Check it out……http://patfraley.com/Events/GW10/GW.html

We were commissioned to cast, record and direct this long awaited title for Jowood Interactive using 53 of our most talented voice artists. I’m told this will be in stores by the end of the year. Available on Xbox,PS3, and PC.

Arcania Story line:

Ten years have passed since the end of Gothic 3 and the world has changed – the Southern Islands have become embroiled in a grueling conflict, and set the stage for the player to brave countless adventures in the guise of a nameless hero. In a vibrant and elaborate environment, decisions will have to be made which will change not only the future of the Southern Islands, but of the entire world…

Old acquaintances and new faces will aid the hero or attempt to thwart his efforts throughout his epic journey. Especially the members of the fairer sex will play a more important role. Who knows maybe the women will make the hero’s life a little more complicated…

Exciting quests and challenging fights will be as much highlights as intrigue and betrayal. Will the nameless hero overcome these obstacles and complete his seemingly insurmountable task?

]]> http://resnickinteractive.com/2010/04/06/arcania-wraps-production/feed/ 0 http://resnickinteractive.com/2010/01/27/production-begins-on-jakers-the-adventures-of-piggley-winks/ http://resnickinteractive.com/2010/01/27/production-begins-on-jakers-the-adventures-of-piggley-winks/#comments Wed, 27 Jan 2010 20:46:56 +0000 Todd Resnick http://resnickinteractive.com/?p=222 We’ve been commissioned to cast and record the French and Spanish versions of  the animated comedy Jakers!

The show had originally chronicled the boyhood adventures of Piggley Winks, an anthropomorphic pig from Ireland and how he relates these stories to his grandchildren as a grandfather in the present day. This game title is set to go out for PC gamers and on the Wii

The word “Jakers!” is based on an Irish expression used back in the 1950’s and means “wow!” or “amazing!” – Piggley and his father use it to express their delight when they discover something on their adventures.

By Richard Verrier and Ben Fritz

December 7, 2009

When Dave Wittenberg began his acting career at a community theater in Boston, he never imagined that one day he’d be making his living as a voice artist for video game characters, portraying the likes of Hades, Tweedledee and Jerry Seinfeld.

But in the last decade Wittenberg’s voice has been heard in more video games than he “can remember.” And, though it’s not the traditional actor’s stagecraft, he still draws extensively on his thespian skills. “You get to create characters you wouldn’t be able to create in any other medium,” said Wittenberg, 38. “From an acting standpoint, it lets you flex your muscles that you wouldn’t ordinarily use.”

What it’s not doing, however, is fattening his wallet. Despite his extensive credits, Wittenberg earns roughly $30,000 a year from his video game work and, like most of his peers, supplements that income by doing voice work for animated TV shows.

Wittenberg is one of hundreds of Hollywood actors who perform in the heard-but-not-seen world of voice acting, breathing life into the virtual worlds of such blockbuster game franchises as Halo, Call of Duty and Grand Theft Auto.

The video game sector, once a backwater in Hollywood, has been the fastest-growing segment of the entertainment industry and increasingly competes with movies and television for consumers’ attention and dollars.

As games have become more like big-screen movies, so has their need for more sophisticated stories and emotionally engaging characters. Games once had practically no dialogue but now boast tens of thousands of lines of it — creating opportunities for actors at time when traditional jobs are shrinking because of studios’ cutbacks in film and TV production.

But the enthusiasm for the new medium has been tempered by a growing unease among many performers that their pay for voice work in video games isn’t keeping pace with the industry’s breakneck growth. Although it’s down this year amid the recession, U.S. video game industry revenue has more than doubled since 2005 to $21 billion in 2008 — about twice the amount of movie ticket sales in Canada and the U.S.

The concerns have fueled a standoff between the video gave companies and the Screen Actors Guild, whose members recently rejected a proposed contract that covers voice work in the video game industry. “The concern going forward is that as these games become larger and larger and generate more income, we as actors won’t see any more money when we walk out the door,” said Wittenberg.

Attorney Scott Witlin, who represented video game publishers in the recent labor negotiations, disputes the notion that actors are being shortchanged. “If you look at the total contribution either in terms of hours that go into the creation of a game or the earnings of the people who make the games, voice talent represents a minute percentage,” he said.

SAG’s bargaining clout is limited. The voices in about 80% of video game titles are performed by actors who don’t work under a guild contract. What’s more, SAG’s sister union, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, recently ratified a separate contract with video game publishers.

“It’s not so much their argument is weak or strong,” said Jonathan Handel, an adjunct professor at UCLA School of Law who specializes in entertainment labor law. “The overarching issue for any union making a deal is: Who has the leverage?”

