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Judgement Day

If you follow VO discussion groups on social media, it’s hard to miss the urgent and sometimes panicked tone among VOs regarding the subject of AI or Artificial Intelligence voice over. There seems to be a pervasive fear that we are all about to be replaced….sent to the unemployment line by our new robot overlords…destined to go the way of the typewriter, VCRs, and my once-impressive head of hair.

Well, you may indeed go bald. There’s nothing I can do about that. But, I can give you reassurance that the age of AI voiceover may in fact be to the benefit of serious professional voice actors.

I understand the gut reaction of VOs to AI, but the fact is it’s an all-or-nothingburger that will either massively impact you or impact you virtually not at all, (and perhaps positively,) depending on how you are presenting yourself to the market.

Remember, AI can only ever be AS GOOD as we are. Never better. Cheaper, yes, but dynamically directable? Hardly.

That said, it is not to be dismissed, otherwise companies would not be pouring millions into the technology.

This technology is virtually guaranteed to ravage the lower end of the market. Clients buying on price generally don’t value quality, and they are going to FLOCK to AI because in their mind even $100 for a commercial VO or .03 per word for narration is TOO EXPENSIVE. If you are currently banging out ten jobs a day on Fiverr and making five figures from that and similar platforms you need to immediately prepare for a major disruption to your business model. Same for those relying on $100-$200 jobs on traditional P2P.

This technology will have little to no impact on the kind of work that goes through agents and managers, and limited impact on fair-rate work being hired by brand names or their intermediaries on P2P or through talent curation web search. These clients may occasionally be price sensitive, and don’t necessarily want to overpay, but price is a tertiary factor compared to quality.

Moreover, just as there are plenty of buyers of craft and luxury goods who will pay more for the personal touch and premium experience even when something from an assembly line can look and function almost as well, (think Rolex versus Timex,) so will there always be plenty of VO buyers who have the time, budget, and inclination to work with a real actor as opposed to an AI voice, and this will be a strong preference for them.

Some of these services are getting real voice actors to help them create AI versions of themselves, which will then be licensed and sold to third parties.

While licensing your voice for use by a third party is interesting, I think it will ultimately prove to be more noise than anything else for non-celebrity voice actors. I can see this paying something noticeable for a famous voice, but even for major VO-only players I don’t imagine this will ever amount to more than a few hundred bucks a month when you look at the actual dollar amounts these kinds of companies are talking about selling the end product for. Having been approached by a few of these ventures my analysis was that yes, there could be some small income from it, but hardly enough to justify the time to help them create an AI JMC, and also not worth the risk of illicit use.

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So, what will the end result of the arrival of the Borg be? Will we be assimilated?

Ultimately, I think this will lead to a needed rebalancing of the VO market to the benefit of pros, as there will soon no longer be any low-end of the market to undercut pro rates, that work having all been absorbed by AI and leaving buyers with the stark choice between cheap machines or paying humans what we are worth.

For hobbyists and lowballers, it will be a dark day indeed. For those dedicated to the craft, you may just find yourself more in demand than ever.

Of course, if you see Sarah Connonr……run!

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of Facebook VO Groups

by J. Michael Collins 7 Comments

Call me old school, but I like Facebook. While I’m active on many social media platforms, for me, Facebook is where I find a thriving community of colleagues and friends in voice over. And with the advent of Facebook groups, it’s never been easier to find your tribe. But like with a lot of things in life, you gotta take the good with the bad and Facebook groups are both, with some ugly sprinkled on top. Let’s start with the good stuff. There are many Facebook VO groups dedicated to performance and marketing for just about every genre, geography, or gear associated with voice over.

There is an incredible amount of opportunity to interact with your colleagues in this industry to get advice, commiserate, celebrate and just have some fun with like minded people. And as we all still navigate a global pandemic, this has proved invaluable as isolation looms large, and in-person interactions with humans outside our immediate bubble are still extremely limited.

A lot of these groups are curated by professionals with track records of success. Newer voice actors have been able to navigate their burgeoning entrepreneurial adventures because of the generosity of people they’ve only ever “met” on Facebook, and that is truly incredible. If you’re looking for a group of people to help or cheer you on – you’d be hard pressed to find this amount of genuinely caring colleagues elsewhere.

