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Will and Kathryn sit down with our very first panel of experts to talk about all things sound! We’re joined by Stephen Frost, Creative Director and founder at Stereo Couture: Music + Sound; Voiceover Actress, Communications, and Marketing Professional Michelle Betton, and Seth Bowser, Freelance Composer and Music Teacher at the Altadena Music Academy, in Altadena, CA.
Stereo Couture: https://www.stereocouture.com/
Seth Bowser: http://www.sethbowser.com/about.html
Michelle Betton: https://www.michellebettonvo.com/
If you have a topic or question you’d like us to cover, you can submit it to www.openpixelstudios.com/podquestion
Learn more about this podcast here: https://www.openpixelstudios.com/behindthepixel
EMedia produces the podcast in Easthampton, MA.
Produced by Jackson Foote and Will Colón
Written and Created by:
Will Colón: https://www.linkedin.com/in/willmcolon/
Kathryn Taccone: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathryntaccone/
Creators & Guests
What is Behind The Pixel: Closing The Animation Communication Gap?
This podcast helps bridge the knowledge gaps between marketing and creative teams. Episodes explore how to communicate creatively, production hacks that save time, and unique solutions to ongoing creative problems.
Open Pixel Studios is a women-owned (WBENC) certified animation studio in Massachusetts that creates custom animated marketing content.
Hosts Will Colón and Kathryn Taccone are co-founders of Open Pixel Studios with years of industry experience in sales, marketing, animation, design, and education.
Submit a question to the pod! -> openpixelstudios.com/podquestion
00;00;00;03 - 00;00;35;28
Unknown
I'm curious what each of your least favorite sounds is. I have one, and this is a voiceover at specific one. Go for it. I hate Mountain. I think a lot. Are you talking like when somebody is talking and there's like the. Like the. Like the saliva, the smell? I can't like, very least favorite sounds. Mm hmm. I suppose whatever.
00;00;35;28 - 00;00;38;15
Unknown
It's out of tune. You know?
00;00;40;27 - 00;01;14;18
Unknown
That's very nice. That's pretty good. I work on children's animation. Mm hmm. Where there's a lot of body noise, humor and. Yes, I can't tell you the number of times that my team has had to debate over, like, the sound of a fart. And that's fine. That's. That's funny. But I can handle when we have to debate over someone burping.
00;01;15;04 - 00;01;34;03
Unknown
Mm hmm. I just. I have to check out, and I don't. I don't say that to the voice actors. You don't? Maybe. Maybe they'll tell you to do this. You don't need to burp in the booth. You don't have to burp when it's in the script. Leave that to the sound effects. People. There's a good piece of feedback.
00;01;34;03 - 00;02;04;06
Unknown
There it is. It's. Thank you all for being here. We have a bunch of folks in our panel, and I want to go around the room and give the people a little rundown for those in our audience who don't know who you are. Just tell us who you are and what you do as it relates to sound work.
00;02;04;10 - 00;02;32;18
Unknown
Absolutely. So super stoked to be here. Thanks for having me. Michelle Batten I am a communications and marketing professional that focuses mostly on written communication, but also some other forms of media. But as regards sound, I'm also a voice actor. So as a voice actor I do primarily narration. That documentary narration is learning corporate narration, medical narration. It runs the gamut.
00;02;32;25 - 00;02;54;04
Unknown
Yeah, it runs the gamut. But yeah, that's where I come in with that. Nice. Awesome. There's always a need to narrate something. And I remember being a lawyer, a temp audio person, and I have a lot of respect for voiceover artists because I am terrible at it, but I doubt that. But yeah, I appreciate that. But yeah, let's, let's kick it over to Seth.
00;02;54;17 - 00;03;26;01
Unknown
Hi. Thanks Lil and Kathryn for having all of us on here to talk. And yeah, I am a composer. It's been 30 years in music, doing lots of different things, teaching, directing irons here and there. But yeah, currently working on some musicals here in the L.A. area and some on the East Coast as well, have been able to do some audio for some animation projects, some short films as well.
00;03;26;20 - 00;03;46;04
Unknown
So excited to talk through some things with you all today. That's awesome. Yeah, I think we're going to have to talk about these musicals later because I'm we might also have to pitch you a musical idea and see what you think because we've had some. That's true. And we do have we have a couple. Yeah. So stay tuned for that.
00;03;46;04 - 00;04;17;20
Unknown
Yes, you heard it here first. Wow, We're going to make it happen. It'll be great. But yes, go ahead, Stephen. Thank you, Will and Kathryn, for inviting me onto your podcast. I'm Stephen Frost. I'm the founder of Stereo Tours. We're an audio studio that specializes in animation, and our work spans from creating original music to post-production to providing voices for ads, TV and film.
00;04;18;14 - 00;05;03;17
Unknown
And while we get involved with any sort of project, animation is what really captures our hearts. And my role here is officially creative director, which means I get to have a vision and lets people know I do more than spreadsheets, though. I love spreadsheets. Yes, a fellow spreadsheet man we're in. And if if you see me in the credits, it's generally as a sound supervisor, which means I get to get my hands dirty in pretty much every aspect of our work at the core of the company, I will say, is an incredible team, and their expertise in my job is really just giving them what they need to do their jobs well.
00;05;04;01 - 00;05;26;18
Unknown
But then stepping back and also being able to see the larger picture and make sure everything's coming together. Awesome. Thank you so much for going through that. So to give everyone a little bit of a rundown and our audience already knows this, but what we're trying to do is kind of open the curtain a bit into a behind the scenes production in animation, but also in other places.
