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I Used To Steal Software and Plugins For Voiceover

audio, Studio, Technology & Voiceover, The Studio, voiceover, Voiceover Career

I used to steal software and plugins for voiceover. I started my career with Cubase LE which came as free software with my Emu 1616 audio interface. As I realized the limitations of that software, I wanted to grow but I didn’t have the money to grow. But having friends in audio engineering, I found out that there were ways to get what was called cracked software.

My first cracked software was a Cubase SX. There was a company that was famous for cracking audio software called      and I used to find their software either online or through a friend who had it. Cubase 2.1 was how I really learned to produce commercials. But a DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) is only as good as the plugins. So for that, I had to find more cracked software.

Free Plugins? Or Digital Piracy?

The hot plugins of the day were waves plugins. Waves were really good and really expensive. Of everyone that I knew who did audio, maybe only one of them actually bought any of the waves plugins legally. Waves plugins could run 10k for a bundle. Being who I am I had to have the best bundles. I had the waves platinum, mercury and gold bundles at some time in history.

As my career grew, I never really considered buying the actual plugins. They were still out of my reach in price. Plus, what was the point? I was getting them for free. Free beats cheap any day. So I perfected my skills with free software and even upgraded as more cracked software replaced the older versions. I went from Cubase SX to Cubase 2.1. Then I moved on to several Nuendo versions for a few years. Meanwhile, voiceover and commercial orders piled on. I had a nice workflow.Free Plugins and Software

I never shorted on hardware though. I bought my first Neuman for $1500. UA LA 610 for $1400. I owned several computers. A Mac and a PC and a PC laptop. I had travel gear and swapped out several audio interfaces at that time.

The Day It All Went Bad!

So what happened? Well, one morning I got up to do my work. I had several commercials in the pipeline for the day. I fired up my computer and my trusty Emu and then started Nuendo and BAM. Nothing. It wouldn’t start. I tried it again and still nothing. So I restarted the computer hoping that would help. Nothing again. I tried a few times and no result. I was in a bad position.

I called a friend and fellow talent to ask if I could come to his house and record this work and he asked me what had happened. I told him. And his response was something I didn’t expect. He said to me “Why don’t you just buy the software?” I had never thought to actually buy the software. So I did. I bought my first version of Cubase, which was Cubase 5. It cost me $300 at Guitar Center. I came home that morning with my dongle and installed the software and BAM…. Nothing!!

At this point, I’m even more panicked. Installing and getting up and running was much easier with cracked software. So I called Steinberg to help me. I went over several things troubleshooting with the tech before I finally had to admit to the tech that I previously installed unauthorized software. He went silent for a second, and in a judgemental tone said “Well then you have to wipe your entire computer clean and reinstall windows to install Cubase properly.

You can imagine my horror. But I had work to do and the day was coming to a close by now. I got off the phone, backed up as many of my files as I could, and wiped my hard drive. I realized that I had to change at this moment. I did put the plugins back on the computer because I needed them at that moment but over time I began to buy them. I didn’t buy all of them but I bought some.

Pay The Money. It Will Pay You Back!

Over the years I replaced Cubase 5 with Cubase 7 Artist. I also bought Cubase 8 Elements for my mobile rig and then upgraded to Cubase LE AI Elements 9.5. I also bought Cubase Artists 9 for my desktop home studio. That version made all of my 32-bit plugins obsolete so now I had to buy all new plugins. That’s when I bought the Apollo Twin and then the Apollo Arrow with all the plugins for those machines. Now, I can’t steal plugins. I buy them. I also fell in love and buy the Izotope plugins. I have several of those bundles for mixing and mastering. I continue to buy software and plugins for voiceover. For Christmas, I bought UAD’s Manley VoxBox and Valley People Dyna-Mite.

Where To Find Free Software

Mixpad
Mixpad Interface

You don’t even have to steal software and plugins. For plugins, there are literally thousands of free ones online. All you have to do is google free audio plugins. For a DAW everyone knows about Audacity which is free but you can also download a free version of Mixpad which seems better than Audacity.

In my opinion, I get the fact that starting a business or learning a new craft is very expensive, but with free software and plugins for voiceover available now, don’t steal. Don’t steal anything actually. People work hard designing this software and they deserve to make a profit for their efforts. I left some links in the description for Mixpad and Audacity.

If you liked this video blog, please subscribe to either my youtube or this page. Leave comments.