The “bad” of Facebook groups is really more of a caution that while these forums for community can be wonderful, they can also become somewhat of an echo chamber and time suck. Pay attention to how much time you spend interacting with other voice actors in comparison to how much time you spend interacting with potential buyers. Having a place to hang out online is great, but unless your peers are also casting, it’s not going to lead to as much work as marketing your business will.

What about the “ugly?” Perhaps it’s the level of removal that is native to virtual exchanges that leads some down this path, but there is absolutely ZERO upside to participating in the snark, backbiting, and character assassination that frequently appears in posts and comments in Facebook VO groups. Frankly, engaging in any dialogue that is particularly acrimonious in these public forums will have a longer life than you may intend. Let me say it again. There. Is. No. Upside. To. You.

I respect that people have strongly held opinions or feel passionate about various subjects. But be careful when sharing them in public places, and pay special attention to remaining respectful in your interactions. If you don’t, you may ultimately lose work because of it. People will form an impression of you based on your online persona that may not be who you think you are in real life. Even if you’re right in your argument, if you come across as a contentious ass looking for any reason to start a fight or project constant negativity, no one will want to deal with you. Cynicism has its uses, but it’s not a very attractive personality trait.

The internet has a very long memory and impressions matter. Is your online persona reflective of how you want to be viewed by colleagues and potential clients?

Video Game Trailers Are The New Movie Trailers – Are You Prepared To Compete?

by J. Michael Collins 1 Comment

As movie trailers go the way of more production and less voice, there’s a new trend in gaming that holds a lot of promise for voice over actors who love trailers. Gameplay and cinematic trailers – produced by video game developers and publishers in order to demonstrate an upcoming or recently released game – are a really hot and exciting part of the market that continues to grow. They are mostly created before a game release so potential players can whet their appetites before they can play the game for themselves. And if you’re prepared to compete, video game trailers are a genre you may want to sink your teeth into.

The video game industry has a steadily growing audience who believes they get more value for their money buying games compared to DVDs, movie tickets, and music. In fact, the gaming industry globally is estimated to be worth around $159.3 Billion as of 2020. A 9%+ increase from 2019. Over 4 Billion of that is in the US, while the largest growth is seen in Latin American and Asia-Pacific countries, adding opportunities for bilingual talent. Moreover, due to the pandemic, this sector is primed for even more exponential growth as younger consumers find themselves ever more attached to at-home entertainment….a trend that will likely continue even when things return to normal.

Traditionally, video game advertising has mostly focused on print, or in some cases digital displays. But within the past decade and certainly more within the past few years, video game creators have begun releasing both cinematic and gameplay trailers and expanding the scope of their marketing to include social media.

While it is sometimes true that actors who are cast in the game will voice the trailer, that isn’t always the case, and there is a real opportunity for VOs in this growing market. So you’ll want to be prepared. Although the primary purpose of video game trailers has been to build hype and drive sales, the trend is for them to be stand-alone short pieces of cinematic art. In fact, some game trailers can easily be mistaken for movie trailers for their scale and stunning visuals. This means the voice over needs to be part game actor, part promo actor, part trailer voice seasoned with perhaps a dash of old school announcer occasionally. It’s not an easy combo to perfect.

If you’re not a gamer, you’re going to want to spend some time on YouTube where video game trailers abound to get a feel for what is being produced.

Ultimately, game trailers may well be the new movie trailer in terms of prominence and high-profile production values. If you are a traditional trailer or promo player, or a newer talent who has an edgy voice that can cut through the mix, it’s an on-trend genre worth checking out!

The Importance of Having Outside Interests

by J. Michael Collins 5 Comments

We read a lot about, “How to make it in VO,” consuming content voraciously in an effort to get a foothold in the business. Eventually, however, many voice actors will put the pieces together and develop a thriving business. Success rarely comes without a good amount of sacrifice, hence the importance of having outside interests.

Unfortunately, sometimes being the dog that caught the car comes with challenges of its own. Once a VO talent experiences some steady success, it can be a struggle to look at the studio as anything other than a little ATM machine, and time away from it as lost opportunity.

Look, being an entrepreneur is no cake walk. And being an entrepreneur in an industry that is always changing and highly subjective is even tougher. Wearing every hat from talent to marketing to bookkeeping to HR can take up a lot of time, money, and mental space.

