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Voice-over Recording Studio Tips Acoustics
I have 9 foam acoustic tiles 40x40cm to deaden the sound in my office where I record as the resonance from the bare walls was noticable on recordings. On other walls I have shelves with objects on - which aren't deliberately there, but help deaden the sound. I try to record in small spaces - i.e. not in the middle of a large room, but in a constructed 'corner' where I can control the surface acoustics more. So I have a large floor standing acoustic screen 1.5m tall by 1m across (pictured left, next to door to show scale) which I pull towards me in one corner of my office so that it creates a smaller acoustically treated space which gives a more deadened sound that without it. If I had the space, I would have invested in a 'room within a room' acoustically isolated booth which would not only have created a great recording environment in acoustic terms, but would have also isolated any extraneous sounds from outside. I've used them in the past and always found them to be excellent acoustic environments. I also have a desire to go to sleep in one. I'd have loved to had one when I lived next door to noisy neighbours.
Mixer & EQ
American readers can get a Behringer MDX2600 for $109.99 or a Mackie 1202-VLZ3 Pro mixer for $299.99 ISDN
Digital Recording Workstations
PCs Computers are now the norm for recording audio in studios. Thankfully, in recent years, manufacturers are becoming aware that even domestic PC users don't like the sound of a large cooling fan humming constantly in their studies or living rooms. This is beneficial to voice-over artists or podcasters because it brings very quiet computers into the reach of everyone - they used to cost a fortune! In theory, you can still spend money on having a customised PC built with water cooling, doing away with fans altogether. I went half-way and installed a fan-less power supply in my PC. To get it out of the way, I do not like Apple Macs. They are too expensive. A. At best - get a custom silent PC with water cooling. Do not underestimate the difference a sound card has on your recordings. I recently connected my voice-over recording equipment to a different computer and tried recording with the same software and equipment but the sound was awful. The only difference was that I was using the on-board soundcard that is built-in to the computer. I transfered my sound card over and it was great again. I use a Creative Sound Blaster Audigy 2 which was well priced and does all I need. Cables & Headphones I soldered my own 3 pin XLR cables using Neutrik jacks and Van Damme LC-OFC quad microphone low-noise screened cable. I enjoy soldering and find it rewarding. XLR plugs are a bugger to solder because you need a total of 4 hands to do it, so be warned! I used to use 8 ohm Beyer DT100 headphones, and sometimes Sennheiser HD 480-13 II / 600Rs, although the Sennheisers aren't closed so if I got too close to the mic is sometimes fedback if I'm having a 'deaf day' with the volume up too high. I now use a pair of Audio Technica ATH-M40fs - they really are superb. Amusing Story: I had to do a voice-over once for a clever cloggs audio producer who had 'been there and done that' and let you know about it! As far as he was concerned, he was the bees knees. But he was well and truly knocked back down to earth when he expected me to do a session in a studio he'd set up that day. The microphones (Neumann U87s - plural because he was obsessed with stereo recording) were pointing downwards towards the seat I was about to sit on, as if they were dynamics rather than side-address condensers! There's only so much you can fix in the mix! I later heard he'd recorded a session with the mics in the more conventional vertical position, but pointing the wrong way round...the mind boggles. So, cut to the chase - what equipment do I need to do podcasts / be a VO? I'm adding this section because I had a quick browse through the web and saw lots of audio supply companies selling 'podcaster packages' of equipment that were TOTAL OVERKILL and quite frankly a waste of your hard-earned money! Kits included mixing desks for 8x microphones - crazy. Below I list the essential equipment you'll need to record your voice onto your PC so that it sounds nice and professional. Do these new USB mics work? I don't know, I've not tried them, but I don't think you get much control over the sound tone with them - no EQ, no gate, no limiter, no compressor. Yes, you can do all that in software, but I like to hear it LIVE. From the price, I'd assume they won't sound super-fantastic. MIXERS -- If you are only doing basic voice recording / podcasts, then you only need a small mixer with a few XLR mic inputs. Behringer do a range of these mini-mixers. As a rule of thumb, as soon as the range starts using sliding faders, that's about the top-end of all you would ever need in a mixer. My mixer is a Mackie 1202 and just has rotating knobs or 'pots' for levels, as once you're set-up, you rarely touch them. You'll never be 'riding the faders' like DJs in the 1980s on KIIS FM or Z100 or anything like that. MICROPHONES -- Generally, the more expensive the microphone, the more of the room acoustics it will pick-up. So if you're not in a sound proof booth, you'll not want a Neumann that will pick up your dog licking his privates in the next room. You can buy very respectable large diaphragm condenser mics for less than $100 these days. They are at the top-end of the sensitivity range you will need. I have an AT2020 and a (probably China-made) Studiospares S1000 and they both, in my opinion, sound more flattering than mics I've owned that cost 8x as much. What do I use? If I'm voicing something for a telephone line, I'll use my SM57. If it's for broadcast on the radio, I'll use the S1000 or AT2020. Simple as that. PROCESSING -- If you have air conditioning, live near a busy road, etc. seriously consider a gate function in your outbound audio processor that will automatically mute the mic when you are not talking, thereby muting any fan noise, PC noise, pipes clanking, etc. SOUND CARD -- I never thought it would, but a good sound card really makes a difference. I'm not a person who buys into the 'solid gold audio cables' for your hi-fi systems or anything, but after trying a few soundcards, there is a very real audible difference between the cheap ones and the ones that cost a bit more. Get a good one. Here are the basics that you'll need to be in control of recording your voice onto a PC:
Here's my studio chain:
My Current Equipment List Microphones: I have previously owned, used and sold: Electrovoice RE20
Watch (and hear) the late great Don LaFontaine
talk about doing movie trailer voice-overs Updated - Fri, 6/08/10 |
benbax.com © 2010 Ben Baxter. All rights reserved. |
Think
how your voice sounds to you when you are in the bathroom or shower. Lots
of reverberation, yes? That's because all the sound waves are bouncing
back to you after hitting the bare solid walls in the room. If you were
in a room that, instead of bare walls had lots of cushions, duvets or
foam, it would sound totally different - no echo. If you go into your
loft, it may sound pretty dead because there's lots of stuff and aren't
any parallell walls. The sound recordist Ty Ford is correct when he says
"Don't use a lot of foam on the walls. Go for a balance of diffusion
(irregular surfaces) and absorption (foam). Too much foam in a room sounds
overly dead and spongy." 
