George Whittam - Audio Engineer, a.k.a George the Tech | AW01
/Welcome to Alicyn’s Wonderland. Join us as we journey through the looking glass and down the rabbit hole into the wild and wonderful world of animation and video games.
In today’s episode, we are joined by George Whittam, aka George The Tech, the go-to guys for voiceover artists everywhere! George has designed numerous studios for both beginners and experienced artists. Listen in as we talk about George’s adventure from sound engineer to podcast host to studio designer. If you plan on becoming a voiceover artist or sound engineer, this episode might be the sign you need.
Show Notes:
[3:04] George, the boom operator to George, the tech.
[9:26] Basics of a voiceover home studio.
[25:26] Voiceover experience in Games.
[35:23] George, the BMX rider.
[41:45] My home studio tour.
[47:46] Instagram Live Q&A session.
Follow along with Alicyn's Wonderland on:
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TikTok: @alicynpackard
YouTube: Alicyn Packard
Twitter: @Alicyn
Transcript :
Intro
Welcome to Alicyn’s Wonderland, I’m your host Alicyn Packard. Join us as we journey through the looking glass and down the rabbit hole into the wild and wonderful world of animation and video games.
Hey, do a girl a favor and please subscribe to this podcast, and go on iTunes and leave us a good review. If you like the show, please help spread the word, it really helps us to get heard by more people. Thanks so much.
Alicyn
For those of you that might not know, tonight's guest is George Whittam, aka George the Tech. George has been, for many years, one of the go to guys for voice actors, creating home studios. He did my home studio, as well as so many others. And not only is George an amazing person, thank you for sending me the invite. But he's also here to answer some questions. So we're going to save the last 10 minutes for questions. So if you have questions, get them ready. Let's go live with George guys. Get it ready. Let's go! Hey, Jeff Howell. It's so good to see your face.
George
Hey there!
Alicyn
You know, that timed out, that literally timed out perfectly. The theme song just ended and you are here.
George
Awesome. Awesome. I know these, these Ig live things are always a little rough to get started. Because there's no real, it's not super elegant the way they have to, they start but I think we got it right tonight.
Alicyn
And then like it's, yeah, well, I'm like then realizing you need to vamp in the beginning.
George
Yeah.
Alicyn
You really can't jump into it or people miss, cause it sends out the alert and then people need to get to their phones.
George
I also have no idea what microphone I'm using right now.
Alicyn
I know. Can you hear me okay?
George
Yeah, but I mean, am I using this mic?
Alicyn
Potentially. Am I using this mic?
George
Do you hear, do you hear scratching?
Alicyn
Yes.
George
Is it making a scratchy noise?
Alicyn
Yeah.
George
So it's this microphone right here? This is the right one?
Alicyn
Uh-huh. That's gonna be the cover shot of this, just like us.
George
I don't know. I don't know about that.
Alicyn
Definitely not. Definitely not. It's good to see your face, George. How are you doing?
George
You too. You too. How are you?
Alicyn
I'm doing great. Happy wednesday.
George
Thanks. I just got home.
Alicyn
Oh, wow.
George
I still do have to leave the house to see certain clients. In fact, I just came from visiting my client that I love to call Client Zero.
Alicyn
Oh yeah.
George
Although, maybe right now during the pandemic, it's not a good nickname. But I just came from
Alicyn
Who's Client Zero?
George
Uh, Howard Parker.
Alicyn
Okay.
George
He's the guy that got me started, inadvertently getting, got me started doing voiceover studio tech stuff. So.
Alicyn
You know, that's interesting. It is such, it's a niche category within an already somewhat niche market. And I was curious, you know, I know a little bit about your story. But can you tell us, kind of how you made the leap from a boom operator - audio engineer to specifically home studios for voice actors.
George
Yeah, I mean, coincidentally, it really does come, sort of, come down to Howard. When I was in Philadelphia, I was doing radio engineering, remote radio engineering, broadcast engineering for the 94 WYSP, an FM station there. That was the Howard Stern station. We were one of the big stations in Philly, and we were the Eagles Football Team station.
Alicyn
Wow.
George
So, I was interning with my friend who was the, he was the engineer doing all those gigs on the road for the team. And I'd heard about it through my cousin, Andy, that they were working on this stuff together. And I was like, man, I need to get in on this. How can I, How can I intern? How can I be there? Long story short, I got to do a couple intern gigs on the field, one on the field holding the big parabolic dish microphone and one in the booth. And then 9/11 attacks happened. And then my friend, Lane, who was the engineer said, you know I don't want to do this stuff anymore, I don't want to travel. He was genuinely afraid of flying and travel a lot more.
Alicyn
Yeah.
George
And he was like, you might be the only one that can do this job. Even though you've only seen one, you've only been in the studio, in the booth one time and watched me run this thing, but you might be the only guy, but I don't know if you'll get the gig because, you know, plenty of people want this gig. Then I got the gig. And then also through that connection with the station and my buddy Lane, I ended up meeting Howard Parker. And he was moving into New York City, and needed his first voiceover studio in his apartment. So Lane and I put that studio together. Now this was in 2001-ish. So flash forward, 2004, I moved to LA. And then Howard caught wind that I was in LA now. And so when he needed something technical with his home studio, he said, he looked me up and helped him with his home studio and then he connected me with his manager, management, Jason Marks Talent, whom he is still with today. And then they connected me with Rick Wasserman, Rick Robles, Melissa Disney. And the rest is just kind of foggy. I don't remember what happened from, those are my first four or five clients. A lot of got lucky working.
Alicyn
A lot of connections.
George
Yeah, I got lucky working with great talent.
Alicyn
Yeah, yeah. Well, I remember I think I met you at was it "That's Voiceover!" the first year they did "That's Voiceover!"?
George
Probably.
Alicyn
I wondered into your booth?
George
Was it in LA or in Disney? Or one of those?
Alicyn
Oh, gosh, I'm thinking of the event. I think it was "That's Voiceover!" when they came to LA. So maybe the second "That's Voiceover!". And you had a booth.
George
In 2008? Was it 2008?
Alicyn
2008? Was it that long ago?
George
Could be, because that's when I also met Dan Leonard, which is why VOBS became a thing.
Alicyn
Yeah.
George
So, that was a fateful event.
