Remote Directed Voice Sessions: Source-Connect, Zoom, Listento
Two audio paths, not one
Every remote directed session at 24K has two audio paths, and it helps to keep them separate in your head.
The first is the recording. The talent stands in the Studio A booth on a Neumann U87 or Warm Audio WA-87, the engineer sets the chain for that voice from the Neve 1073SPX or Universal Audio SOLO/610 and the Apollo interfaces, and the take is captured on the studio machine at full resolution. Nothing about the remote link touches that file.
The second is the monitoring and talkback path: what you hear in your headphones in another city, and how your notes get back to the engineer and the talent. This is the part Source-Connect, Zoom, Listento and Google Meet handle, and the four of them do it to very different standards.
If you take one thing from this page: the platform decides what you hear during the session, not what you get delivered. Pick it for how much you need to judge in real time.
Source-Connect
Source-Connect is the broadcast industry’s point-to-point link. It sends the studio’s audio to you as a high-quality stream, with a talkback channel back the other way, and it is built for exactly this job: a director or producer listening to a voice take from another room and calling the next one.
What it is good for: anything where you need to approve performance and technical quality on the call. Broadcast spots with an agency on the line, ADR where you need to judge sync against picture, a client who wants to sign off before the talent leaves the booth.
Trade-offs: it needs a licence and a working install at your end, or the browser-based version with a compatible setup, and a network that lets it through. That is a ten-minute check the day before, not a surprise at 9:00 AM. Latency is a fraction of a second on a good connection: enough that you would not try to perform along with the talent, not enough to get in the way of direction.
Listento
Listento streams the output of the studio’s DAW to a browser link. You open the link, you hear what the engineer hears, at a quality well above a video call, with a lossless option if your connection can carry it.
What it is good for: listening. If the job is to hear the take close to full quality and give notes, and you do not need a broadcast-grade return path, Listento gets you there with nothing to install. It is also the simplest way to put three or four stakeholders on a listen without configuring each of them.
Trade-offs: it is a listening stream, one direction. Your notes come back another way, usually a phone line or a Zoom or Meet window running alongside, and the engineer relays them to the booth. At its highest quality setting it carries a little more delay than Source-Connect. The two are not a like-for-like swap.
Zoom and Google Meet
Both are video-call tools with audio compressed and processed for speech. Voices are cleaned, levelled and gated on the way to you. Good for a conversation, poor for judging a take: you will not hear the room, a click, mouth noise or a sibilant at anything like its real level, and both platforms will sometimes duck a breath or a soft consonant as if it were background noise.
What they are good for: direction. Seeing the talent’s face, reading a line back, talking through a pronunciation, keeping a client comfortable who has never sat in on a session. With original sound switched on, Zoom improves noticeably. Meet offers less control over its processing.
Trade-offs: do not sign off on technical quality from a video-call feed. Use it to direct, then approve from a reference file at a break, or pair it with Listento for the listening side.
Which one, in one line each
- Source-Connect: you need to approve performance and technical quality live, and your end can support it.
- Listento: you need to hear the take properly and can give notes on a separate call.
- Zoom: you need to direct and see, and you will approve from files.
- Google Meet: same as Zoom, when the client’s IT only allows Meet.
Hybrids are normal. Listento for ears and Meet for faces is a common pairing, and it needs nothing more than a second browser tab.
How the session is set up
When you ask for a quote, say which platform you want and who will be on the line: the director, the client, the agency producer. Send the script, the spec (file naming, slate wording, loudness target, sample rate if it is not 48 kHz) and any reference reads. Corporate work is quoted per project, and a scoped quote comes back within one business day.
Ask for a line check before the booked start, from the same laptop and headphones you will direct on. The usual culprits are a firewall or a Bluetooth headset, and both are easier to find at 8:45 than at 9:05.
In the room, an in-house engineer runs the session. The booth has sightlines straight through to the desk, so the engineer is looking at the talent rather than a screen, and the talent has a person in front of them, not only a camera. You are in their headphones on talkback. The engineer handles slates, take numbering and pickups, and keeps a running pickup list so nothing you flagged gets lost.
One practical note on hours. 24K is open 9:00 AM to 2:00 AM, seven days a week, including holidays. For a client in London or Los Angeles, or a producer who needs a pickup on a Sunday before a Monday air date, that matters more than the platform choice.
What you hear, and what you get
What you hear during the session depends on the link, as above. What you get does not.
Delivery is WAV at 48 kHz / 24-bit as standard, or whatever your pipeline needs. MP3s, split files, slates and loudness to broadcast standard are available on request. Files are named to your traffic department’s or pipeline’s spec, which means you send the spec. Stereo and mono only; the studio does not deliver Atmos.
If you directed over Zoom or Meet, listen to the delivered files before you sign off. It is a small step, and it removes the one real weakness of directing over a video call.
Talk to the studio
24K Studios is at 550 Queen St E, Toronto, at the corner of Queen Street East and River Street on the 501 streetcar line. Phone (647) 389-6649 or email info@24kstudios.ca with the script and spec.
Questions people ask
Does the remote platform affect the quality of the delivered files?
No. The take is recorded on the studio machine at full resolution regardless of the link. Source-Connect, Listento, Zoom and Google Meet only change what you hear during the session and how your notes reach the booth.
Can I direct a voice session over Zoom or Google Meet?
Yes. Both work well for direction and for seeing the talent, but their audio is compressed and processed for speech, so approve technical quality from a reference file or the delivered WAVs rather than from the call.
What do I need at my end for a Source-Connect session?
A Source-Connect licence and working install, or the browser-based version with a compatible setup, plus a network that allows it through. Test it before the booked start from the same computer and headphones you will direct on.
What format are remote voice session files delivered in?
WAV at 48 kHz / 24-bit as standard, or whatever your pipeline needs, with MP3s, split files, slates and broadcast-standard loudness on request. Files are named to your spec. Stereo and mono only; no Atmos.
Can a remote session be booked outside business hours or on a weekend?
Yes. 24K Studios is open 9:00 AM to 2:00 AM, seven days a week, including holidays, which suits clients in other time zones and pickups on short notice.
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