meet jake… and me too
Recently a young man was brought into my studio to voice a script for a student film… my initial reaction was… “wow, there’s some amazing potential here”. After the session, I asked if voice acting was an area of interest, and I was told that as an aspiring actor and film maker, it certainly was! Straight away I recognised that any time invested in Jake would not be a waste.
So, I decided to take on a mentor role with a goal to develop a killer demo. Jake is a Norwegian/American from Minnesota studying in Australia, and as you’ll notice from the audio clip – he’s got a nice American dialect. Unfortunately in Australia, I’ve found that acceptance of American voices on “commercials” is limited to say the least, but Jake plans on returning to the US after he’s finished his study, and I hope he’ll return to America with a demo that will get him some significant work.
Below you will find 2 commercials for NIVEA. I was asked to read this for my client in American Samoa for use on radio, I decided to ask Jake to read a version too. I sent both reads to my client who decided to produce both! I’ve included my read so you can see how these are being used to target totally different audience demographics.
Jake:
Jason:
Keeping in mind, this was Jake’s very first “commercial”…I’d love for you to leave comments on how you think he’s progressing. If you have any projects that you think would suit Jake – please contact me directly. Even if you have some scripts that would suit his style that we can use to practice with, that would be appreciated too!
PS – July2010: Jake has now got a few radio ads under his belt and has launched his website ahead of graduating from Uni here in Australia and heading back to LA – check it out ! JakeStormoen.com
Jason, after hearing both reads, I think that he got you on that one. A very natural feel to his first commercial.
I agree Peter! Very natural… I prefer his read too 😉
Both of you sounded great but If I had to choose I would go with Jakes voice, very upbeat and natural.
My sister and I listened to both commericals and we were swayed by Jake’s commerical.