Training comes in different shapes and sounds. Although a professional coach can guide and train you and your voice, training also involves what you do during your own time to improve your skills. Refer to the later section, “Exploring Other Training Options,” for what you can do in addition to using a voice coach.
Although studying with one coach to master the basics is to your benefit, each coach has his strengths in certain areas. In voice acting, you can choose to take lessons with a variety of coaches depending on what you want to study.
The following sections explain in greater depth the different ways a voice acting coach can help you develop, how different classes operate, what you can do to choose the right coach, how to hire a coach, and how to make sure your lessons are productive.
Understanding how a coach can help you
Voice coaches can teach you everything you need to know about technique and the ins and outs of the business. They can also provide much needed encouragement and help you to set goals that are possible, beneficial, and exciting.
A voice coach can provide you with objective guidance you wouldn’t otherwise have. You can think of your coach as an additional set of eyes and ears with the added benefit of those eyes and ears being trained. Your coach can point out things to you that you may not be aware of, identify areas where you may be holding physical tension that affects your performance, and also instruct you on how to correct those things.
No matter your skill level, a coach can help you in the following areas. You may have strong skills in one area and don’t need much assistance. If you hire the right coach, he can help you with them or just the areas you need assistance. Even if you decide not to use a coach for an extended period of time, you can use these same exercises to develop your skills.
Warm up your voice: Before using your instrument in all kinds of wonderful and wacky ways, your voice needs some special attention. Warming up your voice is crucial to giving a performance that sounds good and feels pleasant. Your coach can show you a variety of vocal warm-ups that can engage your resonators (nasal passages, also known as the mask of the face) and articulators (tongue, teeth, and lips).
Some different vocal warm-ups you may do include the following:
•A soft, low hum spanning only a few notes at a time can kick in your resonators.
•A facial massage while humming can help loosen up your facial muscles and relax them.
•Yawning, believe it or not, is also a great way to prepare. Yawning helps to loosen your jaw and creates more space for you to breathe. After you have a nice loose feeling, you can start to expand the range (pitch) you’re covering with your voice and try different, more elaborate exercises.
•Saying tongue twisters can release tension in your tongue. The tongue is the most powerful muscle in the human body, and it needs to be relaxed in order for you to articulate smoothly and without tripping on your words. Tongue twisters are a favorite of voice actors. You can find numerous tongue twisters online or recite nursery rhymes.
Breathe properly: A good, deep breath can set you up to complete a phrase and allow you to be heard. In addition to breathing well, your breath needs to be supported, and you use your diaphragm to support your breath. Your coach can help you develop your breathing techniques with different exercises. As you master breathing techniques, you can deliver your lines more comfortably for longer durations with greater tonal consistency.
You can do breathing exercises that are as simple as breathing in for a few seconds, holding the breath for a few seconds, and then releasing the breath on a hiss, counting out the beats while snapping your fingers. Think of yourself like a full balloon. The hissing should feel slightly like you’re deflating. Time yourself as the breath is released until no more breath is being expelled. After a while, you should be able to take a nice deep breath and let it out for a longer duration. Refer to the earlier section, “Breathing: Focus on your diaphragm” for advice on how to breathe.
Assume a proper posture for voicing: Your coach also helps you maintain good posture, both when standing and sitting. You do most of your work as a voice actor from a standing position in proximity to a microphone, so you need to know how to stand in order to get the best possible performance from your voice.
When voice acting or singing, you’re using your entire body to perform. You need to stand in a comfortable manner that properly aligns your vertebrae, with your feet shoulder-width apart. If you’re in a sitting position, you may assume the posture of a chorister in rehearsal by sitting on the edge of your seat creating a 90-degree angle, feet touching the floor. A comfortable standing optimal position for voice acting means that you don’t slouch, hold tension anywhere, or need to compensate in any way.
Develop these additional skills: These are some more technical voice skills your coach can help you develop and perfect. He can provide an array of exercises to help with these skills.
•Intonation: Intonation is how your voice sounds in terms of how it rises and falls as you speak. You can think of intonation as how your voice cadences at the end of a sentence, when you ask a question, and so on. As an example, most people’s voices go up in pitch when they ask a question. Intonation can vary between cultures and may affect how the listener receives what the speaker is saying.
•Phrasing: Having good phrasing means you’re able to get through sentences in a script with ease, making the most of your breath, support, and tone in order to technically and artistically communicate the text well. A phrase can consist of an idea or fragment of a sentence or it can be an entire thought. Punctuation is important to consider as a guide to help you determine how you observe phrasing on a per phrase basis.
