 Hey! It's Monday! Time for VoiceOver Body Shop! And our guest tonight is our good buddy, Mark Cashman! Yay! We got lots of stuff. You got a question for him. Throw it in our chat room, either in Facebook or on our website, or wherever you want it, you know, or just yell it with smoke signals. Coming up here on VoiceOver Body Shop, right now. Two men, twin sons from different mothers, with a passion for voice over recording technology and the desire to make recording easy for voice actors everywhere. Together in one place, George Whittem, 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 VoiceOver superstars, and leading the discussion on how to make the most of your voiceover business. This is VoiceOver Body Shop. VoiceOver Body Shop is brought to you by VoiceOverEssentials.com, home of Harlan Hogan's signature products, source elements, remote connections made even easier, VO2GoGo.com, everything you need to be a successful voiceover artist, J. Michael Collins' demos, award-winning demo production, VoiceActorWebsites.com, where your voiceover website won't be a pain in the butt, and VoiceOver Extra, your daily resource for VO success. And now, live from their super-secret multimedia studio in Sherman Oaks, California, here are George Wittem and Dan Leonard. Hey there, I'm Dan Leonard. And I'm George Wittem. And this is VoiceOver. Body Shop. Or VOBS. Well, all right, welcome back to our live show here. And boy, you know, we, you know, watched the Super Bowl yesterday. I've been in LA for three years now. What was that game you're talking about? It was some Super Bowl. Yeah, yes, whatever it was. The Super Bowl. Oh, you've been watching Jeopardy 2. Yeah, no, of course, congratulations to Sue, our technical director for... For doing absolutely nothing, just happy to be from the same town as the football team. From Boston, yeah. You know, I mean, I've seen, I've been here in LA for three years now, and I've seen the Dodgers lose two World Series and the Rams lose. It's like being home in Buffalo. It's like, I haven't left. I can't say it anymore because now the Eagles actually did win a Super Bowl, and I'm still pinching myself because it feels like that can't be true. I know. Well, we've got a great guest tonight. Mark Cashman is going to join us. If you've got a question at any time, and you're in our chat room, which you should be, throw it in there. And Mike Merlino is our chat room guy tonight, and he will throw it to us. And so let's get things on the road here. Let's do it. All right. Well, let's introduce our guest. Mark Cashman is one of the few people in commercial production business that's on both sides of the glass, an award-winning radio and TV commercial producer, as well as a working voice actor and author, and just a good guy. Welcome to our show. Mark Cashman. Yeah, Mark. Welcome to the show. Thank you, George. Thank you so much for inviting me. This is the coolest ever, ever, ever. I love this place. You keep on making it better and better every time I come here. It's a work in progress. Just come once a year, and you'll see the progress. Don't come more often than that. We'll have a buffet here next year. It'll be really something. We do have beer now, though. There's a beer dispenser. Oh, you're kidding. I'll show you that later. No, we've got everything. Oh, that is so cool. In modern place. I'll wait. I'll hold off. Okay. All right. So what's you been up to? About five, eight. You're not quite. No, no, no. That number's not going up. Okay, all right. No, I'm up to about, I don't know, two quarts a day. Yes, exactly. We're here all week trying the veal. No, I've been... I've just been doing what I normally do, and I just keep on doing that for some strange reason. Which is? Which is well... All these things that I mentioned? Yeah, yeah, actually, yeah. I mean, I'm still writing and producing and casting commercials. I'm still teaching. I'm still writing. I'm still public speaking. And so just juggling those four things is... It's keeping me out of trouble. Okay, what kind of trouble could you possibly get into? Don't even ask. Don't even go there. We won't go there. That's perfectly fine. But other than that, yeah, no. I've been very, very busy and having a good time doing it, which is... That's the whole point, is it not? Right. And planning a lot, not just sitting on my laurels and doing the same thing. I've been planning. I've been doing some new things. For instance, I was just talking to you earlier about the fact that I'm actually starting to do what you and George have been doing for the past eight years, and I'm bringing cameras. I brought cameras into the studio that I work out of in Burbank, California. So now, people, if they want to audit one of my classes and be a literal fly on the wall, they can. No matter where they don't have to live in or near LA. Yeah. Now, the people who do live in or near LA can still come by and sit in and see what's going on. But now with the cameras, we're working that out. We're beta testing it and just trying to make it really, really a great experience for people who don't know what it's like to be in a studio. It's going perfectly smoothly. I'm sure everything worked the first try. Yes. It's been required. No learning curve. No learning curve. Absolutely. Everything went off without a hitch the first time. And if you believe that, I got some real estate to sell you in the Galapagos somewhere. It's a worthy endeavor to be able to reach way more people and help a lot more people. Absolutely. Plus, you guys have had eight years to tweak it. You know, I mean, so, yes. This week, we never stopped. This week. So yeah, so we're just getting started and we're just tweaking it and seeing how it goes. But I'm really excited because it's something new and I'm offering, again, just some more things that people can get out of the