Voiceover

Being On-Set During COVID

October 1, 2020 by Heidi Rew

Things are starting to pick up with on-camera work and in August, I had my first audition and booking during COVID. Then in September, I was the live VO announcer for a virtual conference. Here’s what it was like being on-set during COVID…

My first experience was with the agency Ferebee and Momentive. Ferebee is in Greenville, South Carolina and to say I was excited just to get out of town was an understatement. I stayed in a hotel that felt like a ghost town. The sweet woman at the front desk said she was doing the job of several people because they were short staffed. I ended up sending her flowers afterwards because she was so wonderful and through our conversation knew that COVID had taken a toll on her spirit. Hope she ended up getting them.

On-Set Sanitation:

Since the Ferebee staff are working remotely, they set up a small set in their office. This allowed them to control the sanitation, people in and out and social distance. There were only 3 Ferebee people present, plus a makeup artist, Latia Curtis along with myself and another actor (Brian LaFontaine). Latia was awesome! Not only was she a great makeup artist but she took all the necessary precautions. She had a mask plus a face shield on and was on top of sanitizing every single thing she touched.

Changing “Normal”:

Brian and I were hosts for a Momentive informational video presentation. Normally, as is the case with many companies, they typically have a yearly company conference. Because of COVID, they’ve had to change to more virtual and digital means of communication.

Overall, it was a wonderful shoot and I felt very safe and SO grateful to just see people and get out of town. I did lose my sunglasses somewhere along the way, so I stopped by the gas station on the way home for a cheap pair. Didn’t think about the fact I had no scissors and couldn’t for the life of me get off the sunglass tag, so I rode the whole way back with a sunglass tag hanging over my nose. I apologized to the woman in the Starbucks drive-thru and she said, “I wish that was the weirdest thing I’ve seen today.”

Change Brings Innovation:

My second experience being “outside my booth and home” was for a Virtual Live VO announce job. It was such a cool experience to be a part of something so innovative. I’ll share more about that next month!

I do hope things begin to start feeling more “normal” soon but it’s also been so cool to see how (yes…I’m about to throw the dreaded word out…) companies have pivoted during this global pandemic. Despite the weird things that have happened this year and the hard stuff, I’m grateful to still be able to work and to see how people are so resilient and creative.

RADIO IMAGING DEMO

September 1, 2020 by Heidi Rew

I was on air in radio for 8 years, plus additional weekend and fill-in work for 2 years after I went full-time into voiceover and acting. Never in a million years did I think I’d do radio imaging but I just wrapped up recording my radio imaging demo.

The Radio Voice

When I was in radio, you still had the booming, commanding voices doing radio imaging. That was NOT me. I actually kind of stumbled into a radio imaging job. A fellow VO friend said she knew someone that was looking for a female radio imaging voice talent and passed the audition to me. I ended up booking it.

Post Grad Goals

The even funnier part is that it’s for the radio group I first interviewed for after college. I even tried to get a job as a receptionist – anything to get my foot in the door but they never hired me.

That imaging job led me to being the imaging voice for the same radio company’s positive hip hop channel (LF Radio) and the voice for The JR Show on the Joy FM network.

My radio career spanned from J103 in Chattanooga, 104.7 The Fish and B98.5 in Atlanta. I was on air and did traffic throughout my time there. Oh…AND worked in marketing in Chattanooga. In radio, you wear a lot of different hats.

My whole goal out of college was to be a morning show host. When I left radio in 2012, I was crushed. I didn’t really want to leave radio but a lot of different things led to that decision. A part of me felt like a failure for not reaching my goal and I felt directionless. I started on the path of being a full-time voice talent and actor but that was (is) such an uncertain industry.

Best of Both Worlds

Fast forward to 2020 and I’m SO grateful for that change in direction. Not to mention, I’m still able to get a little taste of radio with radio imaging.

I worked with Eric Romanowski on coaching and prepping for the radio imaging demo. He’s wonderful! Very knowledgeable and I learned a lot.