•Fluctuation: Fluctuation is how your voice can go up and down at will. This differs from intonation because fluctuation refers to the mastery of a vocal range and intonation refers to speaking in a certain manner, such as having your voice go up in pitch when asking a question. For example, fluctuating your voice means that you’re able to bring your voice up or down in pitch, kind of like singing up and down a scale. If you have a wide vocal range, you can hit a wide range of tones. If your vocal range is limited to less than an octave (think of a musical scale representing one octave), you can practice to maximize your range and make it work for you.
Fluctuating your voice adds interest and flair to a read. Think of how the use of pitch, meaning the relative position of a tone within a range of other tones, can affect how others pay attention to or perceive a message. The last thing you want is for your voice to sound flat or monotone — you would lose much of your audience! Adding color to your reads by fluctuating your voice can greatly improve your performance. We discuss adding color to your reads more in Chapter 5.
•Elasticity: Elasticity is in direct correlation with how well you have prepared your voice to perform and determines the ease in which your voice fluctuates or leaps around. That’s why warming up your voice is so important, like we discussed earlier in this section. Warming up the full extent of your range provides you with confidence and the ability to experiment, play with, and shape your voice. This is a very important aspect of voicing for people who do character voice work. Keeping your voice well-hydrated by drinking plenty of water helps significantly in this area. Always have a bottle of water handy wherever you go and be sure that you’re well-hydrated before attending a recording session or using your voice.
•Versatility: How far can your voice take you? Versatility refers to the different ways you can use your voice and your ability to change how it sounds. For our purposes, versatility takes into account your vocal range, timber (relates to the tone color or tone quality of your voice), tone, enunciation, and other vocal qualities. A voice actor who can read for a variety of applications or characters may be considered versatile. Some people, for example, are good at home recording commercials and can also do anim
ation voice acting. Although these fields may seem polar opposites, a versatile voice actor can work in very different fields of voice acting and be very successful.
Explore the potential of your voice in a friendly and secure environment to find your groove: Are you afraid to try something simply because of the way producing the voice makes you look? A lot of people in this business twist up their faces to achieve the desired outcome vocally. Others need to use their hands and gesture wildly to get the words to come out. If you’re passionate about finding out what your voice can do, make sure you have a safe place to try things out where you won’t be laughed at or considered odd. Your coach can help you feel at ease and try new things. Another safe place may be your bedroom or bathroom. Be sure to record your voice as you experiment and take note of what you did to create the voice or sound you made.
When you’re ready, your coach can encourage you to record a professional voice-over demo. A voice-over demo is a brief sampling of your capabilities that demonstrates your personal style, brand, and highlights your natural talents. Chapter 6 explains what a demo is and Chapter 8 walks you through how to record your own demos.
Knowing your options for voice lessons
If you decide to hire a coach, you have several options for taking classes. Your classes may vary from once a week to every couple weeks to once a month. The class length depends on what you’re able to commit to and whether or not you’re traveling to see your coach. Most voice actors tend to schedule their lessons for one hour in duration, scheduled once a week. During this time, your coach can instruct you on how to use your voice and introduce new concepts and skills while polishing areas you’re already skilled in.
Because voice acting has many components, you may have lessons that are more technical in nature where you work on technique and other lesson that focus on the more fun, artistic side of things. Your coach can likely start with the basics that include fundamentals such as breathing, phrasing, diction, and so on. The voice is a versatile instrument and performs beautifully if the core skills are in place. Even though you may think all you’re doing is talking, voice acting demands an entirely different level of commitment and attention to detail. Being a word painter requires work!
Some of these educational encounters are shorter in duration. Coaches who teach a very specific form of voice acting hold intensive weekend workshops drilling a particular skill or set of skills. You also may find that you have an affinity for a particular course of study in voice acting. A coach can help you specialize in certain areas, such as the following:
Accents: If you want to master a particular accent or dialect and broaden your horizons as a voice actor, you can seek out training from someone who specializes in this area. Accents can be a lucrative piece of the pie, so mastering a few of the standard accents is a good idea, particularly a neutral accent (or unaccented) speech and a British accent. Your coach can introduce you to the International Phonetic Alphabet and accents in general.
Audiobook narration: If you want to be an audiobook narrator, study with someone who has experience in that area and has narrated titles that you can purchase in stores.
Commercial work: If you want to have your voice heard on television or radio commercials one day, taking lessons from someone who has built his or her career voicing broadcast television commercials and understands the ins and outs of advertising is to your advantage.
Video game voicing: This kind of acting is different from voicing for animated cartoons.
Basically, if you have an interest in a field, make sure that you seek out a coach who has experience in that field.