experience. And you know, truthfully, this is one of the reasons that I offer audits to begin with is because I want people to get a taste of what it's like to see what it's like and not have to invest a whole lot of time and money to see that they may not like it. That's right. They may not see it for them. But you audit any class. Absolutely. And in fact, I do. I suggest people, if you're thinking of taking anything, whether it's acting classes, voiceover, improv, swimming, it doesn't matter what. If you can audit a class, do it. Right. Because this way, you get to taste it. It's like, you know, going to a salad bar. You taste, you just see if you like it. If you don't like it, you spin it out. Right. So when you audit a swim class, do you have to wear a bathing suit? I would. Well, I don't know about that. That's, I'm going to have to. That's, that's a good question. That's a good question. So just to feel like you're part of the group. Right. Maybe just splashing water on your face. Yeah, maybe. Of course, now if someone's auditing it and they're like, did site, I don't like it, they can leave and you're not going to be in self-care. You're not going to see them like picking themselves and then walking out of the room. That's right. That's right. So that's a good idea. Yeah. So one of the things that I've been, I've been paying attention to, because I pay attention to a lot of things, probably more things than I should, I noticed that you've been publishing your 365 voiceover tips. Yeah. So one per day. How did you start doing that? And give us an example of some of those. I started doing it when I was talking to my daughter, a 24-year-old millennial, which is Department of Redundancy Department. But we were talking about having a web presence. And she said, Dad, if you want to have a web presence, you've got to be online consistently and have something and have content. And I said, hmm, online consistently have content. Okay. So I said, okay, let me just start small. I said, okay, I'm going to do 10 voiceover tips over 10 days. Yeah. And I did that. And I did it consistently for 10 days on LinkedIn, Facebook, that whole bunch of Facebook pages, Twitter. So those three things. Yeah. Which I knew. Mm-hmm. Then around eight, around, I started getting feedback by around like six, seven, eight. And people start saying, hey, these are great. Why don't you do more? And I said, okay. So I expanded it to 20. And then I got good more feedback. And I said, hmm, okay. So I just kept on going. You had the ball rolling. Yeah. Had the ball rolling. I had a system in place. And then I realized, oh my God, I'm in it. Right. In it now. I'm in it now. Up to your neck is. And I said, okay, so what am I going to, where am I taking this? Am I going to do 20? Am I going to do 30? Am I going to do 50? Am I going to do 100? Well, then I decided to challenge myself and said, okay. Do you know enough to do 365 tips one a day, every day, for an entire year? And not just changing the sentence structure of another tip. That's exactly right. It had to be distinctly different. Yeah. And I said that. And that was my challenge. I set my challenge up for myself and pulled it off. Amazingly, I also had wonderful, wonderful help from a couple of people, voice actors who asked if they could create graphics to accompany the tips. And so that really, really helped do it. Natasha Marchewka, one of my colleagues, she did about 200. The last 200, 265. And I'm blanking on the wonderful lady who helped me do the first 100. I'm just totally blanking and I totally apologize. But both of these wonderful women helped me really package these auditions. I mean, these tips. And in terms of the day that I started it, I just did it 365 days from that point. And then I think it was like mid, it's 2019. So mid 2018 is when I finished. And then I decided, okay, I'm going to do it again, but I'll start on January 1st. And that way I could do three, and keep track. So give us an example of a couple of these. Like what's today's? January, whatever it is. First today's, today's. Oh, it's February already. Yes, it's February. That's right, February 4th already. Exactly. It was a quote from, inspired by Dawes Butler. For those of you who don't know Dawes Butler, Dawes Butler was basically Mel Blank's counterpart at Hanna-Barbera. So Mel was with Warner Brothers. Dawes was with Hanna-Barbera. But Dawes did almost as many voices as Mel did. And Mel, Dawes said, fall in love with the word, love the words, but don't fall in love with them. And the whole tip was basically, was color your words when you have the opportunity. And when I talk about coloring words, I many, many times will say, that when you're coloring words and you're talking to your peers, that those colors need to be in shades, pastels, watercolors, colored pencils. That's the color you're using for your peers, your colleagues, adults. And the only time that you'll change that, get broader, get more vibrant with your colors, more day glow and finger paints, is when you're talking to toddlers. That's right. Exactly. You see, that's exactly it. That's it. So you can go get bigger, broader, over the top with toddlers. But that's pretty much about it. Good job. Yeah, yeah. So that's just one of the many, many tips. I'm totally completely blanking on any of them, any of the other ones right now. But now I've added Instagram. Here's how much I knew about Instagram. You can't miss them. You're out there somewhere. What's wild is, so my daughter said, Dad, you have to add Instagram to the tips there. And they're Instagram what? And I said, no, no, no, I at least knew what it was. So I went online to Instagram and I couldn't figure out how to post from my computer. Oh yeah. Easy from your phone. That's not easy. That's the only thing that's the only way you can post on Instagram is from your