voiceover narration

Voiceover Read Rate, and How Improving It Increases Your Bottom Line

What the heck is a read rate? As a voiceover artist, your read rate is the difference between the length of your raw voiceover file and the length of your finished, edited one. And if you do any long form narration, it’s something to strive to ever improve. For example, if it takes you three hours to read one hour of finished text, your read rate is 3:1. Chatting with several colleagues recently – professional VO’s who’ve been in it for 5 or 6 years, I discovered that for the majority of them (all of them making a decent living), this is their read rate. But there are a few of us, present company included, who read at a rate of 1.2:1 or better. A tight read rate means your narration business is much more profitable. Your costs per hour and your opportunity to increase your bottom line is greatly enhanced. want to make more money? Have more time? Let’s break this down.

Voiceover Read Rate Case Study

Let’s examine an imaginary case for read rate. Say you just booked a job at the eLearning narration rate of$1200 for a finished hour. If your read rate is 3:1, it will take you 3 hours to narrate and 6-7 hours to edit those 3 hours. So that means you spend 10 hours to produce that one hour of finished product, and you will be working at a rate of $120 an hour. Not bad. But it can be better. For the same job, with a read rate of 1.2 hours of raw to 1 hour finished, not only does it takes you less time to read, but it also takes you less time to edit. 1.2 hours plus 2 to 2.8 (to keep my math simple) to edit and it now took you 4 hours to produce an hour instead of 10 hours. You are now working at $300 an hour. Nice! Those extra 6 hours can be filled with more time to audition and narrate, or time to market or improve your craft or hit the gym. Sub out your editing to a good sound editor and your time/money profit increases further.

Getting Paid to Improve Your Read Rate

Unlike a lot of things in the current voiceover market, a tight read rate is one area where having a few years of experience reading the news live on TV or radio really helps. As well as several years as a DJ and a newsreader, I worked the six o’clock supper hour news shows at two major market networks, and a third national cable station doing weather. They had different approaches to presentation but the CBC gig was the one that really improved my read rate. For CTV and the Weather Network, our weather presentations were totally improvised. You fed the numbers and maps to the control room, stayed up to date with any changes to the forecast, and built your 5 minute presentation around the boards and maps unscripted. The CBC format demanded that I type up my forecast ahead of time to feed it to the teleprompter. Working with a prompter doing weather, helped in so many ways. While anchors and reporters have a more stylized sound, weather people don’t. Ad-libbing, right? You have to make it sound like you’re not reading. In that way, weather people are kind of the equivalent of TV DJ’s (minus the cool factor). So even though I was reading, I had to make it sound like I wasn’t. The biggest giveaway? Flubbing a line as I read. We just don’t do that in real life. One thing that greatly added to making sure I didn’t muff my lines was the pressure I put on myself to sound flawless. What helped create that pressure cooker? Heightened concentration.

Taking Your Read Rate to the Next Level

Since leaving TV and radio (over 20 years ago) I’ve been a full-time pretty-much-constantly-working VO artist. Before technology disruption made it affordable for us to create our own home studios, my motivation for improving my read rate was saving my clients studio time, aka money. This made me a popular client choice and fostered a lot of repeat business. The texts given were always read cold (without having seen them before). A visual artist friend of mine talks about the years it takes to build the eye-hand coordination to be able to faithfully (re)produce images (in her case paintings). There’s a brain connection that has to be exercised regularly to make it happen. It takes time and concentrated effort to forge it, but then once that connection has been created, it’s pretty much like a Roman built road. It’s permanent. In breaking down my own process to do the same with voiceover, I’ve gathered a small, but effective compendium of techniques to be able to improve eye-mouth co-ordination which I’ll be sharing at my X session Narration 2.0 at VO Atlanta 2019.

If you’ve already signed up, looking forward to working with you. And if you haven’t, there are only a couple spots left. See you there!