And if you need software and plugins for voiceover or music production, my Rep at Sweetwater is Jason Koons 260-432-8176 ext 1389. Give him a call

 

Filed Under: audio, Studio, Technology & Voiceover, The Studio, voiceover, Voiceover Career Tagged With: African American male voiceover, African American Voiceover Talent, Atlanta Voice Over, Breaking Into voiceover, Computter Crash, Free software, Home voice over studio, Neuman, plugins, recording studio, Sennheiser, Top Rated African American Voice Talent, Voice Actor, Voice Over, Voice Over Career, Voice Over Channel, Voice Over Professional, Voice Talent, voiceover, voiceover career, Voiceover Coach, Work From Home

Building A Mobile Voiceover Studio – Unboxing UA Arrow

audio, Studio, Technology & Voiceover, The Studio, Travel, voiceover

I started working on a plan to create a full-service, professional mobile voiceover and production studio comparable to my home studio about a year ago. It began when I purchased my Universal Audio Apollo Twin and began tweaking it to get the best sound of my career. Once I realized that Universal also made the UA Arrow, I began planning how to get the best sounding commercials out of a mobile voiceover studio.

Voiceover and audio professionals are very particular about their sound. While it’s the talent that gets you the VO gig, a persons sound can quickly ruin for them. Throughout my career I’ve had moments of sound issues. There have been times when there was noise from the background, or reflection from the room. But in all those moments I was able to fix those issues, except when it came to my mobile voiceover studio. Those issues are much harder to fix.

Because I travel for both business and frequent adventures around the world, it’s important to be able to record wherever I go. I have been caught off guard and had to even record a radio imaging voiceover in the bathroom of IAH moments before I boarded a 10 hour flight to Brazil. I had no other options. It was me, my cell phone and an echoey bathroom and a job that had to be turned in before I landed. I also once recorded in the parking lot at the airport in San Jose, Costa Rica with my mobile voiceover rig. When I listen back on the sound of those recordings, they all sound bad. There are various problems with a mobile studio. The first of which is that you can’t control your environment.

Most talent aren’t recording in the bathroom of an airport. They are recording in a hotel room when on vacation. And mostly these environments are out of the control of and unknown to the voiceover talent before entering the situation. We use things like pillow forts and kaotica eyeballs to get the best sound but I’ve never been able to get the same sound that I get at home. I think part of the reason is that the home studio isn’t mimicked by the mobile studio.

Even though I have a better environment at home, I also have better equipment that filters the environment. At home for example, I have a DBX 166 exclusively to gate noise. As you can imagine, carrying that around “on holiday” would be quite awkward. So instead, whatever hardware I have for the mobile voiceover studio has to do the same as the home studio, but in a much more compact form.

I’ve tried the iRig Mic Studio, the Steinberg UR 22 and most recently the Focusrite 2i2 recording bundle, but none of them gave me the same warm compressed sound that I get at home. And none of them offer the same plug-ins. So when I found out that Universal Audio created a thunderbolt compatible smaller version of the Apollo, I was super excited. The only problem is that my PC was not thunderbolt compatible. So in September of 2018 I bought a Dell XPS 15 (9575). I loved the big bright screen and the portability of it.

I then purchased a gently used Rode NTG3. At home I have a Sennheiser 416 but didn’t want to carry that around with me everywhere I go. It’s a tough piece of gear but it’s also expensive. I was able to get the Rode NTG3 from eBay  for only $300. Additionally I purchased several plug ins by Izotope like RX 6 and another Plug-in which cleans up audio that my good friend and colleague Jean Francois Donaldson swore me to secrecy about. Now all I needed was the same interface.

The UA Apollo has grown in popularity among voiceover talent over the past few years. I purchased mine in 2016 at the recommendation of an old High School friend who is now a world class engineer. The plug-ins that come with this thing are incredible and duplicate the sound of some of the greatest analog hardware in the history of gear. Plus the dedicated DSP chip processes the audio on the Apollo itself, relieving your computer of the strain.

The UA Arrow does the same but with one less DSP chip for slightly less power out the box. It offers the same on screen interface to allow you to control your studio like a pro studio. None of the other audio interfaces that I’ve tried had the same level of control. And out of the box, the UA Arrow has the same plug-ins that I mix with like the Precison Rack Strip. The Arrow also has the DBX 160 plug-in and the UA 610 which both recreate the effects of hardware that I use in my home studio. In fact included in both the Arrow and the Apollo are the:

UA 610-B
UA 1176LN Legacy
UA 1176SE Legacy
Ampeg SVT-VR Classic
Marshall Plexi Classic
Precision Channel Strip (Precision Mix Rack Collection)
Precision Reflection Engine (Precision Mix Rack Collection)
Precision Delay Mod (Precision Mix Rack Collection)
Precision Delay Mod L (Precision Mix Rack Collection)
Pultec EQP-1A Legacy
Pultec-Pro Legacy
Teletronix LA-2A Legacy
Raw Distortion
RealVerb Pro

It’s still early. I haven’t fully tested the system with all of the components in an uncontrolled environments. But the elements are there and this is the best hope I have for having a mobile voiceover studio that sounds like my home studio. If you’re an established voiceover talent, please share your experience with the Universal Audio Arrow or with the mobile gear you use. I am always keeping my eye open for new audio tech.

