2022.09.02 - 0610 – Top ‘Studio Day’ Tips On the day of a recording or live ‘mic moment’ · Eat early - Don’t take a growling bear into the studio with you: the mic will hear it as it will gurgles. Fizzy drinks will make you burp. Spicy food may cause acid reflux. · Lots of water – to top-up your systemic hydration · Exercise and fresh air – to be mentally and physically alert in the often small, windowless studio where you may be for hours at a time · Morning shower and exercises – to freshen up...
Sep 01, 2022•6 min•Season 2Ep. 610
2022.09.01 - 0609 – What Is Not In Your Briefs · Context is important for the style of the read. Words on a page describing a family of tigers, their lifestyle and diet could be read one way if the visuals are of them all playing on the savannah, but another way if the shot is of the dominant male stalking prey. Context may also refer to whether the recording is part of a series, either under the same title, or by the same producer or the same production house. It may be that what’s wanted is a ...
Aug 31, 2022•4 min•Season 2Ep. 609
2022.08.31 - 0608 – Your Voice Mixed With Music Music and rough cuts – commercials, commentaries, documentaries and so on, often have the voiceover second-tracked together to play over the top of a music score. The choice of music for a documentary, commercial or whatever sets the ‘emotional attitude’ of the whole piece: hope, fear, confidence, desire or optimism for example. So as a reader, it’s useful to know what that music is. That way you can adapt your style, attitude and pace to fit with ...
Aug 30, 2022•6 min•Season 2Ep. 608
2022.08.30– 0607 – Your Voice Over Role What is your role? – You are never ‘the voiceover’. Depending on the script, the situation, the story, the audience and so on, you may be a frazzled dad coping with the kids, a corporate CEO, a first-time DIYer, a reassuring uncle. And that relationship is important: your attitude will change if you are giving advice to that frazzled dad as a friend, or interfering neighbour, or parenting expert… in the same way as, for say a corporate e-learning project (...
Aug 29, 2022•7 min•Season 2Ep. 607
2022.08.29– 0606 – Who Will Hear Your Voice? Where will this recording be played? – Again, it can change your tone as a voice actor if you know that it’s for TV or radio or cinema, or to be played in an airport lounge. It could be a corporate script for a video that every staff member will see, alone at their desk and through headphones… or played on the big screen at the annual staff announcement event. For example: a voiceover for the ‘blood donation service’ may at first sound quite serious, ...
Aug 28, 2022•5 min•Season 2Ep. 606
2022.08.28– 0605 – What’s In Your Briefs What’s in your briefs Who is this for? - In other words, who is your target audience, the listener you want to hear this message and act upon it. That should usually be much narrower than “ everyone ”, so it could be a grandmother in her 70s, or a young businesswoman in her twenties, or new parents. Every different audience will lead you to have a different tone, or attitude, when you read the script. You can usually have a guess by looking at the script ...
Aug 27, 2022•7 min•Season 2Ep. 605
2022.08.27– 0604 – The Brief For A Voice-Over Recording The brief for a script recording A written brief, a short but clear sheet of directions, will help everyone involved in a recording session in several ways: You, the ‘voice’, will have set targets for issues such as the tone and pace, the target audience, the characterisation, giving you time to prepare. Similarly, the director, producer and client all know the same information, so they are all approaching the recording with the same idea a...
Aug 26, 2022•3 min•Season 2Ep. 604
2022.08.26– 0603 – Pre-Prep To Keep In Step For radio and podcast presenters specifically, your preparation may include: · Planned spontaneity - Have a rough idea of what to say, maybe not every single word, but blocks of topics and bullet points within them of the points you want to make and how to transition from one block to another. A road map if you will, and one that you can veer off if you want to improvise and extemporise in the moment. Pre-read and rewrite if allowed, to suit your readi...
Aug 25, 2022•7 min•Season 2Ep. 603
2022.08.25– 0602 – On The Day Prep To Get A Better Voice Prepping promotes polished performances. ‘With-the-script’ and ‘on-the-day’ Preparation . For anyone talking on mic, your preparation will include: · Hydration – yep, that again! Hydration preparation! It will take 24 hours for water you have drunk to properly benefit you systemically. Sipping water on the day is great, but that’s only a ‘top up’, to ease a tickle, to clean your mouth or to use a few seconds while you look at the next line...
Aug 24, 2022•3 min•Season 2Ep. 602
2022.08.24– 0601 – How The Way We Sound Shapes Our Identities How The Way We Sound Shapes Our Identities Our voices convey so much more than just information. They can tell other people something essential about who we are: our age and gender and personality (our feelings, our temperament, our identity). On this episode of the Hidden Brain podcast (link below), the presenters look at the relationship between our voices and our identities, how advances in technology might help people with vocal i...
