Most of the time it's a must!

Peter M. Verderosa · **Voice Talent** Joined: 15 May 2007 Posts: 7

When I jumped back into V.O. after teaching myself Sound Forge, I contacted a few well known audio experts to ask if the audio from my microphone should be compressed, expanded and limited before being digitized. All said no... they said that the production company receiving your track will do what they feel is best in
preparing the track for actual use. Aaah!...... but I have since found out that the sound gurus are not completely right. Audition tracks will almost always require some amount of compression (sometimes even "max bass" in Pro Tools or "bass" in Forge). Further, it is often the case where the client asks for that big, "in your face" sound. Sooo...... you may not have to invest in an expensive and "transparent" compressor, expander, limiter, but you sure should know how to record without clipping and how to use your digital processing and effects with great proficiency.

Ken Theriot · **Voice Talent** Joined: 14 Jun 2007 Posts: 44

Peter,

May I ask what kind of mic you use? Also, how do you monitor your audio? I am amazed that you would ADD bass to your vocal. With my set-up, I always have to REDUCE the bass. If you use, like most folks do, a cardiod condensor mic, you will get quite a lot of bass-build-up from proximity effect if you are within a foot of the mic when you speak. Could it be that your monitoring environment is not allowing you to hear all the bass in your recording? One mistake people make a lot is to rely on headphones for critical listening/mixing. In the music audio world, this is universally regarded as a bad idea, since you rarely get accurate information through "cans."

As for compression and/or limiting, I usually do a little bit of slight compressing (not using a compressor though...I just pick 5-10 peaks and lower their volumes manually), just to bring the few peaks down closer to the average level, and then boost the entire thing to where the peaks are close to about -1 or -2dB. The main reason I don't squash/limit too much is that it brings the noise floor into the easily audible range, including any room noise or room sound. If you aren't recording in a really sound-proofed space, that can be a problem. What you can end up with is a "pumping" sound between speaking parts when the ambient noise present during the speaking parts drops away suddenly in the quiet passages, which sounds really unnatural. My recordings are plenty "hot" for my clients, and are averaging between -20 and -25 db RMS with peaks going up to about -1 or -2 dB. One other BIG reason to avoid compressing/llimiting too much is that it can easily add sibilance to your voice! I don't know about you, but I have plenty of THAT already. I usually end up using a de-essing program in Adobe Audition (a preset on the multi-band compressor from IZOTOPE) quite a lot.

My 2 cents.

Ken

Peter M. Verderosa · **Voice Talent** Joined: 15 May 2007 Posts: 7

Hi Ken, All of what you say is right, so you have to have a discerning ear and headphones and good monitor speakers. The recording environment has to be ultra quiet (too many VO people don't have that luxury) and the intrinsic noise floor of the mic your using has to be really good. My mic is the AKG 414 TLII; I love this mic because it has a great response with a crispness that I often find missing from many VO's. "Max Bass" and "Bass" are software effects that don't do what you are thinking they do, but compress certain frequencies a lot more than others. Best example (but even more exagerated) would be the way the announcers sound on most smooth jazz FM stations. When they speak there is a low end richness to their words. The station management must pull out all the stops when buying the gear to put into the audio chain.
But mind you... I'm not saying every track should be recorded this way. Only the ones where the content tells you it is needed. Every movie trailer recorded by Don LaFontaine is obviously highly compressed; the comression is absolutely necessary to make Don's
phrases really effective. I'm thankful for your invitation to dialogue.

Colin Campbell · Posted: Sun Dec 23, 2007, 03:02 (GMT) Post subject:

In most of these auditions we are not dealing with audio purists. We need to make an impression on an untrained ear.

J.S. Gilbert

There are a number of talent hirers who don't know how to mix down or have much in the way of studio sense. This is not the case for all of them and is certainly not my experience with the top 10 - 20% price range for talent or in my personal casting for talent. One can always treat a raw voice over recording after the fact. Essentially all that is needed is a low noise floor.

As a talent hirer, there is nothing we can do about bad acting. My advice, spend less time on the knobs and more time trying to actually create a moving and compelling audition.

If necesary, a talent hirer can express some type of "technical need" as a specification to the audition.

If you have a low noise floor, then learn how to act.

--j.s.

Peter M. Verderosa · **Voice Talent** Joined: 15 May 2007 Posts: 7

With all due respect, I think you missed my point. I am not telling talents to employ electronic gimickry to hide their deficiencies; I'm suggesting an audio treatment for selected auditions to get the edge, to help one put the ball thru the hoop. Believe you me, if one knows how to do it (and many don't) it can make a good voice actor really shine. It will never help a poor voice actor get the job;
it is more likely to make them sound even worse as it brings their every nuance into the foreground.

Gregory Houser · **Voice Talent** Joined: 15 May 2005 Posts: 177

I've said this before, but I'll say it again...

it's not about the gear or effects. If you can't give a strong delivery without them, then you're not going to do well with them either.

However, I do agree in the sense that with the online VO community, it's good to have a solid knowledge of the capabilities of your gear. I do not normally use dynamic processing within the DAW applications in my home studio (Audition and PT-HD). I have outboard EQ and compressors for that. They leave less artifacts IME. 99% of the folks wouldn't notice it, but I'm a bit of a purist in that regard.

When I record a spot for someone I send them the clean track. I also send them one with light compression and EQ as well. It takes me little time to take the original track and do this, and it gives the client the option to either have their people do it, or to use the clip done with my gear (the sound engineer will still probably do some tweaking anyway).

Depending on your geographical area, some B&M casting places add light dynamics to every talent's audition. Others do not. In short it depends, but usually if I add it, I'll say so up front so that if the client wants and audition that it tracked clean, I can readily send it. At no time do I ever recommend anyone to do EQ/compression while tracking, but to do so in post (for obvious reasons).