Voice Acting Club - What's more important? The voice or the acting?

« What's more important? The voice or the acting? »

Welcome Guest. Please Login or Register.
May 18, 2013, 8:52pm

Voice Acting Club :: Resources for Voice Actors :: Voice Acting Discussion :: What's more important? The voice or the acting?

Author

Topic: What's more important? The voice or the acting? (Read 200 times)

Zen Blood
Member

member is offline

[avatar]

Pika-Greeeeeegg!

Joined: Jul 2012
Gender: Female

Posts: 42

What's more important? The voice or the acting?
« Thread Started on Jul 13, 2012, 11:24pm »

If you were to cast one of those extremes, which would you prefer? You could have a flat voice with no emotion, but fits the character, or a very animated voice that doesn't look like it would come from that character.

I wonder this because it would be interesting to see your answers- also, I have a mild dilemma. I have a very expensive and nice mic, but, it doesn't give me the sound I want. I think I sound younger whenever I playback a recording (this new mic I got records pretty much the same.)

I'm worried that no one will ever want to cast me because my voice sounds funny on mic. I feel I'm pretty good at acting, though!

Link to Post - Back to Top IP:

Logged

☀Love me or hate me, it's not the end of my world.☀

Specialty: Soft, mid, high, and mid-low voices.
Mic: Samson Meteor mic
Gender: Female
Vocal Age Range: 7 to mid 20s.
Languages: English, Japanese
Inspiration: Ellen McLain and Mary Elizabeth McGlynn.

D-Mac Double
Administrator

member is offline

[avatar]

Joined: May 2010
Gender: Male

Posts: 1,053
Location: Saga City

Re: What's more important? The voice or the acting
« Reply #1 on Jul 14, 2012, 3:27am »

This is a subject I could discuss non-stop (see the first line of my forum signature), sooooo... prepare for a lot of typing from me.

The way you've worded your post in particular, actually makes this an extremely difficult question to answer, because it really varies depending upon the character's intended personality, and the overall tone that the production is aiming for.

If I have a dark, gloomy, serious-looking character being used in a mature-themed noir setting, I will more than likely want to have them played in a flat, monotone way, with very subtle emotion.

However, if that same kind of character design is instead used in a comedy piece, I may very well look to have them performed in a very animated way that doesn't match the artwork -- catching the viewer off-guard.

This Simpsons character for instance, definitely doesn't have the menacing voice that one would expect, given his imposing physical stature. His voice is quite the opposite of imposing.
[image]

To keep things less complicated, I'll further approach this from the position of a serious production needing a genuinely fitting voice. When you get into the idea of "voice vs acting", it really comes down to a director's faith in an actor's ability to give a desired performance.

I've had a case of needing to cast a very nervous, unhinged young adult. I heard a number of very age-appropriate auditions which fit the character's artwork to a tee. Yet... none of them really hooked me and brought the character to life with a compelling performance.

On a whim, I decided to have one last actor try the part, a 15-year-old. He made numerous smart acting choices with the provided lines, and ended up giving the most interesting, eerie, and memorable audition of them all. But, given his age, he sounded just a liiiiiittle bit younger than what I'd been looking for with the character.

I cast him anyway. I knew I could trust him to hit all the emotional points that I needed -- that he could create a believable, interesting character without me needing to hold his hand and force feed him every single line delivery.

But of course, if he'd sounded like a 10-year-old instead, there'd have been a problem.

So long as both voices fit the character design, and it's a close call between the more appropriate/cooler voice vs the smarter actor, I'm taking the smarter actor every time.

Edit: Zen, you noted having a very expensive mic. Are you by any chance referring to the Samson Meteor you'd mentioned in another thread?

« Last Edit: Jul 14, 2012, 8:14am by D-Mac Double »

Link to Post - Back to Top IP:

Logged

It's more about choices. Less about voices.
----

Newgrounds VAC since Day 1. And your wily veteran since August 30th, 2005.

Tattedspyder
Member

member is offline

[avatar]

Joined: Jun 2012
Gender: Male

Posts: 83

Re: What's more important? The voice or the acting
« Reply #2 on Jul 14, 2012, 3:38am »

Obviously you're always going to be looking for the best actor with the best lines. Aside from the rare, wonderful occasions where a voice perfectly matches the character you'll pretty much always be compromising, settling or redefining.

My personal opinion is to favor the better actor. If you try to focus on the PERFECT voice for each character then you'll end up passing up on really good actors. Try to keep the range of possible, or appropriate, voices fairly wide so that you have a better chance of finding a good voice with good skill.

At the end of the day someone with the golden vocal chords of a Greek god will still sound like a bad actor if they are a bad actor but someone who is a great actor will bring the character to life regardless of their voice.

Link to Post - Back to Top IP:

Logged

http://www.soundcloud.com/thetattedspyder

Zen Blood
Member

member is offline

[avatar]

Pika-Greeeeeegg!