There were practically no roles for actors in video games until the mid-1990s, when technical innovations made it possible to give speech to the digital characters. Video game cartridges before then had limited storage space, leaving little room for voice recordings. Dialogue instead appeared on the screen like subtitles on a foreign-language film.

“It used to be that there wasn’t very much data available for voice acting, and what we had tended to be cartoonish,” said Casey Hudson, director of the upcoming Electronic Arts game Mass Effect 2.

Later, with the advent of higher-capacity compact discs, characters started to speak a few dozen or hundred lines in games. But voices were still often performed by amateur actors or even the game developers themselves, because many companies didn’t think spoken dialogue was important enough to merit spending money on professionals.

In the last decade, however, as the video game industry has transitioned to DVDs and the storytelling ambitions of many game developers have blossomed, hiring experienced actors has become routine.

The use of actors in games varies broadly depending on the genre. Some titles include far more speech than a feature film. Mass Effect 2, a science-fiction game, has 90 actors playing 546 characters who speak about 31,000 lines of dialogue.

Uncharted 2, an adventure game recently released by Sony, intentionally mimics the cinematic style of movies like the “Indiana Jones” series. Actors not only performed voices but also acted in motion-capture suits for non-interactive story sequences — called “cut scenes” — that totaled about 90 minutes.

“We basically made a feature film at the same time that we made a game,” said Uncharted 2 director Amy Hennig, who worked with an experienced theater director to oversee acting. “Good performances are critical so that players maintain an empathetic association with the character who they control.”

Largely because of the industry’s roots in the software business, video game creators have traditionally been compensated very differently than creative workers in Hollywood. Unlike talent in movies and TV shows, they don’t receive residuals, or additional fees for the reuse of their work.

“In our business we’re all employees and any upside we get is purely discretionary, so many of us are not going to have a lot of sympathy for actors who want back-end residuals,” Hennig said. “That’s why we’re talking two different languages when we sit down at a bargaining table.”

The biggest sticking point in the dispute involves pay levels for a new category of actors: those who perform “atmospheric voices,” words and sounds for the incidental characters — bartenders, soldiers, elves, random monsters — in war and fantasy games that involve large crowds.

Under the proposed SAG contract, actors would receive a fee of about $800 for performing up to 20 atmospheric voices (up to 300 words per voice) in a four-hour session. Actors who perform “principal characters” — defined as those that drive the story — would fetch the same fee for doing up to three character voices, and more than double the amount if they do six to 10 voices during a six-hour session.

Although video companies offered a 2.5% increase in wages, an influential group of Hollywood voice actors has strongly opposed the contract. They contend that the provision would require them to do substantially more work for roughly the same pay and put undue stress on their vocal cords, notwithstanding a provision in the agreement to protect actors against “vocal stress.”

“Before, you were doing three characters dying a horrible death. Now you’re doing 20 characters dying a horrible death,” said Dee Baker, a veteran voice actor who has worked on such games as Halo 2 and Spore, in which he voiced entire races of evolving alien creatures. “Not only will this mean less money for more experiences, it’s also going to be a lot more vocally difficult.”

Though it seems counterintuitive, game developers say that advances in technology are making actors more important to the production process, not less.

Hudson, for instance, says he hopes that in the future, game makers will capture the facial expressions of actors for the eye and mouth movements of the animated characters whose voices they provide.

That’s one reason backers of the agreement — including negotiators for both actors unions — argue that the most important goal right now is to give the companies more incentive to hire union talent.

“One of the things we’d like to do is improve the union’s footprint in this area of production,” said Mathis Dunn Jr., an assistant national executive director of AFTRA. “A lot of employers are not signatories to our contract, and part of the reason is that we can’t accommodate their budget. . . . This will keep us in the game.”

LONDON — Brad Pitt’s Plan B shingle and Indian media conglom Reliance Big Entertainment have inked a deal with vidgame company Capcom to develop a feature film based on the “Dark Void” computer game as a potential franchise and starring vehicle for the actor.

“Dark Void” follows a pilot who crash lands in the Bermuda Triangle following a routine mission and finds himself in an alternate world resembling a primitive Earth where aliens with superior technology are planning to take over civilization.

Capcom will release the vidgame on various platforms in North America and Europe in January next year.

Project is the first to come out of Reliance’s development silo with Plan B after the deal was first announced at last year’s Cannes Film Festival.

In addition to Pitt’s Plan B shingle, Reliance has also inked development deals with George Clooney, Nicolas Cage, Brett Ratner, Chris Columbus, Jay Roach, Jim Carrey, Julia Roberts and Tom Hanks as it seeks to establish itself as a genuine global film player.

