Voice Over Article #8: Character Voices and Comedy
One of the most fun things you can do as a professional Dallas voice talent or a professional Dallas announcer is to do character voices for comical spots, comedy skits or parodies. It’s certainly been one of the most rewarding parts for me, and who doesn’t like to laugh?
But, how do you come up with great characters? Imitate! The top writers and performers will agree that the best way to come up with a character is to imitate someone you know or someone you’ve heard. For most Dallas voice over specialists, it doesn’t have to be a celebrity. For a Dallas voiceover job that requires an older character, how about imitating that crusty old neighbor next door? For a cowboy, how about that guy down the street who’s always singing country tunes. For a sweet lady voice over, how about your mom? Can you see what I’m getting at?
If you’re asked to imitate a celebrity for a certain Dallas voice over job, don’t be intimidated. Like anything else, practice is key. If you practice a few celebrity voices that you enjoy and over again, you’ll find that in a very short time, you’ll be able to sound much like them when doing voice over work. If you’re already pretty good at imitating people in your family or your neighbors/friends, you may find that one of those voices closely matches an existing celebrity, with a little tweaking.
Copyright 2001-2011 Jack Of All Pipes Productions
We offer voice over and production services for spots, promotional ads, imaging, film & video narration, trailers, phones and so much more. Check out the demos to the left and navigate to our Services & Rates page for more info.
