I got my first professional Commercial and Narration demo reels in October of 2020. But there had always been something missing.
After I took my 8-week voice-over course under the mentor-ship of the hilarious Tim Powers, I was gifted with the inclusion of two professionally produced demo reels in a professional studio (at Studio 101 in Woodruff, SC) and I got to chat with the audio tech there and I learned a lot of cool stuff. It was an experience for sure! I found myself in a really quiet sound-treated room filled with instruments and a fancy microphone and music stand with my VO script were located in the center.
When it was time to record, I placed the headphones on and my producer (who was linked in remotely) came in over my left-ear monitor to say hello and give me feedback after each take. She was so kind and patient with me. And after about an hour of talking and making small changes in inflection and intonation, I was done. I thanked my producer and my audio tech and went home.
Six weeks later, I got an email with two files simply labeled, “JordanHarbin_C.mp3” and “JordanHarbin_N.mp3”
I plugged in my hand-me-down headphones, pressed play and closed my eyes.
I heard music and talking and for a split-second I reached up to skip the ad so I could hear my demo.
Heh. There was no ads! That was me! I was talking and it sounded like a real commercial! It sounded so awesome!
I was proud of myself and very thankful to my coach, my producer and and sound designer for helping me sound like I knew what I was doing.
But there was something missing. I had my Commercial and Narration demos, but I am a story-teller and these demos were more geared towards the type of stuff one would hear on the radio or to sell something. Neither of which was bad, but I wanted to be able to do it all. I needed an Animation Demo!
But unfortunately, that wasn’t included in the voice coaching lesson plan. I would have to pay more for another demo and an extra trip to the recording studio.
“I’M GONNA FRIKKIN’ DO IT MYSELF!”
Now, I did some research and asked other VAs and spoke to my coach and I know what every voiceover professional would say:
“No! Don’t try to produce your demo yourself!”
But you know what I had to say to all those nay-sayers? What did I say to all those people who tried to shut me down? What did I say to those who discouraged me from trying to prove that I could do it myself?
“Yeah, I know.“
I knew I shouldn’t advertise this professionally, but I needed to have something to improve. And at that point, I had a good starting point: Nothing.
So, I did exactly what everyone told me I shouldn’t do: I made an Animation demo myself.
I started by reading a bunch of great articles from professional and established voice actors in the animation and video game genre and many of them specified what producers look for in a demo of that sort. (*Side Note: Dee Bradley Baker has a ton of great resources on his website: “iwanttobeavoiceactor.com”) So, I took a page from their books and began implementing what would become my animation demo reel.
I started with my script. I looked to some of my favorite characters and tweaked some of their quotes. I found some entries from my own short stories and then some famous playwright quotes. I adjusted a few words and added some flair. Next, I just needed to make sure that I wasn’t doing any bad impressions of these characters (another big no-no in demo reels).
I recorded and edited. I made sure to try to sound as cartoony or as serious as needed. I even found some music and sound effects to make it as fancy as I could.
It was…okay. But I was proud of it. I learned a lot about editing and sound design, and it was better than I thought I could do.
That was until I had a professional producer connect with me over LinkedIn and I asked if he could listen to my demo reels because I hadn’t been getting much work. He told me that my Commercial and Narration demos were great, but there was something off about my Animation demo.
Dang it! I was hoping he wouldn’t notice.
Well, honestly, I figured he would, but I was hoping to get a little feedback. And feedback I got.
So, here we are again. A year and a half later and a butt-ton of recording, mastering, research and experience under my belt and I’m going to try again.
Is this going to be better than last time?
Unequivocally!
Should I try this again after last time?
Well, let me put it this way: The famous mathematician Ian Malcom was noted as saying “those preoccupied with whether or not they could, didn’t stop to think if they should” (Crichton, 1993).
Here goes nothing.