phone, not your computer, which I found out very, very quickly. So she, I got the learning curve on that one real quick. So now at least I'm somewhat up to speed, at least. Okay, I hope. Well, that's good. If you're just joining us, our guest is Mark Cashman. There he is right there. If you've got a question for Mark, throw it in our chat room right now and we'll try and get to that question sometime in the next half hour or so. There's also a Zoom room running. And the Zoom room is running slowly in there. So we'll go to take an actual live voice. Oh, very cool. Question. Very, very cool. Okay, very cool. That's great. Fun of live broadcasting. So one of the other things that you do, I mean, in your coaching, you're constantly giving people advice. You're directing people. You're teaching them how to be better voice actors and stuff. But really the question is, a lot of people ask about what mistakes they make. I mean, people want to do the right thing. I think probably the best way to do the right thing is to learn all the things that you shouldn't be doing. That part of it. What are some of the biggest mistakes you find? Because I know you audition people and you're teaching people all the time. What is it something you find that most people make the most mistakes on? I would say probably the most common mistake is the fact that they're reading every single word and punctuation mark as if it were engraved in stone. Yes. And I keep reminding people, I said, this is ad copy, not Shakespeare. And so basically you have to, the people who can pull off commercial copy of the best are actors who understand improv and ad lib. Absolutely. And basically so that you can take a script and make it become much more conversational when you again understand that you don't have to cue every single word and punctuation mark in that copy. Right. But I think people fear doing that. They don't want to insult the writer and stuff like that. And that's just it. You don't have to insult the writer. You want to honor what the writer wrote always. You want to do that. But at the same time, for instance, I know people who will read again every single word on that page, even if it's wrong, even if it's grammatically incorrect, they'll still read it. Never seen that before. Yes, I know. I call those people voice-over lemmings. That's right. Absolutely. And so basically again, I encourage people to think outside the box, to have the balls, the temerity to change things if they need it, and just not be a lemming in that regard. Don't follow the crime. And don't be afraid to enhance the copy a little bit, embellish the copy, and of course take things out that you know are absolutely wrong. That's crazy. Why would you do that? The name you've been looking for, searching the back of your mind, was Lisa Rice. Thank you so much, Lisa Rice. My apologies. Absolutely. Thank you, Lisa. And again, Lisa and Natasha both put together so many wonderful, just every single one is different. It's interesting. It's fun. And it's so much compliments what I wrote. I can't even begin to tell you. So thank you, Lisa. And my apologies. She's great. I've worked with her. Yes. Wonderful. I have too. Wonderful. Speak to her fairly real often. Thank you. Met her like at the... My brain, I've been losing brain cells just a little bit each. Met her before the Revoice conferences. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. A long time ago. Anyway, let's get Mark Cashman as our guest. Now as a coach, we see a lot of coaches out there, maybe way too many. Now someone like you who's been in the trenches and been doing this an entire career, we know you know what you're doing. But when should people start to look for a coach? I mean, obviously when they're starting out, it's good to find one. Oh, yeah. But should a coach definitely take somebody on just because they want to? And what should someone look for in a coach, aside from the spelling of your name? What should they look for? Well, first of all, we were talking about auditing before. And I always suggest that people try to audit at least... The most important thing is to do your homework. Absolutely. Do your homework, do your research, and find out about the person that you're thinking of working with. Do they have... Have they been doing this a long time? Do they know what they're doing? What's their body of work? Do they have testimonials? And people who are vouching for them? Are they, again, well-known in the industry and respected in the industry? And I always say the best actors never stop learning. So you can take on a coach no matter what. Now I work with people who say, from beginners to veterans. I'll work with veterans who say, I used to book all the time, make six figures, seven figures, not a problem. And now I can't get arrested. What am I doing wrong? So sometimes we have that. Some people say, hey, I want to get started with a coach. I work better with a one-to-one than in classes. And everybody works differently there too. So sometimes that will be a reason for you to pick a coach. Other times you might say, hey, my agent dropped me. Maybe it's something I'm doing wrong. Or I've been struggling with this particular genre of voiceover copy that I really, really want to get into. And I just can't seem to get into the groove and know what I need to know. So there are so, so many reasons to have a coach. What people forget is that the best actors in the world have coaches. Meryl Streep has a coach. I'm sure she does. Daniel Day-Lewis has a coach. Jack Nicholson has a coach. You don't know about these coaches. They're in the background and these celebrities are never going to tell you they have coaches. Every single professional in the world, whether it's an actor, singer, athlete, it doesn't matter what, they all have coaches. Top, top coaches, why? To keep them