But if you haven’t seen the sun in weeks, and weekends are something you vaguely remember having once, but aren’t sure, OR you start every conversation with “I was just narrating a piece about…” OR your kids are starting to fear that “hunched over troll that used to be mom” who lives in the small room in the basement… you may need to take a break, because burnout is real.

We’ve heard a lot of messages in this past year about taking time for self-care, paying attention to your mental health, and slowing down to focus on what’s important. I would add, find outside interests that have nothing to do with voice over (and bonus points if that something is FUN.)

This career is a long game, full of rejection, trial and error, and jagged roads to success. Your primary workload involves putting yourself out there, handling no’s and coming back for more. You don’t do yourself (or the quality of your work) any favors if you don’t allow yourself some distractions and give your brain some time away from constantly obsessing over your next audition.

No one will be surprised that my own outside interests include finding incredible dining experiences and travel, (when the world is normal.) But what some of you may not know is that I’m a trained political scientist and a devoted student of history (World War II era especially.) Those interests led me to read every New York Times newspaper cover to cover starting from January 1, 1930. I’ve read every one through December 15th, 1934 so far and I have plans to read at least a decade more. Not only am I completely fascinated by what I’m reading, but it gives me a mental break from voice over work. It gives my brain something new to focus on and enjoy.

Planning blocks of time into your schedule for marketing, auditioning, and recording are all very important to maximize the efficiency of your work-time management. But don’t forget to schedule-in periods of time to step away and recharge. Pursue something other than voice over. Allow yourself to have fun.

Be interested in more than one thing. Your sanity will thank you.

How to Beat Imposter Syndrome

by J. Michael Collins 11 Comments

The Wikipedia definition of Imposter Syndrome reads as follows: “Imposter syndrome (also known as imposter phenomenon, fraud syndrome or the imposter experience) is a psychological pattern in which an individual doubts their skills, talents or accomplishments and has a persistent internalized fear of being exposed as a “fraud”.”

At some point in every career, a VO talent is going to experience this, and not only at the beginning of the journey. Plenty of experienced voice actors will confess they’ve felt like this repeatedly. But less often does anyone offer up a suggestion for what to do to make it go away. I’d like to suggest a way to beat it, for good.

But to get there, we have to go back to elementary school for a minute. From childhood, what do we focus on in school? The stuff we don’t yet know and can’t yet do, right? And that works for a while to get the basics down, learn to read/write/add, learn history, and maybe some languages. But a great majority of the time, we’re taught to identify what we’re not good at and work hard to get good. Work harder, we’re told. Deficits are highlighted more often than talents.

But does this ultimately lead to success? Do truly successful adults spend all their time focused on the stuff they don’t do well? No, they don’t.

Take football. To be a great football player, you need a knowledge of the game and some general high-level skills (strength, speed, endurance, etc). But no one with the talent to be an NFL quarterback is focused on how he’s not such a great linebacker. If he did, he’d feel like an imposter. More specifically, if a player tried to be good at EVERY position, he’d never get to the NFL. To be truly great, no time is spent on any skills not related to the player’s best talents and one specific job.

So how does this relate to Imposter Syndrome in voice over? Many people decide to join the voice over industry with little to no real knowledge of what is required. So, a lot like schoolchildren, they need a basic education in voice over – how to record yourself, mic technique, what genres are available, how to set up a VO business, etc. At this point in their career, they’re not feeling Imposter Syndrome as much as feeling new, unsure, or just getting ready to start working.

But because this industry is so vast, with such varied opportunities to work, coupled with the need to have a demo for every specific genre you want to compete in, along the way many VO artists get bogged down trying to do it all. And that’s where our good friend Imposter Syndrome comes in.

It’s pretty common to have many interests in voice over (who doesn’t want to do it all, really?) so when pressed, voice over actors are likely to give you a laundry list of what they “do”… explainers, eLearning, commercials, audiobooks, animation, etc. Often they’ve spent time improving their skills in each of these different areas. Often they’ve spent a great deal of money and time focused on the areas where they are NOT booking in order to START booking. And often they suffer from doubting their skills, talents, or accomplishments and feel a persistent internalized fear of being exposed as a “fraud” (basically lookup Imposter Syndrome in the dictionary, and you’ll find a picture of a voice over actor).

