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Debra Mark was born and raised in Southern California, Debra always knew she wanted to be behind the mic or the camera in some way. She was the student who loved to read out loud; loved to be heard. She thought maybe she would become an actor or a news anchor so she went to college for broadcast journalism. Both of these dreams came true in different ways because now Debra is a jack of all trades! You can hear her on KFI 640 AM and KPCC 89.3 as well as see and/or hear her on shows like House of Cards.
Debra's three pieces of advice for being a broadcast journalist or radio personality are to be a good writer, to read a newspaper out loud and work on making it as conversational as possible, and lastly to be natural - be who you are.
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Ben Pronsky grew up in Houston, Texas. He was born to a yoga instructor and a military man. He had studied theater and was doing a co-op theater audition in Houston, where he performed monologues that had a lot of distinct characters. One of the directors introduced him to the director of ADV Films who did a lot of anime and dubbing. After recording his first job for anime, he put together a voice over reel, got an agent and began working in the Houston market. Eleven years ago he made the move to Los Angeles for more opportunity. He feels that his work is all about coming from a place of authentic genuine creation of characters. Ben has studied regularly at the Larry Moss Studio and is currently a member of the Edgemar Theatre Company in Santa Monica.
Ben has been lucky enough to work in video games as well as looping and ADR. Looping, or Wala work, is the background noise in a movie. Productions hire voice actors for call-outs, incidental voices and crowd noises. This is necessary for scenes in public such as restaurants, airports, or hospitals. Looping requires a very specific skill set. Ben says, “It is the perfect marriage of improvisation, voice over and stage. You feel like you are in a theater because you are on this big sound stage.” You can hear Ben’s looping work in the recent movie Deadpool.
Ben’s advice is to take classes, work on your technique and your craft, and learn what your unique skill set really is. Secondly, don’t let the self-doubt in. Never second guess yourself. Third, surround yourself with a really good team; meaning your agent and representation, but also your colleagues, friends and families who are rooting for you.
Find out more about Ben Pronsky at www.BenPronsky.com and @BenPronsky on twitter.
For more advice on enhancing your voice over career, visit SixFigureVoice.com.
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Tyrone Jackson and Alyson Steel discuss voice-over coaching. Alyson reveals that she prefers to coach students who are gung-ho about the industry. She says that it can be a very psychological industry and as actors, voice over artists have to access their emotions as tools, and if they have any emotional blocks its something they have to deal with.
To give our audience a taste of voice-over coaching, Alyson guides our producer, Lexi, through a piece of ad-copy. Alyson gives some great advice for beginners:
1) Stand up when reading copy. Either wear flats or take off your shoes in the booth to feel grounded.
2) Start by anchoring, which means reading each word in the copy without inflection.
3) Figure out who you are in this situation and who are you talking to.
4) Know where you are in the commercial. A coffee shop? A bar? Inside a car?
5) When working on the mic it's not about volume, it's about intimacy.
For more great advice like this visit SixFigureVoice.com! Take your career to the next level!
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Our hosts Tyrone Jackson and Alyson Steel surprise each other with some interview questions about the voice-over "biz" and their industry secrets.
Back by popular demand, here's another episode where Tyrone and Alyson ask each other questions they have never heard before, making for honest and organic answers. Listen to hear tools that are helpful for making it in the industry, trends that Tyrone has seen throughout his career, how Alyson deals with being a woman in the industry and much much more!
To learn more about the voice-over industry visit www.sixfigurevoice.com!
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American Idol's Blake Lewis opened up to our hosts Tyrone Jackson and Alyson Steel. Blake was always a fan of voice over as a kid. Growing up in Bothell, Washington, he was always mimicking people-- he had a knack for impressions and sound effects. When he got into high school Blake found out that beat boxing was a legitimate skill and he dove in head first. Blake believes that beat boxing, voice over, sound effects and singing all bleed together because they are all ways of using the same instrument - the human voice! Right out of high school Blake started touring with bands and it wasn't until a friend at a video game company asked him to come in to record some voices that he started to think about voice over as a career. Just as that was happening, he got on American Idol. After all his musical success, Blake is now expanding into voice over once again. He has a huge range and no filter, which makes him uberly fun to be around, but he needs his coach to reel him in for commercial voice over. Alyson Steel coaches him in setting the boundaries and playing within those boundaries. He is learning how to use the attitutudes from his characters in his normal speaking voice to help color his commercial reads. Blake Lewis is launching his voice over career and so can you. Visit SixFigureVoice.com to learn how. Download Blake's latest album Portrait of a Chameleon from his website here: BlakeLewisOfficial.com
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Roger Leopardi started out in the music business. He and his brother were recording artists known as MVP with a popular single in 1991 called Do It To Me. Because of contracts and bad management, MVP didn't end up taking off.