Alicyn
I remember I had definitely been hearing your name, and you had a reputation. Then I was like, Hi, I'm Ali. Nice to meet you. You know, and it was, the rest is history. Yeah. So tell us a little bit about your podcast that you do with Dan.
George
Yeah, well the show is the Voiceover Body Shop. It started 10 years ago, almost exactly. Our 10th anniversary comes up next month. And it started as East West Audio Body Shop, because Dan, when I met Dan in 2008, he was still living in Buffalo, New York. And I was already here in LA. So we started a remote show. And it really was like a live talk show, a radio show. In fact, it was really modeled after Car Talk.
Alicyn
I can see that.
George
Yeah, we were trying to be like a click and, a click and clack, answer tech questions, try to make it fun and make it light. And that was the whole premises, premises, premise behind the whole thing. So we, we started it based on that. And then 10 years later, we're still doing it. We just renamed the show and Dan moved to LA five years ago because East West didn't make any sense anymore. And one of our fans came up with the idea of VOBS, Voiceover Body Shop. I was like, perfect. That's the name of the show. VOBS. And it's just, it just stuck.
Alicyn
And it also goes with your Car Talk theme.
George
Totally. Yeah. We've always tried to have a little bit of humor and keep it light. But we answer a ton of questions and we get to do a lot of interviews. And I don't know why, why, why have you not been interviewed on our show? Have you been avoiding us?
Alicyn
You know what I think? I remember there was some conflict. You had, you did ask me a couple years ago, I think when you were doing this studio build. Tasker was on the show, Jim Tasker
George
Years ago, he was in my house.
Alicyn
What was that?
George
He was in my house when I lived in Santa Monica.
Alicyn
Oh, I thought you said he slept over your house, which I think would be really adorable. You guys cuddled up on the sofa with like your blankets.
George
Yeah, Jim's appearance on EWABS is really good. I mean, he had some really great, go back and type in EWABS Jim Tasker in YouTube and find it. It's really good. But yeah, that's how that show came together. And then we put it on, we put it up as a podcast for people that are in the car. Some people still drive around, listen to podcasts. So and that's how that show came to be. And we, we have a lot of fun. And then in the end of the day, we just promote ourselves as always, it's all we really do. It's just there. Shameless promotion.
Alicyn
Whatever works, right? Now, so, I'm curious, for we do have, because you guys know we're doing a giveaway. Our very first giveaway on Alicyn's Wonderland and it's been super fun. So we're gonna do that at the end of this show. This is my very official ballot box.
George
You really, you really did do that? You really printed them out and cut them all.
Alicyn
I handwrit them, wrote them,
George
Get the heck outta here.
Alicyn
Yeah, that's how high tech we are. I don't own a printer. I had one and it broke. But um, so it's been really fun to kind of, you know, try something different. But I was curious, because I know, a lot of people that were interested in the contest, are new voice actors trying to build up their home studios. And I was wondering for somebody just starting out, what are the basics? I'm sure you probably have a podcast about it. So we can link to that after but what are the basics that people need?
George
Yeah, actually, I've talked about this in different formats of yours. I actually wrote a blog post on, it on my blog, GeorgeThe.Tech, if you go to the blog on there, it's like the top 10 things a voice actor needs to know. And it really goes into a lot of depth. So for those that want a really in-depth answer, I recommend looking that up. But, the key things are you need, you need quiet, we still don't have a way to get rid of dog barks, and kids screaming, and helicopter sounds in a way that's perfect and automated. So we still have to fix that at the source, it's got to be quiet. Then you need to get rid of the reverb or echo in your room. And then you need to learn how to work a microphone so that you get good clean audio without plosives, and without sounding like you're on the radio and still sounding natural and sounding like you're acting and a microphone is inches from your face but no one would ever think it because it doesn't sound like you're acting, right? These are tricks. It's not, it's not easy. It certainly has nothing to do with how good your voice sounds because God knows, I can't tell me, tell you how many people installed me, even people in this business. Wow, you've got a good voice. Have you ever done voiceover work? You know what, how you, you guys know how hard this is to be really successful in voiceover it's a heck of a lot of work. So I
Alicyn
You'd also need a George Whittam. So, who would be your George Whittam?
George
Right, if I'd be Dan Leonard. But yeah, you need a lot of, it takes a tech a lot of training. So don't over invest in crazy expensive gear. Don't buy the golden microphone that you think is the one that's gonna win you gigs because it's not going to.
Alicyn
Like the literally golded microphone or you mean like the name mic?
George
You know, just fill in the blank, expensive popular mic that all the voiceover forums and, you know, say you need to have, you've got two of the most well-known, well-loved microphones in the business right in front of you. The TLM, Neumann TLM 103 and a Sennheiser MKH 416. It's Sennheiser.
Alicyn
This is not a "you" recommended getting started list?
George
No.
Alicyn
It's a little bit.
George
If you, I mean, just like everything else, somebody could, somebody gets a Mercedes for their sweet 16. Good for them. But you don't. Most people don't and you don't need it. So you need just a good quality sounding signal from a good sounding microphone and that, believe it or not, can be as low as $100. And then I look, yeah, well, Audio Technica stuff, you really can't go wrong with anything Audio Technica, any price point as long as it's a condenser mic. So you want to look at the AT2020. I like the 2035, if you can pony up the extra 40 bucks. I like the 2035, and Rode, Rode Microphones NT1, NTG4. This is an NTG4 right here, it's a shotgun mic. This one, here's the NTG5, a little more pricey at $500. More than most people would need to spend. But yeah, you're just looking for a good quality condenser mic that's not noisy. Has low self-noise, doesn't make a lot of hiss, doesn't require you to turn the gain on your preamp all the way up to get a good recording level because as soon as you do that, guess what? It gets really hissy. So you don't want those Shure SM7B's that Joe Rogan and all the podcasters were using, not a good voiceover mic. And, and then you wouldn't, you want to have a reliable computer that doesn't give you fits. If you're.
Alicyn
But don't they all?
