5 Insider Tips: How To Do Voice Over As A Professional Would
Find out what you need to bring to the table to record a professional voice-over
Landing on your first video project, especially the how-tos and explainer videos. Chances are, you have to think about making voice-overs for your videos.
Or else you’re a newcomer in the voice recording industry, and this is the first voice-over job you take while you’re still grasping the procedures.
If any of these situations apply to you, don’t worry. I have gathered a few fundamentals practiced by those who are experienced in this industry and listed them down to help you.
What Makes A Good Voiceover?
Some might think the auditory portion of a video takes a smaller share as compared to the visual proportions, but that’s not true.
Most of us will likely stop watching a video with bad audio and lower-quality video.
Audio and visual are these two factors that run integrally. Voice over is not an added element for your videos. It will be a significant contributor, and here is why.
Voice-over will be the element that binds the structure together. It will be the backbone that supports the overall structure of your video. Hence if your foundation is not well built, even your excellent voice-over recording won’t save you.
That’s why doing voice-over is a bit crafty to pull.
How The Pros Do It?
After digging for a while, I found 5 points specified by professional voice talents in the voice-over recording industry.
1. Provides Narration In Humanic Voice
Just imagine if you have to listen to a dead robotic voice-over, instead of a cheering soothing voice. What you will end up most likely is dread and a non-organic representation of the thing you try to explain.
In accordance, it will shun your audiences away.
Under the direction of your vocalization, while narrating the script, your content will be carrying a persona (imagine Santa Claus and his ho-ho-ho laugh). The persona depicts will be the life throughout the length of your videos, making your otherwise monotonous boring script becoming more lively.
However, be cautious about picking the right persona that befits your videos. Since you will find it funny if you hear Arnold Schwarzenegger’s voice selling girl-squat cookies, right?
2. Professional Enunciation Gives A Sense Of Credibility
Except you’re a mumble rapper wannabe, then pronunciation should be an invaluable skill to have.
You have to make sure to pronounce each word accurately and that you speak articulately enough to be understood.
This way, you can establish liability and create a sense of authority. Your audience trusts you because you sound like you know what you’re talking about, and mean what you say.
Another pro tip you need to pay attention to, avoid at all cost of uttering “umm,” “ahh,” and “uhh” sounds. Because the nemesis of voice over is hesitation!
Read More: Vocal Fry in Voice-over
3. Tempo Management
Speaking too fast can make what you’re saying arise as salesy, as though you’re trying to pitch in something.
When instead, you should be telling expertise on a subject matter while being persuasive.
Take, for instance, in an advertising piece like explainer videos, the ideal pace is between words per minute — and not any faster.
Too fast, and your audience won’t know what hit them. Too slow, and your audience will likely get bored.
The best kind voice-overs have a natural and thoughtful pace.
4. Play With Intonation And Mind Where You Should Emphasize
You need to figure out which words you should emphasize to trigger the emotion you wish to elicit.
Do you want it to appear optimistic? Confidence? Informative?
Because, believe it or not, your audience can detect your smile simply by hearing how you sound.
5. Practice, Practice, Practice, And Make Notes!
This part should be stressed over and over. It takes years to refine and cultivate a skill.
Practice makes perfect, and the same applies to voice-overs.
As you practice reading aloud the script, you will learn where you should tweak your voice, or which words to stress.
What you need to do now is to push the record and test it out. Then listen to your first recording. Hear how your voice sounds. Play your test recordings and listen to these gremlins.
Does your voice got caught up in background noises?
Does your voice come out muffled?
Does it sound like needing a burst of emotion?
Too robotic, or maybe it sounds too husky-heavy?
Now you know where you made mistakes. The next step is to stick with your voice coaching. Regularly train your vocal, and get a mentor if necessary.
Voice Over Is The Video’s Personality and Identity
Voice-over will be your video personality and also your identity. Voice-over will spice up or cool down the script that you set to be read.
You will read your script in a humanistic voice. With careful pacing while minding the intonation.
The underlying principle of voiceover is, the voiceover explains what might be overlooked in the visual, such as tone, mood, etc. while incorporating personality, reliability, and quality.
In contrast, the visual conveys what the voiceover can’t quite deliver with words alone.
In other words, voice-over is vital to bridge the sentences written in the form of script and visuals, making it alive.
While a fine voice-over gives your videos a particular portrayal of mood, feeling, authority and credibility.
In case you need further reading, you could consider reading this article.
We’ve also summed up all the points above in a video:
Now you have learned these 5 tips to help you with your voice-over journey, what are you waiting for? Grab your equipment and start recording now.
Read More: The Skills You Have to Learn Before Landing Your First Voice Acting Job.
What do you think of the tips? Leave your comment down below!
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