Here’s the finished product…

https://youtu.be/Sk82WA4m0X4

Female Radio Imaging Samples – Heidi Rew (https://youtu.be/Sk82WA4m0X4)

I’m definitely not the commanding, booming female radio imaging voice but Eric helped me find my voice as the relatable, friendly, sexy, smooth, joyful, millennial, real, fun and sassy female radio imaging voice.

To hear more of the genres of voiceover I can do, CLICK HERE.

And what a great reminder that sometimes a redirection can bring you right back to your first love.

Heidi Rew

ONLY MOVIE

August 2, 2020 by Heidi Rew

Two years ago, I auditioned for a VO-only part in an indie film called Only.

Only stars Frieda Pinto and Leslie Odom Jr. It’s about a mysterious virus that just kills women. It’s more than a pandemic movie (I mean, we’re all basically LIVING that movie) but a love story which draws deep parallels about the intricacies of relationships and also asks the question – do you take no risks and feel imprisoned or do you risk it all to live freely, if just for a moment more?

Auditioning

At the time I auditioned, I didn’t really know much about it. In fact, right after I auditioned I decided to take a little hiatus from on-camera acting. With running Atlanta Voiceover Studio with my husband Mike Stoudt and maintaining my own VO career, my days were just slammed. It was hard to really be able to focus on doing well with my on-camera auditions.

The Callback and Booking

After making that decision, I received a callback for Only with director Takashi Doscher, producer Gabrielle Pickle, casting director Jordan Blair Brown and Craig Miller. After I auditioned for the VO part, Takashi asked me to read for an on-camera role of a news reporter as well. I did and they ended up booking me. But not for the role of a news reporter. This was for a brand new role of a talk show host (or Anchor #3 as it says on IMDB).

The Shoot

The shoot was really fun and Takashi was a great director. Everyone on the crew was lovely to work with and it made for an easy shoot. My part was shot in a sound studio (ironically the same sound studio we originally had Atlanta Voiceover Studio in) on a green screen.

The movie first made its rounds at film festivals. Then I heard rumors that it would be released in certain theaters at the beginning of 2020 but then COVID hit. In July, it ended up coming out on Netflix and for a couple weeks was in the top 10 movies.

The reviews have been pretty good too. Here’s one from Variety.

My part goes by fast, so don’t get up to get popcorn but I was so grateful to be part of this movie. Takashi was a wonderful writer and director and the rest of the team were a delight to work with.

If nothing else, watching the movie, you may get some great quarantine tips during COVID?
Heidi Rew

A SWEET VOICEOVER

July 1, 2020 by Heidi Rew

It’s always exciting when you get to do a voiceover for a company you personally use…especially when you’re talking about a sweet treat! I call that one sweet voiceover. That was the case when I booked Edible Arrangements. I love getting and sending Edible Arrangements.

When I booked it, it happened to fall right at the beginning of COVID19 and they were offering FREE delivery. I wanted to figure out a way to send my friends some joy during this time and with free delivery, Edible Arrangements was the perfect solution. My friends all loved them and it was such a great way to feel connected, despite being quarantined.

Here are a few of the commercials I’ve done for them:

Mother’s Day

Free Delivery

TV Spot
Edible always wants my upbeat, peppy, smiley reads for these commercials. I guess if you’re saying “Joy” you need to sound JOY-ful!

I’m partial to the classic chocolate-dipped strawberries but you can’t go wrong with anything from Edible. They even offer fresh produce, cookies, popcorn and a ton of other goodies. With so many more sweet treats to choose from, think about sending an Edible Arrangement to a friend or family member!

To hear more of my commercial voiceover reads, go HERE.

BLACK VOICES IN ADVERTISING

June 18, 2020 by Heidi Rew

As a voiceover actor, I want to highlight an incredible black-owned advertising agency that’s creating powerful messages for brands. These past couple of weeks have been emotional, heart-breaking and eye-opening. It’s led to conversations and a stretching of myself that I didn’t even realize was necessary.

