Revenge of the Spurned Voice Actor

This is an instant classic!
The 20-year "voice of Lexus" gets dumped, so becomes the "voice of Mitsubishi" and has a bit of fun!



In case you care, James Sloyan is the voice talent. By the by, he was replaced by James Remar (Samantha's rich boyfriend in "Sex and the City"} by Lexus because they wanted a voice with wider appeal to fend off recent attacks by Audi.

Ooops! Did I Say That Out Loud?

From the "Things people THINK but don't actually SAY" file...comes this gem from a Seattle News Producer accepting a regional Emmy award.



Having won Emmys and judged Emmys, I can tell you she's basically telling the truth. Now we wait for the consequences!

The Price Is The Price

One of the most frustrating things about growing my voice over business has been all the potential clients who try to lowball the price. Do they do that in other aspects of their life? This video imagines what it would be like if they did!

A Memorial Day Thank You

Take a few moments to remember the cost of insuring our way of life.
As has been oft said, "Freedom is not free". My heartfelt thanks to all the men and women warriors who are willing to stand up to those who threaten the American way of life.

Big Investment for Bigger Voice?

Well, I finally did it.
I finally decided to quit being cheap and upgrade to a better microphone.
While my trusty Rode NT1a is perfect for so many things including Commercials, Narration, Elearning and more, I really wanted/needed something to help my voice cut through the clutter.

So, a Sennheiser MKH 416 short shotgun mic is now on its way to BV World HQ in beautiful downtown IRB!
The 416 is called "The LA mic" because of it's used so much there for anything audio, ESPECIALLY Movie Trailers and Promos.

My Rode, along with many classic voice over mics (Neumann, Telefunken, AKG, etc) are Large Diaphragm Condensors with a cardiod pick up pattern...about the size of my generously-sized head. (Think basketball size) They are very versatile and provide excellent audio.

But the 416 is HYPER-cardiod, which means it's pickup pattern is more the size of a softball..(or so). When aimed/addressed properly, it will pick up more voice and less side sound which is what helps it cut through the clutter that is music, sound effects, etc.
Look at the pic and you can see how it could funnel/focus the sound

If I can ever figure out how to add mp3 audio to this site, I'll do some comparison tracks.

Stop the Texting/Twittering Madness!

Driving lesson #1 - When driving, FOCUS on driving.
I'm sure this bus driver wishes he had....

Suuuu--eeeee! What a stinkin' Media Mess!

Uuuggggggggghhhhhh!
Can we can just slaughter this Swine Flu pig-of-a-story and settle down to a big plate of ribs, sausage and a double-side of COMMON SENSE?

Media, media, media.....especially LOCAL.....where is the context?
Many more people die each month from many more diseases/disasters/mishaps/accidents than from swine flu! Educate me and show me you're above the fray by a little compare-and-contrast reporting!
Reuters columnist Eric Auchard reports The World Health Organization says REGULAR flu knocks people on their asses by the millions each year and kills tens-of-thousands.
So why no pandemic panic there?

These are the stupid battles I fought for years in newsrooms across the country, small and big!
So many times I was trumped with the "But it's the BIG STORY and if we don't lead with it/make it a big deal, we'll look like idiots...besides it COULD snowball"
To which my response was usually..."So you'd rather be in front of the giant snowball instead of behind it?" Siiiiggghhhhh.

The true numbers tell the true story...More than 1,300 Mexicans have been infected with this swine flu out of a population of 109 million. Do the math. The percentage of the population is something like .00001%. In the US, the number is clearly smaller, considering that we have apopulation of over 306 million and there have been 50-plus (as of this writing) reported cases.

I get that the national/global press needs to keep on top of this. That's their job.
But when the locals try to replicate that effort, it's moronic.

Yes, you MUST cover it and TEASE THE HELL out of it.
No, you MUST NOT overblow it and lead all your newscasts with it.

In closing, I will say this... one GREAT thing about this outbreak is that today we have much better, much FASTER communications and diagnostic capabilities than in decades past so it is sooooo much easier to isolate ground zero and get the word out to contain the outbreak and keep it from becoming something bigger. We also have more vaccines and greater ability to get them to the people than in the past.

Now if there was just an anti-hype vaccine for the media!