Having come from the dark ages or radio production (audio tape, linear production, razor blades and grease pencils for editing), digital audio production has been the most significant advance to me.
The problem has been that audio recording software is mostly designed for music recording.
What to do?
Hear more in my article on Audio Daily.
What's A VO Artist To Do?
Most of the features and setting in audio recording software have very little or nothing to do with commercial production. You pay a lot of money to be able to make beats, measures and select the key of your recording. You can even add and manipulate tuba tracks. But in 30 years I've never needed a tuba track - much less a manipulated one, in a commercial.
For straight voice recording and editing I like Sound Studio. It's simple, easy to master, inexpensive and has most of the features pertinent to voice recording. For Multi track recording I've worked with a big range of software from Pro Tools to Deck 3.5 (don't ask), and although I'm having a hard time believing it, the simplest and easiest to work with so far is...drum roll...a program called MixPad made by NCH Software.
Mixpad is straightforward, has the necessary features for commercial production and is compatible with all sorts of audio formats. I keep looking for something wrong with it, but to no avail up to now. If you should want a tuba track, you can download one from their library in the sky.
The most amazing thing about Mixpad is that there is a free version. Free! (not "for free.") I bought the paid version - a whopping $50 or so, mainly just as a matter of principle, but I don't see a lot of difference from the free version. If you don't use Sound Studio there is an NCH editing program called WavePad also available for free. Give it a try, the only cost is a little time.