Determining Rates: A Formula for a Simple Voice Over Pricing Guide

Voiceover Business

Female Voice Over actors Event — At Uncle Roy’s with Shelley Avellino, Dearbhla Trainor, Laura Schreiber & David Toback

While eating cake in Uncle Roy Yokelson’s Jersey living room this past weekend at the 13^th Annual VO Barbecue, I tossed out this blog idea to Dan Leonard, George Whitham, Brad Newman, and a few others and got a thumbs up. So here goes. I am about to stir the pot. Having been a full-time voiceover artist for over 25 years, I am very passionate about voiceover rates, have heaps of experience in what constitutes industry-standard voiceover rates and (obvi) a lot of opinions. What has been bothering me is a lack of clarity around where different talent price themselves vis a vis their particular pecking order and ta-dah! I have a solution for that.

Union Voice Over Rates

Firstly, it’s an excellent idea to become familiar with SAG/AFTRA, ACTTRA or Equity pricing. Union rates have been negotiated between producers and entities that represent the performers. Having sat on some of the committees elected to participate in these great discussions I can say coming to agreements are long and arduous. One thing people always seem to forget is that these negotiated rates are the basement in pricing. One should not ever work for anything lower than what has been negotiated, and with talent, experience and demand, one can negotiate higher rates.

Non-Union Voice Over Rates

In the expanding world of non-union voice over rates, the debate is great on how much to charge for voiceover work. If you partake in any form of non-union voice work, I caution you to avoid a desperate race to the bottom in order to continue to get your share of the pie in our market. There lies the path of fiverr, burn out and not being able to sustain a healthy career in VO. That being said, how you price your voice work is not one size fits all. Yes, look at some of the rate guides that are out there, but also check each other out. A lot of us are now posting our rates on our sites. Survey some of the better talent and constantly working talent to determine what that might be.

5 Pricing Factors to Determine Your Rate

Our art is a craft. Some of us craft better than others. Some have chosen to polish one aspect above another. Not every voice actor is equal. But then not every job is equal either. How do you sort out what to charge? Inspired by a copy writer friend, Steve Roller, I give you the factors to take into account when sorting out what you should charge for a particular job. First of all, go through these and rate yourself 1-3 (low, medium, high). Keep track of your numbers & I’ll tell you what to do with them further down.

Your Voice Over Experience

Are you’re a beginner or a seasoned pro? How long have you been at this? Are you full time or are you working at something else to support your voiceover habit? How long have you been able to write “voice actor” as your job on your tax forms? Have you won awards or been in any stand-out or high profile series or jobs? If you are not yet full-time or have been full time in VO less than 3 years, give yourself a 1. If you’ve been making 6 figures for more than 10 years, give yourself a 3.

Your Perceived Voice Over Value

How do people see you in the market? Not your peers, but your clients. Are you known? Have you done something remarkable and do you promote it? What does your reel sound like? What does your web site look like? Is your YT or Vimeo Channel full of samples of what you’ve done? What is your social media presence? How many connections do you have on LinkedIn, or followers on Facebook or Instagram? Are you one of the go-to talents in your city? Your country? 1-3. Mark it down.

Your Actual Voice Over Value

Strip everything away and ask yourself honestly, how good are you? What feedback have you received about your craft from your clients? And how good in their industry are those clients? Are you working on triple A video games or is your income mostly from games produced in countries with developing economies? Have you ever won or been nominated for an award, or do you have dozens under your belt? Below, average or above? 1, 2, or 3?

Your Geography in the Voice Over World

How expensive is the city in which you live? New Yorkers and SoCal people have high rents/mortgages. You guys live in the 3. Whereas if you live in Greenville, SC, Omaha, NB or in Canada (like me) things cost less. Jot down a 1.

Your Hunger for Voice Over Work

Are you crazy busy this week? Do you have a mammoth project in your inbox that you need to set aside time to prepare? Have you met all your financial targets for the last couple of quarters? Then you, my friend, are happily not that hungry for voice over work right now. Give yourself a 3. But if you haven’t booked yet this week (or this month), you qualify for a 1.