George
Yeah, I know. And we and you know, I'm an apple person. And I know you use apple, it doesn't mean it's going to be, it doesn't mean it's going to be completely pain-free. But I, I am of a strong opinion that Apple computers really are still designed around audio and video production. And so when you're doing that job, they provide far less resistance to doing that. So I'm a really big fan of using Mac computers for voiceover production. There's plenty of you who are Windows people out there. If you're using Windows, there's usually two reasons, one you don't know any better or two you don't, you do know better, and you just love Windows. And you just love building computers, hacking them, you're a gamer, customizing computers is fun, or your brother in law is an IT guy, and he fixes everything for you, so you never have to think about it, then you can be a Windows user. But for everybody else who is a creative, it doesn't want to think about all that stuff and just wants to have an Apple Store to call or, Apple is the way to go. So there's my Apple versus PC. And this is a debate that will go on forever. And I will sometimes alienate some people in the process, but that's okay. But yeah, those are all the really important things, a pair of headphones you can trust. You don't want to use Beats by Dre, because they're not EQ'd for accuracy, they're really EQ's for fun, for music. You've got the Sony's. So there's a lot of kind of headphones that are studio specific, like the Sony's. Like the Beyerdynamics that I've used for 20 years, these DT 770s. These new ones, these are the Austrian Audio HI-x55, which I did a whole review of just recently.
Alicyn
Yeah.
George
We've just, we expanded just now talking about headphones that price from $100 to $350. And you can spend more, you can spend less, but really, the sweet spot for a good pair of studio headphones is about 100 bucks. So the Sony's, the Audio Technica's are two of my most favorite in that price range. Some people like the Sennheiser HD280s. You know, headphones are very, very personal because these are the things that are physically on your body. So, and your ears and the way you hear is unique to you. And it's unique to the pair of headphones you're wearing. So when I hear myself now in these headphones, it sounds quite different than if I was talking and wearing these headphones. And so I'd have, I have to actually get used to the way this sounds, it's quite different. So whatever it is, you have to be familiar with it. And you have to have time to, time to become adjusted to those headphones. And it takes months, sometimes even, even years. So those are the big-big things. And then training, training, training, training, coaching, coaching, coaching, and then learning how to use your equipment, and then getting your audio tuned right. Those are all, all these things go hand in hand. And we're not talking 10 to 20 grand here. I mean, a lot of us can spend less if you are blessed with a quiet space. Now, if you live in, let's say Toluca Lake. Maybe you need a soundproof studio. Just saying.
Alicyn
Well, yeah, we're directly in the flight path here. And obviously, you can't be holding every five minutes for a plane when you're in a session. Auditions, yeah, maybe you can work around it, although it does kind of mess up your flow. So a lot of people actually start in their closets.
George
Sure. Yep, closets. They're okay.
Alicyn
But then you know if you're beginning your career, and then you're working in the closet, that might be fine for 30 minutes an hour at a time. But if you have a two or four hour session, you got to think about airflow and just the comfort. And that's I think one of the things that becomes the longer term investment. So maybe, you know, after a few years when you're working, and you may be feel, although Vanessa closets rock, for some people, that's just perfect, especially if you have a bigger closet. But potentially you might feel if you're, if you're going to work every day, you might not want to be in your closet.
George
Folks that live in you know, Texas, Florida, other markets, Atlanta, real estate's a lot cheaper down there.
Alicyn
You can just buy a whole new house.
George
You can buy a four or five bedroom house for the price of a two bedroom apartment in LA and you can have spare rooms and a whole walk in closet. And so in certain areas, it is much easier to get started as a voiceover because of just those pure, purely practical reasons. So it's, New York City is one of the hardest because who has the space and the quiet. It's really difficult to do this stuff from home in the city. So
Alicyn
What did, what was Howard's work around for your first studio build?
George
The first one we set up for him in New York City was, what I still consider the classic voiceover announcer setup which is a Whisper Room, a Sennheiser 416, a Mackie mixer, an ISDN Zephyr box. I think he had Pro Tools, he still uses Pro Tools. That's what I remember. He probably, probably had a nice outboard mic preamp as well, on top of all that I'm sure we do. He still uses a red, Focusrite Red 7. That's what he likes to use. But yeah, that's it and I, and I didn't even realize that those booths sounded pretty lousy out of the box. Frankly, they weren't acoustically treated very well. And I hate to tell you, but, Whisper Room, if anybody out there is listening over there, they still sound pretty bad, 20 years later. And I've been talking to them, they know me. I've seen them at all the trade shows. I've talked to them hundreds of times, they totally know me. And they have not yet made a better sounding whisper room, acoustical treatment that comes with the booth. Anyway.
Alicyn
Dan Leonard says, Who's this guy?
George
Who's this guy?
Alicyn
For anybody that's just tuning in from my side. This is George Whittam, he is the go to voiceover guy. Voiceover audio guy, helping people all across the country, everybody from Tara Strong to Alicyn Packard.
George
Alicyn Packard, Lori Alan.
Alicyn
Gorgeous Lori Alan and get set up with their home studios. So do you have a tweak that you use them for whisper rooms to make them sound good if one of your clients already has that?
George
Yeah, it's not that hard. But you have to be willing to give up a little bit of space in there. The key thing is, I use these things called the ATS Acoustics Corner Bass Trap, and it's a little intimidating, because it's very big. So people get one of these and I go, Oh, my gosh, this is gonna take up a lot of space in here. But it doesn't really because it doesn't take up any usable space. You know, when you're standing in a square box, or rectangle, there's always spaces in the corners, especially in front of you, you know, the front corners that are totally unused, you might have a mic boom in there or something. But that's it, there's nothing there. So you stick one of these huge bass traps in the corner. And it immediately changes the sound of the booth, it completely changes, it tightens up the sound, it sounds more dry and dead, gets rid of the resonance. And it's not a huge investment. I mean, you can buy one of these shipped to your door for around $200, the bass trap. And it is immediate transformation. So.
Alicyn
It's that them, the acoustic paneling that we have here?