honed, to keep their skills sharp, to basically so they don't fall back on their laurels, and so that they're constantly learning something new and being challenged and just being better. The best actors never stop learning, ever. And so I couldn't think of a better reason to have a coach other than the fact that you just want to get better at what you do. Absolutely. No matter where you are. How about Bill Murray? Do you think Bill Murray has a coach? No. I don't know. I don't know for sure. My sense is probably not. He doesn't even have an agent. You know, he can imagine coaching you. You know Bill Murray has a 1 in 100 number? Are you serious? You want to book Bill Murray? Call him. Call him's 1 in 100. Are you serious? Oh, I love that. Oh, I just love that. Oh, that is fantastic. And that's not surprised me at all. I know we got a lot of questions from our audience, and some people actually want to get on Zoom and talk to you and answer those questions. So we've got all that coming up right after these messages. Don't go away. Yep. This is VOBS. Proving anybody can have a show these days. 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. So if you want your voice actor website without the hassle of complexity and dealing with too many options, go to voicehactorwebsites.com where your VO website shouldn't be a pain in the, you know what? What question do we get most often? Well far and away it's how do I even get started in voice over? And we have a great answer to that question. Take VO2GoGo's free Getting Started in VO class. You heard right. It's free and it's available online 24 seven at gettingstartedinvo.com. That's gettingstartedinvo.com. If you've been watching VOBS and thinking that you need to get in gear and start your own voice over career, this is the class you should start with. You'll learn about the vocal skills you need, the storytelling skills you need, the equipment you need, and the business skills you need. All in one single comprehensive online class taught by VO2GoGo's David H. Lawrence the 17th. This class won the Backstage Readers Choice Award four years in a row. And again, there's no charge. It's absolutely free. Want to take it? Sure you do. Go to gettingstartedinvo.com. That's gettingstartedinvo.com. 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 jeans for wearing and there's jeans for working. Dickies. Cause 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 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 Rick. This is your knee, Rick. When hope is lost. It's the I-8 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 jmichaelatjmcvoiceover.com. Now, if Dan will stop waxing this mustache for a minute, we'll get back to the show. V.O.B.S. is still on? Seriously? And we're back! Here on Voice Over Body Shop, we're talking with Mark Cashman. Again, if you've got a question for him, throw it in the chat room. And I know we've got some people on Zoom that want to ask a question, but the first question we have is from Brighan O'Brien, who apparently is a former student of yours. Yes. Or a current student of yours. And hopefully current. Hopefully current. And we're about to find out. Right. And he says, Hey, I answered this question. Yes, this is, I'm a beginner in the modern age of Voice Over. Having worked a bit in the 90s, I coached one-on-one with Mark all last summer. It was transformative. Transformative. Now I'm auditioning for commercials on pay-to-play sites. Haven't booked a gig yet. As a veteran stage actor, I'm used to altering my accent, pitch, breathing, delivery speed, etc. Based on the character, for example, Hamlet doesn't sound anything like King Lear, does he? No. But okay, that's all right. If a client doesn't like my sound, is there any value in playing around with my vocal delivery for these custom demo auditions? Maybe as a second take. We'll leave it at that, because this question gets even more detailed than that. Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, first of all, trying to please people on the pay-to-play sites is a Sisyphean task. I mean, it's just, it's ridiculous. And of course, truthfully, I was just telling, talking to Dan earlier, the pay-to-play sites are, I call the blind leading the blind. Nobody knows what the heck they're doing. And heck is the minimal word that I can possibly use here. A small percentage. Absolutely, absolutely. Here's the bottom line. When a client is listening to your audition on a pay-to-play site, they're not listening to how great an actor you are, unfortunately. They're listening to your voice print, the actual sound of your voice. And they're listening to see whether that's the sound of your voice, matches their product or service. Now, yes, your delivery is certain that it's part and parcel of it, but it's literally the sound of your voice that your voice print. And so if it calls for a millennial, a 20-something person, and you're a 40-something or 50-something, if you think that you can sound like a millennial, think again. I'm serious. I am absolutely serious. One of my agents sends me 20-something stuff all the time. And I spoke to her a few months ago. Same here. Why are you sending me 20-something stuff? I don't sound like a 20-something guy. I teach 20-somethings. I don't sound like a 20-... She says, no, no, no. You sound like a 20-something guy. I said, okay, I don't know what you're smoking. But I'm not a 20-something... Don't I do not sound like a 20-something guy? When I was 20-something, I sounded like a 20-something guy. Maybe even 30-something, but that's about it. So changing your voice for somebody who doesn't know what the heck they're talking about is crazy. You've got to be yourself. You have got to be yourself. You've got to be authentic. That said, could you pitch your voice up a little bit to sound a little bit younger occasionally? Sure. Could you pitch your voice down a little bit to sound a little bit older? Sure. But it's just increments. It's just little incremental things. So for all intents and purposes, the smartest thing to do is to be yourself. Also, it's a numbers game. Do not forget that. You know how many people audition on a pay-to-play site for every one job? Do you know how many? Approximately how many people? You're not going to believe this. Anywhere from between 200 to 300 people. Minimally. 