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Ready to evolve with AI? Lots of doom & gloom out there lately about AI “stealing” voice acting jobs, which means now’s the time to get educated and evolve alongside and with new technology. In this episode, Voice Actor Tim Heller shares his AI experience - choosing an ethical company, the benefits of creating a clone, the role of human voice actors, the importance of emotion, and more at https://voboss.com Transcript >> It’s time to take your business to the next level, the BOSS level! These are the premiere Business Owner Strategies and Successes being utilized by the industry’s top talent today. Rock your business like a BOSS, a VO BOSS! Now let’s welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza. Anne: Hey everyone. Welcome to the VO BOSS podcast, the AI and Voice series. I'm your host Anne Ganguzza, and today I'm excited to have special guest Tim Heller, who is an actor and voice actor based out of Austin, Texas. Tim has a long line of credits here and has voiced VR trainings for the Air Force, TV commercials for Fox Sports, podcast advertisements for Spotify, ADR and dubbing for international cartoons and animated features. And he's also voiced, of course, my favorite, corporate narrations, children's English e-learning modules in Korea and done local commercials and more. And so he also, before he got into VO was in musical theater and plays in New York City and around the world with some on-camera jobs mixed in there as well. Hoo, wow. Tim: Hoo. Anne: A multitalented [laughs] guest. Thank you so much for joining me, Tim. It's wonderful to have you here today. Tim: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me on, Anne. I'm excited to be here. Anne: Well, you have been in the news lately. I've read quite a bit of press with you in the news. And at first, I guess, saw and met you. And I'm not quite sure how I don't know you already, what with that long list of credits, but I saw you in the article from the BBC news that was en- -- it was a great article, but it was entitled "Voice Cloning of Growing Interest to Actors and CyberCriminals." Always -- Tim: Yes. Not -- not scary -- Anne: -- a little bit of click bait there. Tim: -- at all, right? Yeah, exactly. [laughs] Anne: But the article I thought had a really positive spin on it, but yet they put that title on there to associate, I feel like, oh, are you associating voice actors and cyber criminals? Like in the same -- Tim: Yeah, I got, you know, I had a lot of people reaching out to me afterwards saying, you know, are you, so which one are you? Are you a cyber criminal or a voice actor? I said, well, guess you're just going to have to find out, huh? Anne: Oh gosh. So, you know, I've interviewed quite a few people already for this Voice and AI series, and I've noticed a kind of a trend with what a lot of people will say as a pro of having an AI voice. And they use the argument that it's all about adding work for the voice actor. So I guess I'd like to ask you, first of all, how do you feel about that? What do you feel is the benefit of having an AI voice in your repertoire of talents and skills? Tim: Yeah, so initially I, like, I thought that it would be a great tool to have just to future-proof my job. I sought out more information and tried speaking with lots of different people and ultimately ended up meeting Rupal Patel with VocalID, just because I was curious about like where things were going, and where people thought they were going, and hearing Jim Connelly talk about -- like, he's always thinking about what's next. And so through my experience with Rupal and VocalID, I feel like it is, it is potentially adding more work, work that I wouldn't necessarily have to book a session out in my studio, for which believe me never upset to book my studio up for a session. And I, and I love my job. And so I'm not trying to work less or get rid of any work that could potentially come in. But -- Anne: Well, I think that's a good clarification because I think if I talk to many voice actors, they would say, well, I don't think it's a matter of getting more work, I don't have a problem handling more work. But I don't think that it, it really grabs voice actors in the way that people are trying to sell it. You know, like, oh, you can do more work. And I don't know really many voice actors that say, well, I'm really, I can't handle the amount of work I'm getting. So -- Tim: Yeah, oh gosh, I'm just double-booked all the time. Poor me. Anne: Yeah, that's, that's a very interesting spin on it, but I will say that, I think that it's really good for us to hear these things because there are perceptions out there, right? And these perceptions come from people who we sell our voices to. Tim: Yeah. Anne: So I think it's good for us to really get an idea as to like what their perception is and what their ideas are about voicing, and you