Need A Voice Actor? Get one for free!

ProfKranc

Voice actor and Film-maker here to help :-D
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So, you need a voice actor for your production but you don't know how to get one.
Maybe you have looked at places like voices.com, seen their prices and that has scared you off.

Well, here are a few places to get a voice actor for a cheap rate or for free!
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There are plenty of aspiring voice actors out there on the web who would kill to be a part of an animation or other production. All just to get their name out there or buff out their CV for other potential employers or agents. So in order to do that, they may donate their time just for the attention or to be a part of a production.

But of course, in order to find a voice actor, you need to know where to look:

Voice Acting Alliance - A forum mostly populated by people who love anime and manga. You will find a lot of fandubs and abridgments here. But there is a lot of quality voice actors here who will do stuff for free if the project interests them. (Has a demo reel directory, great to find what you are looking for).

Voice Acting Club - A forum made for machinima makers to get a crew together for their production. In my opinion, there are a lot of peple just starting out here and you will find quite a lot of people with bad mics. But when you find a good voice actor, you find a good actor :D

Behind the Voice Actor: Casting - This forum isn't the best place to find quality voice actors. Is a place populated with terrible mics and bad acting. However they will do just about anything that gives them an opportunity. And there are a few good VA's here and there. But I would suggest seeking VAs out rather than posting an audition here.

Voices.com - This place is populated with plenty of people trying to make a quick buck, don't use this site. As much as it is "the one stop place for cheap voice actors", its not the place you want to go to if you want quality voice actors.

Fiver.com - This place does charge $5 per custom rate (this may mean by word count or finished audio) but there is a LOT of talented people on this site as long as you are ready to fork out a few bucks :)

Youtube - Everyone places their demo reels on here. From professional voice actors to amateurs. you just need to work your way through the murky waters to get the brilliant VAs., Look at your favorite animation or fandub! Check who the voice actors are in the credits and see if you can find them! If they are just online voice actors, who knows they may just want to be in your production if it interests them :)

Soundcloud - There is a small of amount of voice actors who populate soundcloud. It's sometimes tough to find them, but all the ones I have found are always either good in one department or great in both :D
Its one of the best places to find voice actors if you are willing to put in the work, in my opinion.

This is the hook line and sinker of attracting a voice actor:

  1. Have an interesting project
  2. Offer them something in return (attention, a project to work on, monetary payment, etc.)
  3. Make it look like you are organized and know what you are doing.
Everything is in appearances.
Show them the evidence of how organized you are. Have a submit by date, direct them to get what you want. Direct them. Give as many details as possible to what you want. The more details, the more you will get what you want out of the voice actor.

Finally, what you should ask when requesting a voice actor:

A good mic - Tis would mean they must have something better than a laptop mic. Even a rockband mic is better than a laptop mic (and a rockband one is surprisingly good)

Show emotion/Can Act - There is nothing worse than having an emotional line portrayed by someone who is just reading it in monotone. Make sure they can portray the emotion you are looking for. Ask for test lines before accepting them as your VA.

Constant Contact - you need to make sure you keep in constant contact with your voice actors. Don't hound them, but make sure you know how the line are coming log. The worst thing to thing to happen to a project is for a is for a voice ac tor just to disappear along with the lines and you waiting extremely log amounts of time, wondering what happened. Keep in contact with them. Having a Skype group with a group of people (if you are working on a project that requires a group of people) is a great way to make a group dynamic and boost team morale). Make them feel more like your friends rather than workers. that way, it won't seem like a chore, more like a team effort having some

Deadlines - Set deadlines for your actors. It allows them to schedule and something to aim for. But set reasonable deadlines for what you are asking. They aren't machines and are going to stop everything just because you asked them to say hello into a microphone :)

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I hope this helps in your journey to getting a voice actor!¬ Farewell! and best of luck with your future endeavors

-ProfKranc
 
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Lightsen

Animation Yey!
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good info!
Going to be asking for voices in my next vid soon. I'm going to be posting around and offering an email to contact if interested. Hopefully that works better for me :)
 
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PressRecord

Daily Vlogs on a Daily Basis!
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Don't forget to add fiverr.com it isn't free but 5 dollars is just a drop in the bucket! They have tons of talented people on there.
 
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JamesWronaVlogs

I Love YTtalk
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Definitely a bunch of good info! I remember how hard it was to find voice people so that'll definitely be useful to people :D
 
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