The BM-800 Microphone
An inexpensive microphone set up for the budding voice actor… You’re welcome.
Hi there, my name is Ore A. and I run a part time voiceover business. In brief, a voiceover is the voice you hear behind adverts (radio, tv,), e-learning, YouTube Videos, audiobooks, telephone prompts, automated supermarket checkout machines, cartoons and animations etc. The person who has the voice and puts it to use in the ways mentioned, is a voiceover artist, sometimes also called a voice actor or simply voice artist. It’s an exciting job and I really enjoy doing it. The pay is decent too!
One of the barriers to entry for getting into voiceover business is the cost of setting up a recording space and buying equipment like microphones, mixers, headphones etc. Today, I wanted to share with you a little gem I found that might help someone looking to get into voiceovers.
Microphones can sometimes cost a few hundred dollars and other times thousands of dollars. Though the cost may look high, one has to look at it as an investment that would pay off itself over time. However, you can start off small and build up with time.
That being said, I came across a microphone, whilst roaming through the corridors of YouTube voiceover videos, called the BM-800 microphone. YouTubers said it was pretty cheap, but I wondered about the quality. I then listened to a YouTuber run a few tests on the BM-800 microphone and I thought to myself, this microphone actually doesn’t sound that bad. I decided to purchase one from amazon and test it out myself. It cost me only £8 (eight pounds). I could not believe it! It came with a table stand, XLR to 3.5mm cable, a small sound card, pop filter and wind puff. The video above shows my first impressions of the BM-800 microphone. In the video below I run through different setups you can try to improve the sound quality you can get from this microphone. Enjoy!