George
It's, well, It's different in its shape. So the paneling you have on the walls are a flat panel. And the panel I'm describing is a prism, it's shaped like a prism. It's a triangle. If you look at it from the top, it's a triangle. And then it has a flat face. Like that, so it goes, it's a corner mounted thing. And that really can transform the whisper room. So you can, yes, you might start with something that sounds boxy and hollow. And some people end up doing years and years of work in these and never know the difference. They just don't know because nobody pointed it out to them, especially audio book folks. The bar for audio quality, at least acoustically in audio books is really low. They, people get away with a lot as long as it's quiet. Usually the production company is good with it. It can sound like they're 10 feet away from the mic and it can sound hollow, whatever. But as long as it's quiet, they tend to be happy. So they don't even realize what how bad the sound actually is because they don't hear it in context with other types of voiceover. And then when they want to leap in from audio books into the next crossover that, through that magical looking glass into commercials or something, then they realize, whoa, I'm falling way short. And I had no idea. So it's, it's a funny thing. It's a funny thing. And I again, I've set up tons of Whisper Rooms, 10 to 20 years ago, that I never considered tuning them or changing the acoustics. I didn't know any better. You don't know what you don't know. But now I've heard so many good studios. And now I know how to tune them better. So if you worked with me 12 years ago, and you haven't talked to me since, maybe it's time for another call. Might have learned a few things since then.
Alicyn
And that's it, you know, we're always learning and growing and keeping at the edge of, of tech and the edge of our industry. I means so much has changed since you know, COVID happened and just even a year ago, most of the animation sessions were, you were going to studios, most of the commercial sessions it's unless it was an ongoing gig. You're going into a studio and now I've only had been into studio three times and it was for the same job. Everything else has been from home. Now granted, we have, I have a broadcast quality studio here. So it's just, just as easy. But there's definitely would you say that there's a trend toward even more, the home studio than ever before?
George
Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's just because out of just pure necessity, as a lot of people who are either not permitted to work in their studio, commercial studios, or the actors are afraid to go into the commercial studio, they don't even want to go in there. And sometimes, in some cases just is no commercial studio in the production process, because the engineer is working from a home studio, the director is working from their home office. Clients are sitting in their kitchens with their families watching TV. And that's the way, that's the way of things. So what were the things that you did in studio during the pandemic, where they commercials?
Alicyn
It was, they did give me an option. They could have worked, they prefer the studio for consistency.
George
I get that.
Alicyn
You know, to be honest, if the numbers were quite low, and I felt comfortable doing that, and was grateful to just see people, you miss, I missed the energy of being in the same room is as somebody especially when you're working on something like a game, but again, it was it was over Igloo, and everybody was, was on the TV screen, director, everything, so.
George
And then the engineer was probably on the other side of the glass.
Alicyn
On the other side of the glass. I didn't come in contact with him really at all. But.
George
Did they ask you how tall you are before, so they knew where to put the mic?
Alicyn
It was a mic that you wore on your head?
George
Oh, yeah.
Alicyn
I was like this is great. Like a stereo, stereo mic. I know, I miss people too.
George
You had a headband and you had a couple little lavalier mics that stuck out like this?
Alicyn
Very, very good look. No, um, but yeah, everything else has been from home and and a lot of things. I'm getting more and more auditions where there are very specific specs on the home recording on the sides, so that they're looking specifically for, they'll mention like a Sennheiser and anointment. They'll want, you know, x noise floor, they'll want you to not do any kind of post production. So that's shifted, because I feel like I used to want to tweak my audio in post, just to give it a little shushing. And now I think they're really listening for the true sound of your studios. So I feel that nowadays, I'm less likely to do any kind of post on that. I don't know if any other voice actors are experiencing that.
George
I mean, I know that, I'm hearing that over and over and over for gaming, game voice work. They're, the production values for game voiceover production is our, I would say, the highest of anything out there. They are the most careful about the audio quality and the consistency. They, they are really picky about production quality. And well for one thing, there's very big budgets on these games. Two, they are, these games last,they go on for years and years and years and years, making new additions constantly. And the games, the voices that you hear in the games, you know are often being listened to on headphones. And they're, it's incredibly intimate. I haven't been a gamer in many years. I know that you've been on a game. What was the last game that you did that and when it got released?
Alicyn
The Outer Worlds DLC which just came out on Nintendo Switch it came out a couple months ago on the other platforms. And that was really interesting, because it was a DLC, so the world was prebuilt. I recorded.
George
DLC? You're throwing jargon at me.
Alicyn
DLC, downloadable content.
George
Okay, thank you, I didn't know that.
Alicyn
I should've said that, for everybody listening. Um, so it's like, you know, it's like an addition to the game. So we recorded and then eight weeks later, the game was out, which never happens. Usually in video games, you are waiting and waiting. But that was really interesting because they sent an engineer here in like a hazmat suit.
George
Woah. Interesting.
Alicyn
They set up, I mean, they sound checked, they liked my sound, but they wanted everybody on the same microphone that they wanted. So they sent a computer, a monitor, they sent a microphone.
George
They sent a whole rig.
Alicyn
They sent a whole rig, they set it up, and then they came and took it back. So, but I feel like that, I feel like that's happening less now that we're a year in to COVID. And, and people are just adjusting in the end, they know that they can find people with the studio sounds that they need and probably save a lot of money.
George
Yeah, totally, totally. Do you ever get comments on the production value? Or I should say the sound quality or is it just sort of a, you never hear anything unless something's wrong, kind of thing?
Alicyn
Um, I mean, yes. Like the engineer at, at Nick that worked on something recently was like, you're great. Like you, your sound is great. Don't worry about it. You know, but then, yeah, you know, depending upon how you're recording whether it's BlueJeans, and then they're using sort of, so there's BlueJeans and Zoom, and a lot of animation sessions are connecting that way. So that to get everybody on the same page. And then so sometimes they're actually seeing you, which is like, Okay, I guess.
George
I bet you're being seen, I bet you're being seen now. More because of zoom, then you've maybe were, would have been before.
Alicyn
I 100% agree. Hey, Scott, good to see you. You know, I think that when everybody is looking at their screen, they're watching your work. If you're in a studio, they're not really, they're listening, and they're like, making notes and everything. So it's always a little awkward.
George
It's interesting. Yeah, that's really, I always thought it'd be best if the engineer was on camera, because then you can kind of read their face. And they make little faces, right? They they make little reactions. You know, you can kind of read what's going on. You also know if you sound good or not, the engineer based just on their face, right?
Alicyn
Absolutely. And all those visual cues, because then you are, you're, you're writing your own levels. So that I mean, in games and animation where you're, you're yelling, and you're getting really loud. It's one thing for commercial where you don't really touch any levels. When you have to ride them. I, that gives me more anxiety.
George
Are you having to do that? Are you actually finding you're messing with your gain, through out a game, of get your mic gain throughout a gaming session? Are you turning it up? Turning it down?
