How to Become a Voice Over Actor: 7 Tips for Making a Career in Voice Over Industry

From a professional perspective, to have a career in voice over is like being an artist who uses their voice to narrate, entertain or market products for animation, commercials, audiobooks, video games, and educational content. Apart from doing mimicry, impressions or character voices, a voice actor should also possess acting skills. This is because voice actors are rarely seen on-screen. As a result, their voice tends to be their only means for expressing their emotions. As an aspiring professional, you could well be wondering where to start. At present, there are several opportunities than ever for working within the voiceover industry. However, the competition is also stronger than ever. In this sector, you would be required for dealing with many hurdles. But, if you do work on your voiceover skills and are able to find out innovative ways for standing out, things would become much easier for you. In this article, we will provide you 7 tips for making a career in voice over industry. These tips will provide you some directions that could be highly beneficial for you to attain your objectives. It may well take some effort. However, the result will be worth it.

Practice:

It is extremely essential to practice even if you aren’t in a professional recording studio. Several professional Voice over artists have access to home studios for the purpose of recording Voice over acting auditions as well as for improving their recording skills. When you have a full setup, you will be able to practice reading copy as well as listening back to your personal recordings. Practice would also help you in developing a voice-tone that will be professional in nature. This would also appeal to casting audiences and directors.

Read out loud every single day.

You should recognize the fact that voice-over professionals don’t directly get any help from props. As a professional, this also results in voice over becoming relatively more difficult. You can also learn more about your voice through the means of your experience. This could include your strengths, weaknesses and boundaries. As a result, you will be able to learn punctuation, control intonation, breathing and rhythm. The best way to find your personal style and interpret text is practice. As a result, it is essential to practice every-day. You can read a book, newspaper or magazine on a regular basis to improve it.

Check out for auditions.

For voice over professionals, auditions are pivotal. This is how a professional can land a job in the voice-over industry. However, you should only do audition for roles that are suitable for your talent to sidestep unnecessary rejection. Moreover, you should also look-out for open casting calls on the Internet. Apart from that, you can also find a dedicated voice talent where you could find or submit for auditions. Study the character breakdowns and practice good pronunciation when recording your audition.

Learning audio editing

The clients that may hire online voice talents tend to prefer those individuals that have their personal home studio. In such a fiercely competitive sector, it’s not enough for reading a text in a proper manner. This is also essential to know how you would be able to edit sound. Before you start your career in voice over, it is essential to be able to make sure that you are able to gain some audio editing experience.

Record a demo.

For a career in voice over as professionals, having a voice-over demo reel is usually similar to a sizzle reel for a conventional actor. However, there are no accompanying visuals for it. A voice talent’s professional demo reel is primarily a combination of various dialogues or lines performed in various voices. Many voice actors tend to have separate demos for having their character and commercial abilities work. You could also upload such demos for auditioning sites and also look up talent agencies. They can accept unsolicited submissions and can even potentially take you on as a client.

Promoting your voice

If you have your demo reel ready, you should now focus on promoting your voice. After that, you should get people for listening to the demo. You should be present somewhere. This will help you to create your personal website, create your profile across the different social media sites and also upload your demo to voice over agencies.

Never stop training

It is a fact that trends may change within the voice over artists or for someone who has a career in voice over industry. As a result, you should always be relevant and up to date. Gain relevant data from the Internet and professional colleagues. Also, don’t hesitate to obtain opinions regarding your work from your mentor or from other voice talents. Listen to their work, learn from them.