00;05;26;18 - 00;05;46;26
Unknown
And sound is a big space that folks, I think forget about often and don't really realize how important it is. So I want to get a sense of what you typically do at your job. So take us through maybe a little bit of a day to day when you're doing sound work, maybe for animation, maybe not, maybe just in general.
00;05;46;26 - 00;06;08;21
Unknown
But give us a little bit of a day to day taste of like what you do. How do you do your work? And maybe, Michelle, I'll start with you. Sure. As far as voiceover goes, I spend a lot of time in my vocal booth. That's where the sound magic happens. I created a vocal booth in my house, so I record pretty much all of my voiceover project here.
00;06;09;00 - 00;06;24;27
Unknown
I have worked in studios for some of the national commercial work and stuff. They want you to work out of a studio. But in the pandemic, so many voice actors had to find a way to record at home. So most of us have, or many of us, I should say, have vocal booth at home. So I do that.
00;06;25;06 - 00;06;50;22
Unknown
And what's great about having a booth at home too, is that it provides you a lot of flexibility. I can record any hour of the day or night, depending on when a project comes in or when it needs to be due, though it's kind of awesome to have that. So I get into the booth and in the course of a morning I'll work on all of the auditions that I want to submit, whether, you know, they came in from a pay to play website or by some other means.
00;06;51;05 - 00;07;26;23
Unknown
And then once I've done that, then I have the opportunity to spend time practicing techniques, trying new things, working with coaches to hone my craft, just really working to make sure that I'm providing the best possible vocal quality for any of the projects that I'm working on. And so that's both from a physical technique perspective but also from an emotional connection perspective, voice actors, really, we take scripts and we identify the narratives that taking place in each one and identify the emotions that are really happening in that story.
00;07;27;03 - 00;07;50;02
Unknown
And we create moments auditory audibly to then make a connection with the listener. So we're basically bringing connection and emotion to life through what we do. Some people might say like, why is that important? You know, in the face of A.I.? Like, why is it so important to have a voice actor Voice person is the vocal print or what have you.
00;07;50;13 - 00;08;13;26
Unknown
The reason why is because people can tell when they're being told something. And generally speaking, they don't like the idea of being sold something. Otherwise we would still have all of those, you know, old timey voiced actors who you could just really like. It was a hard sell, you know what I mean? Like for everything, the news, you know, selling products, everything was all that hard though, found.
00;08;13;26 - 00;08;42;22
Unknown
But people do not like the way that that sounds. And so really honing in on creating that emotional connection with that person who's listening to your beliefs and what you're conveying to them is really the value that voice actors bring. And I oftentimes talk about voice actors in terms of radio, because with TV and commercial, like at least then you have some visual cues for like what is happening and the emotional connection that you should or want to have to a particular thing.
00;08;42;22 - 00;09;08;03
Unknown
But if you're in your car by yourself on the highway, you have no frame of reference for what's going on. There's that emotional connection that the voice actor doing that work is making with you. And so if you can really connect strongly with the person who's listening to you, not only are you creating a connection and a moment for them, but you can potentially spur them towards some type of action.
00;09;08;06 - 00;09;27;01
Unknown
Yeah, awesome. That makes a lot of sense. There's there's a lot there that that you've touched on that I think kind of going behind the curtains a little bit. A lot of times I don't I don't think when we work with clients that they understand that even voice actors have coaches and are learning specific techniques and they have their own technical language that they're speaking as well.
00;09;27;01 - 00;09;50;04
Unknown
Like we talk about it sometimes from the visual aspect of things where we have certain terminology for how to describe designs and different types of character actions and things like that. But even on the voice actor side, there's like specific terminology that comes into play that I think is really interesting. So I appreciate you sharing that because I think that's helpful for how much work goes into creating a voice because I'm an animator.
00;09;50;04 - 00;10;10;02
Unknown
So the like, I'm just helping to embellish what's already there. The like richness of a voice is already there. And if I can bring that out through the character and make it sound believable, then it's a beautiful compliment. But that voice has to be there in order for it to be believable, so. Right. Yeah. That's awesome. Which makes me think about Seth's role.
00;10;10;02 - 00;10;29;14
Unknown
I think in composing music. I've never written music. I don't, I don't I don't get it, honestly, for the language, clearly. But tell us a little bit, Seth, about what your work how do you do your work when someone comes to you and says like, I want like an original thing that is entirely different, How do you approach that?
00;10;29;14 - 00;11;05;06
Unknown
Yeah, well, first of all, that process of learning how to work as a creative being has evolved over the years, and I think I've gotten closer and closer to freedom and being able to work out something creatively. And so it sort of just starts with like, I'll start super simple. I don't need the elaborate set up that will come later in the process, like the whole workstation and bringing in recording equipment and stuff other than just on my phone at a at a acoustic piano.
00;11;05;21 - 00;11;49;22
Unknown
And it's really helpful to get in broad strokes almost, and in on technical language, what the clients, the producer or what have you is going for to be able to say a move and then to be able to sit at the piano and play with. I like to be as rough as possible, have lots of rough edges to be as uncritical as possible at the very beginning so that I can, you know, because it's so easy, I think, to be overly critical and sort of miss something that might be, you know, it might have a negative, you know, something that you can, you know, turn into something pretty nice later on.
00;11;50;10 - 00;12;31;22
Unknown
At least that's that's from my perspective, usually I'm supercritical. So and that evolving process playing a lot at the beginning and being super rough and embracing that. This helps my creative process a lot. But I think the best, most fruitful relationships that I've had with clients before have come when there hasn't been an attempt to explain to me and musical terms what they want, but rather in their own language, whatever viewpoint they're coming from, it's easier for me to take that and translate it musically rather than sort of sift through what might not be totally musically accurate, I suppose.
