Welcome to episode 22 of the Voice Acting Mastery podcast with yours truly, Crispin Freeman!

As always, you can listen to the podcast using the player above, or download the mp3 using the link at the bottom of this blog post. The podcast is also available via the iTunes Store online. Just follow this link to view the podcast in iTunes:

http://www.voiceactingmastery.com/podcast

In this episode, I want to talk about 5 Essential Steps any Beginner should take when approaching Voice Acting. I get inquiries from many people who are brand new to the idea of voice acting and would like to pursue it professionally. Often, they would like a clear recipe on how to become a working voice actor. The irony of this, of course, is that there is no one recipe for becoming a voice actor.

While there may not be a linear recipe to follow, there are certain abilities or criteria that I find common among the most successful professional voice actors. These are concrete things you can work on in order to improve the likelihood that you will be able to take advantage of voice acting opportunities. Any beginner, (and even some veterans), will benefit from focusing on these steps. I’ve narrowed them down to 5 Essentials:

1. You must become an actor.
2. You must learn how to use your voice as an instrument.
3. You must discover your character types.
4. You must become capable of and comfortable with recording yourself at a professional level.
5. You must be confident.

I explore each of these topics in depth in the podcast itself. While these essentials may seem obvious, you must truly understand and internalize these ideas if you want to become a successful professional voice actor. A superficial understanding is not enough. I encourage you to listen to the podcast thoroughly!

I hope you enjoy it!

Download Voice Acting Mastery Episode #22 Here (MP3)

Welcome to episode 16 of the Voice Acting Mastery podcast with yours truly, Crispin Freeman!

As always, you can listen to the podcast using the player above, or download the mp3 using the link at the bottom of this blog post. The podcast is also available via the iTunes Store online. Just follow this link to view the podcast in iTunes:

http://www.voiceactingmastery.com/podcast

In this episode, I address a question that comes up a lot when people want to talk to me about voice acting. The conversation usually goes something like this:

“Hey! I’d really like to get in to voice acting, but I don’t live in a major city. If I buy all the right equipment, can I have a successful voice acting career recording myself from home?”

This is a complicated question and so the answer takes some explanation. Basically there are some types of voice acting you can do from home, and some that you cannot. They basically break down into two types:

1. Narration-Style Voice Over
2. Collaborative-Style Voice Over

Narration-Style Voice Acting is the kind of work that only requires one voice, like industrial narration, audiobooks, promos and telephone trees (those automated menus you have to slog through when you call a large company for assistance). Rarely is more than one voice recorded for that type of work, so it is possible to do that kind of work from home.

Collaborative-Style Voice Acting includes animation, video games, anime and ADR or Looping. This kind of voice acting cannot be done from home. It requires many actors to come together to create a finished product. Therefore, every actor must be recorded on the same equipment, in the same recording environment with the exact same audio settings in order for the production to sound consistent.

Also, it turns out that even when a voice over job could be done from a home studio, it often isn’t. Producers have good reasons for wanting to use professional studios. I outline their reasons in the podcast. I also discuss what it takes to run a voice over business from home if that’s what you decide to do. But if what you’d like to do is collaborate on animation, games, anime or any other storytelling, the bottom line is you’re going to have to be in a city where that kind of work is done.

Thanks for listening!

Download Voice Acting Mastery Episode #16 Here (MP3)

One of my listeners, Jaden, was generous enough to share a link with me to a fantastic article on Backstage.com! It’s called:

Ask an Agent: What Do You Listen for in an Audio Reel?

There are some wonderful agents represented in this article including:

• Cathey Lizzio from CESD
• Stephanie Blume from Imperium-7
• Cynthia McLean from Sutton, Barth & Vennari
• John Erlendson from JE Talent

Each one of the agents explains what they’re listening for when they receive demos from prospective voice talent. Remember, these are the people who have to decide whether or not they’d like to represent someone based almost completely on 60 seconds or less of hearing their voice acting. Each one of them approaches demo submissions differently.

However, there is one similar pattern that emerges from all of them:

They all want to hear solid acting.