I
purchased an SE Electronics Reflexion Filter after reading
a number of reviews praising it. It was okay - maybe I need to play with
it more, but you still need some sound absorbtion behind you when recording
as I discovered. I was thinking it'd be an instant fix for recording quick
voice-over sessions, but alas, maybe not. Eventually, after a lot of tests
and contradictory to the reviews I'd read, I decided I wasn't very impressed
by it, so sold it on. 
I
use a Mackie 1202 VLZ Pro which I was sold on due to the incredible low
noise pre amps (now Behringer make unbelievably cheap mixers with the
same low noise levels - amazing!). I had used a green Joe Meek VC3Q which
was impractically noisy (lots of hiss) when used with the C414 for voice
work. The Mackie has 4 mic pre-amps, so I could practically leave all
my favourite voice mics plugged in and EQed all 
the
time. To give a more commercial sound, I use a Behringer Composer Pro
MDX2200 compresser, limiter, expander, gate, toaster, teasmaid, etc. It
works great - if I'd been more generous with the spends I would probably
have gone for a FocusRite, but for the price it's amazing. Now discontinued,
its replacement is the Behringer Composer PRO-XL MDX2600 which has even
more features including a de-esser, dynamic enhancer and tube emulator.
I'm not into knobs enough to have enjoyed setting up the ADR F756R Vocal
Stresser which I had bought from a local radio station, so I never bothered.
I sold it on eBay. They were a bit annoyed because upon reflection they
said it was the best sound processor the station had in over 25 years
and hadn't found anything that came close to it! Oops!
Full
time voice-over artists will have ISDN lines, essentially digital telephone
lines which allow you to 'appear' live in a recording studio or production
house anywhere in the world in digital clarity. They aren't cheap to install
or keep going, and BT seem to have a monopoly in the UK. The cost per
minute, per line is 50p, and you need 2 lines - so a 15 minute session
(although it's the production company who would dial in to you) would
cost around £7.50 in call costs. To convert your gloriously retro
analogue audio into digital to be sent down these ISDN lines, you need
an ISDN codec. This not only sends your audio signal from your mixer to
the production studio, but also allows you to hear them (just like a phone)
so that they can direct you and tell you when they're ready to record.
A popular codec is the Prima LT, which is nice and easy
to use and is very high quality (although the price is over £2000).
There are pieces of software available that utilise your broadband internet
line as if it were ISDN lines, AudioTX is a popular version. ISDN lines
give a VO cudos because they are expensive things to have. I do believe
they are becoming less popular as VOIP / AudioTX type software is allowing
the use of a broadband connection as a digital line. 
Years
ago, I used to have to record the voice sessions onto minidiscs then record
them from MD to the PC to edit. This was very time consuming - essentially
doubling the length of time it took to record a session, but my old PC
was just so noisy it was impractical to record while it was on. (Now I
have a Fujitsu Siemens PC which is very quiet indeed, but my new Acer
is perhaps even more quiet). I've always liked minidiscs since I purchased
the MZ-R3 in 1996. I'm very much a minidisc advocate. My new portable
is the MZ-R37 (pictured right). The LP2 and LP4 recording modes of MD
recorders today are incredible. I've found so many uses for my minidisc
recorders that I'm tempted to buy some spares in case they ever stop making
them! I already have hundreds of blank discs from a clearance sale item
in Sainsburys (5 for £1). I tend not to record voice tracks onto
them now unless the client requests it. 
I
bought the Tascam DP-02CF Portastudio, which is a digital multi-track
recorder, recording audio onto a removable compact flash memory card.
The idea was that I could record voice tracks whilst my PC was switched
off, and so have quieter recordings with the more sensitive mics I have.
After a day of playing, I decided it wasn't for me. There's no denying
it looks like a very nice piece of kit, but I think a band or musician
would have much more use that me. My main nag is that when you record
a voice track, you then have to bounce it in real time to create a WAV
file on the compact flash card to be able to edit on the PC later. Perfect
for mixing down songs with multiple tracks, but when it's just recording
one track with a mic it doubles the amount of time spent recording, as
you're listening to the entire session again. Without this snag, I would
have kept it. I still had the mic going through the Mackie mixer and Behringer
Composer Pro before the signal going into the portastudio. I need the
gate function on the Behringer - can't live without it. You can change
the frequency range that the high and low EQ pots adjust, which is a nice
touch. However, this could only be done in the bounce stage, so you can't
hear in real-time what effects any EQ change has on the live recording.
If the buttons were soft-touch rubber/silicon instead of the loud 'click'
type ones, it would have felt like 
a
higher quality product. I didn't get too much into it after realising
the bounce problem, but I can imagine a band or a composer loving this
kit. I was going to buy the Tascam DR-07 portable recorder (pictured right),
but wasn't sure if it was too flimsy and light with no XLR input or faders
so went for the DP-02CF which looks like it meant business more. I sold
my Portastudio to a nice musician in Battersea. I'm not sure whether I
deleted the audio I'd recorded onto it, which may have included me swearing
about said Portastudio. I'll never know!