As Roger was leaving the music business he met his wife and decided to get a "regular" job. He worked in retail for years but always wanted to work for himself. When he decided he could not work retail ever again, a customer who Roger had always helped with programs like Pro Tools came back into his store and Roger asked him, "How come you've never asked me if I wanted a job?" He got an interview with an ad agency the next day.
Roger began his career producing commercials at this ad agency in Fort Lauderdale. He learned the environment and increased their productivity, making 30 - 50 commercials per day. There were about three voice over actors that he worked with on a daily basis. He built relationships with the them and eventually the voice actors started to tell him that he had a good voice that was popular right now.
With this encouragement and the need for growth, Roger told his bosses that he was never going to be satisfied. They never had to pay him a dime over what he was making at that moment, as long as they gave him the flexibility to pursue his voice over career.
Years later, Roger now lives in Los Angeles as a successful voice over artist.
Want to get your voice over career started? Visit SixFigureVoice.com for articles, advice, and much much more that will help put you on the fast track.
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Kyle McCarley has been a Los Angeles voice actor for about six years. He is represented by 90210 Talent in Los Angeles and DB Talent in Texas. He regularly works in anime, cartoons, video games, audiobooks, commercials, podcasts, radio plays, learning software, and phone promts.
After taking classes in Burbank and getting a home recording studio set-up Kyle started reaching out to industry professionals, producers, audio books, and video game creators to book work on his own before he found representation. He believes that you have to be willing to do the work, because the business side of the industry is at least 80% of this career.
Listen to hear his insight on the industry and his great advice!
For more great information visit SixFigureVoice.com!
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Our hosts Tyrone Jackson and Alyson Steel know from experience that it is critically important to have a good engineer when you are in the recording studio. Alyson says that even pyschologically speaking it puts you at ease to know that someone is there to catch your eye and be on your side if there is a problem. And most importantly, the engineers make you sound good!
Luckily, successful hollywood engineer Bryan Showalter was able to join us and share his insight from the other side of the glass.
Bryan grew up in Oklahoma City with a musician father who had a recording studio in the house. He grew up around music and recording, ended up becoming a musician himself, and moved out to LA with his band. After his band "imploded" as he says, Bryan decided to get into recording, with which he was already familiar. He started recording for musicians and segued into recording voice over after working with voice actor Ashton Smith.
Bryan believes being a musician helps you to be a good engineer because you already have an ear for cadence and timing. Tyrone and Alyson agree that a good engineer is also a buffer between the talent and directors/producers. The engineer conducts the orchestra that is the recording session and plays the part of the diplomat. Having a good personality goes a long way.
From his years of experience in the booth, Bryan knows what makes a successful voice actor. Listen to find out what he thinks are the top four characteristics of a great voice artist. He also tells us stories of grown men crying during a recording session!
For more great advice on how to amp up your voice-over career, visit www.SixFigureVoice.com.
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Tyrone Jackson and Alyson Steel chat with Larry Morgan. Larry is a writer, director, DJ, voice artist, producer and associate programmer who has worked in radio for 20 years. He has worked on many of the top radio stations in Los Angeles. He considers himself an LA cliché because he does a little bit of everything and always has a script up his sleeve.
Larry started in radio at a small station in Texas before moving out to LA to go to USC Film School. After school he pursued a career in radio. When he decided to add voice-over work to his skill set he really had to concentrate on having conversational reads because the tendency in radio is to push.
Larry explains that the program director of a radio station is the person who is directly responsible for programming. He has a hand in everything from managing the on-air personalities to the execution of promotions and contests. The program director is basically the radio version of a producer.
To find out more about the voice-over world from radio to television, film, and more visit www.sixfigurevoice.com. Six Figure Voice is your one stop shop for everything VO.
Click here for more!
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Our hosts Tyrone Jackson and Alyson Steel surprise each other with some interview questions about their experiences in the industry.
Tyrone and Alyson have never heard their respective questions before, making for honest and organic answers. We find out who they truly are as professionals, what their pet peeves are, how they rehearse, and what they love most about their careers. Listen to find out which celebrity Tyrone would want to be for a day and who Alyson's celebrity crush is!
To learn more about the voice-over industry visit www.sixfigurevoice.com!
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Working in animation is a really fun facet of the voice-over industry. Tyrone Jackson and Alyson Steel talk about character development and the audition process with Jamie Woodham, a writer from the animated show Talking Tom and Friends.
Jamie Woodham is a staff writer on Talking Tom and Friends. He built his reputation as a comedian and made contacts on Twitter before moving out to Los Angeles. He recommends using social media, especially twitter, to anyone wanting to work in the entertainment industry. Its a free writing sample and networking tool that helps get your name out there.