know, what it takes to voice and what our job really entails. Tim: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I agree. And it's, you know, like, so many people have said before on your series, which also thank you so much for doing this whole series on voice and AI with so many different perspectives. Anne: Thank you. Tim: It's so diverse, and educational, and fascinating just to hear like how different companies are approaching all of this, you know? But so many people have said too, that you can't just take like our conversation that we're having right now, rip my voice, and then have a, like a beautiful clone of, of me or -- and you can also just do like five minutes of like the "Cat in the Hat," you know. It's, it is, it takes a voice actor to properly take direction to, you know, recite these prompts that they have in the VocalID interface. And it's still a skill to have. And so I think it's -- Anne: So anybody off the street, if we had hours, and if we had -- I'm just going to say, I know that there are some companies out there that might have a lot of media, a lot of media, of people, of celebrities, of, you know, people in the entertainment industry. And they theoretically don't need a whole lot of additional material in order to create a voice. However, I think the big thing, and I want to get into a discussion about ethics with you, the big thing is the licensing, right? Tim: Yeah, absolutely. Anne: And how can we protect, you know -- we might have audio out there. As a matter of fact, I have a ton of podcasts out there, and who's to say that somebody isn't going to go download those MP3s and create a voice. Tim: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah. The ethical side of all of this is fascinating as well, because it is kind of still the wild west with, especially, I feel like between everything that happened with, like starting with Bev Standing and TikTok, and then from that point, it seems like every couple days, there's something new and fire and brimstone about AI coming out. Anne: But I think that could be good. Tim: Yeah. I think, I mean, it's, it's getting people talking, right? Anne: Right. Tim: It's, and it's -- Anne: And it's getting people in action, right? In, in action -- Tim: Exactly, yes. Anne: -- to get something done, to get laws enacted. Tim: Yes. And it's, and so, and it's unfortunate, and I wouldn't wish this on anybody, for anybody to have to go through any of that, but now we're talking about it. Now, we're like, when you work with people doing AI clones and stuff, you know, I've said this before is that you really need to make sure you're vetting who you're working with. Anne: Yeah. Tim: And I got very, very lucky that Rupal was already working with a couple of colleagues of mine in the VO world and with Jim and Sam at Lotas, like, and people who are incredibly trustworthy and, you know, really forward-thinking and trying to protect everybody involved. So. Anne: Mm-hmm. Tim: Yeah. Anne: I think that's a very, very important point. And I actually, one of my questions was going to be, what was your process in selecting VocalID and the people that you work with? What was your process in selecting them? Because I think that is now become a factor for people that might be considering having their voice cloned or having a voice dub, is working with a company because obviously we can't do it. We have to hire a company that can do that for us. And so I think that there's something to be said for vetting the company that you work with. What are the qualities of the company that you think voice talent should look for in regards to when they want to create an AI voice? Tim: In terms of my process with finding a VocalID, it started off as just kind of like a conversation with -- a check-in with a voice actor friend of mine when I was still in New York City. And I was hearing him talk about, you know, recording these prompts for this, like, AI clone voice that he was doing with Jim and Sam. And I was fascinated by it. And then a couple months went by, the pandemic started, and I kind of forgot about it. And then when we moved down to Texas, through like an entrepreneur group that I'm in, got connected to Rupal in a completely different way. And so through that conversation, finding out that we had all these mutual connections and stuff like that -- and it was a face-to-face conversation too, at least through Zoom. And that's something that's important to me. I love when I'm able to like, especially in a business setting, be able to have -- like look at somebody and really talk with them and not just communicate through email for something that's really felt as high stakes as this could potentially be. So with Rupal, she started off the meeting with just kind of the backstory of why VocalID was initially created. And I think she mentioned on, on her episode on your podcast, that it initially was created