(dramatic music)
- In a world of quarantine
where no one is allowed outside
and the only way to connect online is through the internet.
- [Nicole] This is Jon Bailey,
a professional voiceover artist.
You may also know him as
- My name is Optimus Prime.
Autobots, transform and roll out.
And I fill out quite a few times for Mister Ryan Reynolds,
depending on what he's in the mood for.
You know, what color pants he's wearing.
I've also filled in for Chris Hemsworth quite a few times
and most recently Leonardo DiCaprio
in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
- But really he has actually
subbed in for them in trailers and movies.
Clearly, we're not all voiceover artists with fancy setups,
but we are trying to sound our best
whether it's on a phone call, or a Zoom call.
Even Jon here doesn't sound perfect over Zoom
without his fancy whisper room sound booth.
How's it going?
- It's pretty good.
Just stuck inside like everybody else.
(laughing)
- Nice.
- You want me to call back from booth
so I can get better audio?
- [Nicole] So I asked Jon to share
the best ways we can sound better from home.
He had three big tips.
- All right, does that sound better?
- [Nicole] Number one: your environment.
- [Jon] You don't want sound to bounce around.
The environment you're in right now,
you're hearing a lot of this room echo.
- [Nicole] Hello, hello!
Echo!
Do you hear me?
- [Jon] Where in my booth you don't hear that anymore
because the sound absorbs into it.
- [Nicole] Jon's best advice:
get some moving blankets.
- [Jon] Some super professional voice actors,
they don't even have a fancy booth.
They're just using moving blankets
from the hardware store down the street.
- The takeaway: hard flat surfaces
like these are your enemy.
You could get fancy acoustic foam
to hang on your walls like the kind that Jon has,
but choosing a room with a lot of soft stuff,
rugs, couches, things hanging on the walls,
will get you close.
Number two: your microphone.
When it comes to your microphone, size matters.
The part of the microphone that captures your voice
is called a capsule.
The bigger the capsule, the better the sound.
I've been doing some testing
and if you're looking for something better than your earbuds
try this one.
Sure, it's not as good as Jon's $1000 professional mic,
but the $130 Blue Yeti does a great job
at producing warm, clear audio for video calls.
It's not a solution for phone calls on your smartphone.
It's best if you're at your computer.
It works with a Mac or PC
and it's mic is pretty much plug and play,
though there are some knobs on the back
you need to know about.
- You can actually flip it on to a setting
that's more built for voice only,
as opposed to picking up other stuff.
- Is it this one?
- Yeah, that's the one.
- If you work in a large echo-y room like me,
you can also turn the gain dial down
to reduce some of that environmental noise.
There is one important no button trick to remember, though.
- That is all you have to do.
You make a Y shape, bro, all right,
hang 10, take your 10 and put your pinky at the mic
and your thumb at your mouth.
That's how far away from the mic you should be.
- Yes, if you have a high-quality microphone,
maintaining that hang loose distance is very important,
but for smaller microphones,
you'll tend to get better audio
if it's closer to your mouth.
That's why for important calls,
I prefer a headset like this,
call center style.
This one is the Logitech Zone Wireless,
which has a little arm that holds out the microphone.
Number three: your connection.
Connection is obviously very important.
You know if you have a great set up, great mic,
it doesn't matter if you have a shoddy connection.
- That's 100% true.
- Slow internet speeds or a bad wifi signal
can make you sound terrible,
so for video calls, a wired connection
over an ethernet cable is best.
But if that's not an option,
sitting close to your router can also
improve the strength of your connection.
You can also turn off your video
to save that bandwidth for audio.
The service you choose also matters.
For instance, the Zoom video conferencing app
automatically suppresses background noise and echo.
Test your mic in the app's audio settings,
then click on advanced to turn up the feature
to aggressive or off.
Lastly, using a wired headset like this one
can eliminate any Bluetooth or interference issues.
And while all of these tips should help you sound better,
they probably can't transform you into Jon.
- Rated PG 13, starts Friday in theaters everywhere,
except that the theaters are closed.