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Radio And Production
February 2010
February 2010 Highlights
Production 212:
OK… So Who Is “Grasshopper” Here?
by Dave Foxx
It has been said many times that the teacher often learns
much more than the student. Two months into having you ask
specific questions, and I’m still getting some real posers. More
than once, I’ve been forced to do some research of my own
because although I might know generally what a good answer would
be, I want to make sure that I’m not operating on any false
assumptions or old, out-dated information. This is really
turning out to be a great learning experience for me.
Notes Off The Napkin:
Relevant Writing
by Andrew Frame
Relevance, by definition is, “pertinence to the matter at
hand.” Using a cartoon of a running cheetah helps to visually
reinforce a symbol of how fast my customer’s oil change facility
is. Or, for the case of non-visual media, a sound of running
feet, or a car zooming through the audio field. An image of a
sequoia can be used to help the imagery of solidity,
reliability, lasting presence. A ships horn could drift into a
fun cruise. A smooth jazz riff can play into a relaxing, upscale
night club. Relevance isn’t a foreground part of your script.
It’s not the words. It’s more part of the theme, and the
importance of relevance to the theme is dependent on where you
place it – fore-, middle-, or background.
Test Drive:
The MXL “Harlan Hogan Signature Model” VO:1-A Condenser
Microphone
by Steve Cunningham
Harlan Hogan is not just a world-renowned voice actor, with a
string of credits that goes back several decades and includes
brands like Raid, Heinz Catsup, and Life Cereal. He’s also a
teacher of voiceover talent and an author of several voiceover
books. Naturally, one of the most frequent questions asked by
his students is “which microphone should I buy?” As an audio
engineer and college professor who teaches recording, I get the
same question myself quite often. It can be tough to answer,
since there are so many good sounding inexpensive condenser
microphones to choose from today. Harlan decided to take a
different approach: Why not design a condenser microphone with
voice acting in mind? So Harlan commissioned MXL, the brand name
used by Southern California-based Marshall Electronics for their
broad line of studio and live performance microphones, to create
for him a microphone that was designed specifically for voice
actors.
Feature:
Why Great Ads Don’t Make It To Air
by Sheldon Hovde
What’s the number 1 reason great ads don’t make it to air?
Read on my friends. An eager young writer gets a new order on
her desk. There’s a small “done” pile to her left, and a very
large “to do “pile on her right. Usually the new order would go
to the bottom of the right pile, but something about this client
peaks the young writer’s interest. She picks up the phone, dials
the phone number on the order, and shortly begins a conversation
with the new client. After a short chat about objectives and
details, the eager writer gets right to work. Sure, she has a
lot of other things to do. More pressing things. But this script
has that certain energy that can’t be ignored. After finishing
up a few minor tweaks and giving it a quick proof read – Voila!
It’s done. Will it win awards? Who knows – who cares. It’ll
work, she’s certain of that.
Q It Up:
The RAP Network Speaks - What happens
when your home studio computer crashes? Part 2
Q It Up: If you’re
employed, hopefully your company has someone who can come to
your rescue when your studio computer has problems, but what
happens when your home studio computer crashes? How much do
you know about computer repair? Does someone else do the
repair, such as Dell Support or a local computer repair
shop, or do you troubleshoot and fix the problem yourself?
What steps have you taken to ensure that a crash or failure
on your home computer results in minimal disruption of your
routine? If you’ve suffered severe data loss in the past due
to any kind of computer crisis, what did you learn and what
practices did you put into place to prevent such loss in the
future? Feel free to add any other thoughts you might have
on the subject!
If you have a question for the RAP Network, email it to
editor@rapmag.com!
...And Make
It Real Creative
by Trent Rentsch
I often wonder what life is like in some copywriter’s
homes… (sfx: door opens) Copywriter: Well, hello, Honey,
Martha, my beautiful, but somewhat
uninformed-because-she-spends-the-day-watching-Food TV-wife!
Martha: Oh, hello, Dear Martin, my handsome,
highly-paid-because-people-are-certain-that-those-in-advertising-makes-tons-of-money-yet-we’re-on-our-third-mortgage-husband!
How was your day in the big world of Advertising at ABC
Agency… call 1-800-555-12-34? That’s 1-800-555-12-34?
Radio Hed:
Don’t Do It Yourself
by Jeffrey Hedquist
Recently I needed a door put into a frame that was slightly
out of alignment. I’ve done this before, but it takes me a long
time. I just don’t do it often enough to be good at it. I don’t
know the techniques, or have all the right tools, shims etc. I
did the smart thing – hired a skilled carpenter. He had it in
1/3 the time it would have taken me, plus he came up with a
creative solution for fitting the door in that never would have
occurred to me. He was the expert. So are most of your clients.
Each of them does something better than the people who buy from
them.
The Monday Morning Memo:
Substance Over Style How to Advertise in a Recession
by Roy H. Williams
“If you say that there are elephants flying in the sky,
people are not going to believe you. But if you say that there
are four hundred and twenty-five elephants flying in the sky,
people will probably believe you.” - Gabriel Garcia Marquez,
winner of the 1982 Nobel Prize in Literature.
Ah, the power of details. Every ad has style and substance,
cheese and meat. Most ads are cheese because ad writers are
rarely given meat. Style cheese includes layout, angle, tone of
voice and hyperbole. Substance meat is provable fact and
concrete detail.
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