A Networking Group for Voice Actors in Denver Hits Stride
by Tim Wenger
They seem to reside in the shadows. Ever-present but never seen, all-knowing and dark. Hard pressed you would be to find someone who has never taken notice of the voices behind the video, on the radio, in the airport. But where do they come from? How did they get that gig? More importantly, who the hell are they?
In short, they are actors. Voice over actors, to be specific, and Denver has a united front of them ready to fill your ear with instructions, commercials, character voices, and just about anything else that requires that special touch of audio-espoused love. The Front Range Voice Over Workout Group is a monthly networking meet-up for voice over actors, giving them the opportunity to meet each other, hone their talents with constructive criticism, and establish connections that can (and often do) lead to paid gigs for the members. Each member of the group has a unique story of how they became a part of the voice over world.
“I got into it because, in the last five or six years as a pharmacist, I’ve been on the phone,” says Cindy Johnson, a founding member of the group. “People would say, ‘You have such a nice voice.’ I got this thing from Arapahoe Community College about their classes and one of them said ‘Do people tell you that you have a great voice? You should consider voiceover.’ I thought, ‘I’m going to go do that.’”
“They’re used in so many places,” says Johnson. “Apps, kids toys, in the gym. They’re used in the airports, everywhere.” The class not only informed its’ students of the uses for voice over, but gave them the opportunity to record demos in a professional setting and get some real-world experience in the field. In the class, Johnson met fellow student Doug Mass. “Doug and I kept on meeting. I said ‘Maybe we should do a meet-up so we can find out who are the other voice over people in the area.’”
The idea quickly came to fruition. “The first meet-up was in Littleton,” says Johnson. “We were calling ourselves then the Littleton Voice Over Group. And then we realized it’s bigger than that, people are all over.” The group kept holding meetings and watched their attendance rise, with voice over actors and people interested in the subject from all over the metro area taking advantage of the networking opportunity.
It grew into what is now the Front Range Voice Over Workshop Group. They meet once a month, and alternate between spending the time at Rocky Mountain Sound Garden working on recordings and discussing the tricks of the trade, with the following month being more of a networking opportunity for the crew.
Mark O’Clock is a solid example of what the group is all about. Having two agents currently representing him, O’Clock is hard at work trying to make a full-time living at doing voice over. “I learned on my own, over the past several years,” says O’Clock. “I’ve purchased my own equipment, built my own studio in my basement. I’ve been at it part time for about seven years, and here as of three months ago I’m a full-time voice-over actor.” O’Clock has also gotten pretty good at the audio engineering side of the business, and did the behind the scenes work on the meet-up group’s commercial that they put together for Rocky Mountain Sound Garden. “The neat thing about the meet-up group- I thought that would be a great place to network, learn the do’s and don’ts. Hopefully, this old guy can make a career out of this voice thing.”
FRVOWG gives its members the opportunity to get connected with work in different ways, often through the member’s agents and other personal connections. “The good thing about it is, if their agent is wanting a certain voice and they can’ t do that voice, amongst the group they might say, ‘Oh hey, there’s a person I know,’” says O’Clock. O’Clock and the fellow members are also constantly networking outside of Colorado, trying to find people outside of the state to represent them.
The best ways to contact the group or click meetup.com and search Voice Over Denver Colorado. “That was the premise of our starting the meet-up group,” says Mass. “Cindy and I were both standing there looking around, not knowing where to go to, and we thought ‘Surely there’s got to be other people in the area who have done the same thing and don’t know the next step, how to set up your LLC, etc.”
“It is a learning and networking theatre,” says O’Clock. “There’s a lot of newbees that think ‘Oh this is an easy business to get into.’ We try to talk to our members, learn from each of our members, and teach each of our members what we’ve learned. It can be a part-time or a full-time business, but it is a professional business. It needs to sound right. There’s a whole lot of work involved in voice over. That’s the purpose of the group is to stay on top of things and learn from people.”
They have also started a website called The Voice Ranch as a promotional tool, a sort of self-run talent agency. “It’s a spin off from the FRVOWG,” says O’Clock. “We wanted a way not only to learn and network, but to promote the voice actors in a way that’s a little bit different from the norm. We’re basically a co-op of voice actors promoting ourselves and producing a clean product where if the client wants one voice, they’ll get one voice that we know is acceptable. Also there is a niche in our group that does ensemble work.”
Check out their websites for more information-
Timeforavoice.com (Mark O’Clock)
Voicebycindy.com (Cindy Johnson)
Category: Buzzworthy2
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