Welcome to 'Lend Me Your Ears'

Being my first newsletter, I thought it would be good to clarify what you’re getting - AND what you’re not.

What you’ll be getting EVERY week:

• Tips on how to get better VO performances.

• Behind the scenes insights into my voiceover projects.

• A look into the history of voice acting and how it’s changing.

• A selection of my best content from across my social media channels.

• Recommendations of other top VO, video and game dev talent.

• Answers to any of YOUR voice-related questions.

• Quality Honey the Studio Cat related content.

What you’ll NOT be getting:

• A sales pitch.

Okay - that all clear?

Wonderful! Then let us begin…

Voice Acting tip of the week:

If you want a script to sound more ‘conversational’, then elide the words. Text without abbreviations is literally more wordy - so if you want to appear relatable rather than formal, write as if you’re speaking to a real person.

For voice actors, this mean’s taking the initiative and giving your clients an alternate version rather than religiously pronouncing every syllable.

Behind The Scenes voice project of the week:

See how I use text analysis in a self-directed voiceover session to make performance choices for a business video.

This project is for Streetwise 365, who do great work designing personal safety programs for the education sector. You can check them out here.

Top talent of the week:

Henry Willard is a wonderful audio engineer who offers a whole range of services. Need a project or demo produced and edited? Need a calm hand to organise a remote voice recording session seamlessly? Need expert mixing and mastering? Henry’s your man. Check out his site here.

Media Recommendations:

Every week, I share three podcasts, articles or interviews that I’d strongly recommend. This week…

1. The 98% Podcast: Process Vs Outcome Goals.

   A fantastic discussion about making sure we focus on the controllables when considering our goals for 2024. Actor Alexa Morden talks with high performance coach Dr Steve Bull.

2. It Takes A Village: A Voice Director’s Journey

   The wonderful voice actor and director Kirsty Gilmore talks about her career in games and working on both sides of the booth.

3. Story Mode: Cyberpunk 2077

   A great insight into how CD Project Red faced the challenges of telling a story from a first-person perspective.

Favourite Writing of the week:

Is internet addiction our responsibility, or is it all down to the Greek God Zeus taking the p*ss? Ross McGregor’s brilliantly satirical piece explores this idea…

@chrisnaturallyrp

From @rossmcgregor5 play Persephone #actingmonologue #actormonologue #britishvoiceactor #britishvoiceover #britishactor🇬🇧

I hope you found something of interest in this newsletter and thank you again for subscribing.

If you have any suggestions on future content or voice related questions, don’t hesitate to email me at [email protected].

Know someone who might enjoy the newsletter? Feel free to point them here: https://www.naturallyrp.co.uk/newsletter

Thanks again for reading, and until next week Honey and I wish you a wonderful week!