Professional Audiobook Narrators Association

By Narrators, For Narrators

PANAcademy

PANAcademy: Prepping, Tuning, and Pimping Out Your Home Studio

by

Virtual Event Virtual Event

Tue November 14, 2023 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm New York

7pm ET (New York)
4pm PT (Los Angeles)
Not your timezone? Find yours here

Now that genuine professional quality audio is a baseline expectation of publishers and production houses, your home recording studio’s setup can make all the difference. “Prepping, Tuning, and Pimping Out Your Home Recording Studio” is a comprehensive 2-hour session designed to equip narrators at all experience levels with the essential knowledge and skills necessary to honestly understand and optimize their recording environment for outstanding audio and visual quality.

Instructor: Byron Wagner

Instructor Bio: Byron Wagner (he/him) has been doing voice-over since the age of 13 (a very long time ago), implementing (& patenting) the first ISDN codec for Disney in ’92. He enjoys crafting memorable results for global audiobook clients from his world-class multi-room Abaton AirBnB/studios in Los Angeles & Ra’anana, Israel, and travels extensively.

Target Audience: Any experience level

Zoom instructions: You will receive a confirmation email with the Zoom link to your event. The Zoom link will also be available to logged-in ticket holders on this page 15 minutes prior to the event.

Got questions? Email panacademy@pronarrators.org and we’ll get back to ya!

PANAcademy: Feldenkrais Lessons

by

Mon November 6, 2023 @ 8:15 pm – 9:15 pm New York

8:15 ET (New York)
5:15pm PT (Los Angeles)
Not your timezone? Find yours here

Please Note: This is a 6 week class that spans Mondays from November 6, 2023 until December 11, 2023

Audiobook narration is a physically demanding job—-despite the fact that it looks like we “just sit and talk”. Ease and comfort as you spend hours in the booth, creating characters, enlivening text, is crucial—both for your own well-being, and for the easy-to-listen-to, exciting end product. These lessons direct your attention to how you organize your body as you do your work…where you can reduce habitual tensions and improve breathing and comfort. Feldenkrais lessons enable you to feel simultaneously grounded and free as you enter the world of your book, so you emerge from your booth invigorated, rather than exhausted.

Instructor: Suzanne Toren

Instructor Bio: In addition to being a multi-award-winning, Golden Voice narrator, Suzanne Toren is a Guild Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner.

Target Audience: Any experience level

Zoom instructions: You will receive a confirmation email with the Zoom link to your event. The Zoom link will also be available to logged-in ticket holders on this page 15 minutes prior to the first class, but subsequent classes will use the Zoom link in the email.

PLEASE NOTE: Online Tickets for this class have been temporarily disabled. If you would like to join, please email panacademy@pronarrators.org.

Tickets

The numbers below include tickets for this event already in your cart. Clicking “Get Tickets” will allow you to edit any existing attendee information as well as change ticket quantities.
Tickets are no longer available

Please note that classes that do not meet a minimum number of students may be cancelled with 48 hours notice. Students will be notified by email and their payment refunded.

Got questions? Email panacademy@pronarrators.org and we’ll get back to ya!

PANAcademy: Twisted Wave Audiobook Post Production

by

Virtual Event Virtual Event

Wed October 18, 2023 @ 10:00 am – 11:30 am PDT

10am PT / 1pm ET / 6pm BST
Not your timezone? Find yours here!

Narrators who work at ACX, Spoken Realms, and Findaway Voices are responsible for completing the post production work on audiobooks so that their audio meets publisher specifications.  This work can be outsourced or the narrator can do this work.

This course will use many of the tools at Twisted Wave to edit, proof, pickup, and master audiobook audio to meet these specifications.

The instructor will present a set of steps that build a finished audio product, which the instructor will call a “workflow.”  The workflow is like a recipe, and like any recipe, once mastered, will allow the “chef” to adapt to specific needs and discoveries.

Instructor: Jack de Golia

Instructor Bio: An award-winning audiobook narrator, e-learning voice, video game actor, and storyteller: Jack will give you winning, ahead-of-schedule voice work for audiobooks, e-learning, political ads, cartoons, commercials and videogames, and anything involving character voices. With a PR & stage-acting career spanning four decades, Jack brings a seasoned and always fresh approach to voiceover work. It’s been said he has the voice of “every man’s man.” While Jack is based in Las Vegas, his studio lets him work all over the world as a male voice actor.

Target Audience: This class is for people with basic knowledge of Twisted Wave and who have Twisted Wave on a laptop or desktop computer, which can include the free demo version.  A Mac computer is optimal, though Twisted Wave now has a PC version.  

