How much to charge for narrating an audio book
STEPHEN FRY or JIM DALE? J.K. Rowling fans can’t decide who’s the better Potter reader. Both of them have recorded the entire series, although you’re probably aware of the fact that they’re not reading from the same books. In Britain, people are reading “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone“. In the US it’s “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone“.
Stephen Fry will read: ‘Dudley had learnt a new word (’Shan’t!’).’
Jim Dale will say: “Dudley had learned a new word (”Won’t!”).”
Fry: ‘Would you care for a sherbet lemon?’
Dale: “Would you care for a lemon drop?”
Fry: he had hands the size of dustbin lids
Dale: he had hands the size of trash can lids
Fry: The rock cakes almost broke their teeth
Dale: The rock cakes were shapeless lumps with raisins that almost broke their teeth
George Bernard Shaw was right when he said: “England and America are two countries divided by a common language.”
I recently got a call from 20th Century Fox to translate a few songs for Wes Anderson’s new movie “The Fantastic Mr. Fox”, an adaptation of a children’s book by Roald Dahl. When Hollywood translates movies for worldwide release, localization is the name of the game. Some translators are good at it. Others… smell at it! (yes, that was on purpose)
OOPS
Consider a simple word like “call.” Pick up Webster’s dictionary and you’ll find 15 definitions for the noun alone. Here are two actual mistranslations from movie and TV subtitles:
A priest explains, “That’s when I got my call from God.”
The subtitle reads: “That’s when God telephoned me.”
A general has to decide whether or not to bomb an urban target, and he says, “It’s a tough call.”
The subtitle reads: “It’s hard to make a phone call.”
NUMBER FOUR
Last month, my fourth audio book was released. When I had the final product in my hands, I remembered that I had had a less than easy time putting in a reasonable bid for the project. I’m obviously proud of my work, but it’s fair to say that I’m no Jim Dale or Stephen Fry (nor do I want to be). I am simply me, and the last time I checked, there’s only one of me on this planet. Believe me, that’s more than enough!
Unfortunately, this also means that I am bidding with the rest of you ordinary mortals when it comes to audio book narrations. Let me ask you this: do you always know what to charge? When looking at the budget range as proposed by the voice-seeker on, let’s say, a P2P, do you always feel that you’re looking at a fair compensation for your services? Or do you think that you’re being taken advantage of, when someone’s offering between $500 and $750 for 80 thousand words on the life and times of J.K. Rowling?
- What do you factor in when bidding on a project?
- Do you use voices.com, voice123.com or the Edge Studio rate cards?
- If you do, do you think these rates are realistic, optimistic, hopelessly outdated…?
For those of you interested in my “Chamber of audio book bidding Secrets”, I’ll tell you how I break down the process, step by step.
Add comment October 25th, 2009
Paul Strikwerda