One of the bright spots, though, has been seeing so many black businesses shared and promoted on social media. Waiting on a new hair product from one as we speak (I guess it would be “as I type” ;p).

Because I’m in the world of voiceover and love commercials and advertising, I wanted to share a black-owned and run creative agency whose purpose is to create ideas that bring awareness to and shift perceptions on racial bias and injustice.

SATURDAY MORNING, made up of founders Jayanta Jenkins, Kwame Taylor-Hayford, Keith Cartwright and Geoff Edwards with Deja Cox as the partner lead, created a powerful film for P&G to celebrate black male pride. It’s called The Look and its purpose is for the viewer to experience what it’s like to be a black man in America.

It’s really powerful and you can see it HERE

Thank you Saturday Morning for how you’re impacting the world through advertising! My hope is that the change happening in the world continues to impact the advertising and commercial world as well. I look forward to seeing more diversity in voiceover and more agencies like Saturday Morning spring up.

I hope this is one more step in ensuring black voices are heard. I’m listening.

https://www.saturdaymorning.co/

CREATING A GREAT HOME OFFICE SPACE

May 10, 2020 by Heidi Rew

Who knew when Jonathan Tilley (personal brand strategist) asked me to join him on his podcast to talk about creating a great home office space a year ago that it’d be released during COVID19?! So many people are now working from home, which has its ups and downs. One of the “downs” is that it can feel uninspiring, chaotic and cluttered.

Check out my episode with Jonathan HERE to learn a simple way to transform your home office space from just functional (maybe it’s not even that) to inspirational.

In this episode, I talk about a crazy “weekend” project I tackled at our home.

I did not like the tile in our guest bathroom. Part of our long-term renovation plan is to re-do that bathroom but that won’t be for a little while, so I decided to PAINT our tile…oh yeah and stencil it. This picture is our BEFORE…

This little project quickly snowballed because once I realized what color I was going to paint the tile, I knew I’d need to do something else with the sink area, then I realized I’d need to get a new faucet if I did that and the mirror may work but only if I get another light fixture.

Can you see my husband ROLLING his eyes accompanied by a dramatic face palm?? That’s what was happening…and continued to happen for 2 months after.

When I started this project, I had a free weekend. Free weekends aren’t easy to come by, so it took me awhile to finish this.

But it all came together finally. I will NEVER attempt to stencil tile again…at least not with this small of a stencil. It was just impossible to do it without messing up.

It was one thing after another. Once I got another countertop, I realized there’d be a gap between that and the mirror. So I ended up doing my own peel and stick backsplash. Then the area between the sink and toilet felt so empty, so I got a shelf. And I had to get a different trash can.

Stenciling the tile in the shower was the worst. That’s where I thought I’d write out “Relax” with the hex stencil but I was so over stenciling that area that I just couldn’t do it.

You can see how wonky the stencil job is here. I gave up on the sides and painted them straight white, which is what I should’ve done for the back as well. I tried everything to hold that stencil in place.

Thankfully it’s our guest shower, so I don’t have to be reminded of my bad decision every day. ;p

The rest of the bathroom did turn out nice. I love the new hardware for the bathroom cabinet. Oh yeah…that was another thing I realized I needed to get.

Here are some more pics of all the updates…

Enough of my HOME projects. In the podcast episode with Jonathan, we talk about ways to create an inspirational space. I wanted to show you pictures of the ways I do that in my HOME voiceover studio and my space at Atlanta Voiceover Studio.

My husband and I both use the home studio, so he had say in the design as well. I tried to make it manly but also fun.

And this is my office space at Atlanta Voiceover Studio. Much different! ;p I have a neon sign that says, “Don’t Stop Get It Get It” on one wall and then quotes and pictures of my past Heidi Rew Show guests. It’s super motivating and inspiring.

You think this will get through to me??? ;p

I know that it can be tough creating a great home office space but lean into the fun of it reflecting you – what brings you joy, inspiration and motivation.

Now…Don’t Stop, Get It, Get It!