I recorded a long form narration job early last year for a client that was a pleasure to work with. Recently, they decided they wanted to update some copy to reflect improvements to the product. No big deal, ordinarily. But little did I know what we were both in for with this particular session.

Obviously, they wanted to maintain the same tone and vocal style as last time so the new VO would match nicely with the old stuff. As soon as the producer began playing some of it down the ISDN line as a refresher, I noticed right away that I was working at a higher level than when I recorded the work originally. This meant that in order to match the tone from last time, I’d have to bring myself back to the level of ability I possessed the prior year when it was recorded. I had to make my delivery purposely sound worse!

It was stiff, sing-songy and a bit pukey in places. And worse, it had to be recreated! What kind of hack did they hire last year anyway?

Forty minutes later, we finished up and I stepped out of the hot booth for a drink and a breath of air. Phone rings. “Uh, yeah Joe… Were you possibly using a different mic last time around?” Oops. I had forgotten to mention that I had switched not only my microphone, but my preamp as well since we had last worked together. (Note: I don’t recommend this to anyone if you have continuing jobs that require pickups from time to time.) Blindly figuring that the ISDN would have provided a clear signal for the engineer to ensure consistency, I hadn’t given it much thought or concern. Now, I was giving it a lot of both.

I scrambled to hook up my other mic and run it direct into the board. With the producer back on the line, we re-recorded the entire session. And yes, the second time was just as purposefully altered as the first, though mercifully it didn’t take quite as long.

You can see why this turned out to be one of the biggest and most unexpected challenges of my VO career. I never dreamed that improvement could come back and bite me like a dog gone rabid. Funny thing was, the producer liked my current read style a lot better, but for purposes of blending new with old, everybody’s hands were tied.

Measured growth in any creative venture is refreshing and rejuvenating. And looking back to who we were can be a good indicator where we’re going. There’s joy in that journey for sure. As long as you’re ok with off-roading once in awhile.

THE SCAM
“Where exactly do you work?” my colleague asked, quite puzzled. It turned out to be some unknown up-and-coming ad agency. “That’s strange… it doesn’t ring a bell for me, and I practically have a photographic memory for every job I’ve ever done”, my colleague said. A day later, when going through a list of past auditions, he found the answer. About a month ago, he had sent in a demo for an ad agency through one of the voice-over sites, and never heard anything back. Until now.

Under normal circumstances people might say: You win some, you lose some. Isn’t that part of this business? That might be true, but there’s only one word for these despicable practices: THEFT! And my colleague allowed it to happen. Everybody knows not to walk around with your wallet sticking out of your purse. It’s an open invitation to pickpockets. But when it comes to our demos, some of us are doing just that. Perhaps I should repeat the advice my biology teacher once gave us, while covering a certain subject: use protection! You have two options to prevent shady producers from running off with your audio file: watermarking and -my personal favorite- messing things up.

DISTURBING SIGNALS
You’ve probably seen watermarks on pictures, rendering them practically unusable. The same can be done for audio files. Some recording software has this effect built in. Your demo will either have some weird buzz in the background, or some noise under part of your read. You can also buy separate watermarking software or… produce the sound effects yourself! Imagine smashing up a couple of plates while recording your demo for that Greek restaurant commercial… Of course this can become quite distracting, and if I were you, I would want people to pay attention to my brilliant performance, and not to some nasty tone or the sound of breaking china. This brings me to option two, which is even more creative.

I usually twist a few things in the copy. I recently did an IVR (interactive voice response)-demo, and I purposely changed the numbers a little bit (”for sales, press five hundred and sixty six, for customer service, go to our competitor”). I believe I also said: “If you don’t know your party’s extension, please dial it now”. For some of you that might be stretching it. Alternatively, you can also leave out a word here and there, but whichever method you prefer, be sure to let the voice-seeker know that you did this on purpose. Otherwise they might think that you recently escaped from a SaVoa Clinic for frustrated voice-actors (Society for aimless Voice-overs anonymous).

TAKE IT TO COURT?
Eventually, my colleague called the agency that ran away with his demo. Much to his surprise, they immediately admitted using his audition. “We used it to have the team listen to the type of voice we were NOT looking for”, they said. “This was for internal purposes only”. Some ad agencies take the art of spinning to a whole new level! My colleague also called a lawyer to find out if he had a case. After all, what had happened was an infringement of copyright. Here’s the good news: the lawyer was up for it. The bad news: his retainer was more than what my voice-over colleague had made in six months. Sometimes it’s better to count your losses and smash up a couple of plates.

(c) Paul Strikwerda