Alicyn
Yeah. At least for the animation sessions. Yes.
George
And they're telling you to do it, though, right? They're saying, alright, can you give us more.
Alicyn
Turn down. 10 db down, 10 db up.
George
Wow. Really interesting.
Alicyn
Yeah, that's, it's a lot to think about.
George
I'm here to learn too, folks. Because I, you know, I work with all these folks like Alicyn and I, unless I get this conversation with them. I don't even know what their worlds is like, half the time. I'm doing what I think is right for them. And then they come back and say, Well, actually, they're asking for this. And I'm like, oh, is that right? Interesting. So, you know, it's really valuable to get feedback from from you, you the working actor, or Alicyn, yourself or anybody, don't assume, don't assume just because I, I'm the tech guy, that I know what's going on in all these studios, because I know what's going on and all of your studios, but I don't know what's going on in all the studios that you're connecting to. So it's very valuable to get that feedback.
Alicyn
Right. The other I think, takeaway is like always run a backup on your side. If you're on a Source-Connect session just in case, even if they don't ask for it. I think it's a good idea.
George
If you've got a properly set up studio, that's so easy to do for you. You shouldn't even have to think twice, it should be very easy to just hit record.
Alicyn
So when it comes to software, obviously a lot of people's using Pro Tools, what do you recommend? For recording software.
George
So, if your job as a voice actor is primarily just to either being directed on a phone call or Zoom, and recording yourself, or just, you know, doing auditions and doing self records. I really think TwistedWave is the easiest thing to use. Again, it's, it is a Mac specific program. They do have a Windows, well, it's not a Windows version, but they have a web version. So if you have a web browser, obviously everybody does if you have Chrome, you can run the TwistedWave web edition. But it's so simplistic that you really lose out on some features that are really helpful. So if you're on Windows and you don't have a budget for, or don't want to spend the 30 bucks a month for Adobe Audition, for example, then maybe Audacity is fine. A lot of people are going with Reaper on Windows, but I feel it's so much more complex than necessary. That unless you have really good guidance on how to set it up. It's a, it's a juggernaut. It's more complicated than Pro Tools.
Alicyn
Oh yeah. Wow.
George
Audacity is usually my number one on, on Windows just to get started, it's so, everybody's, so many people know it. So many people using it. It's easy to get somebody to help you if you have trouble. But yeah, I really do love TwistedWave. I've been tweaking it and dialing it in and making stack processing presets and teaching it for I think the first tutorial I have which still is on my website is from 2007, that's how long I've been using TwistedWave. Weaver told me about it and you're using it mostly, or?
Alicyn
Oh yeah. 100%. 100% I mean, unless I need to multitrack and record a singing audition that they want.
George
You use GarageBand, or?
Alicyn
Yeah, I use GarageBand.
George
It's fine. I wouldn't want to edit a voiceover in GarageBand. And but if you're singing and working over tracks and stuff, that's what it's, that's what it's designed for.
Alicyn
So Marie asked what, what, what we mean when we say run a backup, that would be, so there is a software and hardware called Source-Connect that allows the voice actor to connect to the engineer. And when you're on Source-Connect, the engineer is recording on their end, so you don't have to worry about it. But when I say run a backup, I mean also open TwistedWave and record yourself just in case there's a glitch or something goes down. It's just always good to have a backup.
George
Some productions, video games, more than likely than anything, are such sticklers about quality that they may even say, okay, now send us the wave file that you just recorded during the Source-Connect session. So we can have the original wave of the audio. So even if the sound quality is nearly indistinguishable, some of them are just so picky. That's what, that's what they're going to want anyway. So that's what, yeah, running a backup. That's exactly right. Are we getting other questions? They're probably showing off the screen.
Alicyn
Yeah, I want to remind everybody that we will, we will get to, we'll do about 10 minutes of questions at the end, where you can ask George more specific questions at that little circle, top button with the question mark, go ahead and type your questions in there, and then I can bring them up at the end.
George
Okay, cool. I wasn't sure if there's an easy way to do it, because I bet it just scrolls off the bottom, you only see a couple comments.
Alicyn
Exactly, so, so that's the easiest way to do it. Um, and, but I am seeing an occasional question. This is nice. It's like a nice intimate conversation. We don't have a million people on here. Although a million people's good too. So yeah. You know, I also am so intrigued because I know you as a person. And obviously there's George the Tech, the professional side. But there's also George Whittam, like, tell us about some of your rad hobbies because you have a few.
George
Rad, man.
Alicyn
Rad, dude. Oh my god, so I don't want to sound like a boomer again.
George
Boomer. I have, I have, I am a bicycle nut. I actually, remember BMX bikes that they had like a pad on the top of the frame, like a big pad and with the print stuff on it, right? And I have one that says "RAD."
Alicyn
I knew I liked you.
George
And it's still one of my bikes, because hey, I'm 47, I don't care. This is a, I had bikes that said rad on them when I was 12 and 15. So for me, it's it's fun. But yeah, I'm a bicycle nut. I've been volunteering at a bicycle Co-Op called the Bikerowave, named after microwave and a bike together because there was another place called the Bike Kitchen that started before us and ours, name, the name of our shop was obviously a play on continuing that play on words. So I've been a volunteer there for 10 years, I'm what's called a head mechanic, which is sort of like being a manager. But every single person in this place is a volunteer, not a single person's on payroll. So people voluntarily do the taxes, pay the bills, clean the place, a little. It's not the cleanest place in the world. But we really, it's, it's a place for folks and coming in normal times, come in and work on their bikes themselves, and get some help and guidance, and buy cheap parts, and get inexpensive bikes. We have been closed as of, we can't have people in to work on their bikes, it's just not quite, we're not quite ready for that safety-wise yet. But you can still come to the shop and buy a bike or buy parts when you're in a pinch and we're only open at night. So you know when everything else is closed. You can come see us we're, we're opening right now. We're open on Monday nights, right now. That's it right now. So Bikerowave.org but I've been a volunteer there for like 10 years. And just, I love biking, mostly mountain biking is mostly what I'm into, but I'll ride around the area, ride on the roads. I love riding up in Kenneth Hahn Park in Culver City, which is a fun little place to go. Topanga is where I lived for a while, I love riding up there. I know all the secret hidden trails around Topanga, and so that's that's my primary form of fun, pastime, physical fitness, social outlet. It's all kind of wrapped up in one, bicycles. So other than that, it doesn't leave a lot of other time to do much else other than be a dad when I have my daughter with me. She is turning 12 in just three days.
