Who do you hear ?
Looking for Voice actor
Who do you hear ?
As sound is one of the most important part of the film, specifically the dialouge. Its really important for me to find the right voice for the right momenta, to be honest I was not at all sure what kind of voice I need so it was going to be a process of realization while moving forward with the exploration.
First or most had to find and understand these characters, according to my vision these character are the alter ego of the main character.
As decided like before three character had to be very different not only in the sense of narrative arc but also in voice. I wanted these character to sound intriguing and hearable (if it makes any sense).
And from here started my search for finding 3 different voices for my film.
Requirements
With some idea of what I want and a kind of vocal vision I went on to ask people around me to get actors who could voice for the film. I already had set a requirement, and asking around redirected me directly to Mandy. The first and most requirement I had was to search for someone who is already in Voice over experience, and specifically video game industry. I wanted to do this because I wanted this sense of video game affect which I wanted in this film.
With this intension I posted a job in Mandy, I kept this post from the time of me filming the project till the beginning of Post Production, and my understanding of the requirement was changing and becoming better.
The closest vision I had with the voices that I had, I implemented it in the picture lock and to be honest it felt okay but I was still not sure why it was not sounding like the way I wanted it to sound like. Maybe the answer would have been in the type of voice I will be using. This could be only understood once I get my voice actor.
After my post I got many application and I was really surprised that people would be interested in voicing for something which is not a film but a very different thing.
Reducing the Scope
So using Binaural tech was the most valable answer for my film and with that I had a small talk with Vengelis, our sound desing tutor.
He suggested me the kind of mic and recorder I would need to use these audio but during this conversation he suggested me not to use the binaural audio.
His stand was that If the film would be shown only in headphones then it would made sense and the tech is moslty for the headphone users and hence Hellblade works prettly well because you mostly use headphones to play that game.
And the other reason was that I would have more control with stereao sound more becasue I can use the software to control the panning and other asspects of it but if i prerecod the audio with the direction then it could restrict me in many ways.
With that in mind I started working on the words that the voices will speak, I alrealy had it in my script but as I was moving forward I realised I will have to add things into it to make the story come alive.
The film contained 4 voice in the initial phase and these 4 voice had different personality
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Voice 1: Very on the characters face and always demening him
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Voice 2: Does not give any damn and is just taunting everyone, including the other voices
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Voice 3: Scared and insecured always trying to stop the main character and telling him that he will fail no matter what.
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Voice 4: Calm, colleceted and a grounded voice who asks the player to focus.
Julio had a very imortant point with these character, He asked me about why do I need so many voices, this made me thought a bit and I had no answer for it,
Keeping too many voices would confuse the viewers in diffrentiating the voices, The voices needs to be very distint and diffrentiable.
This feedback made a lot of sense for ame and I started cutting down the character and the lines from the film and made it strict and tight,
During one of the conversation with my editing tutor Julio, he asked me to create a small reff so that I can have an Idea of how the audio will be and how the story will move forward. And for my picture lock and I decided to make a short clip of the film with all the sound techniqe I knew to give the kind of experience I wanted to give.
Refference Sound Design
Taking the frist sequence of the film I recorded some begining dialouge by my friends and myself for using it in the film.
Using the basic technique of panning I placed all the sounds around in a way that the two voice is always at left or right ear, to give the sense of distraction but at the same place the gounded male voice was in the center to make the viewer focus and the character too.
Here was the final result of what I submited in final cut. The feedback was pretty decent but form now on I had to learn and understand in order to make it feel more natural.