00;12;32;08 - 00;12;54;04
Unknown
Right? Right. That's how the beginning process for me goes. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like I would be a terrible client for you, Seth, because I feel like it. Is it because I have like a music background in like, you know, in the marching band? So let's, let's be clear about that. So, so my brain would be like, you know, oh, like, I totally understand, like, vibrato and crescendos.
00;12;54;04 - 00;13;12;20
Unknown
So can you, like, just throw that in there because I'd be great. Like, I think to your point, I think there's a humanity aspect you're bringing to this about like not trying to force a client to, like, learn everything that in the same exact way that you speak that language, right? If you hire a lawyer, you don't have to know lawyer terminology in order to work with them.
00;13;12;20 - 00;13;30;17
Unknown
There's there's something beautiful about the idea of us being translators. We talk about that a lot in our podcast, that it's all about us having the knowledge to be able to translate into what they are looking for and what that vision is. So yeah, you bring up a really good point there. Yeah. And I want to rope Steven into the conversation too.
00;13;30;17 - 00;13;54;14
Unknown
So A So you work with a lot of folks specifically for larger TV film kind of things. Can you tell us a little bit about how that process starts? Where do they come? What do they come to you with? Is it is it because I can imagine when I would say I need audio in our pipeline, in our process, but I want to hear it from sort of your perspective.
00;13;54;25 - 00;14;27;13
Unknown
Well, we're lucky in that people come to us at any point in the process. You never know when somebody is going to decide that they need help. So that makes our lives interesting. Sometimes people come to us in pre-production and we get to follow along from the time that there's really nothing but a Bible for the project. And it's great to be part of that process because we get to see the characters develop and change.
00;14;27;24 - 00;15;11;14
Unknown
We're part of the casting process and we feel like we're really part of the the essence of the project. On the other hand, people will jump in midway and we've got to catch up to speed. They already have established ideas of what they're working on, what they need. Sometimes that's a good thing. Often that's the terrible thing. You know, if you if you go in there and you already know how this actor sounds in your head, most of all based on having, I don't know, like a secretary at your office read it in placeholders or you think you know what the music you want is when it's really just what you were listening to on
00;15;11;14 - 00;15;39;09
Unknown
the way to work. And then we're navigating that sort of landscape often. Then we'll also come in at the end. We're lucky that sometimes production companies are nearing the close of a project and they're horrified with how it's going. The client doesn't have the budget that they need to achieve the vision, so they'll come to us and they're like, Please, anything.
00;15;39;24 - 00;16;11;20
Unknown
Like how do we fix this? I think we've all been there in some way for sure. Difference. Do you think that's that's where the laughter is coming from, really? Right? Because we all kind of feel that. Yeah. So so let's talk a little bit about that, because it seems to me that at least for us, when when folks come to us, they're saying and in terms of sound specifically, it just pick something or just do this or, you know, there's like this kind of throwaway kind of attitude towards sound.
00;16;12;10 - 00;16;36;15
Unknown
In some cases. In other cases, they're very specific. They're very like, you know, it feels like it's polarizing. It's a find someone in the middle who's like, Yeah, I can take it. Let's see what happens. That's really hard to find. I don't know if that's your guys's experience, but I kind of want to get to how do you deal with scratch audio, scratch tracks, things that are placeholders, things that are temporary.
00;16;36;28 - 00;17;04;07
Unknown
I know that it happens in trailers and in music, in movies and sequences. Like there's a whole debate around, do do we even do this? Because then whoever's been reviewing it for 510, 16 weeks has been listening to the same sound or the same voice or the same, you know, post effects for quite a while. And now they have to like, totally change their experience with a different sound of it, different person, a different tune.
00;17;05;00 - 00;17;29;02
Unknown
Can you talk about that a little bit? I don't know if any one of you can chime in first, but is scratch tracks and whether or not they're like a good thing for production or a bad thing or an unnecessary evil? Perhaps? Yeah, maybe so. Yeah. I suppose a lot of it is dependent on the attitude of whoever the creative director is.
00;17;29;02 - 00;18;07;07
Unknown
If the scratch tracks are there and they sort of get embossed into the culture or the atmosphere, the project, whatever it is, and that can be that dangerous, I suppose, because I really don't like when music specifically is there and it doesn't really serve a purpose. It doesn't really have a meaning. You know, I like for especially on longer projects where you get maybe different scenes, you get like an opening, a development, clothes to have, like running themes that you develop to where the music is going.
00;18;07;07 - 00;18;54;25
Unknown
Somewhere, you know. So Scotch tracks, are there a hodgepodge of stuff that I think could be classified as a necessary evil? Because you need to have an idea and they're good at getting that across. Like this should be this atmosphere. You should feel this when you get to this point that I think as long as there's an understanding that it's kind of change that you can, I suppose, trust to use that in the audio position to deliver that same feeling, but then also take it a step further and craft something that fits, that makes sense, that has a purpose musically, even if you know, you don't have to have a technical understanding of music to
00;18;55;16 - 00;19;26;06
Unknown
feel that things are right and meaningful. You know, take like any John Williams score to solidify the X, but as long as there's an open awareness and agreement and trust between the audio and the creative director, then you can, you know, sort of deliberate through it and achieve something that fills the temp track that surpasses it, that's like, Yeah, that's a good point, right?
00;19;26;23 - 00;19;49;19
Unknown
You're bringing up a good point that it feels like a scratch track. Like if they're getting attached to it, it's from a position of safety almost because to say we're going to change this is like, Oh, change is scary. And like, what if it sounds totally different and it's no longer the right vibe? But to your point, Seth, it's like, No, this is we're going to take it to a whole nother level of elevation and deeper purpose and meaning.
