News

The busy Autumn continues at the central London recording studio.  We’ve been beavering on with the English version of the iconic German game Book of Unwritten Tales, with collaborative translation and writing live online across three time zones and working with a great cast. We’ve also been finishing off  the recording for Driver San Francisco, as well as elements of SOCOM 4.

Then just when we thought we’d be winding down for Christmas, along come four more exciting new productions that will keep us on our toes into 2011. This is the kind of down-turn we like. Happy Christmas to all.

It’s been a  busy year with PlayStation Move launch titles for Sony, the reclaimed Driver franchise back in the creative hands of the Edmundsons and Ubisoft: Driver San Francisco. There’s been Trine II, Dead Nation, more Anno, adventures and humour, sport and getting The Witcher, Assasins of Kings demo and E3 trailers wrapped.

The next quarter’s production calendar is under wraps, as usual, but the live tech that makes working at the OM London studio so exciting for writers, directors and actors has gone live for the first time with a trans global script team. Three time zones collaborating live and buzzing on what we hope will be a humorous adventure up there with Monkey Island and Wallace & Gromit.

Next year will see the launch of an updated website. At last we’ve taken the plunge and have decided to join the rat race and do away with this old antique.  We’re also considering rebranding. When we dreamt up the name Outsource Media in 1996 outsourcing was not an established industry verb. Now it’s synonymous with art houses so we’re at the cusp of becoming OM… perhaps.

just say OM & relax.

We were nominated for the 2010 Develop Award for Audio Outsourcer of the year. This is the third year we’ve been nominated and in true form we were sidelined. Pun intended.

Develop Link

TIGA, the trade association representing the UK games industry, today announced Outsource Media as its newest direct member.

Outsource Media was founded in 1996 by Mark Estdale, one of the UK’s most experienced casting and dialogue directors working in the games industry. Outsource Media provides a creative full dialogue production service from scriptwriting and adaptation, casting, recording and post production to localisation. They also produce bespoke sound design and music. The company has recording studios in London and the North of England and a team in Los Angeles. Outsource Media have worked on hundreds of game titles from the Tales of Monkey Island to keenly awaited launch titles for Sony’s PlayStation Move.

Mark Estdale, Director at Outsource Media explains: “Outsource Media’s focus has always been on bringing best audio practice in TV, film, music and radio production to games. We are innovating at the cutting edge of development and facilitating truly cost effective high production values content. We are pushing the creative boundaries in dialogue production, establishing new, exciting, liberating and cost sensitive production methods.”

On joining TIGA Mark adds: “The TIGA community and TIGA events provide valuable and vibrant forums for networking and creative discussion with industry peers. Furthermore, for any industry to survive and flourish I believe it is essential to have a strong and committed trade body that can tackle key issues and effectively advance the industry’s agenda to Government, media and other stakeholders.”

Richard Wilson TIGA CEO welcomed Outsource Media to TIGA: “Outsource Media offer a wealth of experience and skill to any TIGA member looking to fully harness the power of great dialogue in their games. Outsource Media is also an example of a UK games company that is hugely successful internationally, working for clients in the US, Japan and Europe and creating jobs and wealth here in the UK. We welcome Outsource Media to TIGA.”

View TIGA Press Release

Mark Estdale does a candid Q&A with John Keefer for Game Culture.com. See also The Escapist: Developers need to cast actors sooner.

Mark Estdale: "From my experience the teams that produce good voice work are simply those lead by senior decision makers who are passionate about, and understand the power of voice (and audio) and they factor into their schedules and their budgets what is needed to facilitate results. They know."

Download a PDF copy of the Q&A here.
 

Mark Estdale was interviewed along with Side’s Andy Emery and David Sobolov by Keith Stewart for the Guardian Gamesblog.

"Mark Estdale, director at casting and voice recording agency, Outsource Media, has been working for ten years on a system to provide voice over actors with a quick-n-dirty frame of reference for their characterisations.

"What the actor needs is something at the point of performance that they can react to," he explains. "To provide that, you need to throw away all previous script models. What we’ve done is build a database that can actually emulate game engine behaviours and recalls for the actor any kind of pertinent information – visuals from the game, audio, other actors’ lines – and it’s all instant recall. So you get the actor in the studio and when they’re in the zone you hit them with this radical system – it’s all on screen in front of them, and they’re getting all the cues they’d get in the theatre or on a film production, they’re not reliant on trying to figure out what the heck’s going on."

"Actors need to be cast when the developer is starting the design process. I’m working on one production now where we’re there really early in development, and the whole cast is involved – they’re giving voices to the characters as they’re being designed."

"I am thrilled to announce that Mark Estdale, highly respected voice casting director and producer in the video games industry, has agreed to be our guest speaker for our AGM. I am also very pleased that this event will be held at Central School of Speech and Drama in their New Studio. This event will be taking place on Wednesday March 17th 2010 from 6.30 – 8.30pm so consider this an early warning and get it in your diaries now."

"The more things change …the more they stay the same. Outsource Media UK’s Mark Estdale looks at how the audio scene has changed in the past decade, and how it’s still fighting the same battles now…"

Not quite fighting the same battles but still there are battles to be fought…

View Article

Outsource Media have been contracted to record various voice elements for the iconic franchise for Telltale Games.

Mark Estdale, voice and casting director at Outsource Media, said "It was the craftsmanship in Day of the Tentacle, Sam & Max Hit the Road  and Full Throttle that seduced me into this industry in the first place, so it’s a real honour to now be working with Mike Stemmle and so many of the legendary Lucas Arts team that hooked me back in the early 90’s.

The humour, the characters and the rich writing have us once again chuckling our way through sessions."

Outsource Media will be participating in Europe’s largest trade fair, Gamescom,  which will this year be held in Cologne in Germany from August 19-21. OM will be in Hall 4.2 on Stand J22.