If you are one of these people, welcome to a large club – and now here’s how to beat it.

While you may be good at a lot of things, what are you REALLY good at doing? Are you capable of commercials, but medical narration lights you up? Do you have to resist adding your animation characters into every audition for e-learning? Are you really good at multiple characters and long form narration but spend all your time trying to get better at IVR? Where do you absolutely shine? It’s okay, this is a safe space, be honest about where you rock.

Once you’ve answered that question, to quote Steve Martin, be so good they can’t ignore you. If you are great at commercials, find the best commercial coaches, practice your commercial skills even more and work to be the best commercial actor the world has seen. If you are great at medical narration, find those coaches and get even better. If you live and breathe animation or audiobooks, spend all your time in improv and acting classes to get even more skills. Find what you are great at doing, and devote all your time to doing that thing. Practice it. Spend your marketing efforts focused on it, and seek out the auditions from agents and buyers in that space.

Because here’s the thing. When we know we are good at something, when we have our abilities solidly in hand, when we are in our zone, doing what we are best at, when our talent is out there on display to those we work with (and, importantly, to ourselves) when confidence fills us up, we won’t feel like an imposter, because we won’t be one.

That’s not to say you should never coach on something new or never improve in other genres of voice over. But the surest road to confidence and success is the one paved by what you excel at doing. And trust me, the rest of the stuff that you’re not as good at will come with time and experience. Many VO skills (including marketing) are transferable between genres, so becoming excellent at one, and then adding a new one will be easier.

Embrace your talent, and acknowledge where you shine. Then be so good they can’t ignore you. Be so good Imposter Syndrome has no place in your studio.

The Formality Scale

by J. Michael Collins 6 Comments

If you’ve attended any of my classes or workshops, you may have heard me mention The Formality Scale. This is something that I use in any genre of voice over, in both auditions and bookings. I developed it as a scale of where I’m going to go with the read. What diction, enunciation, and clarity of speech I feel are appropriate. It affects my choices about speed, and in general what formality I’ll apply to reads. And I’m a numbers guy, so quantifying the range into a numeric scale makes my brain happy.

The Formality Scale numbers 1 to 10, with 1 being the least formal and 10 being the most. I imagine a 1 as a couple of buddies leaving the bar together in search of good tacos. They’ve probably had a little too much to drink, so their diction is a bit slurred, their speed erratic, the emphasis a little off perhaps, maybe they mumble. Basically, you’re lucky if you fully understand what each one is saying the whole time. This is the most conversational I can be without paying any attention to enunciation. This is 1. It is very rare a read will ever be a 1, but it’s good to know where the absolute limit is and work up from there.

A 5 on the scale is my Baseline read. If we were having a conversation about just about anything, this is where you’d hear me speak. Since you’re a reasonably intelligent person and I like to think I am as well, there’s more clarity to my delivery than there would be at level 1, and in this 5-ish area, sometimes I might be a bit more formal, maybe a bit less, but generally, a basic, normal conversation with family and friends would be a 5.

A 10 on the scale is Symphony Orchestras, 3-star Michelin dining, and the Ritz Carlton. This is where you bring out the big guns of enunciation and precise (and slightly affected tone). Think Thurston Howell III and you’re getting close. As with a 1, a read is unlikely to be a 10, but luxury reads often get close.

So any time I’m doing any kind of voice over read, be it corporate narration, e-learning, and even commercials, I’m trying to intuit from the script, the direction, and what I know of the client and the audience I think they’re trying to attract, what formality is called for in that moment. For example, Corporate reads will never be a 1 because they’re never that casual. They might be a bit informal, but more often than not, the floor to that informality is a 5 and the read formality only goes up from there. Explainers, on the other hand, are generally more casual, but they still have to be informative, so be careful not to drop much below a 4 unless the client is asking for that. Commercials can fall just about anywhere on the formality scale, so I really pay attention to the script, specs, product or service, and intended audience.

For me, wrapping choices like pacing, diction, intensity, and enunciation in a formality scale helps me dial in on appropriate reads and pivot quickly if the client wants a little more or a little less in the delivery. Analyze the information you have, and see if thinking of the Formality Scale helps you take the right approach on your next read.

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