February 4th, 2010 Posted in blog

We’ve gotten lots of feedback about the Amy Stoller podcast on Accents, Dialects and Voice Over! Here’s what one of the listeners had to say:

Mary McKitrick responded to the Amy Stoller podcast with these resourceful comments:

“Doing VO with accents can be great fun, and it is definitely worth pursuing this kind of work if one enjoys it and has an aptitude for it. Some relatively low cost approaches if you just want to explore: 1) Gillian Lane-Plescia at http://www.dialectresource.com/ has a series of Dialects for Actors CDs that are very helpful; 2) youtube is a bountiful resource – if you have an actor in mind (e.g., Billy Boyd, Scottish; Simon Baker, Australian) you can look up interviews; 3) Films: e.g. My Left Foot, Dublin); 4) accent archives such as http://accent.gmu.edu/ and http://web.ku.edu/~idea/ 5) theater department at the local college. I was lucky to find a course at a nearby university called Dialects for Actors. Taking language classes from native speakers is a great investment. I’ve been auditing French, German and Spanish classes at the college in my town for years (you have to forget about the fact that you might be 2-3 times older than anybody in the class – ha!). Concentrate on a few accents with which you have some facility, work on perfecting them, read out loud with them, work with a dialect coach like Amy and, ultimately, market them – and have a blast!”

Thanks Mary!

Press Release:

Los Angeles, CA – February 23, 2010

Click Here

Voicebank.net, the standard in voice over delivery, is working harder than ever to help voiceover actors no matter where they are in their voiceover career. Voiceover actors take classes, work hard, spend money and create a voiceover demo, but how does that demo sound to an agent? Is that demo going to get them work?

With over 150 talent agencies using Voicebank.net on a daily basis, there is an amazing pool of knowledge that can be tapped into. Some of these agents will be taking the time to listen to actors’ demos and put together their thoughts on what is great about the demo, what needs improvement and their overall views.

This premium service will be available for an introductory price of $30 per one minute of demo. Actors will receive their written critiques back in less than 10 days.

Don’t miss your chance to perfect your voiceover demo!

Contact:
Voicebank.net, Inc.
Erica Kelly, COO
direct line: 661-877-4355
toll free: 1-877-294-9910
e: Erica@voicebank.net

Click Here

I was at Real Time with Bill Maher at CBS Studios last night for the first episode of season 8. Family Guy’s Seth McFarlane was a guest. Bill Maher asked him about the Sarah Palin controversy over Down’s Syndrome Voice Actor, Andrea McFarlane played a Down’s Syndrome person. Sarah Palin was outraged and felt that Family Guy and that character was making fun of her Down’s Syndrome son Trig.

McFarlane defended the character choice of using a person with Down’s Syndrome to play the role, saying that Andrea “loves her life as a voice actor and is proud to be part of the show.” As a sister of a Down’s Syndrome person, this was great to hear!

-Tracy Pattin

Click Here

Gustavo Rex began his acting in New York in 1980 in Classical Spanish Theatre. Soon he found himself doing “Sexy voices” for the  Late Night soft porn show “Electric Blue.”  But his full time voice over career began here in LA in 1989 and it’s been his bread and butter ever since.  Thanks to his agents at Cunningham (CESD) he quickly became one of the top Hispanic voice over talents in LA. And even though he did a lot of theatre in New York and  TV and film work her in LA, his love is the voice.  His work ranges from commercial vo to trailers, animation and narration. He was the voice of Captain Crunch in Spanish, the announcer for Taco Bell with “dat dog,”  launched the Fox Network in Latin America, was nominated for an Emmy for a PBS show called Rock en Espanol and did multiple voices on and directed the animation series Leo the Lion and the Adventures of Honey-Honey. He’s also a Spanish Star Search winner.

Click here

In tomorrow’s podcast (part 2) voice actor Gustavo Rex continues sharing his experiences and insights about the Hispanic Voice Over market. He talks about:

•The Hispanic Voice Over Market and the audition process

•Pay structure. How it’s different from the mainstream voice over market

•Straddling the Hispanic and the Mainstream market. How he’s able to do it.

•The Hispanic Voice Over job. How the delivery is different.

•Getting typecast

and much more…

Click here to listen to part 1with Gustavo Rex

-Tracy Pattin

Click Here

It looks like a small broadcast TV studio. Lots of cameras, cable, wires and curtains. People running around with headsets on, a control room with those big windows. Only this is all internet. It’s TheStream.TV’s studio.  Live stream TV essentially is live internet TV. It airs in real time instead of recorded shows you see on sites like YouTube .  The Stream has a line-up of shows from Coin-Op TV (a wacky show about video games) , The Game Show, The Real Cool Club and others.

The interesting thing is they engage their viewing audience from the get-go making them the perennial guest. One person on each show sits at the computer with a camera overhead, reading and reacting to the plethora of comments from the chat room proving to be as entertaining as what the hosts are saying and who they’re interviewing.

They have sponsors but it’s still an uphill climb. According to LiveStream. Tv’s Brian Grammo, “It’s a technology that is still working out the kinks but it’s getting better and better.”

So what are the possibilities for voice talent? Perhaps they’ll be used for promos just like broadcast television. And if advertising kicks in, then that’s a whole new opportunity for voice actors.

Just like so much of this emerging technology, it’s a wait and see.

-Tracy Pattin

Click here

Click here

February 2nd, 2010 Posted in Audio Podcast

Amy Stoller is an award-winning dialect coach based in New York City. She teaches accents and dialects to performers, and American English speech and diction to non-performers.

She has been literary manager of an Off-Off-Broadway theatre company, casting director for a Brooklyn Shakespeare company and an American musical-in-progress, director of New York workshops and readings, and production manager of two one-acts that journeyed from the US to Scotland.

January 26th, 2010 Posted in Audio Podcast

Amy Stoller is an award-winning dialect coach based in New York City. She teaches accents and dialects to performers, and American English speech and diction to non-performers.

She has been literary manager of an Off-Off-Broadway theatre company, casting director for a Brooklyn Shakespeare company and an American musical-in-progress, director of New York workshops and readings, and production manager of two one-acts that journeyed from the US to Scotland.