The conglom has also backed Steven Spielberg and Stacey Snider’s reconstituted DreamWorks banner with $325 million in equity in the latest incarnation of the company.

Plan B is currently in production on a biscreen adaptation of Liz Gilbert’s bestselling book “Eat, Pray, Love.” Julia Roberts, Javier Bardem and James Franco star in the Sony film written and directed by Ryan Murphy.

The company is also in post-production on Terence Malick’s “The Tree of Life,” starring Pitt and Sean Penn. That pic will be released in the U.S. by Bob Berney and Bill Pohlad’s distribution banner Apparition.

Source: http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118011605.html?categoryid=1079&cs=1

This months spotlight is on voice actor JB Blanc.

He worked extensively in theatre in Britain for over 15 years, including a three-year stint at London’s Royal National Theatre. His theatre work encompassed everything from avant-garde physical theater companies to world tours of Shakespeare plays and classical Greek tragedy.

His film career was essentially launched by his highly acclaimed role as Luigi Vampa in 2002’s The Count of Monte Cristo, and following that success, he moved to Los Angeles where he now lives. Film and TV roles soon followed on productions such as Pirates of the Caribbean, Iron Cross, Tristan and Isolde, Garfield, Biohazard, NYPD Blue, Prison Break, CSI: NY, The Company and The Unit. In 2006, he made his US theatre debut in iwitness at The Mark Taper Forum in downtown Los Angeles.

JB is also a highly accomplished voice actor with projects in film, animation, video games and commercials. He plays several major characters in the forthcoming Marvel/BET production, The Black Panther and is a regular on Naruto and Bleach. Recent video game work includes Alighieri in Dante’s Inferno for EA, Darksiders: Wrath of War, World of Warcraft, Red Faction Guerilla, Tales of Vesperia, Tales of Symphonia, Arcania, Silent Hill, Coraline (in which he voice-matched Ian McShane), Wanted: Weapons of Fate and many others. He has also been a dialect and acting coach for several years, is resident Dialect Coach at The Fountain Theatre in Los Angeles and has worked on productions in the UK and the US , including more recently, The Informers and The History Boys at the Ahmanson Theatre, Los Angeles.

Theatre: The Blue Room (The Odyssey) Shining City, Coming Home, Photograph 51, Gem of the Ocean, Accomplices, Victory, (Fountain Theatre) The Importance of Being Earnest, Summer And Smoke, Major Barbara (LA Theaterworks), The History Boys, iwitness (Mark Taper Forum, CTG) The Oedipus Plays, Mary Stuart, Chips With Everything, Flight (Royal National Theatre, London), The Duel (Lyric, London), Romeo and Juliet, Love for Love (New End Theatre, London), The Lizzie Play (London and World Tour), The Taming of the Shrew, The Phantom Lady, Julius Caesar, The Love of a Good Man (Arts Threshold, London), A Comedy of Errors (New Victoria, Stoke). Film: Iron Cross, The Informers, The Incredible Hulk, The Count of Monte Cristo, Shadowlands, Tristan & Isolde, 102 Dalmations, Moonlight Serenade, Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties. Television: CSI: New York, Raising The Bar, The Unit, Crash, The Company, NYPD Blue, Dr Vegas, The Bill, Vanity Fair, London’s Burning.

Members of the American Federation of Television & Radio Artists have approved a new deal for videogame voice work — two weeks after SAG members rejected the same pact.

AFTRA, which made the announcement Thursday, said the deal received backing from 66% of those casting ballots. The pact was sent out to AFTRA’s 2,200 members who work under the contract.

AFTRA covers the lion’s share of unionized voice work for vidgames. SAG, which has asked the companies to return to the bargaining table, had no immediate response to Thursday’s announcement.

The two performers’ unions have generally made little headway with vidgame companies; an estimated 75% of the voice work performed goes to non-union performers.

Opposition has emerged to the new deal over the “atmospheric” provisions allowing employers to use actors to perform up to 20 voices of up to 300 words at the daily base rate — provisions viewed by some as signifying a major reduction from the current pact.

SAG’s rejection may doom an effort by negotiators to synch up the expiration dates and terms of the pacts for SAG and AFTRA. Negotiators for AFTRA and the Screen Actors Guild reached separate deals with similar terms with vidgame employers on Oct. 2. AFTRA’s deal is a 15-month extension of the current pact that expires on Dec. 31. New deal will expire on March 30, 2011.

The new AFTRA agreement includes a 2.5% increase in minimum session fees to $802 for a four-hour session starting on April 1.

“AFTRA members who work on videogames do so using a highly specialized set of skills and require unique protections from their union agreement,” said AFTRA president Roberta Reardon.

