The Best Guide Yet to Voiceover Usage Fees

The Best Guide Yet to Voiceover Usage Fees With analogies from other industries to help understand them By Chas Rowe   In the UK professional voice-over world, usage fees are a longstanding, common and necessary industry standard. Unfortunately, there isn’t much written about them, and not all of the information is entirely accurate, either. So …

Five Ways to Write Voice-Over Copy Like a Jedi

Five Ways to Write Voice-Over Copy Like a Jedi And you don’t even have to use ‘the Force’ By Chas Rowe   ‘‘You can type this sh*t, but you sure can’t say it! Move your mouth when you’re typing!” These were actor Harrison Ford’s immortal words to writer/director George Lucas on the set of Star …

Voice-Over Usage and Licensing: A Mini Guide for Video Producers

Voice-Over Usage and Licensing A mini guide for video producers By Chas Rowe   If you make corporate and explainer videos for your clients, and you work with professional UK voice-over artists to do so, you should have heard them mention the terms ‘usage‘, ‘licences‘, or ‘licensing‘. Chances are, if you know and understand these …

Farewell, Kobe Bryant: Basketball Storyteller

Farewell, Kobe Bryant: Basketball Storyteller Reflections on a star’s creativity – on and off the court By Chas Rowe 27th January, 2020     Like many people around the world with a strong pull towards the sport of basketball and a longtime passion for the NBA, I struggled to sleep on Sunday night. Kobe Bryant …

Fair Pay/Play in the UK Voice-Over Industries: Analysis & Comment

Fair Pay/Play in the UK Voice-Over Industries: The First Independent Legal Survey of UK Voice-Over Artists Analysis & Comment By Chas Rowe   Introduction On 18th July 2019, the University of Exeter’s Centre for Science, Culture and the Law published the findings of the first independent, ”focused study” of voice-over artists working in the UK …

Five Keys to a Successful Voiceover Project

Five Keys to a Successful Voiceover Project How to unlock good practice in voiceover hiring By Chas Rowe   Working with a professional UK voiceover artist can make you feel a bit lost, if you’ve not done it before.  How do you find one? How much does it cost? How can you tell how good …

Why Voiceover Artists Need Good Briefs

Why Voiceover Artists Need Good Briefs 5 reasons to give a good brief in a voiceover project By Chas Rowe   I like briefs. I like detailed briefs. I like detailed, branded, functional briefs.  Too much information? Not for me. You see, we’re not talking about cotton underwear. We’re talking about business briefs. Proper, professional, business briefs. Briefs …

How to Hire a UK Voiceover Artist

How to Hire a UK Voiceover Artist 10 tips for good teamwork between clients, production houses and artists     What are your rates? Here’s the script – how much? Can you do a 30 quid buy-out with an NDA for all online media forever? These are all genuine questions I’ve been asked in recent …

Too Much Information Is Good

Too Much Information Is Good: A guide to client briefs in voiceover booking By Chas Rowe     Before I became a full-time professional voiceover artist, I used to eat information for breakfast. I used to eat information at drive time. I used to eat information overnight. And I used to regurgitate it, so that …

Why GDPR is FUBAR

Why GDPR is FUBAR By Chas Rowe   The EU’s GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) is like the Kennedy assassination: everybody’s got an opinion about it, lots of people claim they’re experts, nobody seems to be right, and we may be destined to debate it forever. And like the death of America’s 35th president, to …

Ready For Launch

Ready For Launch   There’s a lot of hard work that goes into launching a website for a voice over business. It’s a bit like a space launch. First, you need the ideas. Second, you need the engineering to push those ideas forward. Third, you need the team to bring those ideas and engineering together. …