00;19;49;19 - 00;20;08;25
Unknown
I think that's, that's a really good way to think about it and to phrase it to a client, because otherwise they might not have seen it that way before. So that's really interesting. And to your point about the like the combination of needing the balance with the creative director, that I'll jump to Stephen there because I know you, you might have some things to add about that.
00;20;09;06 - 00;20;46;08
Unknown
Well, I like Seth's response because it comes from this really beautiful, creative, pure place. Yeah. And I feel like more often than not, we're dealing with just the practicalities of timelines and budgets. I get where clients are coming from. Like early in my career, I was producing sessions where we would do the scratch tracks first for music and then I would just be completely married to them by the time we roll around to doing the final tracks, I'm like, Forget it, We're just using the scratch tracks.
00;20;46;08 - 00;21;15;01
Unknown
They're perfect. They'd be ridiculous tracks, and the engineers would get furious with me. So they came up with this plan to start making things really badly so that I would have no choice but to rerecord it. It didn't. It didn't work. Now we're just like getting these very colorful recordings that I'm refusing to change. I don't have an answer for how to get around that feeling except just trying to avoid giving people the opportunity.
00;21;15;01 - 00;21;37;26
Unknown
So in our experience, for example, you know, we get a batch of scripts and like maybe we get ten episodes for an animated animated series and we just have an actor quickly read through all of them, do funny voices, and then we deliver that to the animators so that they can get started with storyboarding and so forth. And the directors promise is always the same.
00;21;37;26 - 00;22;07;00
Unknown
We're just using it for timing. Hmm. Hmm hmm hmm hmm. It's not true. Yeah. And then it rolls back to us, and it's all lip synched to this person's half hearted imitation of other characters. So suddenly we're in this position of having to ADR all these episodes, the actors are forced to use somebody else's emotions that are not really emotions.
00;22;07;26 - 00;22;32;16
Unknown
Our solution to that was to get person on my team who is the most embarrassed to be in front of a microphone. And she would read it all and she would read it slow and in a monotone. Mm hmm. And I'd like to say that worked every time it didn't. They still would lip sync to this, but not not nearly as much.
00;22;32;16 - 00;22;53;23
Unknown
They they clearly knew that we were trying to enforce some sort of order. That's totally fair. Finding that balance is definitely tricky, right? Because every client is slightly different in some way there too. So, yeah, I applaud you for making lots of different efforts there. Thank you. Thank you. What with and with music, I do have different opinions generally.
00;22;53;23 - 00;23;22;22
Unknown
I love when people provide us with music references. It's my understanding that editors tend to work with music regardless, and when we jump into projects, it's whether it's just like watching Wizard of Oz with Pink Floyd or not, you tend to notice a tempo in the animation, and once you find that tempo, just everything is a bit magical.
00;23;23;18 - 00;23;51;19
Unknown
It's easier, I think, when they actually have a tempo to work with and also an idea of what they want. That's clear. The problems arise when they leave us to be artists and now they're married to an idea. But we're supposed to be reading their mind to find out what that idea is. And they don't want to tell us.
00;23;51;19 - 00;24;20;18
Unknown
I'm convinced that not not that I know anybody's motivations for anything, but I'm convinced that it's embarrassment, maybe embarrassment of the music that they're listening to, embarrassment of them telling us what to do when we're supposed to be the experts, maybe embarrassment of changing their minds. But for better or worse, they're attached to what they've chosen. And I'd say 99% of the time, nothing else is going to make them happy.
00;24;22;13 - 00;24;49;17
Unknown
So I appreciate people being honest up front and letting us know what they what they really feel intuitively that's there. Because otherwise I think that it's more likely that they're going to be unhappy with the end results, even if even if the end results are perhaps objectively more in line with the original vision. I think something I'm I'm hearing from both.
00;24;49;17 - 00;25;12;03
Unknown
But what you and Seth had in here is like there is some sort of level of like vulnerability that the client's going to be experiencing throughout this process. And like, especially if they have an experience that before through sound of, of any kind, it's a new feeling that we we don't really know how to talk about on like the day to day of giving and getting feedbacks.
00;25;12;03 - 00;25;36;08
Unknown
And I have a feeling, Michel, you might tap into this a little bit as well on that side of vulnerability, because it's it's sort of it's really deep. I think there's something there that I talked about it from the fear of change, but there's it's just being vulnerable through that process. Yeah. So just before we get to Michelle, I wanted to ask Steven, you said ADR, and I'm not sure everyone who would be listening to this would know what that means.
00;25;36;10 - 00;26;03;14
Unknown
So could you just define that real quick? Yeah. Michelle Correct me when I get this wrong. Automatic automatic dialog replacement. Is that, is that it? I, I'm not certain, but that sounds close. Again, I don't do a ton of ADR or dubbing, so I'm not an expert in that, but that sounds good. Yeah, don't quote me. You're very internet, Michelle.
00;26;03;14 - 00;26;32;16
Unknown
And I believe that ADR stands for automatic dialog replacement and what that entails is, for instance, let's say you're making a film and the characters are standing 50 feet away in the rain and you have a very poor recording of the audio of them saying their lines. Then you pull them into a studio, you put that on a loop and you bring the actors into the studio and you just have them repeat the lines, repeat the lines until they get it.
00;26;32;16 - 00;26;56;08
Unknown
Right now you have a clean recording. As you can imagine, this takes at least ten times longer, I bet. Yes, that makes perfect sense. Thank you, Michelle, Let's get to you. Do you do you ever get a scratch track version of the script? And then you have to rerecord or there are they guiding you in some way? Can you talk a little bit about that on the voiceover side?