Alicyn
Oh my gosh. Wow. Time flies.
George
Yeah, um and my girlfriend who lives with me here in Venice. She is currently, unfortunately, with her father and her family. That's not unfortunate, but she's there for unfortunate reasons. She's there to help him recover from cancer. But he's in, she's in Iran, her whole family is in Tehran, and around Tehran, Iran and she's been there for over a month and a half. So I don't know if she's watching, right now. She knows about this, she, it's 6:30 am there so maybe she's just waking up but if you're there honey, hi, I miss you. But yeah, that's life here right now and developing the new website for the company is taking a lot of spare time as well. And just, I like being outdoors when I can, you know, because we work indoors a lot, as what we do, as actors. I know you do too. Getting out on the weekends, going camping, taking out the trailer, whatever it's all, that stuff's fun, and we're lucky that we can do that pretty much year round here. Really lucky.
Alicyn
I forget how lucky we are and for everybody.
George
Just from the news right now.
Alicyn
What Texas has been going through, and my family back east and everything, you do get, you don't ever want to take it for granted, but.
George
No, no, definitely not. Definitely. And I want to say while I'm here that if there's anybody watching that knows anybody in Texas that has been directly affected by this maybe, they had a pipe burst in their house and ruin their whole studio, or whatever is the case and you're out of gear and do hit me up. I mean, send me a message at George@georgethe.tech, just email me because I have gear, you know I accumulate stuff over time, I get gear from old studios, and I've got stuff, I probably have enough to set somebody, not computers, but at least all the other stuff. I have enough stuff to probably set up three or four studios at least, so.
Alicyn
Yeah, AshleyTurnerVO says she's in Houston. Ashley if you've been affected or you have any friends in the voiceover community that have been affected, have them get in touch with George and see if he can help.
George
Yeah, let me know. Let me know. Houston, yeah. Got, you guys got hurt, hit bad. Yeah, so that's, that's what I do. It's a, it's a, it's a fun life. And it's fun to be able to use my hobby as a way for fitness. And I know for you as well, you, your hobbies are part of your fitness as well. You've always been into yoga, acro yoga.
Alicyn
Acro yoga. Yeah, it's, it's a great way for my husband and I to connect.
George
You guys literally have to connect. You're like, it's pretty amazing.
Alicyn
Yeah, it is really fun. I know. I feel like somebody was saying like what is it? You're gonna post another picture of you with, like doing a handstand on your husband's butt. No, those are outtakes. And maybe that's what we need, like an awkward acro yoga series. Because, yeah, you know, not every picture is like a posters. There's a lot of like hysterical ones. But yeah, so back to home studios, before we got to questions. What are some of your favorite studios that you have designed?
George
Hmm. Well, definitely yours is one of them. For sure.
Alicyn
Oh, yeah. That was fun. You want to talk a little bit about that process?
George
Yeah. Well, I mean, yours is neat, because we did a standalone. I mean, essentially, it's a tiny house. So if you, you know what a tiny house is.
Alicyn
Do you want me, maybe I'll just go ahead and show them the house.
George
Can you move around?
Alicyn
While you, while you explain. So. Let me start from outside.
George
Wow, she can actually go outside and see the face of it.
Alicyn
So people can get a sense of, I don't know how the lighting is right now.
George
You could see the siding where the light is there. You could see the siding. So yeah, so it's a tiny house. It's like 10 x 12 feet, overall footprint, which was the biggest that we could really make in that area without having to go through permitting and crazy stuff in the city. And it's a, it looks like a little tiny house with sliding patio doors. And you'll notice there's two sets of sliding patio doors. And this is a big part of the soundproofing, this soundproofingness of the space. Every single thing on the outside of the building is double, double doors, double layers of glass. In fact, some of the windows have up to eight panes of glass, which is a little overkill, but that's what we got in there and we had there's a lot of glass, the windows are not a weak link in this studio. We made sure of that. And then we've got, yeah, there's so what everything, everything that makes the studio what it is, is a lot of it's what you don't see, it's inside the walls. It's, everything is mounted so that it isolates. Yeah, that's the space between the two doors. See how wide that is?
Alicyn
Six inches of insulation?
George
Yeah. And there's this big space there. So that's what makes that room so quiet that she can work through just about anything. And then we've got our acoustical treatment. And, you know, I did a minimal, I would say a minimalist approach to the acoustics. We didn't wallpaper the place as if you look, try to look straight up. You know, there's a few panels interspersed on the ceiling. But you can see there's a lot of negative space. And so it took a little doing to figure that out, but I didn't want it to feel like you were completely surrounded by, you know, a foam Iron Maiden. Those booths that are lined in that spiky foam, you know, I didn't want to feel like that at all.
Alicyn
Oh no, am I frozen?
George
No, you're good.
Alicyn
Okay. Seems like you said frozen. Okay.
George
No, you're good, no. Yeah. And then we went with a power desk, which is really great. So Alicyn can be working, sitting or standing and it's equally comfortable. And these fortunately, have gotten very affordable now.
Alicyn
Yeah.
George
Thankfully, I mean, Costco carries them sometimes. This is great, because you can mount everything on the desk and whether you're sitting or standing or if you have kids that share your studio. And this was really fun, right? We mounted your gear.
Alicyn
I need a better cable situation, but.
George
Yeah, we got a little work to do. You see the, the rack suspended from underneath, where she can put things that rides up and down with the table. And it makes it very easy to for anybody of any height to use it. And she can work sitting or standing. And everything moves with it, the monitor, the mics, everything. And then what makes this space really special, space, really special is she has a loft, which is really sweet. Super, super cool. So.
Alicyn
Yeah.
George
So, how often do you go up there?
Alicyn
Oh, every day.
George
It's a library ladder. Yeah, that was a big deal. Actually, that had to be made and took some time to get that I remember.
Alicyn
We had to do some searching but we did find it. And then if you go up here, this is a little meditation nook.
George
I love that. These little porthole windows on the sides.
Alicyn
Oh, cute.
George
Yeah, it's a super, super neat space. So it is, it is, yes, it's one of my favorites by far because it just, it's just a fun space to be in. And it's comfortable. And it just looks really cool.