to help people who lost their power of speech. And so that was something that spoke to me as well, that like, okay, this isn't a company that's just like -- Anne: Yes. Tim: -- okay, where is that cash cow? How can we milk it and, and move on? Anne: Well, and she's been around too a little bit longer than -- it just seems like lately, there's just a ton of that have sprung up out of nowhere -- Tim: Yeah. Anne: -- creating AI voices. And so I think she's got some longevity to her having started, I think it was back in -- what was it? 2014. I'm not sure when she started. Tim: I'm not sure either. Anne: It's been a while though. Tim: But it's also coming from like an academic background too, like really having, like, I think -- something I always try to do is surround myself with people who are a lot smarter and better than I am. And so I think meeting Rupal really knocked that out of the park. And so really focusing on like the ethical side of things and she -- we have a contract that, you know, for the, for recording my dub, and I didn't even have to ask the questions of, okay, well, what if I don't want to do a project? Or how is this protected? She had everything laid out already. And, and the fact that she was working with Lotas, you know, like if you can really vet somebody by finding out who you know in common or asking people in the industry -- like for instance, I had another company reach out to me that was interested in cloning my voice again. And so like reaching out to the people that I know now through all of this and, and really trying to figure out who they are, and what they're doing, and making sure you're not stepping on anybody's toes. But does that kind of answer the question? Anne: And looking at every contract. Tim: Yes. Oh my gosh, contracts, contracts. Anne: You know, I actually have employed the services of my lawyer more than once in terms of looking at a contract. And I think that for today, it is so important that when we're talking about AI voices that maybe a lawyer get involved. I think it's a worthy investment to really check out those contracts. Tim: I agree. And you know, I've only been doing voiceover for three and a half years and full-time for the last year and a half. And so I haven't really needed a lawyer for any of this yet, but now that I've got my -- my dub has been fully created and I got my first job request today for it -- Anne: Ooh, congratulations. Tim: Thanks. I was, I was like, whoa, this is kind of cool. I don't know what to do next, but we're going to figure it out together. But it's definitely at the point where I do think that it is necessary to bring a lawyer into make sure that like everything going forward is protected for, for me and for VocalID, but -- Anne: Absolutely. Tim: -- yeah. Anne: And that you're fairly compensated. Tim: Exactly. Anne: Yes. Tim: And that's a whole other thing too, that I've gotten a lot of questions about since the BBC stuff came out, is that, like, can you charge the same amount? And it's right now, the answer is, is no, right? Yeah, because it's, I'm not the one that's going to be spending an hour or 20 minutes or whatever it is to book out my studio and do it. Anne: Your time is not necessarily required at this point. Tim: Right. Anne: To create that. Tim: And it costs a lot of money to create this dub. And so I'm not the one who has that machine learning and that computer who's running everything. Anne: Sure. Tim: I provided my voice, and I was able to build this for free because they're working on building it up and really polishing it to turn it into something that's more commercially friendly. Anne: Well, I, I should make note that companies are now charging to have your AI voice be created. Tim: Wow. Anne: And so it's absolutely, that's going to be -- Tim: Yeah. Anne: -- you know, that's going to be an industry there. So I don't necessarily want the BOSS listeners out there to think that they may necessarily have their voice just created. As a matter of fact, there have been some auditions that I've seen out there for TTS projects where I think they may or may not state that it's going to be used for creating a, a dub after that. But there has been some low pay per hour I've seen, and everybody's like run, don't, you know, don't audition for that. And it's interesting because I guess you have to figure out really, who is this company vet that company. And if you can, like you mentioned, meet face to face with the people from that company, are they transparent about the usage and what's going to be happening? And, and I of course would say to everybody at this point, I think it's great to get a lawyer involved. Even if the contract seems like it's got everything specked out, I would suggest that that would be a good thing to do. Tim: Yeah. It can't hurt. And, and with the vetting of the companies too, like I find that if you are just curious and really