00;26;56;23 - 00;27;23;29
Unknown
For sure, yeah. We do get scratch tracks from time to time because, you know, as Steven alluded to, you're working on a project and as you're going through the process, you just have to have a play folder before you get that final content, which comes to a little bit of my thought in process as a voice actor. Very selfishly, I would love to come in to a project probably earlier in the process, but not, generally speaking, how voice acting goes.
00;27;23;29 - 00;27;48;24
Unknown
We tend to be one of the final elements of a project, maybe coming in earlier might allow some of these issues that we've talked about here, but we definitely get scratch track. Sometimes they're fine, sometimes not. I think some of the problems that we encounter with Scratch fact is that depending on who recorded it, they may be a fast talker and they may just go really quickly.
00;27;48;24 - 00;28;27;14
Unknown
But the actual emotion of that script does not call for a speedy read, which is a really energetic read. But now you've only got however much time that person left you to make that same emotional connection that you have to change potentially what that entire project sounds like based on the time that you have left. So not necessarily a criticism, but it doesn't leave as much room for the emotional interpretation in that the voice actor is going to do versus just saying words to make sure that there is space for that Once the project gets a little bit further along in the process.
00;28;27;14 - 00;28;50;13
Unknown
So that's been some of my experience. That's not a wholly negative experience. You know, sometimes it's just like, okay, you've got this amount of time and that's totally work for me and you know, cool, now I go forward. But there have definitely been times when I felt like, Wow, I could have used more space here for making this sound the way that it connects to me.
00;28;50;21 - 00;29;18;21
Unknown
But yeah, again, that comes down to also whether or not the client has a really clear idea of what the moment is that they want their best actor to experience. If they don't have the most clear picture of what that emotional connection is going to be like, then they won't know to leave that kind of space or leave the potential for that kind of based for the voice actor to make that connection.
00;29;18;24 - 00;29;41;12
Unknown
Right. Can I jump in real fast? I just I just want to clarify when she's talking about emotions, if there's people listening who are just like, well, I do medical stuff. There's no emotions. There is emotions. Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah. I do medical stuff and there are emotions in that. There's some there's at least one emotion in anything in any script that you do.
00;29;41;15 - 00;30;06;24
Unknown
There is a character in every script, and therefore there are emotions in every single script. If you don't think there are emotions in medical narration, try it again. You're doing good. You're doing it wrong. Yeah, yeah. Awesome. Well, let's let's go a little bit deeper into the feedback hole. And so I want everyone to sort of think of what the worst way a client can give you feedback on your work.
00;30;06;24 - 00;30;35;16
Unknown
What's like the worst thing? And I know Steven, maybe I'll be. I'll be the client. Hold on. So I can I can, I can method actor right now. So let's see. So if I go to something like with Seth going back to my like I know crescendos thing, you know, perhaps if I'm the worst type of feedback, if I gave you like hey this, this feels icky and I would like it to not feel icky, Can you do that?
00;30;36;24 - 00;31;22;15
Unknown
Girl, you have two days. You know, like, honestly, I would rather take this feels icky over I suppose maybe micromanaging and trying to get to the end result of making it not so. I think it all comes back to the trust. I think between whoever is giving feedback and and is looking on the audio to be like it feels icky, what can we do to And then I like the example to make it not feel icky, you know So and then to trust your audio person to to one either just understand it and be like, okay, let me come back at you or be like, Hey, what would you say it like, Can you further
00;31;22;15 - 00;31;45;13
Unknown
elucidate on what the heck you're talking about? You know, But I'm okay working with boundaries and they help a lot. Like we have to have it this way as long as this, whether you're talking about means like it, it has to hit a different, like emotional point. And that's not the tone we were going for. Rather than telling me like, you know, the double bass note should be different here.
00;31;46;00 - 00;32;20;12
Unknown
Yeah, well, I mean, what am I here for then? Like, you can get a free, you know, doll and just, like, write that yourself, right? Because if you're writing music, like, I think that's what you hired me for, right? So, you know, that makes perfect sense. Awesome. I was going to say, if I really like what you said about boundaries, I have a somewhat similar feeling about the types of projects that I do as I was just talking about working with clients who don't either know or don't give you like a somewhat clear idea of where they're headed or where they want to go.
00;32;20;12 - 00;32;45;28
Unknown
Having those boundaries is really, really valuable because I can obviously create that moment for myself. I'll just read the script, find the story that identifies with me within that script, and then bring it to life. But then if that's not what you had in your head, but you didn't let me know what you had in your head, then we will spend a lot more time going back and forth about what the end product should actually be.
00;32;45;28 - 00;33;11;21
Unknown
Whereas if you give me a much clearer idea of what those goalposts are, then we'll get there a lot faster with a lot less headache. I cannot tell you how many projects I see online where there is absolutely no direction whatsoever for the voice actor. Cool. Now I get to do whatever I want, but you know, maybe none of the things that they get are what they're looking for.
00;33;11;21 - 00;33;38;18
Unknown
So having at least a pathway, some boundaries makes the project go a lot more smoothly and happier for everybody In terms of ways in which I don't like to receive feedback, I think to what I just said more than feedback. I love that upfront guidance that's really useful. But what I don't love is adjectives that don't have much meaning.
00;33;39;10 - 00;34;12;04
Unknown
I'll give you an example. I had a live DirecTV session one time, and for anybody listening who doesn't know what a live DirecTV session is, it's basically when the voice actor is in their booth or in a studio and members of the production company and maybe the actual and clients are listening in on that session and providing live in the moment, feedback, direction, etc., so that they get exactly what they want by the end of the session rather than there having to be a lot of back and forth over email or by phone.
00;34;12;12 - 00;34;32;23
Unknown
So I was in a live DirecTV session and there were actually a lot of people in that session. Usually you're in a session with like three people or two and one had nine. That was a lot. That is a lot. Oh, my goodness, It was a lot. Each. You know, they were reflecting to each other. How was that?
