Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Audiobook Adventures: Chapter 29

As the year winds down, and the holidays take up more and more of my time, I imagine I'll long for this period, when I record or edit a three or four times a week with practically no deadline pressure.

That's not to say that I don't have multiple commitments and deadlines looming--I do, but they're all pretty much doable.  As usual, the major projects are the two remaining Dumarest books, but I've got a handful of short stories I've also taken on, not because I need the money (what money?), but because I wanted to do them.  If I actually made a living doing this, that would probably be the ideal situation for me.

So far, the fourth Dumarest book has been pretty smooth sailing.  It's still got the long chapters to deal with, but it does seem pretty straightforward, with fewer characters (so far) that show up once and never again.  I am, however, really struggling with one of the character voices.  I decided to cowboy up and try an accent I'm not very confident with, and in the editing, it sounds awful. 

Like, Mila Kunis in OZ, THE GREAT AND POWERFUL awful.

But I am committed to it, and unless the publisher says, "Holy Narnia, Rish, that one voice is just too terrible to allow out to listeners; I'm gonna have to ask you to re-voice," that's the one I'm going with.  There was a Voice & Dialects course in college that I really wanted to take, figuring it would help me with my acting, but it was scheduled opposite a film class that was also only offered at that time, and I was already leaning toward Film instead of Theater, so I never took it.  Sometimes I wish I had, though, since that might've helped me out with my voicework.

So, I finished the third E.C. Tubb book, and submitted it the day before the deadline, only to find out a couple of days later that I had only uploaded part of the first chapter.  I'm not entirely sure how that happens (we're required to submit the first fifteen minutes of every project and wait for notes before proceeding, so it's possible I used the wrong file when compiling the whole book), but the omitted section was familiar to me, so I had to go through my files (luckily, I hadn't deleted any yet*) and find the rest of the reading to edit in.  Technically, I did miss my deadline because of that, but I'm not counting it.

These books are sort of keeping me from my solo podcasts, The Rish Outcast and the Podcast That Dares Not Speak Its Name, both of which have episodes recorded but not edited.  I also hoped to do a Christmas episode of TPTDNSIN, and with work, Dunesteef, and the other stuff, that's looking less and less likely. 

Too bad.  It was a really lousy story too.

I think I mentioned in the last post that one of the projects by a famous SF author fell through, after I had auditioned and won the part/gig, didn't I?  That was a bit sad, but I am happy to mention here that I did get the job to do the Ray Bradbury story, and that has to be the highest-profile author I've done since starting this hobby, head and shoulders above the other writers, at least as far as recognizability.  I have a little under a week to get started on that one, so by the time this sees print (virtual print, at least), I should have recorded it.

Then I'll press on with the fourth Dumarest book, and see if I can't get the others done as well.

Rish Outfield, Audiobook Boy

*Actually, I HAD deleted all these files, but as I hadn't emptied my Recycle Bin, they were still sitting there.

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