200 to 300 people. So that said, it's a numbers game in this particular case and there are many, many, many, many people who don't book for a long, long time before they finally book something and then do that. In fact, one of Brigham's questions was, should I listen to the people who are booking and try to sound like them? To a certain extent, you can see what they're doing. But you're not going to be able to be a voice match or anything like that. You're going to be you. Maybe listen to the spots that are selling. Yes. So you know it's buying. Yes, absolutely. What's the delivery that's working? Exactly. You can't unless you're an impressionist. So for all intents and purposes, yeah, you might listen to the style of delivery that's winning these gigs. And invariably, they're a little bit over the top or maybe a lot over the top or just plain cheesy. But they are certainly not subtle. And the buyers on the pay-to-play sites are also not subtle. They're pretty over it. I don't know if I answered the question to your satisfaction, but... Made sense to me. At least. I mean, come on now. Being honest. Yeah, but that's the way it is. Do we want to try and get Raul on here? We can give it a stab. Yeah. Is it Raul or is it just Raul? I'm assuming Raul's going to unmute his mic and we're all going to see what happens. And he'll tell us exactly how to pronounce his name. He's muted there. I'm surprised there's no accent over the U. Maybe there should be an accent over the U, but we don't have that ability on the Chiron to Raul it. He's still... I think we've been both clicking the unmute buttons simultaneously. Isn't that interesting? Is that like when you call each other and you get a busy signal at the same time? All right, Raul. Okay. Well? Do we have him? Do we unmute him? Be to us, Raul. He's going to get a level. Hi, it's Raul. Raul. Okay, Raul. All right. Like Raul Julia. Okay, Raul. You're on the air. Go ahead. Hey, Mark, how are you doing? I'm a character. I'm an upcoming character voiceover newbie. Can I make it in New York City? Do I have to live in LA to be a successful character? No. No, that's the most amazing thing about... Nowadays, I mean, it used to be you have to live in LA or New York, but now it doesn't matter where you are. If they... If you do an audition and they love your voice and they love your audition, they will... All you have to do is walk into a studio in New York City, they'll patch you in and direct you. That's it. Whether it's ISDN, whether it's hip-diddle, whatever the source connect, it doesn't really matter. They'll find... If they love you, they'll find a studio for you. You walk in there, do your thing and walk out. Absolutely. You do not have to live in LA. All right. My second two-part question. Do you do workshops or the one-on-ones? Both. I do workshops. I do classes. I do one-on-one coaching and I do various workshops. I'll do commercial workshops, audiobook workshops, animation or video game workshops, which happen a few times throughout the year. But yeah, pretty much the whole thing. Okay. Thank you for your time. Hey, Raoul, what's your website, man? Yeah. Raoul, do you have a website? Are you still with us? Did you leave us? All right. We'll find him somewhere. He's making one right now. Oh, shoot. He's supposed to have a website. Darn. Darn. That's it. Okay, we'll do some due diligence there. We'll run that down. Yeah. We got a question from Devox, too. What are some mistakes that you see more seasoned voice actors make, perhaps from lack of self-awareness or traps they might fall into? And what are some not so obvious ways to address them? That only happens every single day. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, it's funny. One thing that a lot of veteran, no matter what level you're at, but particularly veteran voiceovers, they complain to me. They say in the direction, it says be conversational, but the copy is not conversational at all. So what do I do with that? And I've got workarounds, I've got tips and tricks and techniques to basically figure it to help you take clunky copy that you would never say to anybody and actually make it sound conversational. It's funny in the very beginning when I first got into this, the rule of thumb, and you've probably heard this forever, was in voiceover, you're always talking to one person that the microphone is somebody's ear. Well, I want to tell you right now that is a fallacy. That is not the case, because in voiceover, and particularly commercial voiceover, you're working with copy that nobody would ever say in this lifetime on this planet. Except on TV. Except on, well, exactly. But in terms of a realistic conversation, you'd never have it. The reason is, is because of the nature of the beast, which is commercial copy. Right. As commercial voice actors, our job is to tout and explain the benefits of a product or a service or an organization. That is our job. That's then the nature of the beast. So when an agency is getting ready to create a spot for a particular client, what do they do? They send the copywriter over to the clients, they sit down, and the copywriter says, tell me all about your product or service. And the client says, we want, tell them about this, tell them we do this, tell them we got this, it does this, this, this, and this. Copywriter goes back to the office and starts to concoct and make and