When NASA sent people to the Moon (they really did), the average age of the staff at Houston Control was 35. Thats the upper age when people assume you can adapt to new technology, wear fashionable clothes and know any band in the top 10.
Well guess what, the average age of an experienced British Male Voiceover is over 35 and whilst we often champion being warm and engaging, we’re a pretty tech savvy bunch.
As a professional Audiobook Narrator, I’m always looking for ways to improve the productivity of my recording and editing process. I’m not talking about AI technology here, which seems to be the default assumption when talking about new technology these days.
I run a successful Voiceover studio in Hampshire, UK, where I narrate, edit and mix audiobooks for clients around the World. Like many specialised creative businesses, producing broadcast standard audiobooks for platforms such as Audible is a demanding and time consuming process.
Audible lead the market in terms of audio standards, demanding a low noise floor, broadcast quality audio and pristine studio recordings. In fact the ACX Standard also widely quoted as a requirement by independent publishers.
Productivity is King
To get a financial return on your time investment whilst meeting these standards, you need automations, short-cuts and efficient work-flows to be able to get the job done efficiently.
I work on the basis of a 2:1 ratio of narration time per hour of audio content, with the edit usually being around 3:1 after that.
Rates for Audiobook narration are generally lower than other Voiceover genres like commercial, eLearning and Narrative or Documentary styles, so productivity is the name of the game here.
Its normal to charge per finished hour for audiobook narration, which includes the narration itself, the edit and the final mix to ACX Standards. If you’re charging £250 PFH for Audiobook Production, you’re effectively working for £50 per hour of studio time.
Per Finished Hour:
2 hours of narration (£100)
3 hours of editing (£150)
The final quote will usually also add on a factor for pre-read, the mix and all necessary file management necessary.
Efficient Studio Time
There are two ways to be more profitable in your studio:
1. Raise your hourly rates.
2. Increase productivity.
Here’s what I do to ensure that my time spent recording doesn’t exceed the 2:1 ratio for audiobook work.
External DAW Control Hardware
My favoured DAW is Cubase and I also use the Steinberg CC121 external controller. This is essential in my workflow as it allows me to manually control the start / stop mechanism without having to break my stride when recording.
Anything that takes your eye from the text, has you reaching for a mouse and having to trust your judgement on cursor placement is bad for productivity.
Punch & Roll
I use Cubase as my Digital Audio Work-station, which allows me to either configure the controller to return the cursor to the beginning of my last recorded segment, or to leave it at the end point of the recording.
I prefer to do hot editing and this allows me to re-record the last few seconds when I’ve made a mistake, if my voice has decided to break, or the neighbours dog has decided to be unhappy.
It’s a technique thats referred to as punch & roll and if you ever try to narrate an audiobook without it, you’ll find it a laborious process.
Reducing the Time Of Edits In Audiobook Narration
The slow and painful way to edit audiobook recordings is manually. When I was in-experienced, I once did this for a 100,000 word book and soon realised why things had to change.
On face value it makes sense, using volume automation between phrases to take the noise floor down to an acceptable level (-60dB).
The main problems with manual editing for audiobooks:
1. Manual editing is incredibly time consuming.
2. It’s difficult to be consistent in your approach.
3. You can be over zealous with breath and room sound deletion, which gives the recording an un-natural or over-processed feel.
Post Production Software For Audiobooks
Audiobook narrators are Humans that breathe, are expressive and exist in a space that has a degree of ambience. Thats what people, even unconsciously expect to hear and anything that removes it excessively is distracting.
Izotope
Its widely recognised that Izotope, particularly the post production suite is among the best software available for producing the quality results with your audio.
There are plenty of tools available in the Post Production Suite and not every Voice Artist agrees on the perfect sequence, or choice of plugins that should be used. Below is a glimpse at what I tend to reach for and have as a templated plugin chain for:
My Plugin Chain For Audiobook Production
1. Limiter – I go for a global limit from the outset that takes away the extreme peaks and places the audio within a range I can manipulate. Unlike music production, audiobook narration is not looking for promote wide dynamic range; quite the opposite.
