Help! Advice on Pronunciation for Voice Actors
- Written by Stephanie
- 2:48 PM
- Add Your Comments (7)
Hope your holidays were happy and healthy. Here’s a recent question from an aspiring voice actor, asking about articulation.
I call this Pro-nunciation.
Q: I’ve been taking voice acting classes for a number of years and am finally starting to get booked for V-O work. Occasionally, though, clients ask me to articulate certain words they say I’m not speaking clearly. They seem to contradict the direction they give me. For instance, when they ask me to be conversational, and I say the word “to,” it comes out sounding like “ta.” When I say the word “for,” it comes out sounding like “fur.” I don’t want to over-articulate, because then I sound “read,” and therefore not conversational. What do I do in these instances? How can I walk that fine line between over-enunciating and under-enunciating? Help!!!
—Janice W., Hollywood, CA
Janice, you’re not alone in this situation.
When we’re conversing, we’re not really thinking much about our pronunciation. And when we’re asked, as actors, to speak conversationally, we tend to fall into the unconscious speech pattern of everyday conversation—at conversational speed, i.e., the pace that we talk most of the time—to friends, relatives, acquaintances, even strangers. The trick in voice acting is to walk that fine line between under and over-articulating.
When we over-articulate, we sound snobby, prissy, stiff—and it’s very off-putting. Someone over-enunciating doesn’t sound like a warm, friendly person. On the other hand, under-articulating makes a person sound stupid, lazy or both. I once saw a wonderful V-O demo cover with the word “Mumbling” inside of a red circle with a slash. So voice actors always need to strive for clarity of speech without under or over-doing it.
To answer your question, there are a few little tricks to keep your articulation clear when you’re behind the microphone.
Remember that many of these words are “bridge” words, meant to tie other words together. The four most common words that we get “lazy” with are to, for, our and your. To sounds, many times, like ta. For ends up sounding like fur. Our tends to sound like are, and your many times sounds like yer.
Now, speaking these words this way sounds perfectly fine in a typical conversation. But when we’re reading, say, a corporate narration, we don’t want to sound like we just fell off the hay wagon. And we don’t want to sound like a snob either.
The trick is to add a letter in front of or at the end of the word to change the pronunciation.
So, for instance, in order to make sure you always pronounce to correctly, insert a w inside it, changing it to two. You’d never pronounce two as ta, would you? For the word for, add an e at the end of the word, changing for to fore. Again, the spelling forces you to pronounce the word differently. The same thing goes for your. Changing it to yore or you’re will give you the pronunciation that’s called for. And finally, saying the word our correctly is simply a matter of placing an h in front of the word, changing it to hour.
I’m sure there are many more examples like this (and please, readers, if you have any more examples, write in to Voices.com and share!), but the trick is to figure out how to enunciate clearly and cleanly, without under or overdoing it. It takes a lot of practice, but that’s why we get paid the big bucks, right?
Good luck out there, Janice, and break a lip!
I’ll share more voiceover questions and answers in the coming months. If you have any questions, please write to me and I’ll get back to you.
Sincerely,
Marc
MARC CASHMAN creates and produces copy and music advertising for radio and television. Winner of over 150 advertising awards, he also instructs voice acting of all levels through his classes, The Cashman Cache of Voice-Acting Techniques in Los Angeles, CA, and is now offering One-on-One voice coaching via email or phone. He can be contacted through Voices.com, at cashcomm@earthlink.net or at his website, www.cashmancommercials.com.
Cashman Commercials © 2007
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Comments
Marc,
I like your ideas! As long as I've been in the business, I've never heard anyone present these simple solutions. I just think they're very clever ways to make sure these words are pronounced correctly - especially in the case of a more formal project. Now, dealing with a producer/director who says "conversational" and then requests such enunciation, is still one of our more challenging dilemmas. Grin and try to do what they ask seems to be the only diplomatic way to get through the session. Sort of like trying to read that copy that is oh so traditional announcer copy in a conversational "tossed off" way!
Thanks!
Melanie
www.melaniehaynes.com
voice-over-studio.blogspot.com
Excellent advice - this issue comes up a lot for native Brits as we tend to drop the endings of words anyway.
Hello,
I thought I add my two cents. Here is a link to a site that not only gives you the pronunciation of challenging words you may encounter, but you could also hear the word spoken correctly.
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary
I hope this helps.
Sincerely,
Michael Oldham
Well that was simple solution to an obnoxious problem...Thanks!
This is a blessing. For(e) all the years of practice to all the ears with practice. Its awesome. I just started browsing this site and it has helped me immensely , especially this blog. Pls do send some more tips like these and also another lesson on promo ease scripts and punctuation. Thank you again.
Wonderful tips, Marc.
There are so many of these, and you've keyed in on the most common words that so often go "hick" without meaning to do so. Another one that is more subtle but worthy of note is when midwesterners, westerners (Californians in particular), and sometimes southerners add a second (unnecessary) vowel before a standard vowel. This can give off a shrill or whiney sound that is unpleasant to many ears.
Here is an example...
Wait - there ya go - the word "example" - that's a good example. Many people add an "e" sound before the first "a" - as if to say "exeample."
How to correct this?
Your trick about adding another letter in there somewhere to "re-spell" it is excellent. To correct the above, the re-spelling could be "exahmple." I'm not suggesting that one should aim for something terribly posh-sounding in going for that "h" to purge the "eeeah" sound, but intending the "h" will neutralize the middle of the word to do this for those who are inclined to double-vowel-ize that "a" sound when they should not.
And I'm an offender on this one, myself - worse - I am an offender when saying MY OWN NAME. Nice. Right. It's not, as I am often inclined to pronounce it, "Neeeancy." And it needn't be a "Fahncy Nahncy" thing entirely - but as a Voice Coach myself, heck, I oughtta not wince at myself when I utter my own name.
Cheers.
Hello,
very interesting post. I'm a film producer and I will get my film translated with the dubbing method in one month. Thus, It's very important to know that voice acting is to walk that fine line between under and over-articulating. As a German I couldn't recognize that for example the conversation sounds snobby.
I will pay attention to the articulation thing after getting the translated version. A bad dubbing could change the message of the film and impact on film drama.
Thank you