Figuring Out Your Own VO Rates

Old Fashioned cash register voice over rates — Source: Alvaro Reyes

If you’ve added all your numbers up, you have something between 5 and 15. Multiply that by .1 So a newbie will be at .5 and an Award winning, 25+ year pro (like yours truly) will have a 1.5 Here’s where the magic happens. Now go back to your guide whether it’s the Union rates or non-Union (which are actually about the same) and multiply their suggested rate by your personal number of .5 to 1.5 SO, if your tally was 1.1 and the suggested rate is $500, you can with clear conscience (and data to back your decision), comfortably charge $550. If your tally was .8, your rate might be $400.

Variability in Voice Over Rates

Why shouldn’t we all just stick with the rate as-is? Same reason my narration rate doesn’t match Sigourney Weaver’s. We’re not all at the same point in our careers. I was a full time radio announcer for 4 years before I became a member of the Union. Those 4 years and the increasing quality of the work I did within them gained me access to qualify for Union rates. Before that, I may have thought my work was as good as. But it wasn’t. I wrote this because of so many friends and colleagues with lesser degrees of talent/experience who aspire to charge suggested rates, but aren’t there yet. It’s also for the multitude of experienced, talented voice artists who should be charging more. A lot more. Know your worth. Know the market. Price yourself accordingly.

I will now remove myself from the soap box I have been spouting and ask for your comments. What do you think? Rates are a hotbed in terms of topics. I’ve pulled the covers back. Want to climb in?

How to Shoot Your Voiceover Career in the Foot – VO’s Worst Practices

Voiceover Business

If you ever get a chance to help out in any casting project, take it. Whether you sign up as a reader for a day, get an summer internship at a casting house or even volunteer to answer phones, being on the other side of the proverbial casting couch gives you an unparalleled vantage point and insight into what separates the bookable from the floundering.

As a voice over artist with a long, successful career, I’ve tracked my slow season. January and July are my quietest months. So when a panicked long-term client reached out to me this summer with an unorthodox project, I had time, resources and expertise to help them out. What transpired over the next month was an insightful case study in how other (about 150 other) voice over artists behave in the context of a job. I have cast multiple voice over projects in the past, but they were generally small – one or two mostly, occasionally up to a dozen. But this huge job put me in a unique position on the hiring side of the voiceover proposition. Snuggle up, buttercup, I’m going to share the good, the bad and the fugly in this week’s bloggy wog.

The 4 Second Audition Rule

Multiple esteemed sources in our industry say casting directors only listen to the first few seconds of my audition. Guys? It is so true. I fought against it. I gave the first three or four, ten seconds before clicking to the next. The truth is when faced with over 50 auditions to listen to, unless your engager has no idea what they want or perhaps, they want to hear you come in tight on a :15 or :30, they make their casting decision in the first 4 seconds. If you can’t nail it and grab their attention off the top, you won’t do it for their audience either. Those who delivered in the first 4 seconds, made it to my short list.

Talent is key

There is no replacement for talent. Natural talent is rare. There’s only one Jennifer Lawrence. For the rest of us, there is talent enhancement! If you’re not booking the way you want to, it’s probably because you need to work on your craft. Even the best of us continue to get coaching, do improv, stand-up, scene study, work with dialect coaches, etc. Your lack of care to your craft is obvious when compared to the 50 others in an audition. Find someone more successful than you and ask where they trained, who they coached with, for how long and for how much.

Do Adhere to and Deliver on Instructions

Take the time to read the instructions. Don’t jump into a read too quickly at the expense of not fulfilling a requirement. If they’ve asked for inspirational and you’ve given them conversational, you’ve missed the mark. Unless you do conversational as a Take 2 and give them that for variety to display your range.