00;34;32;23 - 00;34;57;12
Unknown
You know, blah, blah, blah. And then, you know, we worked through a few sets where they were like, okay, we really like this direction. We want another direction. Okay, cool. That's great. Then they started just kind of like throwing things out there. Like, can you sound more thoughtful in this next read? And thoughtful doesn't really have a sound.
00;34;57;26 - 00;35;42;23
Unknown
I could get there if you said inquisitive or curious or something where there's like an actual sound reflection there. But thoughtful is quite subjective to me, at any rate. So now I'm sitting there and I'm like, Right. I thought, yeah, I thought, okay, very thoughtful about how to sound thoughtful. So just things that you could be really critical with yourself about what you're asking a voiced actor or an artist of any kind to actually, you know, reflect back to you, then that would be super useful because there are some things that just don't have much meaning and, you know, you'll get whatever that voice actor is able to come back to you with in that.
00;35;42;23 - 00;36;14;27
Unknown
Well, in our podcast, you we, I think Will's talked about this idea specifically of like action oriented words or like action oriented language that makes a clear distinction about like this is how you can take action on the type of feedback that we're giving you that has a clear mutual understanding. Because to your point, if you're there's so many words that are just so subjective, and I think we did a we did one in our last episode of Think where we had like I had will repeat a sentence, but I said, make it feel like light and airy.
00;36;15;04 - 00;36;40;29
Unknown
And you're like, okay, well, what is what does that actually mean? Like, it's so open to interpretation. So yeah, having a clear descriptive language that's action oriented is definitely really helpful. So that's a great point. Yeah. Steven, I feel like you deal with this a lot. I don't know if there's specific types of feedback that you guys get that you wish you wouldn't get and what would be a better version of the feedback maybe.
00;36;41;03 - 00;37;13;29
Unknown
Yeah. So let me preface this by saying I took some notes on the subject and let go for the past few days because because I saw this is the subject of our conversation in my notes I wrote, I'm serious, I wrote and you're really in trouble. The moment someone says I used to play in marching band. Yes. So, Oh, I'm so glad I could be here to be the worst client that you have to deal with.
00;37;15;20 - 00;37;40;17
Unknown
I'm here, you know. I accept it. I've. I've come to terms with it. I've, you know, I've gone to lots of therapy over this. You know, I. That's awesome. That's perfect. And apologies to any any of our listeners who are then bad people. I don't know. We're we're great. Yes, we're great, but we make terrible clients when it comes to feedback on sound.
00;37;40;17 - 00;38;03;04
Unknown
I got it. But the second half of that sentence is more or less what you said, which is because then you get super specific feedback that doesn't make any sense. And I have an example of this which has happened so many times. I mean, this this happens regularly. The client will say, speed up the music. That's easy, right?
00;38;03;05 - 00;38;31;12
Unknown
We all know what that means, but that's not what it means to the client ever. What it means to us as musicians is increase the tempo. That means you have a track that's like tough to cut and then you increase the tempo to tactic. Okay, great. Now it's out of sync with the picture. You come up with an awkward ending because the math doesn't work anymore and the client hates it because it turns out they don't actually want an increase in the tempo.
00;38;31;24 - 00;39;01;15
Unknown
What they want is more drums. They want subdivisions. If you just threw a bongo track on top of the original, then they're happy because what they imagine as faster to tap is got to got to. There you go. Now it's faster drums in some sense. Mm hmm. So what I kept coming back to is that everyone needs to go to therapy.
00;39;03;01 - 00;39;30;11
Unknown
Okay? Yes. As they say, how you do anything is how you do everything. And I once had a day job and it was in my corporate consulting, and I, you know, turned some, you know, nothing piece of work in to my manager who nobody he didn't manage anybody but me. And He came down and he lectured me. He's like, I am your client.
00;39;31;04 - 00;40;06;10
Unknown
You need to present this to me as if I'm the person making decisions. And that's when I realized that's exactly the same thing that we're dealing with here. If I was working with you well, and Katherine, you would be my client. But you're answering to somebody else, right? And they're answering to, like, ten more people. And it just goes and goes and goes and now everybody is dealing with these unaddressed power dynamics from their childhoods where nobody knows really how to communicate it.
00;40;06;24 - 00;40;40;21
Unknown
You get defensive when you receive feedback. Your clients are receiving feedback from the people above them. And it's a really emotional experience for everyone and a lot of room for misunderstanding. So everyone's role when you're in the I don't know what's the opposite of the client, but what is it like creative? The creative, the creative role I think, is to be curious and not defensive, but most of all curious.
00;40;40;21 - 00;41;12;24
Unknown
Yeah. And the client's role is to engage with the creative in a somewhat vulnerable, as you mentioned, and also open hearted way because we are all working toward the same goal. And that's so easy to say. I mean, all all of us have said it. We need to be opening up communication. Everyone knows that. But what that means when you're in the moment is quite scary, actually.
00;41;12;24 - 00;41;32;16
Unknown
Yeah, that's totally so. I mean, I'm not giving you anything to work with here, though. No, no, no. This is perfect. Yeah. No, this gives us a lot to go off of. I do have one last question. It's kind of a curveball, but I is a really big thing that is happening to a lot of creative jobs. And I just want to get a sense of where have you seen it?
00;41;32;22 - 00;42;02;07
Unknown
And your just your thoughts on it quickly. I know we're sort of running out of time here, but maybe, Steven, why don't we start with you. Do you feel like where have you seen eye popping up and how has it affected you, if anything, or what are your thoughts? It took me a while to realize that this guy who was getting all of the video jobs on Instagram was actually a I know what a great voice, what everyone's affording him.
