Finding My Voice

I love it when Bob Souer talks about his work.  I learn something from his comments every single time, like in this post where he answers a question about networking and “getting out there”.  Brilliant thoughts, Bob!

The other morning I got up early for a bike ride.  I remember that the tires felt like they were low on air the last time I rode, so I pulled out the ol’ pump and connected it to the back tire.  Sure enough, the pressure was way below the recommended level.  A few quick pumps later and it was back to normal, and I moved on to the front tire, which was also low.  Once that was at the proper pressure level, I put the pump away and took off on my ride.

One of the immediate differences I noticed is that it’s much easier to ride hands-free with the tires properly pumped.  Not many days before, I’d tried to show my daughter about riding without holding onto the handlebars, but it didn’t work so well.  The front tire wavered and swayed much more than normal, though at the time I didn’t know that it was due to low tire pressure.  After pumping up the tires prior to my morning ride a few days later, though, I had no trouble balancing while riding hands-free.

When prepping for a voiceover session, there are lots of last-minute things you can do to make sure you’re “pumped” and ready:

• make sure you have plenty of water
• study the script to determine what style of read you should use, and to find the key points that will help you deliver the best performance
• mark up the script so that you remember what you found
• take time to practice reading the script out loud

These are just a few of the things that you could do to “pump up” for a session.  You might have some personal preferences, things that are especially helpful for you to get in the right frame of mind.  If you neglect some of these last minute things, you might not be fully prepared for the things you may be asked to do in the session.  If you’re pumped, you’ll be ready for it.

Yes, I’m slowly building the ol’ blogroll. It’s gonna be a work-in-progress, so check back regularly to see what’s new. As this blog is about voiceover, the links will naturally center around the blogs and portfolio sites of fellow voiceover artists, along with other voiceover resources. I’ve learned so much from so many people in the voiceover community, and I hope you will take the opportunity to visit their sites and soak up their wisdom. As new sites get added from here on out, I’ll try to highlight the new entries.

Along that line (and with apologies to those previously on the list who were not specifically mentioned), I encourage you to visit the blog of Dave Courvoisier. Dave is a voice talent in Las Vegas, and works by day as a news anchor for KLAS-TV. Dave began blogging about voiceover a couple years ago, and his insights, talent, and dedication have inspired me immensely. If you’re reading this in May 2009, you may notice that Dave’s latest post includes some thoughts about declining traffic to his blog, along with musings about its possible discontinuation. I recently shared my thoughts in response to his post, and encourage you to do the same if you’ve felt informed and inspired by the thoughts that Dave has shared on his blog over the past couple years.

Hang in there, Dave!

Hey there!  Welcome to the blog!  My name is Justin Barrett, and I’m a voice actor.  Most of my work so far has been in the arena of character voices.  I’m currently providing the voice for one of the initial four dinosaurs that will act as the “hosts” of Webosaurs.com, which is scheduled to launch later this year.  Previous projects include a national commercial for Nintendo, two characters for a live stage show (pre-recorded voice tracks for full-body puppets), a computer game, and several animated home videos.  Prior to my current full-time job as a programmer/developer at an animation studio, I was an animator for seven years, and was heavily involved in community theatre before that.  Acting is in my blood, and I love the challenge of bringing characters and scripts to life through vocal performance.

I hope that you enjoy the thoughts and experiences that I’ll share, and I look forward to learning from the conversations we have here.  Thanks for taking the time to visit!