draw and write a story based on all that information. But a lot of that information is all the stuff about the product, why it's better, why it's greener, why it's cheaper, why it's better designed, why, why, why, all this stuff that we talk about. Well, the thing is, you would never, I would never say, George, when do you see what this, this aspirin does? It, it helps you sleep better. It, you'd look at me like I'm off my meds. You'd look at me, it would be absolutely crazy. So we never have this conversation. And so that's basically what we have to do with copy when we get it, particularly commercial copy, is we have to frame it. You've got to frame the story. Very, very, very important. And if you don't frame it correctly, then all you're going to be doing is reading. And this is basically one of the most important things that I talk about. I make a distinction between voiceover and voice acting. Voiceover is 2.9% APR financing for 60 months on all vehicles in stock. That's voiceover. There's doesn't, there's no acting involved in that. Right. We want to get into voice acting. And so the only way to get to really to be believable in a story is to frame the story and understand and ask three questions. Who am I? Where am I? And who am I talking to? If you can answer those three questions, you understand the story. And if you can answer those three questions, you don't understand the story. And my dad always told me if you don't understand what you're talking about, shut up. No one else is going to understand that either. That's exactly right. Right. Yes. Right. And of course, then there is, of course, what I refer to as voice overacting. Yes. Voice overacting. Absolutely. Absolutely. And the thing is, is that even today, particularly with video games and character work, you know, Raoul was talking about being a character. If you listen to any video games nowadays, you cannot get into overacting at all. It's got to be much more nuanced, much more subtle, much more down to earth. It's not animation. It's video games, which is grittier, darker, more realistic and just a lot more natural. Yeah. Yeah. Brian Jester asks, Oh, Brian. Yes. Are you going to be at VO Atlanta this year? I am not. Only because I'm very, very busy. I just don't have the time to do it. Which is a good thing. And yeah, I'm not complaining, but I was there last year and but I won't be able to make it this year, but Brian, I hope you have a great time. It's the right now, the largest voiceover convention in the country. And like over 600 people showed up there. So you'll be networking with a ton of people and I'm sure that a lot of people who are going to be speaking there are going to be really good to attend. Yeah. All right. To have fun. Yeah. Now, one of the things that you've done is you've written this book. Ooh. Yeah. Absolutely. Is it backwards on screen? No. No, it's there. It's Vio. The yellow seems to be coming off a little bit on the chromic in there. Yes, exactly. It's called Vio. Tell us about this book. It's, well, you know, it's interesting the reason I came up with the title was because as I was teaching my classes and coaching and everything, I would invariably hear the same thing. Oh, I didn't know that. Oh, I never knew that. Oh, why didn't anybody tell me that before? So it was just a natural that I would name the title Vio. And I'm actually, this is the first here, I'm working on my sequel. Yes. What's the working title? V-O-A. V-O-M-G. Oh, V-O-M-G. Ah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly, exactly. So, yeah. So that's why I titled it this way. And, you know, it was really interesting. It was after I wrote it and got everything down, then I had to decide how I was going to design it. And that was really interesting, a little process there. One of my friends, one of my colleagues, Allie Kay, is an art director, graphic designer, just a brilliant, brilliant person. And I asked her to help me design the cover. So I figured out, okay, here's what I'm going to do. So I first of all, I went on Amazon and I typed in voiceover books. And of course, if you go on Amazon, you have that, the thing you're scrolling, scrolling, scrolling. You have all these books. So I just went boom, boom, boom. And I looked at all the books that popped, all the ones that popped. I said, ooh. And I started finding some very, very, some common things like color and contrast and being able to look at a title and instantly get what it is. Yeah. Then I took all my voiceover books that I collected over the past 30 years and I put them on a table. And I had about 30 of them, at least. And I put them all on a table, on a big coffee table. And I put them all out. And the two of us stood there and said, okay, let's first of all take out all the ones that are just nothing. They don't look that good. They're boring or whatever it is. Out, out, out, out, out, out, out. Okay. Now let's take a look at the ones that really pop when you look at them. You can tell instantly what it is just by glancing at it. Take that out, out, out, out, out. Then we got it down to three. So the three books were, I like this yellow color, but I could, could be a little bit more vibrant. I like this contrast on this one, but I like to have it just a little bit more and I like the overall layout of this thing. But I'd like to have it just be more pleasing to the eye. And so by process of elimination, we came up with this and that's basically how I did it, process of elimination. Cool. Where is it available? It is available either on Amazon. You can go directly on Amazon and get it. Or or you can contact me directly and I will send you an autographed personalized copy. Yeah, that's it. Absolutely. And I take you a little bit longer to get it because Amazon ships it like that. And I send it via snail mail, but it's in a nice, you know, padded