Filed Under: audio, Studio, Technology & Voiceover, The Studio, Travel, voiceover Tagged With: Audio Interfaces, Home voice over studio, Izotope, Plug-Ins, recording booth, recording studio, Sennheiser, UA Apollo Twin, UA Arrow, Universal Audio

Vacation & Voice Over In Thailand

Demos

When you work hard, you should play hard. But this playground was 22 hours awayfrom my doorstep. Thailand! A place I loved so much I had to visit twice in 7 months.

Thailand is an alluring place. I met an ex US soldier in Tokyo who said to me that he had been all over the world but Thailand was his favorite place. So much so that he had moved there. And I see why.

My tour guide to this constitutional monarchy was Jackie, a beautiful 32 year old woman who I met hanging out with some friends. Jackie was from Chang Mai, and is the daughter of a Thai mother who passed and an African American US Army father who she had never known. We had great conversations where she shared what Thai life was like. She also surprisingly knew a lot about US culture with great accuracy. She agreed she would pick me up from my hotel room and take me around Pattaya to find voice over work.

I did a lot of research about voice over in Thailand before I started knocking on doors. Many of the doors were closed and one was even slammed in my face but I found a be gentleman who ran a
local tv and radio station who spoke to me. I talked to him for quite a while and kept in touch but found that the rates for doing voiceover, at least in Pattaya Beach were quite low.

On my next trip I some more networking but this time in Bangkok. But Bangkok is also a big city with lots of tourist attractions that I took full as anywhere of. From the Kings Palace to the river ride to the market, I really took it in.

From there it was of to Phukett in the south of Thailand. Phukett is a beautiful pace far from the hustle and bustle of the capital, Bangkok. It’s relaxing and the water and landscape are breathtaking. Phukett is famous for being one of the places in Thailand where the the tsunami hit and over 10,000 died or went missing. Now there is a clearer evacuation plan and early warning systems in place to help residents and tourist survive possible devastation.

From Phukett back to Pattya beach where I ran into that ex US soldier by coincidence.

We hung out for a few days and he really explained more in detail why he loved this place. It was also in Pattya when I started checking my email and realized that i had missed a few voiceovers and auditions. But I was prepared.

In anticipation of doing actual voice over in Thailand I brought my Harlan Hogan potabooth to see if the old thing still had it. It still had it. And i still had to squeeze work in to playtime. I guess as a working voice actor there is no such thing as a real vacation. But Thailand is one hell of a workplace.

Portabooth available at voiceoveressentials.com
Sennheiser 416 at Sennheiser.com
Voiceover Talent available at DaneReidMedia.com

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Filed Under: Demos Tagged With: Atlanta Voice Over, Mac, PC, recording studio, Seeking Work Abroad, Sennheiser, Thailand, Top Rated African American Voice Talent, Travel for Work, Voice Over, Voice Talent

My Voiceover Studio- A GoPro Experience

About Voice Over, Blog, Studio, Technology & Voiceover, The Studio

One of the most popular video subjects on YouTube amongst Voiceover Talents and recording enthusiast is the subject of what’s in your studio. This topic, no matter how many times its posted and how many ways it’s recorded, always seems to get thousands of views per video.


But this video is done with a twist. I show off and explain my studio using my Gopro Hero Black 3 Edition with a first person view. With my camera strapped to my head, I show you the main elements that keep my studio operating.
Why do people show off their home studios? Some of it is bragging of course. But some of it adds real value to people who are looking to build their own home studio. Many talents are also audio engineers and have expertise in acoustics and pro audio gear and can help other voice talents create the best and most professional sound. Sometimes Voice Talents create these Youtube videos to showcase to clients that they are working with the best gear themselves.
But for me, I just wanted to share. In the spirit of creating great online video content, I wanted to take you on a journey into my world and where I work. Just as a Dr. has a stethoscope, these are the tools that make a great voice actor sound amazing. A pro studio helps you land the job by telling the client that you are serious about your craft. And over the years, I have shown clients how serious I am.
Home recording studios are the center of much controversy too. It gets Voice Talent and audio engineers debating about how much do you really need in a studio to get the best sound. It pits Mac users against P.C. users and friends against one another. (OK, I’m not sure about that last part). But with technology constantly changing, making the home voice over studio smaller and less expensive, it makes you wonder why we even need ALL this stuff… or if we will need it in the next few years.
For now I enjoy my home voiceover studio and all its bulkiness because size does matter in this case. It creates great sound that clients appreciate. For a while, bigger is better for me.
GoPro.com
LookChina.com
Sennheiser.com
Neuman.com
UAudio.com
Owenscorning.com
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Whats in my voiceover home studio.

Filed Under: About Voice Over, Blog, Studio, Technology & Voiceover, The Studio Tagged With: Atlanta Voice Over, Computer, Gopro Hero 3 Black, Home voice over studio, Mac, Neuman, PC, Sennheiser, Voice Over, Voice Over Career, Voice Talent, Work From Home, Youtube.com

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