^{about me · build a voice booth · equipment list · telos ONE / mackie 1402 vlz setup · symetrix 528E settings · software}

ABOUT Me

My name is Dave Diamond, professionally, of course. I began my career in radio quite forcefully, people might say.

I moved from West Virginia to Albuquerque, New Mexico in September 1992. Three months later, I heard KKSS 97.3 Kiss FM for the first time. I'd never really listened to CHR (Contemporary Hit Radio) before, but the energy was incredible. I decided to show up at the station to speak to the manager about part-time work. When I arrived, I was told by the receptionist that I could fill out an application, but the Program Director was very busy and could not meet with me. I looked at my watch, it was 9:37am on a Friday.

Everyone knows that lunchtime comes much earlier on Friday, I decided I'd wait until the Program Director came out of his office to go to lunch. Since the radio station was on the 12th floor, I figured there'd be ample time to speak to him on the way down in the elevator. When I informed the receptionist of my plan to wait, she promptly got up from her desk and walked to the back of the office out of view. I thought for sure she was calling building security to have me "removed." Instead, she returned, gave me a wink, and told me he would see me in a few minutes. Woo-hoo!

Well, the minutes turned into an hour. Finally, with a smile on his face, the Program Director came into the lobby, extending his hand to shake mine and introduced himself. As we walked to his office, his first comment was to a co-worker: "Hey, Randy, this guy isn't leaving until he gets to talk to me today," His first question was "What can I do for you?" Knowing how badly I wanted to be on the radio, I said the first thing that came into my mind, "Fire this guy who works overnight. He sucks. I can do better." Gulp. Fortunately for me, he laughed and asked, "So, you're the next big thing, huh? Why should I hire you?" I've always hated that question, especially when the obvious answer is: "Because I'm way better than that guy you have on now," which is, of course, what I blurted out. Suddenly, my size 12 shoe seemed a whole lot bigger as it was shoved into my mouth. The very moment those words left my lips, Overnight Guy pops into the office. Ah, the embarrassing taste of leather. Laughter erupted for what seemed to be an eternity before the Program Director looked me squarely in the face and said, "Anyone who'd sit in the lobby for nearly two hours and threaten to stay longer deserves a shot. Hell, you remind me of myself when I was your age!"

On our way out of his office, he took me to one of their studios and introduced me to the Assistant Program Director. I should tell you here that Randy Savage is a legend in the Albuquerque radio market. "Dave wants to do some on-air stuff for us," Mr. P.D. said. "Think he can handle it?" I asked Randy if he was about to do the station ID. He was, in fact. I asked him to put it in cue and play it back. With the help of the liner card, I talked all the way up the ramp of the intro to the song and 'hit the post', that's radio slang which means to stop talking before the singing begins. The Program Director's reaction: "Come in Sunday, 5:30am. I'll train you myself." I was elated. In January 1993, I was hired full-time. I stayed with KKSS for over two years before moving up and on to another station in another state.

Since my break into radio nearly fourteen years ago, I've had some awesome experiences -- without ever having to sit in any more lobbies -- as I've worked my way up. I left the business six years ago and work from a home office/studio in Pasadena, CA, providing voiceover for every facet of multimedia. You can hear me around the world via the world wide web, on CD-Rom presentations, voice mail systems, commercials, sales and event promotions, and, of course, AM and FM broadcasts.

I've filled this site with samples of my work. Everything from CHR to ROCK. It's all here. I'm certain you'll find a style to suit your business' image.

Let's talk. Meet me in the lobby.

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HOW to Build a Voice Booth - created 9/24/2003

What you're about to read here has been considered one of the coolest tips a young aspiring voice talent can use as well as seasoned pros. Of course I'm not taking credit for this idea but I can't be certain the VO talent that gave me the idea didn't stumble onto it himself either. I've got some pics to show you too so let's get started!