The pact includes an increase in the AFTRA health and retirement contribution rate by 0.2%, bringing the total producer contribution rate to 15%. It also establishes a new cap on annual health and retirement contributions to an individual performer to $125,000, and an automatic $100 payment when a producer fails to provide advance notice of vocally stressful work.

Originally posted on variety.com

“For many of us Armin was a personal friend,” said Andreas Speer, Spellbound’s studio manager. “We still cannot believe that he has passed away.”Jean-Marc Haessig, the firm’s creative director who had worked with Mr Gessert for fifteen years, said: “I worked with Armin very closely for more than 15 years. He was a good friend with whom I had a lot in common. Our visions of what to do to make our games great were absolutely the same.”Mr Gessert had put plans into place in case Spellbound were to be without him. Andreas Speer will now act as CEO with Jean-Marc Haessig continuing his role as creative Director. “We will continue following Armin’s goals, as he would have wanted us to,” said Speer.“Though I will miss him bitterly I will continue to strive to create games that Armin would have been proud of,” added Haessig. Mr Gessert had built a reputation over his twenty-five years in the industry, gaining prominence with titles such as The Great Giana Sisters and The Great Courts. His first work was the action adventure Street Gang which came out under the label Rainbow Arts in 1984. He founded Spellbound in 1994 and won further success with games such as Desperados and the Airline Tycoon series.

Screen Actors Guild thesps have thrown a wrench into the world of videogame voice work, rejecting a tentative deal for a new contract and asking employers to return to the bargaining table. The American Federation of Television & Radio Artists, which covers the lion’s share of unionized voice work for vidgames, is sending out the same deal to its 2,200 members who work the contract with a Nov. 12 deadline for response. AFTRA’s national board OK’d the deal Saturday with “an overwhelming and strong” recommendation for a yes vote.

Scott Witlin, who reps vidgame employers at the negotiations, told Daily Variety that it was uncertain if the companies would be willing to return to the bargaining table to sweeten the SAG deal.

The two performers’ unions have generally made little headway with vidgame companies — an estimated 75% of the voice work performed is non-union. The SAG contract covers publishing giant Electronic Arts and about 70 other gaming companies.

The rejection, announced Wednesday, comes a week and a half after SAG’s national board approved sending out the deal — without a recommendation — to four member caucuses in Chicago, Hollywood, New York and San Francisco.

Opposition emerged at the Hollywood member caucus on Tuesday night over the “atmospheric” provisions allowing employers to use actors to perform up to 20 voices of up to 300 words at the daily base rate — viewed by some as signifying a major reduction from the current pact.

“From the actor’s point of view, this is a lousy contract — particularly in the multiple voices area,” said Peter Kwong, whose work on vidgames includes “Narc” and “GoldenEye: Rogue Agent.” “I’m encouraging AFTRA members to vote this down.”

Kwong said the question of a strike wasn’t discussed at the Hollywood meeting.

Witlin called the rejection “unfortunate,” noting that the offer would pay thesps a day rate of $782 for four hours of work. He added that the “atmospheric” provision represents a way for actors to get more work over the long run.

SAG’s rejection may doom an effort by negotiators to synch up the expiration dates and terms of the pacts for SAG and AFTRA. Negotiators for AFTRA and the Screen Actors Guild reached separate deals with similar terms with vidgame employers on Oct. 2. AFTRA’s deal is a 15-month extension of the current pact that expires on Dec. 31.

SAG and AFTRA have said the deals — which had been negotiated separately during the past year — achieved parity between the AFTRA and SAG contracts. If ratified, both deals would expire on March 30, 2011.

The unions said the contracts contain a 3% wage hike for SAG to match AFTRA’s current deal and an additional 2.5% increase on April 1 for both unions.

Other key points: a 0.5% increase in the pension and health contribution rate for SAG members and an additional 0.2% next year for both unions, bringing the total rate to 15%; the establishment of a $100 liquidated damage per job for failure to give notice of vocally stressful work and agreement to develop a set of guidelines for conducting vocally stressful work; and a cap of $125,000 on contributions to the AFTRA Health and Retirement and SAG Pension and Health funds for performers paid more than $125,000 by a single producer in a single year for work done on the same game franchise.

Source: http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118010505.html?categoryid=1079&cs=1

By Heidi Schooler

The interactive-gaming industry has rapidly grown into one of the biggest forms of entertainment today. As the public continues to crave new video-game titles with more-original ideas, voiceover actors will be expected to be on their game to meet the continual expansion. I recently had the chance to ask Todd Resnick, casting executive of Resnick Interactive Development and founder and CEO of Gamecues Corp., about this important voiceover field.