Aug 23, 2022•2 min•Season 2Ep. 601
2022.08.23– 0600 – Vocal Confidence Through Familiarisation With The Script And Situation · Familiarisation with the subject – the knowledge of the script, not just the words, but the meaning and the significance and intention of it, and the role your ‘character’ plays in conveying the message. Plus, who that message is targeted at, and what you want that recipient to do with the information… Nerves are what you are feeling – but think of the audience, not yourself. If you have to present a scri...
Aug 22, 2022•4 min•Season 2Ep. 600
2022.08.22– 0599 – Vocal Confidence Through Familiarisation With Yourself · Familiarisation with yourself – we have to turn nervous self- consciousness to self- confidence . That is, moving from being aware of every element of who you are and where you are and what you are doing to a more overall approach: that you have put in the time and the training, the prep and the practice towards your performance. The work on your skillset, helping create your mindset. And part of that mindset comes from ...
Aug 21, 2022•3 min•Season 2Ep. 599
2022.08.21– 0598 – Vocal Confidence Through Relaxed Breathing · Relaxed breathing – we have looked at this a few times. If you breathe properly your whole body relaxes, your mind calms. You are less tense, so your voice strengthens. You have breath control to get to the end of a sentence without panicking. Your heartrate steadies. You are less likely to commit verbal slips and trips. Every element is interconnected and starts with your breath. Remember what I said at the start: breathing is the ...
Aug 20, 2022•1 min•Season 2Ep. 598
2022.08.20– 0597 – The Vocal Confidence Quotient The Confidence Quotient Effortless attention is when the challenge and the skill, are in balance. That balance is called ‘confidence’. To put it another way: (Relaxed breathing + familiarisation with self, subject and situation = confidence) = you sound credible and authoritative Let’s look at those elements briefly over the next few days Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Aug 19, 2022•1 min•Season 2Ep. 597
2022.08.19– 0596 – Work Variety To Increase Your Vocal Experience Work variety Some of that practice may come from lots of work in which you’ll be experiencing different kinds of reads and learning new styles, and keeping your eye-to-mouth co-ordination and staying in the ‘zone’. But if you have less work, then practice is good to make sure you are ready when the phone rings or the email pings And of course, the more auditions you do for say voice-over work, the more practice you’re getting. Jus...
Aug 18, 2022•2 min•Season 2Ep. 596
2022.08.18– 0595 – Why We Sound Different In Our Headphones Self-feedback Your voice is very personal to you – get used to hearing it, learn to like it – but be aware of what you need to do to improve it. And then practice! Why do we sound different when we listen to a recording of ourselves? It’s to do with the way we usually hear ourselves. When we speak, we hear our own voice two different ways at the same time, one slightly behind the other (out of phase). Convectively (through the air) – as...
Aug 17, 2022•4 min•Season 2Ep. 595
2022.08.17– 0594 – Wrapping Up Presenting Unboxing Videos On screen presenters, whether that is for livestreams, or video conferencing or pre-recorded videos for YouTube or webinars, often find it difficult to talk and do something else at the same time. It sounds odd as we do it all the time in real life, but whether it’s an unboxing of a new product or simply holding and describing a book, fluency often suffers. Be aware of this and plan for the possibility, make some notes and practice. Howev...
Aug 16, 2022•3 min•Season 2Ep. 594
2022.08.16– 0593 – How To Practice Ad Libbing Skills Looking lots Really looking at the world around you. On your walk or commute to work (be careful if you are driving!), take an effort to notice what you pass by. Perhaps take a different route occasionally to force yourself to see what’s different. And then sharpen your awareness and increase your confidence by giving an out-loud running commentary (a bit of a problem on public transport, I grant!) of what you notice. Not just “a woman putting...
Aug 15, 2022•4 min•Season 2Ep. 593
2022.08.15– 0592 – How To Practice Talking To Time Practice Talking To Time You will also benefit from being able to ‘talk to time’, that is to fill exactly 10 seconds - or 7 or 12 or whatever - and to make sense and be a complete sentence. This is useful if you ever have to present a programme or bulletin that has a ‘clock end’, as well as knowing how to shave off a second or two (or half!) from a commercial voice-over script. As we saw in episode 427 Take some copy which has a required duratio...
Aug 14, 2022•5 min•Season 2Ep. 592
2022.08.14– 0591 – The ‘Two Brains’ Skill You Need To Master Practice Having Two Brains A way to practice receiving information and delivering it at the same time is to ‘parrot’ someone else’s news bulletin, or links on the radio. At home (and probably when you are alone!), listen to a station and repeat the script as it is being said . Or repeat ads a split second after the voice-over does so on the TV or radio. You will have to listen, process and repeat all at the same time, like having two b...