HERE'S WHAT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT AND HOW YOU CAN USE IT

RUBBERMAID Roughneck Vertical Storage Shed - 3667-02-907 - 74 cu ft

Product Size:

(Outside) 66 x 36 x 78 in
167.64 x 91.44 x 198.12 cm

(Inside) 60 x 30 x 72 in
152 x 76.2 x182.88 cm

Benefits:

• Quick assembly with basic tools
• Seals tightly for less leakage
• Easily converted to phone booth (just add a phone)
• Lockable (for nieces and nephews)
• Vertical Storage Shed has two doors for easy access
• Heavy duty floor features an angled entry ramp
• Walk-in Accessibility (6' height)

WHAT YOU'LL NEED

• vertical shed (duh)
• 3" thick foam (22')
• a stool (or you can stand)
• 12" diameter planter's pot or foam bass trap
• microphone stand & mic
• fluorescent lamp
• stick pins or paper clips
• a throw rug (make it soft)

LET'S GET STARTED

READ THIS CAREFULLY - DO NOT glue the foam to the walls of the booth. There are two very good reasons. Here they are..

1. You will someday have to move the booth and you will destroy the foam while dismantling it. What a waste. Besides depending on the glue used it could eat away at the foam like a small piranha.
2. Glueing your foam to the walls would prevent you from using the booth for up to a week to allow time for the fumes to dissipate.

The goal of foam on the walls is to dampen the sound inside the booth and prevent resonance, echo, and outside artifacts.

That's it. I hope you've enjoyed this how-to lesson on 'The Booth'. If you have any questions regarding 'The Booth', contact me. Thanks for reading. - Dave

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EQUIPMENT List

Here's the complete and accurate list of the equipment I use daily. If you have any questions about anything you see here, please contact me.

Microphone

• Neumann TLM 103
• ART Tube MP mic preamp
• Symetrix 528E Voice Processor
• Rubbermaid Roughneck Shed
• Cool Stool
• Atlas Boom Mic Stand

Monitoring

• Rolls RA62 Headphone Amplifier
• AudioArts Engineering Model 8400 DA
• Furman HR-2 Remote Headphone Station
• Rolls RS79 Digital Tuner (no longer used)
• Event 20/20P Powered Monitors
• Mackie 1402 VLZ Mixer

Icing

• Telos One Digital Hybrid
• Denon DN-T620 CD/Cassette Combo
• Furman PL-PLUS Power Conditioner
• dbx 266 XL Compressor Gate
• iPod Video G5 30gig

Production Effects

• 1,001 Sound Effects (Sonic Foundry)
• Captain Audio
• Ear Candy 1
• Ear Candy 2
• Ear Candy 3
• Ear Candy 4
• Flash eFX
• Future FX
• Mzzz Muzic
• Radioactive Noise
• The Big Whoosh
• The Big Whoosh 2
• X-Attack
• X-Static Goldmine
• X Stream

Audio Plugins

• db-audioware DirectX bundle
• Sonic Foundry XFX1 DirectX bundle
• Sonitus Ultrafunk DirectX bundle
• DSP-FX DirectX bundle

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TELOS One / Mackie 1402 VLZ Setup

It's no secret what I use daily in my personal voice-over studio. I'll never understand why some talents are mum on what it is exactly they put their faith in to deliver their reads on a daily basis. Go figure.. Anyway, here's how to setup a Telos One Digital Hybrid with a Mackie 1402 VLZ Compact Mixer.. Read more about the Telos One here and read about the Mackie here. Take a look at the back of the Telos One and you'll see some XLR jacks, phone jacks and a 9 pin connector for remote control of the unit. From left to right we see the main INPUT balanced XLR jack (female), an AUX/MIX OUT balanced XLR jack (male) and main OUTPUT balanced XLR jack (male). Let's deal with those now.

All of your connections from the Mackie to the Telos will be XLR to 1/4" balanced connectors. A audio snake is best for this application but not necessary. Here's a look at a snake for your reference. Step One: Label one 1/4" connector "Send 1" and plug it into the Aux Send 1 channel on your Mackie. See left. Label the male end of this connector "Main Input" and plug it into the main input of the Telos One. Always use Line Level (button should be OUT) See right.

