New World Adventures
samanthakano97 for Gwenevere (Loving housewife of Alek, the sword fighter)
2,553 words.
IN MY HEAD: I imagine Sarah Alexander's character Susan Walker from the TV show Coupling
You are honour bound! You gave me your word that I should join you for
our first quest, and you have broken it! (Angry)I shall not delay you too long. I swear by all the gods, you shall not regret my presence. (Over-the-top gratitude for letting her tag along)
You were right. I should have drawn my sword. (Apologetic) [This is one of those well after the fact thought-out prepared-in-advance sincere apologies, not an off the cuff apology in the moment.]
The first line is less shrill and more forceful than the last recording, but at least I got the line right this time. :)
That was very good. I could tell you were not worrying about how you sounded at all that take. You were angry Alek wouldn't take you on a quest, then you were happy that he would, and finally you were sorry you didn't draw your sword. There was no pretending, no reading, no thinking, just acting. However, your microphone didn't catch it. If you have a look at the wave form to the right of the play button, you'll notice places where you were so loud that the noise touched the very top and very bottom. This is called "peaking", and if you peak, just once, you need to delete the entire file and do over. When adjusting the microphone, yell into it. If it peaks, turn it down, then yell again. Don't worry about the volume coming out being too quiet. That's easy fixed. But the moment you peak, it's beyond fixing. If you keep that in mind, both the peaking and the feeling the emotion, you will win a lot of auditions. Trust me.
This take was done with a friend's microphone and him adjusting the levels; the first take was with my own mic. I'm actually surprised that this one has the issue, because he has a better microphone. Either way, any final recording would be done with my mic and adjustments, so that might eliminate the issue.
Just tell him to adjust the microphone to your yelling, not your whispering. ;) Also, if in doubt, turn the gain down. A gain (volume) too low hurts quality slightly, but set the gain too high and quality is instantly destroyed. The best microphone in the world will have the same problem if you don't adjust it correctly.
So should I try a third take using my own mic?
Use whichever mic you will be using for production, but make sure you test it first. Lots of software colour codes things for volume. Green is quiet, yellow is ideal, read is almost peaking, then there is some other indicator for peaking. When recording, you need to avoid peaking at all costs. This can mean recording everything in the green section, then turning up the volume to the yellow in post production.
Also, if you have access to a more expensive mic, ask to borrow it. You probably just adjusted it wrong this time, but if it's more expensive it should get higher quality when adjusted correctly.
(Another possibility, is maybe he set it up for himself. A microphone should always be calibrated to the loudest noise you expect it to capture.)
As the subject of this conversationn (SamanthaKano97's Audio Engineer for this audition), I can tell you that the audio on the software it was recorded on did in fact NOT peak. I've noticed with this improved version of Casting Call.Club that the imaged audio on the playback appears to be peaking even if the audio is slightly louder then a normal voiced recording. If it sounds peaked, then it must be a conversion hiccup from .wav to whatever CC.C's site playback file is.
Ah, I was wondering why pretty much everyone had peaked audio. Shit. How can we work around this?
I apologise for any offence caused, and know that even if it was your fault, I wouldn't have thought any less of you.
See my latest update. I hope that clears everything up.
The audio isn't peaked. It just looks that way.
Wow, that's embarrassing. Goodbye illusion of being a competent director. Thanks for taking the time to let me know. I really appreciate it. I only wish someone else had let me know sooner. I hope I can live this down.
Do not feel bad. It's perfectly understandable that directors want a quality product.