Get Your Sound Quality Right

sound waves Kim Handysides voice over professional — Source: Avid Blogs

Shortcuts in your sound quality are glaring in a string of others who’ve spent the time and money to get it right. Listen back to your sound and compare it to the sound of others in the field who book regularly. If you can’t identify what’s wrong, enlist help. Befriend sound engineers and booth gurus. Listen to podcasts. Ask sound equipment suppliers. Play with your room. One piece of equipment I stumbled upon that I heartily endorse is the VOMO portable sound booth. A lightweight construction of sound absorbing material, it gives you an effective room in a pinch.

Client Communication

Keep your introduction brief. In my huge casting project, faced with so many voice over talents from which to choose (over 100), my eyes flashed over the accompanying letter that came with audition submission like lightning. My primary interest was being able to communicate with them off site (yes, I went through a couple of pay to play for some talents) to be able to go back and forth easier, quicker.

After being hired, despite my request to communicate via email, (and the fact that this particular site had no qualms about leaving it once initial contact was made) many talents kept communicating through the site. This left me wasting time sifting through endless threads (with other people attached to the same thread. I found that frustrating and made me not want to hire those people again. Follow instructions.

Be polite. On this particular job, the budget was low. I knew that going in. I mentioned it in the specs. It was an unusual job – not for broadcast – with a better rate than audiobook, but not much else. So, I found it annoying when people told me what I already knew. Don’t waste my time arguing.

A Related Voice Demo

Although it was for pretty much always only about 4-6 seconds, I did listen to related voice demos that talents sent me, as well as the audition. I wanted to hear what else they could do. And I noticed two incidents where I would have done it differently. Some people sent a second take as their related generic demo. That was a waste of time. Unless otherwise specified, second takes go on the submitted demo.

Invoicing/Payment Issues

Invoice me right away if you like. Then it’s off your list and on to mine. But understand if your client needs to clear some other things off their desk before they get to you. Two talents in this great big job asked for payment up front – as in, before they sent the files. That’s your prerogative – I do this with clients from certain countries – I’ve only never been paid twice in 30 years. One was some guy in the Ukraine. One was a Union gig, and my stewards gave up after 3 years with no luck. But know that for people in North America asking to be paid before you do the work risks you not getting hired again. Many clients (including me in the mega-project) are only getting paid after the job has been produced/integrated/approved/and the client’s check has cleared/at the end of the job. So if you ask to be paid up front, I have to bank roll you out of pocket. It’s all about cash flow.

Voiceover Company Name Problems

Want to make it difficult for me to find you again or to pay you for the job? Name your company something other than your own name. Your face is your brand. Your name is your brand. Period. End. It makes it so difficult for your client if your company name is Fairy Dust Voice Talent and your name is Joe Guy. Especially if you don’t indicate the connection in your communications somehow. Be found. Use your name. Keep it simple, sweetheart.

My biggest lesson learned? I will not go seeking work as a casting agent. That shizzle is tough! Casting pro’s, production co-ordinators, agents…they work hard for their percentage. Thank heavens we’re not all the same. I’ll stick to performance, thank you very much.

Voice Over Portfolio: Why We Love Morgan Freeman

Famous Voiceovers, Voiceover Styles

Oh, the honeyed gravitas. Languid and relaxed. Soothing and warm. There’s that dominant, strong male sound, with a nice low pitch, but it’s grounded and non-threatening. When Morgan Freeman does voiceover you feel like you’re in good hands, er…tones. We can’t get enough. And neither can our clients. Ever wondered why?

A STUDY

Casey Klofstad did. He’s an associate professor of political science at the University of Miami. A year or so ago he conducted a study involving political ads. He found kind of what you instinctively already knew. Lower-voiced individuals (like Morgan Freeman but this apparently applies to both male and female voices) give us the impression of integrity, competence and physical power.
WHAT HE’S DONE

Except for an early stint in the air force, Morgan’s been an actor most of his life. He did his first credited voice over for the documentary, The Civil War, in 1990. Since then he’s done countless documentaries including American Masters and the March of the Penguins. I don’t know about you, but the movie that made me sit up and take notice was probably Shawshank Redemption, where the casting director and director wisely departed from the written character of an Irishman for Red gave the role to Freeman.

