What makes a good Voice Over Narrator, Actor, or Artist?
Is it a golden voice, or being told you have a good radio voice? Having a ‘great’ voice is possible, of course. There are some people whose voice timbre or pitch, perhaps combined with an accent that the listener finds musical or otherwise pleasant, makes them naturally easy to be listened to. Very few people (and I’m not one of them) have that kind of a voice. Having a ‘radio’ quality voice is more frequently found, and acquirable. In the Voice Over market at present, however, it is less desirable. Voice Over work performed over the past couple of decades is not as ‘announcery’ as it once was back in the days of broadcast television, or commercial radio. Conversational tones are the current preferred style for commercial work (both voices and on screen).
Acting is a craft, above all else. You get good at a craft by learning and then by practicing.
Scott McKinley
What makes a normal person’s voice a good Voice Over then?
- Reading from different sources
- Read aloud skills
- Read from different POV – Narrator, Protagonist, Teacher, Student
- Read with different characterizations, and voices
- Experience in communication skills
Voice Over artists are actors.
Acting is a craft, above all else. You get good at a craft by learning and then by practicing. There is no shortcut to make voice over work a well-paying full-time job for a beginner to either acting or voice work. It is an ongoing process, and some are better at it, or become better at it than others.
These are the following guidelines on how you can make Voice Over a paying job:
- Independently wealthy
- Established artist (or actor) in another field, or in the VO field in another capacity
- You have connections with VO Talent, Teachers (coaches), Audio Engineers, Studio workers
- Completed courses, earned certifications, degrees, scholarships, favorable reviews
- Professionally produced Demo ‘Reels’. In studio.
- Voicing. All the time.