The Mic Guy: Adventures in Voiceover

Today’s private coaching session with Sirenetta touched off several new flashes in the old chandelier.

We began the hour talking about some of my recent challenges. As Sirenetta rightly pointed out, confidence is the key. Once I trust myself enough not to overthink and overwork every word of copy, I’ll be better off.

Toward that end, I walked into the booth with pristine, unmarked scripts and tried to just let things fly. The technique seemed to work — although I didn’t hit anything perfectly on the first take, I managed to get to a place of relative quality within just a couple of attempts. Sirenetta’s customarily pointed and incisive directing helped.

We worked through a pair of similar scripts designed to bring out my conversational, “regular guy” side. In both cases, I started the process bigger and broader than necessary, and needed to work backward to find a more believable note. When I got there, I was pleased with the end results, albeit frustrated that it still takes me longer than I’d like to find the sweet spot. But, as I reminded myself, it’s the final take that matters. I’ll probably choose one of these two pieces for my “final exam” in next week’s Friday afternoon workshop.

Next, we played with a character script for a TV spot. Once again, I found the character work easier to hit from the start. Maybe I’m just more comfortable working at greater distance from my own perceived self. A therapist would probably have a field day with that revelation.

Last on the docket was a spot that involved an internal monologue. Once Sirenetta pointed out that I could treat the monologue as though it was the audible half of a dialogue, this came together rather well.

What I took away:

• Confidence is good.
• Instinct trumps intellect.
• Frame a monologue by envisioning it as a response to an unheard question.
• I’m still crippling myself with literal-think, but I’m improving.
• Let the copy sell itself.
• Less is still more. Except when it isn’t. And I still have trouble knowing which is which.

Overall, a step forward. I’ll gladly take every one of those that I can get.

This entry was posted on April 10, 2009 at 9:28 PM and is filed under Reflection, Voice acting, Voiceover, Voicetrax. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.