We’ve seen him in A Raisin in the Sun and Driving Miss Daisy. His winning Oscar was for Million Dollar Baby, but he was nominated in several others. We loved him as God in Bruce Almighty. Since then we’ve heard him replace Walter Cronkite’s voice for the intro to CBS news (2010), narrate the summer Olympics and announce for campaign for Hilary Clinton’s campaign. He’s done a few VO’s for commercials, gaming and has become so iconic, his likeness has been on everything from South Park to a character in Drawception, a Pictionary/Broken Telephone sort of game where he’s been morphed into Godzilla. Morganzilla.

FUN STUFF

Happily, not one to take himself too seriously, he also pokes fun at the art of narration in a gentle loving way. As a deity would. Jimmy Kimmel thought asking Freeman to narrate a random fellow caught on camera with a selfie stick would be good entertainment and it was brilliant.

Everyone’s life would probably be more interesting with Morgan Freeman narrating it. Mark Zuckerburg thought so. Or thought a variation of that would be interesting. So he asked Freeman to be the voice featured on Jarvis, Zuckerberg’s artificial intelligence assistant. He also licensed his voice to Waze to coincide with the release of the film London has Fallen.

HIS TONE

Analyzing the why of our love for his sound, some people have said it’s familiar, as in we’ve heard it on so many things. But Morgan doesn’t risk over exposure. Actually, that’s one of the benefits of voice acting. Your sound doesn’t burn as quickly as your face. Or so they say. Others point out that nice maple rich tone. Still others say it’s his confidence. Confident people don’t shout and rail. They don’t have to. They speak low and quiet.

I think it has a lot to do with his delivery. When the stakes are raised, he comes across as passionate, but it’s contained. Even his intensity is relaxed. Intimate. Like he’s sitting next to you in your living room. Or better yet, the back porch. Arms stretched out on either side. Gazing at the countryside while he spins his tale.

GET YOUR MORGAN ON

Voice actors often get references of how the client envisions the sound of their project. Male actors see a lot of vocal references to the great Morgan. The man himself has this advice for actors: “If you’re looking to improve the sound of your voice, yawn a lot. It relaxes your throat muscles. It relaxes your vocal chords. And as soon as they relax, the tone drops. The lower your voice is, the better you sound.”

Stephan Allard. a Quebec actor I often work with played him once for a dubbed version of an ad for Bailey’s Irish Cream. Guy Nadon, another actor in my hometown has dubbed Morgan Freeman 23 times, in French for the Quebec market. About this, Nadon says it’s not so much about the voice as that he heavily leans on Freeman’s attitude and performance.

If you really want to get your own Morgan on, don’t try to sound just like him. But do take cues from him. He’s unique. Yes, but so are you. No one has your voice or your delivery.

He’s confident. Damn straight. So why shouldn’t you be? No one can be or deliver like you, better than you.

He’s comfortable. This is technique and head space. Your head must be in a good space, before you can project this. A director friend of mine once said of her impression in working with Robert Redford, “The man is just so comfortable in his own skin.” My notion on where that comes from? Introspection. It’s a mindset. Call it the Morgan mindset, if you want.

A sucker for corny humor and pitiful puns, one of my fav Morgan Freeman quotes is, “I gravitate toward gravitas.” I also love about him that his concern for the honeybee decline led him to hobby beekeeping with 24 hives. But my favorite sentiment from Freeman is his controversial statement about Black Month history. Anyone who puts forth a platform of erasing lines of difference in status between us because of race or color has my vote. Whether we’re voting for Voice of God or godzilla.

I’m a female voice actor who’s tapped into my inner Morgan Freeman for everything from documentaries to web commercials. What’s your favorite Morgan Freeman VO?

