[Nick Griffin]

[Todd Terry] “Older Neumanns also command huge prices on the used market.”

So, Todd, you’re telling me that those two U-87s that I let go in 1985 when I closed my audio studio are actually worth more than I paid for them in the late 70’s?

[Homer Simpson] “Why do things that only happen to stupid people keep happening to ME?”

[Nick Griffin]

[Ty Ford] “I get the harder scripts. Ones that require interpretation or are technically difficult.”

Right ‘dat! I can personally testify that Ty did a spectacular job voicing one of the most arduous and lengthy projects of my career. He has that rare knack of being able to take difficult terminology and concepts and make them sound perfectly logical and understandable.

One thing I would like clarification on if you’re still with this thread, Ty, is under what circumstances do you use a large capsule mic like the Neumann versus the smaller hyper cardioid Schoepps? I’ve seen you use both and not sure why.

[Nick Griffin]

I couldn’t agree more with most of the comments here so far, except for the fact, Todd, that the original “Voice of God” was Norman Rose. (I last worked with Norman in New York in the mid-1980’s and he was in his early seventies then so I doubt he’s still around, let alone working.)

Bill’s comments about exercising the muscle are an interesting take on a complex process. To it I would add the idea of necessary mental development. The average normal human being is clueless about the subtleties and nuances of voiceover. Our brains aren’t tuned into these factors without a great deal of practice and training. Tell someone to “Take that same paragraph you just read, get prideful on the word ‘exclusive,’ stay flat on the ‘furbisher’ sentence, go warmer on the tagline and shave half a second off the whole thing.” Even with direction the normal mind doesn’t perceive, let alone remember the numerous factors that make up these micro-performances.

This is also why so many actors easily transition into voiceover work. Their brains are already attuned to the details of performance. Getting to focus only on voice and not physical expression and blocking can be viewed as a luxury.

Good luck with getting into voiceover, Hunter. With hard work, concentration and a boat load of practice you can go far and make a good living. Even everyday voices used well can go far. If you have “golden pipes” like a Don LaFontaine or Peter Thomas that’s a plus.

[Nick Griffin]

S-Corp for the past 21 years. I was always told that being a C-Corp meant that one would first pay taxes as a C-Corp and then again as an individual.

[Todd Terry] “so that we can start company retirement funds for employees”

Whaa??? We have a SEP IRA plan and have for years.

[Nick Griffin]

[Ryan Mast] “However… how do you protect your reputation while dropping a client? What do you do to help prevent them from talking poorly about you afterwards and harming your reputation?”

How? Carefully and tactfully — especially difficult when what you really want to do is tell them where to shove their business.

One way that worked for me (I hope, because it’s too soon to know if they’ll try to trash us with others) was to use the excuse that “the timing just isn’t good right now.” I explained that they needed (and wanted) a lot of attention that we simply didn’t have the time to give at the moment.

Then I called around to those of our clients who know these people and, in some cases, work with them. I let them hear from me that we had decided to withdraw because they wanted a different deal than everyone else. With some I also explained how the ‘dumpee’ boasted about how they found ways to stiff other vendors. (To this day I have NO IDEA what they were thinking while they were telling ME this stuff.) Now if they want to trash us at least the people who matter the most have already heard my side of the story.

[Nick Griffin]

A middle ground might be to sell the client some of the component parts — pre-comps without the underlying work that created them. Handled correctly they’ll not feel that you’re holding back on them and you won’t be giving away the “magic.” That said, DO make sure to get paid for what you turn over and keep it pleasant. Remind them that you’re available for future projects when the need for fresh creative trumps budgetary limitations.

[Nick Griffin]

[Richard Keating] “but for end clients who were mostly technologically challenged, the interface was was somewhat daunting.”

My experience was that the tech challenged clients needed to be talked through the first use, generally have yet to take advantage of any of the annotation features, but except for that very first time have no trouble whatsoever using MediaBatch as a viewer. Many clients routinely ask us to use MediaBatch for other purposes such as putting up a library of still photos that their sales force can download and other forms of non-video data transfer. Everybody loves the interface… in my experience.

Richard, if you can keep your price commensurate with your feature set there may be a place for your product, but my clients and I are solidly behind MediaBatch.

[Nick Griffin]

[Maarten Mylemans] “I would be able to live with if I didn’t have to find a workaround every two mouse clicks.”

Then you are correct to look to move on. That’s unacceptable.

[Maarten Mylemans] “it’s kinda sad to hear that most editing software are riddled with bugs.”

Is this what you’ve read elsewhere, because it wasn’t part of this thread and has not been part of my experience. If you’re convinced that changing platforms isn’t an option then you should also look at Sony Vegas to see if that’s more to your liking. The good thing about entry level Avid is that it will make moving to the higher levels of Avid in future jobs simpler. Then again, the higher levels of Avid are usually on Macs — at least as far as I’ve seen.

[Nick Griffin]

Maarten-

First and foremost I think you should post some specific issues / behavior you are experiencing on the Premier COW and see if any of the experienced bovines there can help identify something which may be causing your problem. Your issues could be caused by any number of conflicts with other software or hardware.

Second, you didn’t say whether your problems were with the Mac or PC versions of PP. Specifying that will be important to help in finding a solution.

Third, in answer to your question, NO, all editing programs are not riddled with bugs. Personally I’m a Mac user of Media 100 (1st choice) and Final Cut Pro (3rd choice because I like Media 100 that much more), but my partner uses a lower cost version of Avid on the PC and is also quite satisfied.

I like Media 100 because it is highly streamlined, allowing me to work faster. Final Cut Pro does most of the same things, and in some cases, a few more, but requires more steps and more clicks to get the same results. Media 100 comes with Boris Red, yet Final Cut Pro comes with Motion, Color, Soundtrack Pro, Compressor and probably a couple of additional pieces I’m forgetting. All things considered, it’s worth it for us to have both and use each for its strengths.

I’ve written two two articles on Media 100. First on Producer, which chronicled my move back to Media 100 after moving to Final Cut:

https://library.creativecow.net/articles/griffin_nick/media100_producer.php

Then late last year I stepped up to Media 100’s hardware-based version 13:

https://library.creativecow.net/articles/griffin_nick/m100v13_transition.php

This summer Media 100 Suite was released, replacing both Producer and the full Media 100. I love it, it seldom crashes or has any other problems, and — of greatest importance to me — I use it to earn a living.

[Nick Griffin]

I’m with Rich on this one and, unless you’re just starting out, it’s almost a no-brainer. Our reason for having multiple systems is expressed as “the computers should be waiting for you, not you waiting for the computers.”

I’ll also point out another obvious no-brainer, the kind of un-attended digitising / uploading / dubing that Chris is talking about is a whole different ball game than the more typical scene selection / setting ins and outs for a complex edit. That’s just the first step of the editing process and therefore should be billable at the same rate as the later stages of editing.