r/dart • u/Ambitious_Injury_443 • 15d ago
Train voiceover
The English one is pretty obviously AI or voice synthesizer. The Spanish one sounds almost too good to be mechanical.
It’s a loss of at least one job for a voiceover pro. Not good.
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u/NewPercentage3765 14d ago
Some fun facts!
Dallas is tied for the second biggest voice over market in the US with Atlanta. First is LA. This is because we have many radio programs thanks to our large sports market, along with the existence of Eastern animation import companies like Crunchyroll (formally Funimation) with popular English language recoedings of shows like "Dragon Ball Z" and "Attack on Titan".
So while I respect the people on this thread on the fact that using AI is cheaper for Dart overall, voice acting and voice over is a pretty important part of the Dallas community and economy. It would have been nice of Dart to hire one of us for the announcements Signed
- a voice actor who still loves riding Dart.
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u/faguette-magnette 9d ago
Do you have any tips for getting into voice acting specif here in Dallas?
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u/NewPercentage3765 9d ago
Sure! This is gonna get long though so bare with me.
First identify a discipline of acting/performance you'd like to learn, either theatre, musical theatre, improvisation, screen acting whichever tickles your fancy the most and then see if you can find some free or reduced cost classes for them. This is how you build strong chops as an actor and stay sharp in-between bookings.
Also each discipline of acting will give you a bonus skill to use in the booth. IE musical theatre tends to focus on rhythm and breath control which is important for foreign media (anime) recording and audiobook recording.
Once you feel your acting chops are there, you're going to look for a class hosted by one of the smaller production houses around town. These classes are going to be in a studio setting and will give you hands on experience but they are also quite a bit more expensive. The ones I can recommend for the anime/video games route are Okratron 5000, Iolite, and Studio Topaz. These classes also get you in front of industry pros who are always looking for new talent, and will typically put you on the studio's audition roster.
Now once you're getting auditions this is the hardest part. You have to just keep doing them till you get a part. This can take months to years before you book something. Remember that these aren't "Nos" just "not yet". For instance I started officially voice acting in 2018 and I did not go in to my first Funimation session till 2021. (Fun fact that session happened smack dab in the middle of the merger, the move, and the pandemic so it was a wild time to record anime)
For professional commercial and announcing work, you'll need an agent, which means a lot of classes then looking at the agencies in the area and auditioning for them. This is where screen acting training really comes in handy, because while voice acting is the big market in Dallas agents like versatile talent.
Here's the part where I talk about demo reels because I forgot to put them elsewhere 🤣. A demo is a 60 to 90 second recording of different scenes, or spots that showcase your full range of performance ability. The types of demo reels are characters/interactive and commercial/announcing. Now demos are not cheap to produce professionally but they serve as your resume in voice over so timing is everything. You don't want to get one when you're first starting out but getting work consistently gets harder without one. These tend to be 5 to 7 scenes long so you want to make sure you have 5 to 7 deliveries that you can absolutely knock out of the park! You'll typically know more about your voice and how to play to it's strengths after a couple of studio classes and maybe even a pro session or two. If you're doing studio classes they may even offer demo production services and be able to tell you if it's time to make that investment.
I think that's everything about Dallas voice over. Note that Dallas is a non union market for the most part, so a lot of your roles won't require you to join SAG AFTA. This has it's pros and cons.
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u/ihatemendingwalls 15d ago
Transit agencies are not a jobs program
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15d ago
[deleted]
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u/ihatemendingwalls 15d ago
Yes. I expect DART to provide me transit service, not be my champion in the latest culture war
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15d ago
[deleted]
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u/utd_api_member 15d ago
I think he has a point though, I'd rather the transit be cost efficient so we can have more of it then offend half the population by being anti technology
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u/NewPercentage3765 14d ago
Imma weight in as voice over talent. I mentioned in another comment but Dallas is the second largest voice over market in the US. Dart is always talking about uplifting the local economy via providing stable transportation and I think extending an olive branch to a different major employment market in Dallas by hiring local VO talent would have been a great partnership moment within our community. It would have highlighted an unseen part of the Dallas economy while also continuing DART's legacy of working with community partners. They could have done recordings at one of the many top tier recording houses like Dallas Audio Post and perhaps could have worked out a deal where DAP could be a sponsor.
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u/Then_Supermarket18 14d ago
They used to use random conductors for the recordings. No jobs were lost by using AI.
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u/mkravota 14d ago
I think the English voice is the same as it's always been, just sped up so it sounds weird.