How to Make Spectacular Commercial Voice Overs

Voiceover Styles, Voiceovers Completed

So, it helps to have talent. Obvi, as my kid would say. (Insert age appropriate eye roll here) And a few technical things too, like training, practice and timing. But more than that, the secret sauce in how to make spectacular commercial voiceovers is a recipe of love, understanding and respect. Let me break this down.

Love the ad

Since I was a little girl, talking to myself in the mirror, telling myself about Scope or Crest or Johnson’s Baby Shampoo I have loved ads. I started out loving them more than cartoons Like the horrified text books used to predict, I couldn’t tell the difference between these mini-movies and regular programming. To me they seemed as entertaining as the cartoons (that I would also imitate). I don’t think you can do ads justice unless you do love them. If you don’t try to figure out why. Which brings me to the next insight.

Understand the ad

The voiceover often drives home the message of the ad. It shows who speaks for the brand and reflects the sound and image the company wants to portray. Few ads cling to an authority to present their info, more often the voiceover represents some cool new fact the average Jane or Joe is passing on to the average friend, namely, you. I think it’s also important not just to understand the ad you’re working on but seek understanding about ads in general. Why do we need them? Why are they important?

Respect the ad

Ads have incredible power. They stay with you, infiltrate your childhood, linger as jingles and catch phrases in your memory (“Got milk?” “Where’s the beef?”) And of course, they influence our buying behaviour, and our culture. Marshall McLuhan said advertising was the greatest art form of the 20^th century. And while ads constantly change, morphing into something more palatable to millennials, who do not trust anything that smacks of sell not tell, they will survive. They will adapt. They will evolve. After all, they are the brainchildren of one of the most adaptable creatures on earth, right?

Want a sample of what I’m talking about?

Here’s an ad I find easy to love, respect and understand. In the middle, it features my voiceover for the product, a cold medicine. The production company is Molio, a kickin’ it creative company in the MidWest. These people turn ads on their elbows and create serious entertainment. And their client was cool enough to buy into their concept. This is what I call winning in advertising.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znXBpotSORI

Saline Soothers Commercial for Walgreens & Rite Aid – Kim Handysides Voice Over (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znXBpotSORI)

Fun, with a capital F, right? It’s longer than a regularly formatted ad, but that’s ok. Fewer and fewer people are watching regularly formatted programming now anyway. It’s a mini-movie complete with a love triangle and bloopers at the end. It accomplishes what the best advertising sets out to do. It entertains, it makes you laugh, or smirk at the very least and it gets you to associate their product with the fun and the story. They’re not selling here. They’re telling. In a totally artful way.

Aren’t you lovin’ it?

I’m a veteran voice over artist who spits out spectacular commercial voice overs daily. Contact me if you’d like to work together. Or chat about anything aural.

Insider View Pt 2: 7 Secrets to Directing Your Voice Actors

Voiceover Coach, Voiceover Coaching

My Insider View Pt 2: Directing Voice Actors – 7 Freebie Secrets — Source: Deviant Art

You’ve been tasked with directing the audio on a commercial, a corporate video or gaming session. You know how you want it to sound, but are you certain you’ll be able to get that from your voice actor?

Actors are a touchy-feely, capricious lot. They are trained to observe and catalogue the behavior of others, be open to the moment, sound and appear truthful or believable and simultaneously tap into their rainbowed fount of expressive creativity.

The Power of Improv

Give your actor licence to play. Get a good take and a safety in the (sound) bank, then invite the actor to improvise. Ad-libbing around the script can unearth sparkling performances. Encourage them to roll into the script with lead-ins, toss in extra words and extros. These can all be edited out. But sometimes enhance the original script. A fellow actor I often work with in commercials is extremely proficient at this. He peppers his performance with Bruce-isms, often cranking up the funny, relevance and sheer entertainment value.

