Quote:
Originally Posted by pwalker8
Technically, it's not all that expensive to put together a recording studio. I know people who have done it. The real issue is that voice talent is, well, talent. Having a good speaking voice just isn't enough any more. It isn't nearly as easy as they make it look.
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No, we didn't spend a lot. Les than 100 dollars. (One of the mics is a Yeti that we picked up on Craigslist. It's actually a remarkable piece of equipment for 50 dollars and makes me wonder what one gets for the 700 that some people spend (or more)). We bought a lamp-like arm to hold it and we already had a computer. We actually have mixing equipment too, but only used that on the first two stories before we switched to the Yeti mic.
Husband has some recording experience so setting up a quiet (dead) room wasn't hard either. I made the pop guard (I call it a spit guard just to annoy my husband) myself because I have every fabric under the sun in my collection. Made it from silk/hemp and a quilting hoop. Worked extremely well on the Shure vocal mic. For engineering there's all kinds of great software out there, some of it FREE.
The talent part is something we are still learning/learning about because it's like art--every listener has an opinion on how much "acting" should be done. Some want a full cast, some expect various voices, some hate various voices. I've followed a few forums and you hear the oddest complaints that range from "why use British voices if this is the American version" to "His voice isn't the way I thought that voice should sound."
I agree, however, that you can't just read the text or it's worse than listening to a bad sermon that goes on forever. We downloaded audio books from the library for examples, and sometimes those had good acting but very poor audio quality. The range of what is out there is HUGE.