Acting ability is the key to an animation performer’s success in traditional animation and gaming, now more than ever before. – Cathey Lizzio

When I cast on animation projects, I look for acting ability, comedic/dramatic timing, and an interesting vocal quality. – Stephanie Blume

Overall, we expect competitive talent to display in an audio reel strong acting, comedic timing, a wide range of vocal and performance ability, and the ability to make a character walk off the page into life. – Cynthia McLean

Like anything else, we listen for acting. – John Erlendson

Developing your acting skills is the single most effective thing you can do to elevate your chances of succeeding in voice acting. It’s more important than vocal range, your age, or your recording equipment. You must be able to act believably and competitively in order to be considered to play characters. This is something I stress extensively in my podcast, especially in Episode 10: How to Practice Voice Acting Anywhere and in my special report The Top 5 Mistakes to Avoid in Voice Acting. You should check them out!

Hopefully this article gives you some insight into the minds of agents. I certainly found it enlightening! Best of luck to you in your voice acting endeavors!

One of the new business models that the internet has made possible is what is known as the “Pay to Play” voice over casting website. Traditionally, a voice actor would pursue representation with an agent who would submit that actor for projects. If the actor was cast, the agent would take a 10% commission of the actor’s salary as compensation. Agents are not paid ahead of time, they only make money when the actor makes money.

Pay to Play sites work differently. You pay the website a fee to get access to auditions. They give you space on their site to create a profile where you can post your demo and contact information. Then, you get access to auditions from producers who post their projects on the website. I have yet to try any Pay to Play sites so I don’t know what it’s like working with them first hand. My agent keeps me pretty busy so I haven’t explored that avenue yet. I’ve heard from other voice actors who have tried these sites that they can sometimes be a bit of a meat market with hundreds if not thousand of voice actors all competing for the same projects. However, this blog post caught my eye.

It’s a promotional blog post from Voice123, one of the larger Pay to Play sites. The post is called, Voice Overs Never Cease to Amaze Me. The post is designed to promote the ease of hiring their talent to those producers who are interested in using their service.

However, the most interesting part of the post to me is not the video of the final project with voice over, but rather the fact that they posted all the auditions for the project on a separate page for everyone to listen to. Rarely do you get the chance to hear other actor’s auditions for a part. In fact, it’s considered very bad form to allow other actors to hear their competition’s auditions. Since this blog post is aimed at the producer, however, Voices123 thought it would be good to showcase the type of talent that would audition for a project posted on their site.

So take advantage of an opportunity that almost never happens in voice over, listen to the auditions of your competition. Imagine if you were the producer, which talent would you chose? Do you agree with their choice? Why do you think the producer chose the actor he did? How could you audition differently to stick out from your competition? It’s a wonderful window into the voice casting process.

Here’s an amazing interview with one of the greatest voice directors in America, Andrea Romano. Andrea’s resume is littered with some of the most popular cartoon series of all time including the original Batman, The Animated Series from the mid 90’s, Animaniacs, Pinky and the Brain, Teen Titans and Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Andrea talks about some very important ideas to remember when approaching voice acting:

1. Her first question is always, “Is this person I’m thinking of casting a good actor?”
2. Her second question is, “Do they have voice over experience?”

Microphone technique and animation acting, you can teach in a very short time. I can’t teach acting in a four-hour recording session. Acting is something that they’ve got to bring to the table themselves.

That is why I stress so much that you must be a capable actor before you can be truly successful as a voice actor. No matter how much time you spend in the booth, recording on a microphone or polishing your voice, if you do not have the acting ability to support all of your wonderful technique, you won’t be able to bring a good performance to the project.

So do whatever you can to get more acting experience. Take acting classes. Join your local or school theater group. Get online and join a voice acting group. Whatever it takes to give you more opportunities to practice playing pretend as characters.

Enjoy!

Here’s a great blog post from a good friend of mine, Juan Carlos Bagnell. Juan works as a casting director at one of the most prestigious casting offices in LA, the Voicecaster. He uses the online moniker of “SomeAudioGuy” but trust me, he is THE Audio guy. Not only is Juan a fantastic director, but he can articulate how he does what he does which is invaluable!

I highly suggest you check out his blog post on “The Art of the Pick Up” or how to recover once you’ve flubbed a line in the booth. Juan shares some great insight as someone who works with top talent voice actors every day. He sees what works and what doesn’t and his eye for subtlety and nuance never ceases to amaze me. Whenever he’s directing me in the booth, I know I’m in the best hands.

You can also check out his online web series called, Movies You May Have Missed or MYMHM for short. He does wonderful reviews of seldom seen but valuable movies with his show partner, Lee. He’s even done an interview with me about zombies, vampires and other mythological subjects in film and horror.