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VOICE ARTS AWARDS
Entries Open for 2nd Annual Voice Arts

Awards
, And Gala Site Travels To Hollywood
June 5, 2015

(VOXtra) - Entries are now being accepted for the 2nd Annual Voice Arts Awards competition, honoring top creative talents in the voice over world.

And the Voice Arts Awards Gala, where winners will be announced and celebrated, travels to the Pacific Design Center in Hollywood on November 15, from last year's New York City debut.

Created and presented by the Society of Voice Arts and Sciences™ (SOVAS), the competition is open to voice actors, producers, directors, copywriters, marketing executives, talent agents, casting directors, audio engineers and "others who sustain, create and produce media," notes Rudy Gaskins, Chairman and CEO of SOVAS, a non-profit organization.

"The inaugural contest was extraordinary (see the 2014 winners), but the interest this year has already surpassed expectations," Gaskins says. "It's an exciting time, and there's no restraint on what we can do as an industry."

Among what's new this year: nine Spanish categories - up from a single overall category last year, and a Spoken Word Performance category that covers storytelling, prose, poetry, and speeches.

Competition entries may be submitted online only, at www.VoiceArts.org. Submission deadlines are June 30 - Super Early Bird; July 31 - 2 Early Bird; and August 15 - Final.

WHAT IS ELIGIBLE?

According to the Voice Arts website, this year's contest entries "must have been aired, broadcast, published or otherwise made available to the public or B2B (business to business) constituents between January 1, 2014 and June 30, 2015.

About B2B, the site clarifies: "An instructional video intended only for the employees of a given company would fall under the definition of B2B and is therefore eligible for submission."

And "Demo Reel" entries are exempt from the eligibility dates. "However," SOVAS notes, "Demo Reels will be judged according to contemporary, professional expectations for today's marketplace."

With a note that the list is "not exhaustive," the award categories listed at the site include:
  • National TV (Commercials, Promos, PSAs, Narration, Sales)
  • Local TV (Commercials, Promos, PSAs, Narration, Sales)
  • Radio (Commercials, Promos, PSAs)
  • Video Game
  • Animation
  • Narration
  • Trailer
  • Audio Book (in many separate genres)
  • Political
  • Consumer Sales Video
  • Instructional
  • Demo Reel
  • Voiceover Podcast
Also according to the website, this year's competition judges include:
  • Barbara Ransom, voice actor, director, writer, producer (English and Spanish)
  • Cedering Fox, voice of the Oscars (2013 and 2014), Artistic Director of Word Theatre, featured in Secrets of Voiceover Success book
  • Dave Fennoy, award-winning voice actor and voice over teacher
  • David Lewis, writer, producer, director, owner of David Lewis Creative Radio, and VOX: Chicago Voicecasting
  • Denise Woods, voice actor, actor, speech/diction and dialect coach
  • Frank Rodriguez, voice actor, actor, producer, translator (English and Spanish)
The Voice Arts Gala on November 15 conveniently shares the weekend with the SOVAS-sponsored That's Voiceover™ career day, also at the Pacific Design Center in Hollywood, on November 14.

"The voice over community has traditionally been thought of as just the actors and a few ancillary folks who sell and service equipment or teach," says Gaskins. " What we've always done as organizers, and now as SOVAS, is to use our programs to aggressively connect the universe of professionals within which voice acting exists as an influence and a service."

SOVAS Board member and voice actor/author/coach Joan Baker adds:

"What's interesting is that the Voice Arts™ Awards, like That's Voiceover!™, has voice acting at its core, but producers, casting directors, writers and audio engineers can also enter into their own categories on the merit of their specific crafts. They too are judged by experts in their fields."

For more about the Voice Arts Awards program and to enter, please visit: www.VoiceArts.org.

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