Getting the right voice for a character is an arduous job for both - the creator of the character and the voice artist. Every character in every voice project has its own style, charm or ruggedness, flair, and flavor with which it took birth in the creator’s mind. And the voice artist has the job to bring it to life. It’s like finding a particular needle in a stack of needles. It takes a lot of effort and trials & errors to finally land a voice that truly justifies the character for both.
So, if you belong to either of the two – creator or voice artist categories, Voyzapp here is to help you out. Obtaining the experience of thousands of character voice casting projects, Voyzapp – the leading and most economical voice-over marketplace has assembled a short and quick guide of essential points to help you complete your voice-over project.
For Creators Casting the Voice Talent -
The voice of your character should enliven it and you must find the best voice artist available to make your character ‘pop’ and your audience exclaim ‘wow’! So, just take care of these few tips and you will have quite an ease in locating the voice talent you want to work with –
Defining the Key Emotion(s), you want to Target – Your character may be vibrant, have depth, or maybe just a regular person. But still, you need to define how you want your audience to perceive and feel when they hear the character speak. Maybe you want them to feel joy, excitement, happy or maybe it’s the bluer side you are targeting, whatever it is you need to define it clearly.
The Key Attributes – Don’t get lost in words lay down clear attributes of your character like Gender, Age group (kid, teen, adult, old, or elderly), pitch (low, high, normal, light, etc.) the tone (bossy, angry, baritone, conversational, etc.)
The linguistic Traits – It's very crucial to clarify the origin of the character. The region they are born in, the localities, languages, accents, etc., are critical in authenticating the character. Failure in doing so could easily disengage the audience and the character may be lost forever.
Budget, of course – You get what you pay for! That’s period. Once you have laid down all required details and attributes of the character you need to find the most suitable pro-voice-over actor. An experienced voice artist would have better understanding, control, and range, with a slight change in breathing he/she can change the whole feel of the character. Hence, even if you are on a tight budget, don’t skimp.
For Voice Talents Finding Character’s Voice –
As actors, you must be able to take the words from the script and breathe life, persona, and sentiments into it using your voice and connect the audience with the character. You must be able to make the audience go ‘oh no!’ when you say something sad or disheartening, or say ‘what!’ when something is unexpected. So, here are some quick tools for you to get into the mood and find the right chord –
· Imagine your audience in front of you, sitting outside the booth waiting to hear to speak. Now focus on the key emotion that you want them to feel and make it as much personal as possible. Think like it, try to become that character, it will make it more realistic and engaging, and authenticate the character while convincing the audience. Keeping your imaginations up and running also keeps the character and your performance active, alive, and engaging.
· For a brief moment be more than just an excellent animation voice-over artist. Think about the physical attributes of the character - how they look, dress, walk, stand, and kinds of mannerisms. Whether it's outgoing, social, or introverted and how it behaves with other characters in the story. Imagination helps here also, figure out the key things that drive, motivate, and keep it kicking. Once you can cultivate those you can easily find the apt voice for it.
· The character may have pitches additional to its normal one and the tone may also vary. Does the character speak fast, slow, moderate, or eats up the end of every sentence or word? Take the creator’s notes about the tone with right instrument, pitch, and accent of the character, it will help to configure the voice further.
If the project is something that you want to cherish, you should always work with experienced professionals. They know the ins & outs and every other technicality involved and can guide you through the functioning of the industry.
These are not all, but fundamental, for sure. These will help people belonging to either of the groups get up and running in the right direction. However, Voyzapp is always here to lend a hand if and when needed in finding the right voice for characters. After all, we are the most reliable voice-over agency in the country.
