that there is some star some studios that for some reason have a prejudice against that product And I don't know exactly why I know tim said he has had some Inconsistencies with that piece of gear some bad experiences with that piece of gear And the thing is there's three different generations of scarlets There's one two and three And I don't know which of them maybe one of maybe it was the two That had a bad rap because they had the one they had the two then they had the three The three came out pretty quickly after the two maybe the two has some problems I don't know but whatever it is. They they had some kind of a Reason to believe it's not pro quality At the end of the day you can buy a a steinberg ur 12 same basic price And it's going to give you the same basic features and give you the same basic sound quality. So That one's totally fine If you need to be totally portable Um, you want something very portable you go with the mic port pro pro. Yeah, my car point two million dollars, but 300 dollars Um, and then something else in the middle would be like the ssl2 Um, I had very good luck with that with my recommendations and people that have had it Um, and that's in the 250 dollar range. So Not near 6.2 million. Yeah, it's yeah. Yeah, I mean they're all Anything over You know, I mean the solo is what 120 bucks. There's there is a new one for personas. I think it's called the go Yeah, I have not personally had or used one yet. It's 80 dollars Yeah, and universal audio has the uh, the the the bolt or the volt They had the that's right. There's a new series from universal that goes sort of the to the more basic way of operating Not with the complex Super difficult to use console called the volt series Yeah, you could check out the volt one is another option. They're all under 200 dollars. So yes nowhere near 6.2 million and You know don't exaggerate that much Uh, okay, we got a question here about a webcam. Let's go on to j. Horace black's question here about a google minispeaker Is this not an iot device again describe? What's an iot device an iot device is any device that connects directly to your network over wi-fi or ethernet? So if it's a bluetooth device that just uses bluetooth, that's not on the internet It's not internet of things if it's a device that you control with a wireless a wireless remote like this um It could be an internet of things if you had to set it up using Your router or your wi-fi if you had to type your routers Here's the thing right how many times have you had to go into some strange application? And type in the routers username not the username, but the routers password The password you use to connect to your wi-fi network This is why these internet of things can be in security risk because that $10 chinese wi-fi light bulb knows The access credentials for your wi-fi network Now you're getting where i'm at and why these things can be a little bit risky So uh, you want to be careful that's that's what we're talking about when we're saying On the internet of things device probably a google speaker is one of the least likely things you have to worry about Because i would think that google would be extremely careful to make sure its software is up to date and is safe Um, but yes that technically is an iot thing. Yeah Uh, play the voice real kids video family. It's such a long title. Maybe just reduce it to like phil Or something like that Uh for submitting auditions, is it better to normalize the audio before sending or just send the raw audio is captured? well it depends Normalization now there are different views on this and different people have different ways of looking at it Our friend uncle roy always says when you finish recording normalize stuff before you start working on it And then once you finish all the processing normalize it again to get it to back to to uh to negative three Um, it's badly misused. It's misunderstood If you record right in the first place your modulation is proper If you normalize it shouldn't do anything Meaning that you're very little or very little and uh, so If you've recorded and you've got nice fat Wave forms, you know, but you're not over modulating if you normalize Is not going to hurt anything Yeah, you can do it But I would want to see what your recordings look like first because if you normalize stuff that's recorded too low You're going to be adding a lot of hissing and white noise and stuff like that. So don't do that Um, but if you're recording properly up front, yes, you can normalize uh afterwards Okay, you get a question I'll do it Patricia says are you familiar with the synco mic d2 as a matter of fact? We are yeah, because they did a hell of a good job of marketing it on YouTube through influencers getting them in the hands of A lot of influencers and they've uh, they've done a really good job of getting their brand out there that way So yes, we have i'm familiar with it. It sounds fine It's nothing special, but it sounds fine. It doesn't sound anything at all like the mic. It's imitating Like the 416. This is a shotgun mic. It doesn't sound anything like the sennheiser mkh 416 So you get that out of the way um It sounds fine, uh, I have not shot it out or compared it directly to any of the shotgun mics I have I have the road ntg 4 and the 5 Um, so I can't say how it compares to that But I can say I've heard it many times because people have bought them because they're so cheap And I've heard them and they always have a very Natural and I would say dare sort of a flat sound So I think they might be really good on women if you have a tendency towards sibilance It will smooth that out Or if some men have some tendency towards sibilance as well, it's going to smooth that out But if you have a darker voice like I do not a lot of high-end frequency content It's going to sound rather dull on my voice and I might have to brighten it up later To get the sound that I wouldn't want it to sound like so Dan how about you? Have you heard some samples from the Think of it might be to know I don't believe in in modeling mics It's not a modeling mic. It's just a cheap shotgun mic. It's like a $200 shotgun. Oh, oh, oh, yeah, that's right Well, yeah, it's uh, it sounds okay, you know, if you if you put it if you use it, right If you use the right technique with it No one's going to know what mic it is in the first place. That's the thing. I don't get You know, it's like, you know, you've got operators, you know engineers in new york saying you can't use a 2i 2 and scarlet 2i 2 Okay, I'm using an audio night e4 But I'm still using my My focus right to absolutely no way. They'll know Exactly unless you tell them so One's the word on that not a clue. Yeah Henry lorak has got a good question here best mixer for a home studio seen a few for podcasts with memory opinion old radio guy from the gates yard and audiogram and others with the roundpipes The thing is what are you mixing? Uh, you know, all of the all of the interfaces today, you know, some of them have like two inputs If you're only doing one microphone And you're not mixing anything else. Why would you even use a mixer? Now? I'm using uh, the rhodecaster pro Which is indeed a mixer made for podcasting, but it also works great for voiceover But I do a lot of other things aside from just voiceover. So it's important That you understand That a mixer isn't the answer to all sorts of problems because you know people aren't running ISTN anymore, right, george And that was why people would use mixers. They