You should be able to start and stop recording, start and stop playback, set recording levels, and gauge your room tone.  You should also know how to read the two level meters on either side of the main Twisted Wave screen so that you can set your audio to peak between -6 and -4 dB.

The instructor will provide a short audiobook script. You’ll be asked to record at the levels just mentioned and include 15 seconds of room tone. The instructor will send you instructions for uploading the audio sample.  You will be asked to not do any editing.  Please do not remove or adjust breaths, nor process this audio in any way.

Zoom instructions: You will receive a confirmation email with the Zoom link to your event. The Zoom link will also be available to logged-in ticket holders on this page 15 minutes prior to the event.

Tickets

The numbers below include tickets for this event already in your cart. Clicking “Get Tickets” will allow you to edit any existing attendee information as well as change ticket quantities.
Tickets are no longer available

Please note that classes that do not meet a minimum number of students may be cancelled with 48 hours notice. Students will be notified by email and their payment refunded.

Got questions? Email panacademy@pronarrators.org and we’ll get back to ya!

PANAcademy: Casting Your Audiobook

by

Tue October 17, 2023 @ 4:00 pm – 6:00 pm PDT

4pm PT / 7pm ET / 12am BST
Not your timezone? Find yours here

In this 2 hour session, Erin will discuss the things you need to think about when casting your book… with…well you. 

You will learn about the different Point of Views (POVs). This will help you understand what to do with the protagonist (aka YOU… most of the time).

Erin will then share what she calls the “Family of Leads”. She will explore the way we can mine the text for how and why these characters are in the book to begin with, their significance in the story and the protagonist’s journey and how all of this informs our decisions in “casting”. 

Then Erin will look into the different choices and qualities of voice we have available to us to create these real people. 

Making truthful and diverse storytelling character choices is the way to make a book rise to the top and honor, as best we can, the world the author has diligently provided! 

During and after the presentation Erin will open up the floor for questions.

Feel free to be specific about current projects and maybe even be willing to play!

Instructor Bio: Erin Moon is a classically trained actor, long time educator, award winning narrator of over 450 books and has been in the audiobooks industry since 2005 wearing many hats on both sides of the glass. She is a member of the Ed Committee (PANA), has taught at Acting and VO training programs in the US and Canada for well over a decade, as well as being a frequent panelist, workshop leader and podcast guest. www.erinmoonactor.com

Target Audience: Beginning (0-25 titles) and Intermediate (26-75 titles) narrators

Zoom instructions: You will receive a confirmation email with the Zoom link to your event. The Zoom link will also be available to logged-in ticket holders on this page 15 minutes prior to the event.

Tickets

The numbers below include tickets for this event already in your cart. Clicking “Get Tickets” will allow you to edit any existing attendee information as well as change ticket quantities.
Tickets are no longer available

Please note that classes that do not meet a minimum number of students may be cancelled with 48 hours notice. Students will be notified by email and their payment refunded.

Got questions? Email panacademy@pronarrators.org and we’ll get back to ya!

PANAcademy: Financial Literacy — How to Make Your Money Work as Hard for You as You Do for It

by

Virtual Event Virtual Event

Tue October 3, 2023 @ 4:00 pm – 5:45 pm PDT

4pm PT / 7pm ET / 12am BST
Not your timezone? Find yours here

Understanding how money works is crucial to saving, growing and keeping it.  By demystifying how money works, this webinar explains different ways to make your money work for you. Participants will leave better prepared to assess their current financial situations and plot a path forward to wealth creation and greater financial security.

By the end of this course, participants will understand what Financial Literacy is and why it’s important, ways and vehicles for saving and growing money and wealth, and how to assess their current financial situation and set goals.

Instructor: Wendi Miles-Boykin

Instructor Bio: Wendi is an accomplished executive level professional and leader with over twenty years of experience in financial services, marketing and sales. Building teams and leaders to achieve remarkable results is her passion.

In 2014 Wendi pivoted from her corporate career to entrepreneurship and joined Wealth Wave whose mission is to end financial illiteracy, to help individuals and families save and invest their money and create generational wealth She holds life and health insurance licenses, long term care certification, and securities licenses.

Prior to her consulting and financial businesses, Wendi worked at Western Union for 21 years reaching the level of Vice President, Marketing with responsibility for product management, strategic marketing, retail marketing, creative services, client relationship management, advertising and promotion. She is also a patent recipient. Prior to Western Union, she held sales and marketing positions at Xerox®, General Mills® and Warner Lambert® companies.

Target Audience: Any experience level

Zoom instructions: You will receive a confirmation email with the Zoom link to your event. The Zoom link will also be available to logged-in ticket holders on this page 15 minutes prior to the event.

Got questions? Email panacademy@pronarrators.org and we’ll get back to ya!