Grunts, Groans & Growls

Ask for non-verbal sounds. Sighs, moans, giggles, yips. These utterances are paralinguistics and add flavor and punch. Think of them as audible emojis. Welcome them. 7 % of human communication is in the form of words. 38% of our communication expressed through sound is non-verbal. Your voiceover actor’s sound scape will sound more realistic adorned with a few choice non-verbal sounds. Ask for lots, then use your judgement on what to keep and what to toss.

Actor W’s: Who, Who, Why and sometimes Where

Every actor needs to know three things going into a commercial, cartoon or any session. Who am I? Am I a businessman boarding a plane? A mom shuttling kids to soccer practice? A peer revealing the latest time saving technology at work? Who am I speaking to? My best friend? A colleague? And why? As in why is it important that I tell them this message of your project now? These are things that we all know in real life. Your actor needs that info, too. Some actors may make those choices themselves, but it is better for the director to understand and communicate that out of the gate. Where will it be shown/heard can also guide the actor. The delivery for a cartoon channel delivery will sound different from a self-help audiobook or a conference hall seating 2000. The “what” is the unfolding performance itself.

Cracking the Code

Your script is your brush and paint. Your marble and chisel. The tool you and the actor (and sound engineer) will use to create your audio end-product. You can help the actor interpret the script by pointing out certain words or phrases. Point out triplets and make sure the emphasis is not on the repeated words. Verbs are great places to lay emphasis, especially in a list. The creativity of both you and the actor may be taxed if the client weighs in and insists certain prominence be placed on words that are important to them. Sometimes the thrown away words are the ones that sell the most. What is not said in the script but could be implied in the scene is another layer of nuance and can often be as important as what is said.

Evil Line Reads

The worst thing a director can do is give an actor a line read. Meaning, tell the actor, ”Say it like this, Charlie:” and then attempt to deliver the line yourself. This is the mark of either a green or a shoddy director. At best, when you line read, you are doing the actor’s job for them. So, then why are directing? Why aren’t you acting? At worst, you are muddling through your own probably poor rendition of what you want, which does not inspire, may irritate and will probably confuse the actor. Your job is to motivate, guide or propel the actor toward a certain delivery. To do this, you need to a) understand what is important in each line and the narrative in the whole and b) sort out how to encourage the actor to find that on her own.

Rhythm and Muse (ic)

There is one exception to the line-read rule as colleague voice coach Martha Kahn points out: kids. Child actors are incredible aural mimics and hone in on the music of your phrase. Your tone, rhythm, accent. Everything. Under 12 years old, they are still incredibly skilled at distinguishing subtle differences in sounds. I talk about the music of a sentence when directing actors. It’s another aspect of observation they will incorporate into performance and it’s another tool for you to helping them create the right sound. Descriptors you can use are giving a line a close (effectively ending the line on a lower note) – this makes a statement sound definitive. It’s opposite, uptalking, is generally a tendency to avoid, unless you’re helping the actor define a less credible character. Too much music, a roller coaster sound sounds fake and “announcery” and too little music or inflection sounds robotic.

Vocabulary (Words, words, words)

Good directors speak actor. They understand that to arrive at a certain performance, an actor uses substitutions. For example, your actor may need to be enthusiastic about a casino, but in real life come from a background where gambling strained or destroyed their childhood. The actor will substitute something they can get excited about instead. It may be puppy adoption, Steve Madden shoes on sale or baseball season. You don’t need to know what the actor is using to find that enthusiasm, but reminding them about finding a substitution is important. Another great actor-word is intention. Which means more than objective or target. To the actor, it means how do I get what I want? Another element actors use to help them create is subtext. Smart communication is layered with choice. Often what we say is counter to what we mean. Actors use this to layer in authenticity to the characters they create.

Directing takes skills. This blog is Part 2 of a three-part series on directing voice talent and can be applied to most audio or video projects. The first instalment looked at the three positions the voice director navigates in a session. The third focuses on tips on self-direction for working remotely from your own home sound studio, as more and more voice actors are doing nowadays.

What are your pet peeves & what do you think makes a great voice director?

514-803-2296

kim@kimhandysidesvoiceover.com