had created a hydra of Of cables and stuff like you don't have to do that anymore. All this stuff can be routed into your computer very easily Uh, and and very simple interfaces Do just fine and you you can do the mixing Afterwards in post using multitracking. So I I don't get why people are like I got to get a good mixer Well, unless you're doing live audio or something you're trying to mix down a band, but for voiceover not really that necessary Yeah, the rhodecaster pro is the one I have the most experience with and the best overall long-term user experience with So if you miss that radio console feeling I would still probably recommend that one if that's what you're after Yeah, one more question. Yeah, which is an interesting one because sort of goes to what we were talking about with normalizing, but Uh new loudness question when processing files for auditions. Why are you processing and what processing are you using? Uh for auditions or tracks for demos on a personal website. Is there a standard for loudness? Like normalized to minus 3db with loudness and minus 14luf Why do you people go look at all these numbers? It's intimidating forget about it get your get your modulation right get your mic technique right And get your acoustics right and you don't have to worry about any of this stuff because the engineers don't ask you about it do they I think the only time i've ever seen specs for this is video game directors saying like Peaks around minus 18 And that's about it Or audiobook productions where mastering is required at a specific exact Dinah, you know rms range, right? I've done some little surveys about it and the average I seem to be seeing is about minus 20 Roughly for the average level seems to be what most people are delivering Their audition files at it's not a standard though. So if you're going up as high as minus 14 Much much too loud I would say minus 20 is a range to focus on but That's been my experience. Yeah, if you're modulating properly it all comes out anyway, which is you know I think if you concentrate too much on the geeky stuff here and all the numbers and all and things like that That's what's intimidating. I happen to know Jonathan Grant is a car guy. Oh, okay Geek He's an awesome dude. He loves hot rods and he's an attention to detail kind of guy. I see a picture of his studio. It's amazing I can't wait But uh, yeah, it's yeah, it's easy to get caught in the numbers, but there there still is no actual Established industry standard level for anything that we do overall, right because there's different industries Which is the other thing that I think people forget, you know, you as you said audio books video games commercials Narration it's all different and all the standards are different because there are no standard But if you record it, right Any engineer is going to say okay that works And that's all you got to worry about. Did you interpret the copy properly? Means a heck of a lot more just don't go too low and don't over modulate and you'll probably be fine Alrighty, well Well, that was an interesting half hour I'm gonna turn off my light now. Bye. Okay, and we'll be right back to finish things up right after this Before time began there was v obs dot tv Watch or else Hey, it's david h. Lawrence the 17th and we talk a lot in this business about moving forward with our career Getting more information We often don't talk about simply getting started It can be one of the most immovable objects In in our life getting out of our own way and just simply taking the first step And if you're watching this podcast voiceover body shop For some tips on how to get started in voiceover or to change something about your voiceover career or to increase your knowledge in a certain area Check out vio heroes comms getting started in voiceover If you go to vio heroes comm slash start, you'll get all the information It's really cheap And I give you a lot to get started in the business But you might also learn something if you've been in the voiceover business for a while vio heroes comm slash start That's vio heroes comm slash start In these modern times every business needs a website when you need a website for your voice acting business There's only one place to go like the name says voice actor websites comm Their experience in this niche webmaster market gives them the ability to quickly and easily get you from concept to live online In a much shorter time when you contact voice actor websites comm Their team of experts and designers really get to know you and what your needs are They work with you to highlight what you do Then they create an easily navigable website for your potential clients to get the big picture of who you are And how your voice is the one for them plus voice actor websites comm has other great resources Like their practice script library and other resources to help your voiceover career flourish Don't try it yourself. Go with the pros voice actor websites comm Where your vio website shouldn't be a pain in the you know what? This is the latin lover narrator from jane the virgin anthony mendez You're enjoying dan and george on the voiceover body show And we're back To get out of here, but we still got a couple of things we got to cover Uh next week on this show. We got another great cast. I'm not saying who So stay tuned for that. Who are our donors of the week this week? We have jonathan grant christopher epperson sarah borgias philips appear thomas pinto shelly avaleno george wittom your dad brine page patty gibbons rob raider gregg thomas a doctor voice atland productions shana pains and baird martha con don griffith tray moseley diana birdsall and sandra man willard Alrighty remember if you want to uh You want to have you you want to get your audio right and you want to learn from the guys that know What what it's supposed to sound like? Well, you can talk to us you can go to my website, which is homevoiceoverstudio.com and see all the stuff I do And george you go over you want to talk to george you go over to george the Tech and I just happen to notice somebody asked about how do you donate to the show dan? Well, go to our website v obs dot tv and right underneath the big screen. It says Donate now. Yes, please donate in red Let's look for that at the bottom right below the video image And you can make it one time just a little contribution if you heard something helpful Or you can make a small subscription donation on a monthly basis through paypal So click on the red and give us some green Yeah, I like it Alrighty, uh, thanks to our sponsors tonight. Uh harlan hogan's voiceover essentials voiceover extra source elements vio heroes dot com voice actor websites dot com And jmc demo demos Thanks to jeff holman for great work in the chat room tonight lots of questions You know we we seem to get more questions for tech talk than we do sometimes for the guests Oh, that's definitely come the case. Yeah, which is fine and we appreciate those questions Sumer lino for putting up with us for the last two hours And uh our technical director getting it done and of course lee pennie for being lee pennie. Well Kids it's not an easy business. You got to be you got to be a good voice actor And you got to get your audio sounding right But we've come to the conclusion that if it sounds good It is good. I'm dan Leonard and i'm george wittem and this is voiceover Body shop or vio bs tech talk talk tech talk tech talk tech talk. We'll see you next week. Have a good one everybody