2. De-click – I use Izotope de-click to remove unwanted artefacts like mouth clicks and pops.
3. Nectar – I’ve played around for a long time with many different types of EQ, but have come to settle on Nectar as it complements my voice tone nicely. Every Voiceover is different and this is something that has to be built around both your specific register and the recording space.
4. Expander – When it comes to removing the noise floor from an audiobook narration, you need a sympathetic approach. Using something like the Izotope Voice de-noise, I found too aggressive, with phrase endings often compromised. An expander however is more sensitive and allows you to adjust the threshold so that the noise is reduced, natural breathing is maintained and phrases are left intact.
5. Compressor – I actually use my DAW’s stock compressor as I’m not looking to add colour or character to my audio; Its really more about getting the waveform to something closer to a smooth sausage. Having a templated compressor setting is essential for different styles of audiobook narration. Its all about getting to the end of the chain within a short reach of the ACX standard.
6. Normalise – Providing your compression is at the right level and you haven’t over egged anything, you should be within a short bound of ACX Standard. Before normalisation, my levels should sit below ACX Standard settings, allowing me to enhance the waveform so that it meets the magical (-20 to -18 dB) / (<6dB peak) across the whole recording.
Why Templating Audio Settings Is Essential
When it comes to the final mix, you’re going to have several hours of audio that have to sound equal in level and tone. It’s effectively mastering and I generally have a single track for each hour of audio on my DAW. Imagine if each hour’s audio was recorded at different volume levels, with different levels of compression, or even different mic positions.
Since what I’m talking about here is productivity, templating your mix process, noting the state of the room, the mic position and even the time of the day when you finish a recording session, are all things that save you time in the long run.
Familiarity With Audiobook Text Is Essential
Its fair say that the more experienced you are as an Audiobook Narrator, the longer the sections of text will be that you can deliver in one segment.
However, its not really meant to be about ‘getting through it’. Most publishers are looking for a performance and an effective one is only possible when you’ve done a pre-read, rehearsed and tested characters.
Approving Your Tone and Character Voices
You’ll save time by recording a 15 minute test read for your client and asking for feedback, before going into the main body of the work. You may go back and forth a number of times until a style is approved, but this is so worth it in the end. Imagine having to re-record everything because you didn’t agree on the voice style up front.
The same applies to voice characters and accents. I’ve also learned the lesson of seeking clarification of pronunciation as and when it arises, rather than trusting my instinct. Trust me, it will save you so much time.
Audiobook Narration Software
I worked with a company in Dnipro, Ukraine called ‘SOLVVE’ that produced an excellent piece of software called ILM. It’s a commercially licensed platform that was made for a product called Whole Reader.
Whole-Reader allows audiobooks to be read and listened to simultaneously. The beauty of working with bespoke software like ILM was that it was geared towards productivity.
I recorded over 40 books from ‘Project Guttengerg’ for them and it was the most incredibly efficient work-flow I’ve ever seen.
It required me to open their software on my computer and then apply some configuration to my DAW, so that the platform received my studio produced audio, rather than that of an amateur sounding computer microphone.
The cursor followed the text as I narrated, with both the text and the waveform visible at the same time. Editing tools were built in and also visible on the same screen. In place of my external controller, I just used a simple transport function.
If you ever get a chance to work with applications like this I would urge you to do so. When I first thought about moving away from my known and well rehearsed work-flow it made me shudder.
Then I smiled, because I realised that my editing time had been reduced by half.
If you’re looking for an experienced audiobook narrator to deliver a clear, articulate, warm and engaging audiobook project, with good character skills and a great reputation then get in touch with James Fowler. You’ll find him reliable, easy to work with, prompt in delivery and bursting with great reviews.