Notice the cable is the same color. Genius isn't it? Ok, so now we've got a connection from the Mackie to the Telos for sending audio down the line to the caller. Now we need to get the caller audio into the Mackie. Step Two: Label the female XLR end of another connector "Output" and plug it into the main output of the Telos. See left. Label the 1/4" end of this connector "Line In" and plug it into any of the first six channels on your Mackie. Why one of the first six and not any of the remaining eight channels? The remaining eight channels break up into four stereo channels and are better suited for CD, CASSETTE, and SOUNDCARD inputs etc. See right. Notice again how the cable is the same color? Science is fun, huh? Ok, we've got a connection from the Mackie to the Telos and back again. Step Three Now, let's set up the phone line so this application is actually useful. If you look on the back of the Telos you'll see two phone jacks. See below.

The jack labeled 'Phone' will be useless to you unless you choose to activate the Telos and pipe the audio from the Telos One into the Mackie for on air use. But, if you're using the Telos One to connect clients to your booth for direction while reading, you'll need to focus on the 'Line' jack instead. Connect a phone splitter to the Line jack on the back of the Telos One. Plug your phone line into one side and a phone into the other. Make certain your Telos One is powered on. (image above may differ) Test your phone connection to the Telos One Pick up your phone, on the front side of the Telos One under the heading Telephone Line press ON. You should hear a brief burst of white noise along with your dial tone. If this dial tone is distracting, disengage the hybrid by pressing OFF, press 1 on your phone, engage the hybrid once again and you should hear the burst of white noise and then silence. If you do not hear the burst of white noise while listening on the phone, make certain you have connected the splitter to the LINE jack, review each step above, check your connections and return to this test. Step Four Let's send audio to the Telos One. On your Mackie there are two rows of Aux Sends. They are like a purple color almost.. not quite red but not purple. See below.

We're using Aux Send 1 remember? Choose a source on your mixer for test purposes. This can be a microphone, CD player, soundcard, any source will do as long as the output is constant for testing purposes. Turn the Aux 1 knob of your source up (clockwise) just a bit. Perhaps one notch. See image right. Look at the front of your Telos One and find the two buttons farthest to the left next to the LED readout. See below. G/R means Gain Reduction. With this button IN you will see the amount of gain reduction of the signal going into or coming out of the Telos One. When this button is OUT you will see the input level of source device (source IN) or caller (source OUT). Start playback of your source device or begin speaking into your microphone. Whatever device you choose, you should have already tweaked the Aux 1 level mentioned above.

Step Five Disengage G/R on Telos One (the button should be OUT). Engage Source IN (the button should be IN). We are now monitoring the input level of your source device on the front of the Telos One. The level of this input device should peak at -6db with the occasional tickling of 0db but not overload. If the level is far above or below the target level, adjust the Aux 1 knob for your source device to achieve the optimal setting. Pick up your phone, press 1, engage the Telos One. You should hear your source device in the phone now. If you do not hear your source device, please refer to Step one of this tutorial. Step Six Now, let's tweak the settings of the Telos One on the front side. Engage the AGC button (the button should be IN) this will provide you with consistent levels both IN and OUT of the hybrid. Disengage the OVRD (override) button (the button should be out). There's no need for this function with this application. Override is useful for talk radio hosts who have huge egos and must talk over callers and treat them with disrespect. What's left to do, you ask? Plenty.. Next we'll make a connection from the Aux Output on the Telos One to a headphone amplifier so you can hear the caller without your voice added.

Step Seven The next part of this tutorial deals with sending the Aux Output of the Telos One to a headphone amplifier thus providing you with the unaffected signal coming from the phone line. In other words, this signal does NOT pass through the Mackie. Let's begin.. Take another look at the back of the Telos One and you'll see the Aux Out male XLR jack. Choose another female end of your audio snake and plug it into the Aux Out jack. Make certain the Aux/Mix button to the right is out (the button is up). The male 1/4" tip of this cable will need to be split into separate left and right 1/4" jacks going into the back of the headphone amplifier. For this application you can pick up a splitter at Radio Shack or similar electronic components store. It looks like this: Plug the male end of the 1/4" lead from the Aux Out cable into the female end you see on the left. The two 1/4" mono male leads will be used for the Master Input L/R jacks on your chosen headphone amplifier. See right. Once this connection is made the only thing left to do is connect your headphones to any of your headphone amplifiers output channels and adjust the volume of the channel accordingly (See left). The signal you receive through this connection between components is (in technical terms) the raw caller signal. Once the Telos One is engaged, you will hear only the caller in your headphones, not yourself.... yet.