00;42;02;07 - 00;42;40;20
Unknown
Yes, I realized a long time ago I started in the music end of this. I realized that I'm not competing with other composers. So much. I'm competing with music, libraries. People have $5 budgets and that's that's the problem. And I just added this whole other layer to the landscape. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. I fear for, for instance, explainers, medical narration, technical narration, people doing a series of 500 videos, music I'm not too fearful of yet.
00;42;40;20 - 00;43;06;20
Unknown
But even yesterday, I got an email from one of the air music companies saying, Yeah, now you can give us the chord progressions that you want and you know, every three months or so I'm hearing something that I'm shocked has improved so much from the last time I heard something. Hmm. I think it's a matter of time and that we all are going to have to learn to live with what that looks like.
00;43;07;01 - 00;43;36;01
Unknown
And we can argue all day about what we bring to the table. I think what Michelle's talking about in terms of emotion, I hope that I can't replace that. And that's for the moment. What we have to hang on to is our ability to be emotional and to be curious. I at the moment doesn't seem to ask the questions or to read the nuances and your language, the things that you're not saying.
00;43;37;00 - 00;44;06;08
Unknown
And that's what gives us the edge. Yeah, Yeah, I know you touched on that already, Michelle, about that emotional piece, but yeah, where, where do you kind of sit with it too? Yeah, I is all over the place. I'm also a vocal coach as well as being a voice doctor and one of my fellow coaches at the Voice Acting Institute, he had his voice stolen and that actually was the product of several years.
00;44;06;08 - 00;44;29;16
Unknown
It was there was a company he did routine work for to Stevens Point where he would do, you know, 2 to 3 minute videos for them like five times a month. And what have you, have you and, you know, like eight years ago, voice actors were not thinking about what I was going to be doing now. And so he signed a contract with this company.
00;44;29;29 - 00;45;00;25
Unknown
There was a clause in there that he was just like, I don't really know what application I would have. And it ended up being that they have the right to use this voice for whatever they want going forward. So it's on every voice. Actors mind. I think a lot of us are taking a lot more care with the contracts that we're signing with clients to make sure that we are covered and that the clients we work with are not looking to use our voices or turn our voices into our products that they can use going forward.
00;45;00;25 - 00;45;33;18
Unknown
So there's a lot of that. And then to your point, often it's about what we bring that at least for the moment does not, which is we are able to create really powerful emotional connections at the drop of a dime. Feeling emotions is what humans do. It's not what computers do. So we bring that to the table and as much as possible we just try to make sure that the clients that we work with really value what we bring to the table over a computer.
00;45;33;18 - 00;45;59;17
Unknown
But to Stevens Point, you know, there is work that is very likely to go away, you know, IVR, which has phone systems. You know, any time you call a company and it walks you through the system, that is that's a got a high likelihood for being AI in the very near future if it if not already and then explainers and things like that where you know people feel like like medical narration, there is no emotion in there.
00;45;59;17 - 00;46;21;02
Unknown
So who cares if it's a computer or if a person does it? But think about that person on the other end. You have to listen to that. If you're going through a training that is computerized and it's a five hour training, like the experience of listening to a computer versus listening to a voice actor will be completely different.
00;46;21;02 - 00;46;54;02
Unknown
The uptake of that information will be completely different. So yeah, I would just extoll people to think about what that end listener's experience is going to be and what you want their experience to be. Yeah, that's a great point. I hadn't thought about it from that perspective, but that makes perfect sense, especially like we've done coursework in the past and it's like any time it's a long course, it's almost like we have to approach it more from a storytelling aspect because if it's just this like really long dry content, it it's really hard to pay attention to.
00;46;54;03 - 00;47;10;27
Unknown
So you have to create a new level of exposure with it. So yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, I'd love to see maybe some, some numbers and some some data on it because I would imagine you get lower engagement rates on any kind of media. But you know, yeah, it's worth doing. I think of like audio books, right.
00;47;10;29 - 00;47;44;04
Unknown
Like audio could be a space where that that type of research could actually happen. Oh yeah. Audio books are like it can make or break a good book like depending on how the audio is 100%. So that makes the truth. I mean, I think as a as a voice actor, I think we're still lucky that we're in a in the phase right now where by and large people can still get to that point, that uncanny valley, what they call uncanny valley, where at some point your brain is like that is not a real voice.
00;47;44;04 - 00;48;24;24
Unknown
And so we're still somewhat in that phase, but much, much, much more rapidly than a lot of us would have thought. We're getting to a place where it's like, Wow, that that was actually not bad at all. So yeah, yeah. And what about what about you, Seth? Where do you see it in sort of the composing world? I would just say in general, you know, out here and so many strikes across us that fighting this very thing, the contracts for unions, you know, I wonder why shouldn't I, you know, especially at this stage be applied more to like business decisions rather than creative decisions.
00;48;24;24 - 00;48;58;04
Unknown
Like I feel like it might be more properly applied in that sort of zero one language rather than the creative side that, you know, I think, you know, things will change. But we've got the nervous systems. There's electronic circuits that we're up against that I think the imperfections that are inherent to us sort of, at least for now, delineate us from circuits.
00;48;58;05 - 00;49;29;26
Unknown
Yeah. So I think I would love to see that continue are the beautiful imperfections of what it means to be a person in general in a creative and specific for those things to be sort of celebrated and embraced. But I think they will be that I know, you know, I will have its place. I just sort of wonder if it should be more applicable to maybe less creative decisions.