Alicyn
I love it.
George
Any studio where I can go outside the box and not have it be a box are my favorites. David K also has a studio that's a bit shaped like this, high vaulted ceiling. Love high vaulted ceilings in a studio. Howard Parker I just came from. Also it's a smallish booth. It's maybe six by six. But it has a nice high ceiling that follows the ceiling line of the house. So it's very tall. So I love that it makes the space easier to work in. It sounds acoustically nicer to have all that headroom. And those are some of my, by far my most favorite and if you're watching and I didn't say the name of your studio, sorry.
Alicyn
That's also his favorite.
George
So many but there's also I have to drop a name, by far, I have to drop the most famous name in voiceover, ever Don LaFontaine. I got to, well, I didn't design his studio but I, I was his tech for the, for a few years before he passed away, in '09 and, and then I got to design a studio in his name at SAG, the SAG foundation. It's called the Don LaFontaine voiceover lab. So if you're a SAG-AFTRA member, you can record there for free and take classes there for free. That was something that I did as a joint project with a whole bunch of people, but it was really co-founded by Paul Pape, and Joe Cipriano, and myself, it was Paul's concept initially to do this, I believe. And the three of us are the co founders. So that's probably my most. That's probably my proudest space, because it's one of the only things I designed where it benefits 1000s and 1000s of actors.
Alicyn
Yeah. It would be really fun if when COVID you know, is not such a thing. If we went over there and did a live tour, and a live stream of that, that would be really fun. I would love to do that.
George
It's long, it's long overdue. I've gone over there and talked about once a year. I haven't been there in the last year. So I would love to go there again and just be there around so a lot of fun to be there. So yeah, so it's if you want to see some of the stuff I've done, go to Georgethe.tech, you'll see a studio gallery link on there and I just try to post all the studios I've done, including Alicyn's, and it's not just pictures of the done studio, it's pictures of the thing being made. So it's you can see the whole process, what it looks like.
Alicyn
So, it's George the dot tech?
George
That's the website.
Alicyn
I'm just going to share it here if anybody wants to.
George
If that's a little confusing, Georgethetech.com does work. I have both domains. But that's, that's I like to hold my name is my address so Georgethe.tech.
Alicyn
That's cool. Um, well, let's go ahead and go to, go to some questions, because we still have our...
George
Yes.
Alicyn
Giveaway. Um, so let's, let's see if we have, there's a couple questions that popped up in the question box. So let's see questions from your viewers will show up here, that's funny, where did they go? I thought there was four questions. And now I'm clicking on there. And there are no questions.
George
So I just wiped them out. If you had some, I guess.
Alicyn
Yeah, I think, I think it might have glitched. So if you do have a question, go ahead and type it in again. But in the meantime, is it time? Are you guys ready?
George
Let's do it. Let's do it while people are putting their questions in.
Alicyn
We had 40 sorry, we had 54 different entries.
George
Holy cow.
Alicyn
Yeah, well, some people got multiple entries. Because they, if you shared it to your stories, you got an additional five. So I'm just gonna start. Oh, I just dropped some. You know, maybe I'll have my own game show someday. Okay. So we'll see, I'm gonna call one. And you're all winners, but the winner of the free consultation with George is oh, look at that. Can you see you guys? Jeff Burns.
George
Jeff burns. Awesome.
Alicyn
It makes me really happy that Jeff won, I mean, it would have made me happy, there's like so many candidates in here. But Jeff has been on almost, on almost every single live stream since we started the show. And we're at 23 episodes now. So.
George
And you know what, I'm also glad he won. Because when I type him into my client database, he's not in there. So that's cool. You get to, we get to work together for the first time. And congratulations, you get one hour of free time. So email me and George@Georgethe.tech.
Alicyn
You won! Congrats Jeff!
George
Set you up.
Alicyn
That's so awesome. I know Jeff's been working on building up his studio and this is probably really useful.
George
That's great.
Alicyn
I see Daniel Block has an actually, an amazing question. That I have been wondering as well which is, Will AI replace the craft of VO?
George
AI will replace the craft of VO when AI replaces the craft of symphony orchestras playing on film scores and, and concert halls. That's when it will replace the craft of voiceover. So has that happened yet? Has AI replaced some of music? Well, if you want to call synthesis or sampled instruments, AI, we could say that I guess, I mean, certainly the, the at the low end of the budget range, there's always going to be synthesizers because it means one person can play all the parts. But when it comes to the big time games, the big time films, all the best production values, people are always going to want people and people are always going to want to work with people. There is no substitute for working with humans, face to face or even on Zoom, the energy, the personalities, the the nuance of the human voice is so unbelievably detailed. It would take hours and hours, days or weeks, or years to program a human voice that sounds convincing, doesn't sound practical. But couldn't you just have a human read it? So I don't think it's gonna happen anytime soon. But there certainly is synthesize voice stuff that's out there. We all know.
Alicyn
I mean, things like explainer videos and some of the, like, long form narration, what about that? I mean, in the next ten years, don't you see some of that going away?
George
Yeah, I mean, if you're doing YouTube videos, and you're only making $10 in advertising per video, then you're probably, if you need narration, you may not pay a voice actor $100 to do your voiceover, so that, there's going to be affordable or low budget jobs, or no budget jobs that want to have a voice that just can't swing it. And there are ways to hire voice talent very, very affordably. But the quality can sometimes really be subpar. There's definitely a get what you pay for in voiceover. So I don't know what's going to happen. But I know there is some, there's definitely some apprehension about it in the voiceover community for, for a reason. I get that.
Alicyn
Chris Brown is asking, do you prefer the SC 2200, or the SC 2300 for an upgrade?
George
Hmm, I know the SC 23/2200 pretty well. In fact, I believe when I was still working with Don, he had one in his studio at one time, because they sent him one to try out. The thing about the SC 2200 is kind of like the Rode NT1 and that they've been updating over the years. So there's various iterations of it, there's the 2200, A, A2. I'm googling this because I can't remember all the different versions that they have. But the 2300 is not one I'm familiar with, this one may be the next iteration of the 2200. But until I've gotten to hear, I'm like and try it out in my own studio and really compare it. I can't speak to it. So I don't know yet. But if you're going to get one, get it from somewhere that has a return policy, set it up, record it, get a mic check from me, I that's something I do, you can record. If you've got a few different mics and things and you're trying to decide, go to my website, look in the tech services and look for mic check. And you can send me a bunch of samples, and I'll help you narrow it down.