Joined: Jul 2012
Gender: Female

Posts: 42

Re: What's more important? The voice or the acting
« Reply #3 on Jul 14, 2012, 11:25am »

Jul 14, 2012, 3:27am, D-Mac Double wrote:

If I have a dark, gloomy, serious-looking character being used in a mature-themed noir setting, I will more than likely want to have them played in a flat, monotone way, with very subtle emotion.

Mhm, that's one of the cases I was thinking about. It does depend on the character.
Would you happen to still have a recording of that guy? He sounds really good, I'd like to hear what he did.

Yup, it's the Samson Meteor mic. Yesterday, I got the Samson C01U USB Studio Condenser. *face palms* they're both Samson...If I'm looking for a different sound I should have tried another company. Anywho, I'm able to return the new mic for all my money once I decide if I don't want to keep it.

My mic has a hard time capturing the seriousness in my voice- it makes me sound like a mixture of sounding younger and sounding lost (if you know what I mean.)

Thank you so much for commenting! :3

Link to Post - Back to Top IP:

Logged

☀Love me or hate me, it's not the end of my world.☀

Zen Blood
Member

member is offline

[avatar]

Pika-Greeeeeegg!

Joined: Jul 2012
Gender: Female

Posts: 42

Re: What's more important? The voice or the acting
« Reply #4 on Jul 14, 2012, 11:32am »

Jul 14, 2012, 3:38am, Tattedspyder wrote:

My personal opinion is to favor the better actor. If you try to focus on the PERFECT voice for each character then you'll end up passing up on really good actors. Try to keep the range of possible, or appropriate, voices fairly wide so that you have a better chance of finding a good voice with good skill.

Yeah, that's right!

I forgot that sometimes no one ever perfectly fits a character.

That's what I'll try to do!

Thank you for commenting~

« Last Edit: Jul 14, 2012, 11:32am by Zen Blood »

Link to Post - Back to Top IP:

Logged

☀Love me or hate me, it's not the end of my world.☀

D-Mac Double
Administrator

member is offline

[avatar]

Joined: May 2010
Gender: Male

Posts: 1,053
Location: Saga City

Re: What's more important? The voice or the acting
« Reply #5 on Jul 14, 2012, 4:08pm »

Jul 14, 2012, 11:25am, Zen Blood wrote:

Would you happen to still have a recording of that guy? He sounds really good, I'd like to hear what he did.

It's something I'm keeping under wraps for now until the production releases next month, but I will say the performance was heavily influenced by that of this character in the game Left 4 Dead. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7d0opAMt-oU#t=1m42s

Quote:

Yup, it's the Samson Meteor mic. Yesterday, I got the Samson C01U USB Studio Condenser. *face palms* they're both Samson...If I'm looking for a different sound I should have tried another company. Anywho, I'm able to return the new mic for all my money once I decide if I don't want to keep it.

My mic has a hard time capturing the seriousness in my voice- it makes me sound like a mixture of sounding younger and sounding lost (if you know what I mean.)

To be honest, these are really not considered to be very expensive microphones. A studio-grade microphone would cost several hundreds of dollars at the least. Both microphones should give you a different sound, however, as they utilize different technology. I've never used either one myself, but the C01U is very capable and popular mic used and recommended by many people on this forum.

I'd be curious to hear your record a quality comparison clip for each microphone. What software do you use to record?

Link to Post - Back to Top IP:

Logged

It's more about choices. Less about voices.
----

Newgrounds VAC since Day 1. And your wily veteran since August 30th, 2005.

Zen Blood
Member

member is offline

[avatar]

Pika-Greeeeeegg!

Joined: Jul 2012
Gender: Female

Posts: 42

Re: What's more important? The voice or the acting
« Reply #6 on Jul 14, 2012, 5:38pm »

Jul 14, 2012, 4:08pm, D-Mac Double wrote:

Okay then!

Quote:

Ehh...yeah ^^'
Well, expensive for me

but at least that means I can go up from here.

A comparison? Is there a site I can use where I can temporarily post audio on?

« Last Edit: Jul 14, 2012, 5:38pm by Zen Blood »

Link to Post - Back to Top IP:

Logged

☀Love me or hate me, it's not the end of my world.☀

hiiragi
Member

member is offline

Joined: Mar 2012
Gender: Female

Posts: 14

Re: What's more important? The voice or the acting
« Reply #7 on Jul 14, 2012, 5:56pm »

Personally I feel both are important. (And there are enough wonderfully talented voice actors out there to find your right voice and actor). You need the right voice to help express your story (it's an art form in it's self!) and yet a good actor to once again express your story.
But then I think it's also important for them to have good diction. If we can't understand you than you are wasting your breath! ^_^

Link to Post - Back to Top IP: