Voice-Over Voice Actor

A Peek Into The Secret World Of The Voice Actor


Filtering by Category: Reminders

Voiceover Tip: Copy the Vocal Patterns on TV Commercials




And it's fun! Enjoy!


How to Create Voice Over Copy For Practicing Purposes









Voice Actors: Practice People-Watching & People-Listening!




Calm      Pointed      Sincere      Flustered      Agitated      Loving

Hypnotic      Polite     Warm       Shrill       Distant       Brash


Happy people listening!

Reminder: Work on your mic technique!



man an d mike cartooon

Tips for Microphone Technique


Here are some tips to get you started.





















Great exercise: make like a snake!

Imitating a snake can be a great exercise to increase your breath control and expand your lungs.

Try this:

1. Inhale deeply and then, holding your palm an inch in front of your mouth so you can feel the air, let out a hiss.
2. Hiss for as long as you are comfortable and then take a deep breath.
3. Repeat this 5 times alternating between an “s” hiss and a “z” hiss (which we guess might be called a ‘hizz’).

4. Begin to gradually increase the length of your hiss (or hizz) as you are comfortable.
Hissing can strengthen your abdominal muscles and your diaphragm because they are working to maintain one strong continuous flow of air. Another exercise that’ll work your abs is to pant, rapidly, like a dog when it is hot. This exercise will force your diaphragm to rapidly push and pull, which will strengthen it over time, but might tire you out pretty quickly. The benefits are many, though, not the least of which being to help protect your voice when you have to do any shouting or yelling.






Expand Your Breath! Some good exercises....

Learn about your breathing, then expand or lengthen it, to really increase your skills in VO!

     1. Begin by lying flat on the ground and placing your hand on your abdomen just below your ribs.
     2. Feel the natural rise and fall as you breathe.
     3. Notice the natural ‘pause’ between inhale and exhale.

This is how your body breathes without you trying to do anything to control it. As you breathe, there should be four sections to each breath: 1. an inhale, 2. a pause, 3. an exhale, 4. a pause. We usually don’t feel the pauses because they’re short and they happen naturally, but they’re there, all right.

This next exercise focuses on lengthening, or expanding, your breath:
      Begin by inhaling for a three-count, holding for a three-count, exhaling for a three-count and holding for a three-count.
      Do this until it’s comfortable and then start to increase your count, four-count, five-count, etc. If you start to feel lig ht-headed or dizzy, stop immediately and take a break.
     See if you can comfortably work up to 5, 6, 7 or even 8, 9, 10.

(Tara once had a voice teacher who could breathe in and out on a thirty-count, which comes with a lot of practice. Being able to hold your breath and control your breathing allows you to play with your voice more, giving you more range and stamina, which could come in handy for things such as recording long passages for audiobooks or characters who really ramble on.)




Can you Step Out of Your Natural Voice? Stretch Yourself!




Exercise: Phrases

  • Over here                                          
  • I need that                                         
  • Let go                                                   
  • What are you talking about       
  • Don’t do that                                    
  • I don’t think that’s a good idea 
  • Give me the new one                   
  • No                                                         
  • Try it again                                         
  • Listen to me                                      
  • Alright                                                 
  • Stop right there                               
  • Wow that’s huge                            




Come say hello on Facebook: Voice Over Voice Actor

Simulate an audition; it's great voice over practice!

1. This exercise is to help simulate an audition experience for you. Remember to look for all the information on the page to give you clues to your performance.
2. Do a trial run with each of the specs and record yourself. Play it back and listen to hear if what you planned in your head was apparent in your recording.

Try out the following Commercial and Animation Audition Copy using the following specs. See how each unique spec changes your performance.


1. young, cheerful, spunky 2. wants to be everyone’s friend
3. eternally optimistic 4.intelligent, honest, down-to-earth

1. In the summer heat, 2 bucks can go a long way.
Now, at The Burger Joint, grab a large drink, large fries
and your choice of hamburger or cheeseburger for only $1.99.
Come in and fill up for less than 2 bucks.

2. Why choose one of those other companies that might loose your package or handle it with less-than-optimal care?
Let BoxYouUp come by your office or home and package,
mail and deliver your important items at your convenience.
Visit BoxYouUp.com for pricing.