00;49;30;06 - 00;50;00;07
Unknown
Yeah. So you bring up a good point. It reminds me of something I heard a writer say once that was talking about how just how interesting it is that like we work in such a creative, open, expressive kind of field, which is limited to the business side of things, the production time management budget, like there's all these constraints that are being pushed on what is inherently such a creative and open and non time bound field.
00;50;00;07 - 00;50;29;20
Unknown
Yeah, so it's it's just kind of the confines that we that we live within right now. So I do I feel you on that front of like I would also like to see it be utilized for things that that can be purposeful for a business or something to grow because it's, it's part of that nature. But part of our nature is this sort of expressive side that I agree I don't think you're going to get from your your standard ones and zeroes maybe maybe a little more zeros one day, but not not in the same way.
00;50;31;09 - 00;50;58;28
Unknown
There's this beautiful book called Future Hit DNA. It's like a decade ago by, I think, the head of Yahoo! Music at the time. And the premise of it is that technology dictates creativity, essentially. And he goes through a history, the history of music, and shows how that applies in ways that we have. No, we have no idea. Like why is songs 2 minutes long?
00;50;58;28 - 00;51;30;29
Unknown
Because that's what fit on a piano role where we're accustomed to decisions that were made based on technical limitations of the past and every era. People think the same thing. This is the downfall of creativity. Now, you know, now there's recorded music. Live musicians won't have jobs anymore. Once people didn't have to just get into a room and play with each other, suddenly they didn't have to know how to play with each other and now they don't even have to know how to be on time.
00;51;31;07 - 00;51;57;16
Unknown
We already have the technology to just, you know, click one button and everything is synched up. We don't get accidents anymore. And this is this is not a sudden movement away from creativity. It's just the next stage in what we've already been working with. Yeah, no, that's a great point. Yeah. So I it's a good point to end on.
00;51;57;19 - 00;52;22;17
Unknown
Yeah, I know, yeah, I want to be mindful of time here. So where can people learn a little bit more about you in the interest of building trust and, you know, doing things that are not A.I. and more, How can people find you so that they can work with you and build some really great sounds together? I'm going to start with you, sir, so I need a update, but I have a website called set thousand dot com.
00;52;23;04 - 00;52;57;06
Unknown
Check out the Great Age of Sale, which is one of the musicals that I'm working on, Compassion Street. It's the other one up in the Delaware area of response for Excellent. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for asking. Yeah. What about you, Michelle? Very. You can find me at my website, which is Michelle Batten bio. That's Michelle with two ls and b t t and veto icon.
00;52;57;08 - 00;53;24;09
Unknown
And you can also find me on Instagram or Twitter now X or Facebook at and Baton VO or on LinkedIn as Michelle, Ben and Steven. You can find my company Stereo Couture Stereo couture dot com you're all making it really straightforward to reach out. That's great. Yeah. And we'll put some of those in the links and descriptions and stuff like that.
00;53;24;09 - 00;53;45;12
Unknown
So yeah, I'll give you. Thank you so much for being on the podcast. We really, really appreciate it. It was fantastic and lovely. Yeah, we learned a lot throughout. We think our audience is going to learn a lot from it, so we really appreciate. You taking the time? Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all so much. And thank you and have an awesome.
00;53;48;20 - 00;54;19;09
Unknown
This episode was brought to you by EA Media. Our producer is Jackson Foote. Our music was created by Hidden and through premium BET.com. And until next time, stay honest. Stay creative. Stay open. Open. Pick cities. We will see you in the next episode. Thank. During the pandemic, we watched a lot of TV, but we watched traveling TV because we needed to see other people travel and live vicariously through them.
00;54;19;17 - 00;54;45;26
Unknown
And we came across. I had never seen it. The Amazing Grace. Yeah, the TV show The Amazing Race. It's a bunch of teams, teams of two. Normally they go out and they race around the world. They race around the world, hopping from one country to another. They learn a little bit about the culture. Typically, they're doing challenges throughout these throughout these jumps and each leg of the race, usually you get a winner and a loser, and the last person to finish the race is usually kicked off.
00;54;46;07 - 00;55;09;02
Unknown
It's a fantastic show. And I thought I wasn't really going to like it. And we binged it almost religiously throughout the pan, correct? Correct. And so now we had talked about making some tiktoks that were Amazing Race but at home. So like, you know, teams would have to fold laundry within a certain amount of time. And like, there were all these, all these ridiculous challenges.
00;55;09;02 - 00;55;25;21
Unknown
Yeah. And then we took it a step further and were like, What if there was a form of entertainment to take The Amazing Race somewhere else? What if it was a musical? How do you how do you feel? Just thoughts. I like the idea of your amazing race at home and immediately I was thinking like, what other things could you do?
00;55;25;21 - 00;55;49;00
Unknown
And I thought, Well, you don't want to race washing your hands. You need to spend 20 seconds doing that. MM Yeah. So what if the musical where everyone's compulsively washing their hands for 20 seconds but they have to sing a song for 20 seconds each time and that's good. There's actually nothing that gives me more pleasure than making up what I think a person has going through their mind in a moment.
00;55;49;00 - 00;56;08;25
Unknown
So I will hopefully be that person. Yes. Tell me why. I'm glad. I mean, that that's that sounds great. Both of the musicals I'm working on currently were born out of the ages. You know, as as I say, the Great Depression. That's a different era. No, but kind of the same right out of out of the pandemic. Yes.
00;56;09;25 - 00;56;33;14
Unknown
It's a wonderful thing. Yeah, Basically, Yeah. Both of them were born out of the pandemic. Lots of creative stuff happening. So, yeah, just tell me what you need, some of which parts need to be scored. There it is. I'm glad we can make this happen. We look forward to calling. All of you. Get this idea off the floor.
00;56;33;14 - 00;56;34;01
Unknown
Awesome.