Step Eight Adding your mic to the mix. Coming soon!

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SYMETRIX 528E Processor Settings

_"  The Internet is FULL of folks like me who struggle with getting the "right" settings.  And while each application is different, voice quality, mic used---your suggestions give a darned good reference point--better than the manual-!!! - Phil G.  _"

MY SYMETRIX 528E VOICE PROCESSOR SETTINGS

The 528E is a complete, self-contained voice processor that performs six separate functions: microphone preamplification, de-essing (sibilance removal), compression/limiting, downward expansion, parametric EQ, and voice symmetry alignment. Read more about the 528E from Symetrix Audio by clicking here.

MIC-PREAMP | DE-ESSER

While I get most of my gain from my external pre-amp, an ART Tube MP; I still give it a bit of additional gain here in the pre-amp section. Line level and no -15db pad used. I found that the most effective settings for the de-esser were just above 3k and a high threshold. And of course the DE-ESS should be in. This is noted by the X and is consistent throughout this tour.

DOWNWARD EXPANDER | COMPRESSOR

I'm not using the downward expander at this time. I haven't had a need for it since implementing 'The Booth' in my studio. As you can see here I use a high Compression Threshold and when combined with a max'd out Compression Ratio, it makes for a hard limiter. This means only very high levels are compressed back to the threshold level. Like I said, in this case the threshold is rather high so my dry voice-over doesn't sound squashed, squeezed or too processed. EXP/COMP button is in.

LOW EQ

In my opinion frequency and bandwidth settings should mirror each other like they do here. In order for my voice to pass through the unit with very little artificial ingredients added, I chose a safe freq. range to adjust. In this case, a bit below 160hz (this freq. is in everyone's voice). By doing this I am telling the unit to accentuate freq.'s just below 160hz and open the bandwidth up just a little more than one and a half times normal. This allows a broader range of freq.'s to pass through in the chosen freq. range. You wouldn't want to open the bandwidth up anymore than 1.5 times normal for applications such as professional voice-over, commercial production, and on air work. You also wouldn't want to narrow the bandwidth anymore than necessary otherwise you will ultimately allow only the freq. chosen to pass through the processor. Notice only a slight bit of boost here also. Don't over do it.

MID EQ

Much of the same philosophy is involved here only I made a slight modification to the mid freq. range. I want my voice-over to have a more palatable sound to it when auditioned dry and without any processing. For me this is accomplished by fine tuning the mid freq.'s to allow more mid range to come through. You'll notice the bandwidth here is a bit higher as well. Now.. while I allow more mid range through, I don't want to give you a headache at the same time. As a result there is little boost used here.

HIGH EQ

Again, much of the same philosophy is involved here only I again made a slight modification to the high freq. range. A larger bandwidth was needed here so the high freq.'s don't resonant in your fillings. Remember a broader bandwidth allows more freq.'s to pass through which allows for a warmer, more enjoyable sound to your ears. Slight boost and EQ button in.

OUTPUT LEVEL

The output stage of the 528E has only one purpose on this unit. GAIN and more gain. In my studio I use an external pre-amp for most of my gain with a slight amount at the input stage as well. There really isn't any need for much here at the output level stage, is there? No, there isn't.. right! The most important thing to remember when setting your levels on your mic or anything else is to not let the source distort. Kind this is mind.. "You put crap in, you get crap out". The voice symmetry button corrects for excessive positive or negative signal peaks of the human voice. I use it, do you?

Thanks for taking the tour with me. It was a pleasure to share my 528E settings and philosophy with you. Check out a complete list of my studio equipment here.

SOFTWARE

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