Alicyn
Help tell us about some of the other services you offer like effects stacks, and.
George
Yeah, so the effects stack thing, I do that on just about every single audio recording program that's available. And that really is about mostly about getting great sounding auditions. So it's taking the voiceover that you're providing that should be already good audio, and just putting it in a nice suit and tie, basically, just giving you the best possible presentation that you can. And also trying to make it sound familiar. So when that casting person or even just the client themselves is listening to your audition, when they hear it, it sounds familiar. It sounds like woah, that voice sounds like it's this, it's, it sounds real. It helps suspend belief a little disbelief, I guess, because when they're hearing your voice with that the right amount of processing just right. It can sell, sell the audition. So that's the stacks and racks. Yeah. And then the soundcheck would be just 25 bucks. And I'll listen to your audio and give you my pointers about sound quality. And then again, like I said, the mic check would be I've got a couple of mics. And I don't know whether I should use the pad switch or not the pad and the high cut. And so they use figure eight or cardioid. And should I have the mic? So you can record all these samples? And I'll tell you, this is the one this is the best possible sound you're going to get. And that's, that helps a lot of people. Like that one's pretty popular.
Alicyn
Awesome. That's so great. Tasker asked, .WAV or AIFF?
George
Yeah, so a WAV and AIFF files are really interchangeable. They're both what we call PCM audio. So they're really the the audio in its most raw form. So whether you record WAV or AIFF doesn't really matter, because I think every single DAW recording program can read or write to either, but WAV is developed by Microsoft originally, originally and AIFF was developed originally by Apple. So the Apple audio file natively was would have been a AIFF. So yeah, it actually, it's kind of tomato tomahto. Doesn't, it doesn't matter.
Alicyn
Yeah, I always wondered that myself. Well, it looks like we only have a couple minutes left. And I don't know if, if it's just going to cut us off after 60, after 60 minutes, or if it's going to let us go a few long, a few minutes longer. So we'll keep going and hope. One more question has come in. When you do a sound test for clients, do you only rely on your ears? Or do you include a visual output to make an evaluation?
George
No, I rely on my ears. I just, to me, it, what matters the most is how it translates to me and my hearing. And it's because, it's all about the context. And I've heard so many of your voiceovers, and studios, and stuff that I know what it's supposed to sound like. And so it's far more effective for me to just evaluate it based on the way it sounds than anything else, any other metric. But if you want me to do something fancier, let me know. I don't know what that would be. But if you want to see some kind of a waterfall plot or an RTA readout or something else.
Alicyn
Just like emojis, just like hehe, happy emojis.
George
Maybe I'll have one that's all emojis. I don't know.
Alicyn
Thumbs up, thumbs up. Awesome. Well, where can we keep in contact with you? Obviously, anybody that's coming over from my side, be sure to follow George on Instagram, but you're also pretty active on Twitter, YouTube, do you want to give us your um, handle?
George
I'm the most active in terms of day to day checking and interacting would be probably still Facebook. Okay, so find me as George the Tech on Facebook. I am pretty active in a bunch of the different Facebook groups. I'm kind of like the genie in the bottle. If you say my name, tag me, I will pop up and become involved in the conversation. So I don't, I tried there's too many groups and I don't browse all of them every day by, by any longshot. But if you tag me, you might just get, you're probably well, you know, I can guarantee I will, I will chime in if you tag me on Facebook. So if you tag at George the Tech, I will pop up. Instagram, I'm pretty active. LinkedIn, I post things as well there. Twitter. I post stuff on there, but I'm not a Twitter user that often. And then my show the Voiceover Body Shop where you can ask tech questions, email the guys at VOBS.TV. And I have a geek, really geeky podcast, a true podcast called The Pro Audio suite.
Alicyn
Right with Robert Marshall, from Source-Connect and Darren "Robbo" Robertson from Voodoo Sound, and Andrew Peters, the founder of Real Time casting.
George
Yes. And those two folks, the last two are in Australia. So we do it together. We record all together like a real radio show. But it's a podcast, it's well produced. And like if we say so ourselves, it's our names on there, right? So, and we interview amazing people like we were interviewing some audio engineers, we've interviewed musicians, we've interviewed actors, all kinds of people in there. So it's, it's a lot of fun. And we do take questions offline, people can email us there. But mostly we're just talking to each other and answering questions riffing on a subject, that kind of thing.
Alicyn
Very cool.
George
Yay, car alarm.
Alicyn
Car alarm.
George
Hallelujah. And, by the way, my favorite cartoon characters of all time.
Alicyn
Ren and Stimpy
George
Ren and Stimpy.
Alicyn
Is that coming back? I feel like that's coming back again.
George
I hope so.
Alicyn
Thank you guys so much for tuning in this week. It's been such a pleasure. If anybody is not already following me, please do because we have some really great guests coming up in the future. Next week is Duane Capizzi. And Duane is currently the show writer of the new Carmen Sandiego on Netflix. It's an awesome show. If you've haven't seen it yet. Check it out. And then we have Rob Paulsen coming on. In two weeks. We have Yeah, Rob Paulsen, the legendary voice actor, award winning voice actor, currently starring in the new Animaniacs reboot. And then in two weeks, we have Hope Levy coming on. She plays the mom in Boss Baby. She's the original creator of The Voice Actors Network, and we're gonna do a song together because.
George
She's really cool, we've interviewed her on our show VOBS before.
Alicyn
Really? Yeah. So it'll be, it'll be so great to play some music with, with Hope. So I hope you guys tune in and thank you so much for watching and George, thank you so much for the giveaway. Jeff, just go ahead and message George and if you guys like giveaways, shoot me a DM and let me know and maybe we'll do another one when Rob comes on. Okay, guys, have a wonderful day.
George
Thank you.
Alicyn
Okay, take care bye.
George
It was fun. Bye bye everyone.
Alicyn
Thank you.
Outro
Thanks for tuning in to Alicyn’s Wonderland, where we explore the wild and wonderful world of animation and video games. Please remember to subscribe and leave us a review. For more episodes of Alicyn’s Wonderland, please visit us at www.alicynpackard.com. See you next week.