February 2003 RAP
February 2003 Highlights
Feature: How to Produce Your Voiceover Demo
By Tom Richards
So you're expanding your horizon beyond your full-time radio position to
take your first step into freelance voiceovers. And, at least this time,
you're going to sidestep all those demo producers cooing of fame and fortune
hey, maybe next time. For now, though, your voiceover demos looming before
you like its the Super Bowl and you're nothing but a lowly water boy. You
may not believe it now, but everything's going to be okay. By identifying
your best reads, by selecting material that showcases your strengths, by
producing audio with variety and texture, and by editing and sequencing for
maximum impact, you can produce a demo that'll not only get you in the game,
but score, too.
Interview: Howard Parker - Voiceover God
By Tom Richards
If you had to single out just one voice artist whose career has seen
staggering growth in the last year, it would have to be Howard Parker. Over
his ten-year journey from his first radio gig in southern New Jersey, to
radio Creative Director chairs at Omaha and Syracuse, to WYSP Philadelphia
as in-house station voice and producer, to his current prominence among New
York's voiceover elite, Howards growth has been truly phenomenal. He's on
the Travel Channel, HBO, Court-TV, CNN, USA network, ESPN Classic, and
Showtime; does promos for NBC-TV affiliates in Philadelphia and Boston, plus
others in Houston and Seattle; and radio imaging in Chicago, Toronto, St.
Louis, and more.
But its perhaps in the domain of movie trailers that the 34-year old Mr.
Parker has made the greatest impact. After nailing his first trailer
audition, for the romantic comedy "Blow Dry," the hits started coming with
"Moulin Rouge," rapidly followed by "Planet of the Apes," "Minority Report,"
"Black Knight," "The Others," "Star Wars Part II, The Attack of the Clones,"
"Chicago," two Golden Globe nominees for Best Drama, "Gangs of New York" and
"The Hours;" and the upcoming "Terminator 3," the pace shows no sign of
letting up.
RAP caught up with Howard in his New York studio after his last ISDN feed,
on a day that had begun 12 hours earlier
Test Drive: The Really Nice Compressor and the Really
Nice Preamp from FMR Audio
By Steve Cunningham
Is it just me, or is our equipment getting better lately? I'm not talking
about the latest 4,000 kHz digi-whizzy-oversampled bit of computer software;
I'm talking about some basic hardware products that are really good. There
are large diaphragm microphones that cost a third of what they did and sound
great, small mixing consoles with total recall and programmability that are
fast to use and cost about what a good analog console did a few years ago.
And the effects boxes... great reverbs and delays and flangers for a few
hundred bucks.
Q It Up: The RAP Network Speaks - How Did the Radio
Production Bug Bite You? - Part 1
Q It Up: What happened when you first learned that radio
production was something you wanted to do for a living? What was the turning
point for you? When did you realize this was your path? How did you wind up
living your dream? And how has it turned out for you? Has it met your
expectations?
Production 212: The Year End Countdown
by Dave Foxx
The Year-End Countdown. This is one of those projects that I dread and
gladly anticipate at the same time. Its an opportunity for me to really cut
loose and do "my thing." Its also an opportunity for me to cut loose and do
"my thing." Ill explain.
Most of you probably don't produce the entire show like we do at Z100. My
experience as a jock was more of a "here's a stack of records have a good
show" kind of thing. I know many stations do their countdown, if they even
have one, live. Well, here we produce the whole thing. Nine plus hours of
nothing but produced magic, or so I hope. Of course, nine plus hours (we do
the Top 100 of the year) equates to something like 90 man-hours of labor.
That sounds like way too much work to me, but I still recommend it. It
allows jocks to take some time off while some board ops get a chance to earn
some extra cash, and if its done right, it packs a powerful programming
punch to the holidays. More importantly to me, its a chance to really show
off to the boss, because I produce the living daylights out of it.
RAP Forum: US Radio--A View From the Other Side of the
Pond
by Sean Bell
Here in the UK, we have a name for people who have a passion about a
subject, a passion that exceeds the boundaries of accepted normality. Some
people spend all of their spare time hanging around train stations
collecting the numbers from passing rolling stock. Others go that little bit
further when it comes to plane spotting and so on. This name is Anorak, and
I'm quite at ease with saying that Im a radio and production Anorak.
Radio Hed: Collect All 6,528,927
By Jeffrey Hedquist
Need ideas? Techniques? Inspiration? Entertainment? Go to your audio
library. You know, that reference library of sounds, commercials, talent
tapes, radio shows, humor and audio theatre that you've been collecting over
the years? It may be completely organized, categorized and cross-indexed or
just a big box of tapes, CDs, DATs, DVDs, records, cassettes piled on top of
each other up on a shelf, but its one of your main sources of writers block
breakers.
...And Make It Real Creative:
By Trent Rentsch
How long has it been, 5 years of this sickness? 10 years of missed
lunches? 15 years of ignored deadlines? 20 years of fitting in that phone
number just one more time, even if the spot is already 37 seconds? 25 years
of re-writes, re-cuts and re-heating dinner? Do you know rejection better
than your kids birthdays, do you consider caffeine the foundation of your
food pyramid, and does the word Neumann make you unconsciously salivate? If
you are still mourning the loss of cut 5, disc 37 in the vinyl production
library, and/or have described at least one salesperson in terms that would
make Ozzy Osbourne blush, no one would deny that you've done your time in
the Production trenches. You deserve a Purple Heart or another drink on
Promotions tab.
|