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...
Tag Archive for: voiceover narration
Determining Rates: A Formula for a Simple Voice Over Pricing Guide While eating cake in Uncle Roy Yokelson’s Jersey living room this past weekend at the 13th 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 ...
How to Shoot Your Voiceover Career in the Foot – Worst Practices 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 ...
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 politica...
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 lovi...
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 li...
With more years as a voice actor than a millennial can claim to be alive, I am often called upon to direct voice over sessions. What is the view from this particular vantage point? Join me for part 1 of a 3 part Insider Series with lessons from both sides of the glass. This morning I directed a voice actor, female, 30ish, to do a narration for a corporate video. Completely bilingual, (French and English) but with more experience working in French than English, she had a light, genuine vocal impr...
Just like this Porifera named Bob, children are like sponges. Sometimes we forget how quickly and how much they pick up and next thing we know, they’re repeating words we may not think they should incorporate into their vocabularies just yet. They absorb more information than we realize, and their education doesn’t stop when the school bell rings. And of course, they are extremely comfortable with electronic environments. This plus the fact that schools are overcrowded and underfunded...
You receive a voice over script for a new commercial for toothpaste, insurance, or maybe it’s shoes. You’re want to deliver the perfect sound to match the product, but there are no tags or directions to guide your delivery. How do you get started? Even the most seasoned voice actors need to do a little digging. As a voiceover coach, I tell my students, many of the clues and questions to ask are in the text itself. An experienced pro might take it further and do a bit of research, too. Wheth...
Narration jobs for eLearning courses are a great source of income for voice over artists looking for steady work. This is no surprise considering that online or distance learning is becoming a mainstream and accepted form of education. People can receive entire degrees from the comfort of their home, and further careers in their field of study. Voice over actors can benefit from this growing trend in modern education, by bringing their talent to course curriculums. If you’re considering...