package. And, and yeah. Okay, cool. And it comes with a bookmark. A bookmark. Bookmark. Of course. Bookmark. Yes. Yes, exactly. So, yeah. Now, one of the other things you do, Natasha writes, you have, it's called audition aid. Yeah. Tell us about that. Oh, audition aid was very, very cool. I was really, really happy when I came up with that. I call it VO coaching on steroids. So basically, if you've got a commercial, an audition that is really, let's say it pays $5,000. It's a national commercial. You really, really want to get it? So basically what we do is, is we work on one-on-one coaching on just that spot. 15 minutes or 30 minutes max of concentrated no, just focus on just that spot alone, that audition alone, so that you know exactly what you're going to do when you get behind the mic to go and actually do the audition. So we break down the copy. And the one thing that I always try to do is, is this is my zigzag theory. I always say, if you know everybody's going to zig, how are you going to zag? What are you going to do differently in this audition than anyone else? So you try to figure out what everybody else is going to do and then figure out what you're going to do. You're going to bring something different to the table and better, not just different. You could stand out like a sore thumb and be different. You want to be better, obviously. But basically, so audition aid is this concentrated 15 or 30 minute session that just focuses on that one spot, that one audition. And we figure out basically what we're going to bring to the table. What you're going to bring to the table that's going to be different than anybody else that's going to make the writer say, oh, that guy gets it. That guy gets it. And that's basically what audition aid is all about. And again, it's just it's done online via Skype, which I do majority of my stuff through Skype. But now with the cameras in the studio without auditing, I'm going to be doing a Zoom as well. And also my online classes I do through Zoom. So Zoom, Skype, Skype, Zoom, six, one half dozen the other. They both have their advantages and disadvantages. Two platforms. Yeah, absolutely. Whatever works for you. Yeah. So thank you, Natasha, for bringing that up. I completely forgot about it. Well, until somebody calls you, Mark, I need some help with the audition. Then you'll remember about it. So if people want to get ahold of you, where can they find you? They can find me. Oh, geez, it's embarrassing. I mean, if you Google my name, that'll come up. So all that information will come up. Mark at CashmanCommercials.com. Just like Bill Murray. You just go directly to me. There's no filter. You don't have to talk to a manager or an agent or anything else like that. And my site is CashmanCommercials.com. If you feel like going there and just listening to stuff and there's a lot of... There's so much stuff on the website. It's just insane. It's embarrassing. But it's not superfluous stuff. It's all legitimate stuff. But a lot of my commercials are on there, music, copy, the combination of both. So... And demos. Oh, that's it. VODemos are on my website because I produce demos for my students. So if you are thinking of doing a demo, but you're not sure about what the template is or what the best practice is, basically what a demo should sound like, go to my site, click on the button that says VODemos. And you'll hear demos that I've done for my students. And that'll be a good template as to what you need to do, what your demo is going to ultimately sound like. Outstanding. Yeah. Mark, it is always a pleasure... Dan... ...having you here in our secret... Coming across... Little... Our little secret clubhouse here. Clubhouse in your canoe and rowing over here. This is the bed. You know, it's funny. When we were kids, we did. We had the clubhouse. Right. And now we're big kids. And now we have a big clubhouse. And a much better clubhouse. And you know what I realized? We're still doing what we did when we were kids. On Saturday morning, I know that tons of voice actors out there are going to relate to this. Saturday morning, we got together with our friends and said, let's put on a play. Let's do a show. Let's put on a play. Let's do a show. Let's put something on. And we're still doing it. That's the most... That is the coolest thing ever. Only we're actually doing it. That's exactly... We're really doing that. Exactly. We're... Well, because we're adults now. We don't have the cardboard box with the... Yeah. Bigger the voice, bigger the toy. Yeah. That's right. All right. Thanks for being with us, Mark. Thank you, Dan. Pleasure. All right. We'll be right back. Hey, it's time to talk about Harlan Hogan's VoiceOverEssentials.com. And Harlan is about to do the second reorder of the multicolor LED VoiceOver Recording with Remote Sign. It's a huge success. Everybody loves these things. And they're offering a discount to owners of the original fluorescent sign as replacement tubes, as you know, are kind of difficult to find. LEDs pretty much last forever. You want details on how to get that special discount? Write to Terry at terry.ly at voiceoveressentials.com. That's terry.ly at voiceoveressentials.com. She'll give you all the details on how to get that. By the way, VoiceOverEssentials stocks replacement earpads now for the Harlan Hogan Signature Series Voice Optimized Headphones, Versions 1 and 2. It's got Napa Leather and Memory Foam OEM pads. So go over to voiceoveressentials.com. Best place to go? Go to the bottom of our website page. It's right down there. Click on the picture of Harlan Hogan and it will take you right there where you can order all of these stuff, especially the sign which everybody wants. 