honestly, anything around AI is just -- with all the fire and brimstone posts that I've been seeing all over social media and in the news about all of this and like kind of damning those who are involved in it from other industry professionals, it's like, if we can just like, stay curious, ask questions and be kind, just like, just seek that understanding out. I think that's, like, the most important thing is that don't just take anybody else's word for it. Anne: Sure. Tim: Don't just believe like one article you read, but really like ask those questions. Anne: Sure. Tim: And so trying to make myself available to those who are curious or who are upset and afraid, and it's like, it's totally fine to be either/or. Anne: And, and understand that there will be clickbait [laughs] Tim: Oh yes. Anne: in terms of the publicity around this. There's going to be a lot of clickbait just because it is a very current, relevant topic of today. And it's not just people in the voiceover industry that are afraid of the robots or AI taking their jobs away. So there's going to be a lot of, I'm going to say, a lot of that going on. And so I think we just need to make educated decisions. So let's talk a little bit about how you've actually created the voice. Let's talk about that process. What did that involve? Tim: Yeah. So the way that VocalID works is that once you are brought on and sign the contract and everything is squared away, legally you get login information for their own interface online. So it's not me recording prompts into Logic on my own system. I'm actually recording directly into their interface, and it goes kind of line by line, and it's like different speeches or children's books just to capture all those individual phonemes that we create with speech, where I think with traditional text-to-speech modules like Siri or Google or any of those assistants, you record those prompts, and then it pieces those exact prompts together, where with this, it's really building it from scratch completely. And then you can manipulate it phonetically or modulate the pitch or change inflections on things. And it's, it's really, it's wild technology. It's really cool. Anne: So I've seen some of the technologies now that say that they can literally change emotion. I mean, have you seen that? I mean, what are your thoughts about that? I think that's a, I don't know. It's, there's so many nuances of human emotion, and to me -- Tim: Yeah. Anne: -- and I'm a tech girl, and I'm trying to envision and understand because that's what I always do. I mean, I was in technology for 20 years, so I'm trying to understand the process. And is it possible -- you know, we have, I want to say infinite amount of nuances as a human -- Tim: Yeah. Anne: -- and I don't know how possible that is to dial that emotion in like a straight, linear fashion, right? Like, oh, let's do -- Tim: It's hard because -- Anne: 20% happy. Let's do 40% happy. Tim: Yeah, exactly, 'cause like, what is that 20%? The 20% happy is going to be different for every person and different for every subject that you're talking about. So I think that alone, like having emotion and being human is our job security in the industry, right? Anne: Yeah. Tim: Like computers will not do stuff that we don't explicitly tell them to do. And so it's, you know, with the emotion side of things, I think it's, it has potential, but I think that it's hard to get it to really convey sadness. 'Cause then you have to like, you have to break down sadness then into code, into an equation. Okay. It's like -- Anne: Into an algorithm. Tim: Yes, exactly. So it's fascinating and wild to play around with, but I don't think like that true human emotion is there yet. And it might not be like what the point of having an AI voice is. Anne: Oh, I'm so glad you said that. It's exactly, it may not be the point. And I think a lot of people are just so afraid of, like, the ultimate, oh my God, it's bad. It's going to replace us. But I think that there's going to, in, in a few years, there's going to be like, it'll settle, it'll evolve into here's where it belongs or here's where it fits best. And it may not be -- I mean, I still believe that there's always going to be room for humans. Tim: Yeah. Anne: And I don't know if they'll try to develop the technology to make it sound completely human. I don't know if it's even possible. And again, humans are the ones that are creating the technology. Tim: Yeah. Yeah. And the company that just came out with the, they did the audio for the DLC, for The Witcher 3 expansion. Anne: Mm-hmm, yeah. Tim: I listened to some of their samples on their site. And in that sounds like pretty realistic, but that's also like that character is -- it's old right here and it's all very upset. Anne: Yeah. Tim: And it's like, it's very, it's not incredibly dynamic. That voice actor who voices him is dynamic and gives the dynamic performance. But