Picking a coach
Your voice is your instrument and is also the main component of your business. That being said, selecting the right coach for you to study is a decision that will directly impact the outcome of your goals. We assume that you’re a working professional or are on the brink of starting as a novice voice actor who wants to study with a coach to aid in the preparation of recording a voice-over demo and develop and improve your skills.
Although a great deal of your success is reliant upon your actions and level of dedication, studying with the right coach can play an equally important role in determining how successful you are in this field.
Considering individual or group instruction
Figure out whether you want one-on-one instruction or group instruction. Here’s a quick overview of the pros and cons to these types of instruction:
Individual instruction: When you study one-on-one, the pros include the following:
•You get more personalized attention. Being in a class of one has its benefits, including that your coach can focus solely on you and your voice. You can accomplish more working privately with a coach than you would in a group setting.
•You have an individual instruction plan. When you study privately, your coach can plan lessons just for you that are specific to your needs and your goals. Each lesson will afford you the opportunity to learn, experiment, and improve as a voice actor, given the individual attention you’re receiving.
•You receive a custom experience. Working with a coach one on one isn’t only a wonderful way to accelerate your learning, but it’s also the best way to receive a personalized education. You can ask all the questions you want about things you’re most interested in and may also be able to choose scripts or texts to work from.
•You get more microphone time. Mic time is something that all voice actors crave when taking lessons or being coached. There is no better way to maximize your time at the microphone than to study privately with your coach.
•Your coach can provide a personal consultation. Being the only student in a class opens up opportunities for your coach to be honest with you about things you need to improve upon or celebrate areas that you have excelled in. You have time to consult with your coach and ask career-related questions, demo-related questions, or seek tips for how to book auditions that come your way.
Some cons include the following:
•It’s more expensive. As the old saying goes, you get what you pay for. Studying with a coach privately will cost more than studying in a group setting. You’re paying for the individual attention, which costs more.
•You may have to travel. Some of the best voice acting coaches are located in metropolitan centers, such as Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago. You may also find that a voice acting coach doesn’t live near you. If you want to study in person, you may have to travel.
•You have fewer people to obtain feedback from during a lesson. Sometimes hearing the thoughts of others who have different perspectives is valuable. When you study one on one, you have only the coach’s feedback to go from as opposed to multiple insights from a number of people.
•You may feel isolated. When it’s only you and your coach, you may feel a bit isolated in the sense that the only voice you’re hearing is that of your coach. You may also be someone who prefers to work in groups and likes to be part of a team.
•You have nowhere to hide if you didn’t do your homework. If you want to truly succeed, you need to do your homework. A coach will know if you haven’t practiced, which can reflect poorly on you as well as set you back in terms of progress.
Group instruction: Studying in a group provides you with a unique setting to develop your skills. That being said, group instruction has its own pros and cons as well. Some pros of studying in a group are
•You can give and receive more feedback. Feedback is a helpful tool for improving your reads or performances. Giving feedback is a useful exercise because you need to be listening attentively and objectively to give good feedback. Listening is one of the chief skills you’ll need as a voice actor because professional voice actors, believe it or not, do more listening than talking.
•You can watch others perform. Observing others perform or take d
irection is a great way to scoop up practical tips that you can then apply to your own performances or technique.
•You potentially have a lower cost to participate. If you’re just exploring voice acting and want to invest only a modest amount at first, a group lesson may be a good fit as is auditing a class.
•You’re introduced to other voice actors in your area. Meeting other voice actors is important because they understand you! Voice actors work in a very specialized area, so you can turn to each other for support and help.
•You can get a feeling of community. Being surrounded by people who know what you do and are encouraging of you is a must. Fellow voice actors are generally some of the most welcoming and helpful people you’ll ever meet in a business setting. Get plugged in to your local voice acting community. (Refer to Chapter 10 for ways you can network inside and outside of class.)
The cons of studying in a group are as follows:
•You get less personalized attention. If you’re looking for someone to hang on your every word and make the class all about you, a group class isn’t right for you. Remember that the instructor needs to divide his or her time among other students to be fair to all in attendance who paid to take the class.
•Other people can see you perform. If you’re shy and are worried about how you look and sound, this can be problematic.
•You get less microphone time. Mic time is very important for training sessions. You really can benefit from your performance with mic time. The more time you have at the microphone and the more work you have to review after the fact, the better.
•Material may not be altogether at your skill level. This issue can happen from time to time if who sign up for workshops geared toward a different level than you are. If you have any experience whatsoever, you may want to consider intermediate or advanced-level courses.
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