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 voiceoverextra.com. That's voiceoverxtra.com. I'll have to take a moment here to ask you to listen to me and thank and buy products from one of our wonderful sponsors at Source Elements there, the creators of Source Connect. It's a tool you need at this point. If you're at that point in your career where first of all people are asking for Source Connect, well that's a no-brainer, but B, if you're trying to get the attention of an agent or jobs that require live real-time direction and live real-time recording, this is a tool you want to have in your tool belt. You can get a demo right now. I mean, you don't have to have a reason to have it today. You can at least get the demo going on. Go over to source-elements.com and get a 15-day free trial. Get it ready to go. Get the iLock thing going on so you can use the software. Don't have to buy a little iLock key to use Source Connect standard. Once you have it up and running, you'll feel confident. You know how it works. You'll know you'll be ready to go. And then when the day comes, you've got that gig. You can purchase the license online. You can pay for it outright or you can do a monthly installment plan, which is actually a subscription. So when you do that, you get ongoing support throughout the entire time that you're paying for the subscription. So give it a try. Go over to source elements. That's source-elements.com. Get the trial. If you have a chance to tell them that we sent you, we'd really appreciate it. And we're back. God, I love doing this show. Especially when we get that kind of engagement from the audience. Yeah. It makes it a lot more rewarding for us. It really does. Next week on this show, I'm not exactly sure who our guest is next week because we're not on next week. We do the tech talk again next week. And then we have another live guest. We've got a few people lined up. In the queue, but we're getting them just confirmed. That's right. So stay tuned for that. Yeah. Well, we'll be letting you know about that. Who are our donors of the week? Let's go take a look. We have a lot of folks who donate on a regular basis using our YouTube link. It's right on the website. And they can subscribe and send these in regularly. People like, oh, Maria's is not a subscription. I can tell you by the amount that she sent today. Nice of you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Maria. She sent a donation. Andrew Kaufman, he's a subscriber, sends a little bit every month. Rick McIver. Thanks, Rick. You know, I think he probably sent us a little bit of money because we answered his question. What a guy. You know, we appreciate it. Yeah. It's like a little tip we think. Thank you. John Griffith, Martha Conn. Hi, Martha. Saw her at NAMM. By the way, we saw Martha. That was fun. Shayna Pennington-Baird. And I'm going to say it again because she's here. Shawna Pennington-Baird. Shawna. That name, man, has a pain in the neck. Are you waving? Our technical director is waving to herself. I think we've used up the oxygen in the room. Antland Productions, Andrew Kaufman. I already said his name. Joseph Valentinetti, Stephanie Sutherland, and Diana Burzel. All right. All names that we've seen many times before. We thank you for your ongoing support. Hey, show us your booths. Yeah, we want some new ones. Whose palace is this behind us today? Yeah, this is Mike McCall. Did his studio maybe five or six years ago in the studio city area? It is awesome. Almost as nice as this. The best thing about it is the desk, which you can't really tell from this, but the desk is like right in the middle of the room. You can walk entirely around it and never trip on a cable because everything comes up from the floor in the middle. That's the way it should be. This is the coolest space. But you guys should send in your photos. Send them in landscape and try to get them. My portrait landscape. Enough lighting so we can see what's in the photo. We got a couple in there. Sometimes they're really dark, kind of hard to make out what's in the shot. And I know it's not easy when your studio's small to get an image that looks good. But keep trying. Well, we will use the ones that look good. Yeah, send them in to theguys at vobs.tv. Also, we're on Live Alternate Mondays now. We do what we do, our live taping on the first Monday generally and then the third Monday. And then we run our tech segment, the Tech Talk on the other Monday. But if you come in live, you'll see both as we tape them together tonight. Exactly. And if you want to be in our studio audience, like these fine people are tonight, let's have that audience cam shot again. You could be here. Same thing. Right to theguys at vobs.tv. We need to, of course, thank our sponsors, like Harlan Hogan's VoiceOver Essentials. We also have on the tablet. You remember their VoiceOver Extra? That's Source Elements. A view to gogo. Dot com. And VoiceActorWebsites.com. And of course, J. Michael Collins demos. Great guy. I should have memorized that by now. After a couple of years. We've had the same slew of sponsors for a while, which is very amazing. We also need to thank the Dan and Marcy Leonard Foundation for the betterment of live webcasting. Our producer, Catherine, I know, producer Catherine Curtin, Mike Merlino for doing great chat room. Thanks, Mike. He's getting the hang of that. We really like that. And of course, our amazing technical director who's just got it together. She likes the wave to herself. Sue Merlino. We really appreciate that. And of course, Lee Penney simply for being Lee Penney. Well, that's going to do it for us this week. You know, this isn't an easy business and we're here to help you out. And what we really want to do is make you sound good because when you sound good. You is good. I think that's the way it goes. Anyway, we say it differently. This doesn't really matter. I'm Dan Leonard. I'm George Woodham. And this is VoiceOver. Body shot. Or VOBS. Have a great week, everybody.