Jamie explains the process before behind the scenes of an animated show. His advice for auditioning is to bring something unique or very real to the character. When you are casting a nerdy character, for example, 95% of the auditions sound the same (i.e., nasal quality, high pitched voice). He says that if you want to stand out, bring a quirk, react to lines, and do whatever is in your control to give the character as much of a personality as possible.
If you want to catch Talking Tom and Friends, you can find it here on YouTube.
You can follow Jamie on twitter @jwoodham and listen to his podcast Best of Friends on iTunes.
To learn more about how to build or improve your career in the Voice-Over industry visit us at Six Figure Voice. Click here for more info.
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Alyson Steel and Tyrone Jackson get to sit down with Dave Sebastian Williams of Dave & Dave Recording Studio and 93 KHJ to talk about how the voice-over business has changed over the years.
Back when Dave had his radio show on 93 KHJ, it was the number one radio station in the city and it retained 40% of the Los Angeles audience. He felt like he had made it to the top. But Dave always felt that he needed to be prepared to expand—you don’t just do one thing in this industry. So he used some of the money he was making to take acting classes. The acting classes helped him train his voice for the transition from radio to voice-over acting, which are two very different crafts.
In the 1980’s Dave owned his own studio in Hollywood. All the recording technology was tape. He came kicking and screaming into the digital age. One of the differences he has noticed since digital became mainstream, is that recording sessions have become longer. Now the directors and the writers have more opportunity to change things on the spot. They record more so that they have a myriad of options.
He has also seen technology change the agent scene. Since the scope of voice over is now so big, covering commercials, promos, trailers, live shows, cartoons, and video games, he has seen actors have specific agents for each type of work. For example, you might have one agent for promos and a different agent for video games. Also, it can help to have different agents in different cities, because an agent in Dallas might have better relationships with the casting directors in that area.
Dave has been a drummer since he was in the fourth grade, and he has found that this has helped with his timing as a voice-over artist. To improve your timing, he advises to sleep with a metronome by your bed. Change up the beats, and after doing it for a month, see how you walk and talk differently
Dave also recommends going to every class that you can and recording yourself for 3 minutes every day. List to yesterday’s performance to see how you can make it better.
For more great tips like this, visit SixFigureVoice.com.
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Voice-over artists Tyrone Jackson and Alyson Steel discuss how the industry is the business of show, but it’s also a business of people. It’s important to be presentable, listen to others, take directions, and know your place. As Alyson says, “Be present, prompt, prepared!”
Richard Malmos, whose voice you may recognize from the Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn and later with Craig Ferguson, stopped by to chat with Tyrone and Alyson about the business.
Richard started as an actor and a singer, eventually got into radio in the Midwest, and got to learn about voice-over on the job from all the people that came through the studio. He simply listened to what other people were doing. Just like actors observe how people behave out in public, Richard listened to the tonality of people’s voices.
Richard luckily got an agent before coming out to LA. He says that this was key because it’s darn near impossible to get auditions for the big jobs, especially in a big market like Los Angeles, without an agent. His first big paycheck came from a gig for Western Auto. They had sent him three separate checks and he thought it was a mistake! Turns out it paid more than he thought!
Richard’s advice for new voice-over artists is to really give it some thought and if you are going to go for it don’t do it halfway. Get the training, invest the money, and take it seriously.
If you take the business seriously, visit SixFigureVoice.com for more tools, articles, and advice on how to grow your career.
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Welcome to the Six Figure Voice Podcast! Our hosts, Alyson Steel and Tyrone Jackson, introduce themselves and explain how they got into voice acting. The two actually met in high school at The High School of Performing Arts in New York City, made famous by the movie “FAME.” However their journeys to the industry and to success have been quite different.
Tyrone explains that there’s nothing special about his voice, he just knows how to use it. He’s a great storyteller. People have an impression that doing voice-over work is all about the quality of your voice. In reality, almost anyone can break into the voice-over business; you just have to know how.
Alyson and Tyrone go over the first three of Seven Steps to Becoming A Professional Voice Over Artist. You can find the rest of the steps at SixFigureVoice.com.
First, decide if voice-over work is a hobby or career. If the work is only a hobby, you tend to give it half the attention it deserves. At the beginning of your voice-over career you must do something every day to make your dream a reality.
Next, intern at a local radio station. Just by being in the environment you will learn every aspect of the business and how the pieces fit together. Network with the people you meet and start to build the relationships that will help grow your career.
Work on your skills every day. Today’s voice-over market is very competitive. There are thousands of beautiful voices looking to break into the “biz.” The more you work on your copy reading skills, the more value you’ll have to producers and casting directors. They hear voices every day and can easily tell the amateurs from the professionals.
Want to read the next four steps to becoming a professional voice-over artist? Visit SixFigureVoice.com, the one stop shop for everything Voice Over. Click here for more info.