like for, for that kind of stuff, like that can come in handy. That's where an AI voice is great because then they can just pick that up and it's quick. But right now I feel like it's more so along the lines of that e-learning, the traditional text-to-speech stuff, IVR, and it's not -- we're not looking to replace the human experience or the human emotion, right? It's just something to kind of augment -- Anne: Well, we aren't. [laughs] Tim: We aren't. I'm sure that there are companies that are working towards that. And I'm sure we'll see that at some point, right? Anne: Yeah, but you're right. There's going to be an attempt. I'm sure there's going to be attempts. Tim: Yeah. Anne: And it's, I think that's just the evolution. And again, it's not just affecting the voiceover industry. I think we're just here in a little bubble sometimes, and we need to really try to -- well, we really need to really try to, to see AI for what it is and try to evolve along with it. So let me ask you a question. How are you intending or how are you marketing your AI voice? Tim: That's something I'm still working on. It's a great question. So Rupal asked if I'd be interested in putting my AI profile on Voice123, and Rolf and their team has been working on putting these profiles on there just to try to get ahead of things and stay with the movement of AI. And so I agreed to do that, and I've got a profile on there, and then trying to figure out like what samples, like I have some samples I'm going to put on my website, and a little like VocalID badge, but it's going to be, it's still kind of in process of like, okay, how do I pitch this to clients too, or to potential new clients? And so I think it's going to be reaching out to those people like that you've brought onto your podcast, like Hugh -- Anne: Sure. Tim: -- that would have a better idea of like, okay, well, if you pitch it to this company for this reason, then that would be best case scenario, you know? But I think it's going to change a lot. Anne: This is great. I'm thinking so if you have it marketed through a pay-to-play, I think we need to make sure how are we being protected legally? How are our voices being protected? Are their usage -- is there something that's going to be put in place that will protect us if we sell it through that? Or if you sell it on your own, how are you negotiating that -- you creating a contract, I would think, I would hope, that you would create a contract that would -- and well, normally, I think in our emails, we specify usage and, and all of that. And I think that the same thing absolutely has to be for your AI voice. And again, I'm at this point, because of the newness of it all and the wild, wild west of it all, I'm always happy to have somebody consult with me that's in the legal field -- Tim: Totally. Anne: -- just to make sure that when I'm first starting to negotiate that voice, I wouldn't want that voice to be used for any purpose other than what it was intended. I would not want it to be sold. I would not want to say things that I didn't agree to with that voice. Tim: Yeah. Anne: And so I think that that's very important. So I commend you [laughs] for going ahead and, and delving into the new world of technology here, and kind of really you're, you're testing the waters. You're on the, I always call it the bleeding edge of technology. Tim: I love that. Anne: There has to be, you know, we have our trials, we have our, our successes and our failures, and that's how we all evolve and move forward and learn. And so I wish you all the luck with your AI voice and congrats on your job [laughs] on your first job. Tim: Thanks. We'll see how it goes. Anne: Yeah, absolutely. And we'll, we'll keep in touch with you. And so I thank you so much for spending time with us this morning and sharing your story with the BOSSes. And I am excited to hear about where your voice will go. Tim: Thank you so much, Anne. Yeah. Thank you so much for having me on and give me the opportunity to speak on this. And if any of the VO BOSSes out there have any questions, I'm, I'm here. Anne: Yes. Tim: You know, I'm easy to find. Anne: Absolutely, how can they get in touch with you? Tim: You can either reach me through my website TimHellerVO.com or @TimHellerVO on all the social platforms. So. Anne: Perfect. Tim: Yeah. Anne: Awesome. Well, thanks again. I'm going to give a great, big shout-out to our sponsor, ipDTL. You too can connect to like BOSSes and learn more at ipdtl.com. You guys, have an amazing week, and we'll see you next week. Bye! Tim: Bye! >> Join us next week for another edition of VO BOSS with your host Anne Ganguzza. And take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at voBOSS.com and receive exclusive content, industry revolutionizing tips and strategies, and new ways to rock your business like a BOSS. Redistribution with permission. Coast to Coast connectivity via ipDTL.