Aug 13, 2022•2 min•Season 2Ep. 591
2022.08.13– 0590 – How To Practice Sight-Reading Practice Sight-Reading Another way to help you sight-read is to read aloud and ad-lib around the credits at the end of a TV show as they scroll up. Doing this will help your muscle memory of sight-reading: being able to take almost any script and anticipate where it is going to get a good inflection and tone from the get-go. And if you have recorded it, play it back to yourself while looking back at the text. That way you can check your accuracy (...
Aug 12, 2022•3 min•Season 2Ep. 590
2022.08.12– 0589 – How To Practice Script-Reading Accuracy Practice Accuracy Keep up your eye-to-mouth accuracy by reading lots of every style, and out loud . It could be bedtime stories to the kids, newspaper or online articles, billboard ads as you are stuck in a traffic queue… some couples even read novels aloud to each other, taking turns at each chapter. Anything. To yourself, to someone else or even into a recording app on your phone. There are plenty of sites [1] with actual or mocked-up ...
Aug 11, 2022•2 min•Season 2Ep. 589
2022.08.11– 0588 – The Cheeky Hack To Sound Like Other Voice Artists Listen to Other Voice Demos Go onto voice agent websites and listen to the demos of other voice artists. After all, they have got an agent so must be doing something right! Work out what it is: · How are different voice used for different messages and scripts? · How are they working to communicate the message and the meaning? The more you listen (really listener) and analyse what’s is already being produced, the better you will...
Aug 10, 2022•1 min•Season 2Ep. 588
2022.08.10– 0587 – Life’s Free Voice Training Opportunities Listening lots Don’t skip through the commercials on radio or TV, the internet or cinema! Watch and listen to every ad that comes on. [1] · Listen mindfully – that is, really listen · Think: o What is the service or product being advertised? o Why is this ad being played at this time, on this station, on this show? o Who are they targeting and therefore, what style is the ad written in? What is this script really saying and trying to ‘m...
Aug 09, 2022•4 min•Season 2Ep. 587
2022.08.09– 0586 – 10,000 Kicks To A Better Voice Continual Practice I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times. Bruce Lee You have to be continually ready for your next live or recorded voice session, much like an athlete must always be ‘match fit’. If you don’t use it, you’ll lose it. Practice won’t make you perfect (what is ‘perfection’?), but it will make you better. Only amateurs believe that rehearsal inhibits spontane...
Aug 08, 2022•3 min•Season 2Ep. 586
2022.08.08– 0585 – The 3-P Formula For A Better Voice THE THREE P’s FORMULA If you want to claim you have a professional presentation (albeit sounding adlibbed), then you need to work at your craft. In the same way the starter guitarist doesn’t launch instantly into riffs and jams, you need to do the work to underpin your future career of having ‘your mouth on the mic’. Get the fundamental foundations, the mouth and mental muscle memory, before your creative communication excellence can begin. A...
Aug 07, 2022•3 min•Season 2Ep. 585
2022.08.07– 0584 – How To Be An Auto-Cutie 3 Look at the lens · Keep looking the camera lens ‘in the eye’ in the same way as you’d look at someone if they were in the room with you. That doesn’t mean a stare or a glare, but with a natural ease (one of interested, informed involvement) alongside occasional glances at your paper-notes or maybe a colleague or monitor. Not only will this make you look conversational, because you will be emulating the style of face-to-face interaction, it will also h...
Aug 06, 2022•4 min•Season 2Ep. 584
2022.08.06– 0583 – How To Be An Auto-Cutie 2 Rehearse · Have the font set to suit your sight. Although, the larger the font, the fewer words will appear at a time, it will save you squinting or slipping up and getting panicked. You can often switch the text from white on black to black on white if that makes it easier for you to read. You may also need to adjust your glasses as you’ll be focussing on the mid distance rather than close distance as you would be with a script. · You can’t see many ...
Aug 05, 2022•4 min•Season 2Ep. 583
2022.08.05– 0582 – How To Be An Auto-Cutie 1 How to be an auto-cutie The speed of the read · The prompter operator should follow your pace. That is, you don't need to speed up or slow down to follow the words appearing, but trust that the words will be there when you need them. Don’t play ‘cat-and-mouse’: if you go quickly the scroll of the script will pick up pace too. · Develop rapport with the operator so you find a balance on your likely speed of the read together with the speed they need yo...
Aug 04, 2022•3 min•Season 2Ep. 582
2022.08.04– 0581 – Prompts On Using Your Voice With A Teleprompt Teleprompters While we are talking about reading from a screen, a few words on systems [1] which project the words you have to read, onto the lens of a TV camera, or alongside the lens of a mobile phone. Teleprompter positives · In using a teleprompter, presenters naturally look into the lens (or the text is so close to the lens that their eye-line doesn’t look askew), giving the impression of eye contact which helps ‘connect’ with...
Aug 03, 2022•5 min•Season 2Ep. 581