1. energetic, sporty, hot shot 2. is always having a good time
3. goofy, crazy, wild 4.nervous and easily excited

1. Hey little monkey, I don’t know what you are doing in there, but you need to come out right now. You hear me?I don’t wanna have to yell. C’mon now. Get out. Get. OUT. Monkeeeeeeeeee! OUT. Now see, that wasn’t so bad, now was it. Ha! Silly monkey.

2. You mean there is more out there than this? Robots even? Wicked!
Because I’ve been waiting my whole life for that.I just know I can take them on.
Let’s go.
What are you waiting for? Let’s do this thing.
Woah. Did you see that? I’m awesome.

Fantastic. Hopefully getting the experience of listening to your performance has given you a deeper understanding of the variety of things you will want to consider when working on audition material or even going to an audition. Of course, this exercise can’t exactly duplicate an audition experience, but the more prepared you feel before you go into an audition situation, the more confident and relaxed you will be, and the higher your chances of you doing your best work, and with any luck, booking the job!

Hum while chewing - it's a great exercise!

We hear good feedback from folks about this exercise, and we find it very helpful.

Give it a try!

1. With your lips closed, start to hum.
2. Then make chewing movements, as if you were eating, and keep humming the  whole time.




Great VO Exercise: Raspberries, Sirens, and Lip Trills

1. Keeping your lips together, like you were making imaginary car (or motorboat, if you prefer) “brrrm, brrrrm” noises, and allow your lips to make a “raspberry” type sound (like a good old-fashioned Bronx cheer without sticking your tongue out), or lip trill. Begin at the bottom of your possible range and while continuing the lip trills gradually raise your pitch until you hit your highest note possible.

2. Now reverse direction. Start at the top of your range and move downward thru your natural pitch to your lowest note.

3. Continue your lip trills while going from low to high and back to low again. It’ll sound a little like a siren.

4. Repeat the sirens 3-5 times until you feel like your voice is beginning to get warmed up.

5. This can be hard to describe on paper. Feel free to visit this link ( ) to see an example.


Lip trills are a great way not only to warm up your face and resonators in your sinus cavities, but also helps keep your vocal cords and neck muscles from tensing up while you’re warming up your voice. Don’t worry if your voice cracks during the sirens. That’s just a natural part of expanding your range. We all have “head tones” (high) as well as “chest tones” (low) in our range, and in order to move back and forth continuously from one to the other, you have to move through your natural “break,” which is the sound that often people associate with a teen boy going through puberty. One of the reasons for this is that the vocal cords are actually growing and stretching and sounds that used to be easily within one range move to a different register, and the voice “cracks” as it pushes through unfamiliar territory. So in addition to warming up your voice, this exercise can also help you widen your vocal range.


Sirens w/out Lip Trill

1. Allow your mouth to hang slightly open, and begin an “ee” sound at the bottom of your range. As you exhale, slide your pitch higher and higher until you hit your highest note possible.

2. Now reverse direction. Start at the top of your range and slide your pitch downward until you hit your lowest note.

3. Make sure your face and jaw are relaxed and comfortably open while making the siren sound.

4. Repeat the sirens 3-5 times until you feel like your voice is warming up.
Practicing sirens can really begin to stretch your range and gently allow the musculature in your face and neck (as well as your vocal cords) to begin to become accustomed to the sounds you’ll be making while acting.


Whether you have a high or low-pitched voice you can also begin to think about the placement of the sound you’re making. This is separate from the pitch. Placement relates to the physical location in your body where your voice is resonating. For example, if you have a head cold and are all stuffed up, you might sound very frontal, or nasal, since your sinuses are blocked and thus blocking the sound from escaping completely, therefore creating a very frontal resonant sound. If you drop the sound way back to the back of your throat, then you would almost sound like you were swallowing the sounds, creating a very different quality altogether.


Begin to play around with extremely frontal, a mid-range placement as well as a back placed sound. This is something that you can bring into your work and begin to pick and choose where certain voices you create will be placed and where others will lie instead. [Should this be a new exercise to help develop awareness of where you’re placing your voice?]








Green Apples

REMINDER: One of the most useful things that I use to keep clicks down when I'm vocally smacky in the booth is to bite into a green apple (Granny Smith not Golden Delicious). I think the pH balance in the apple does something to the saliva to keep your mouth moist without being wet sounding.