Topic: Dumb Q #4764: How to "professionally" record voice with my gear?

[whatboutbob]

Hey folks,

It has been a while.  Life went and got in the way of taping.

I apologise in advance for some pretty dumb questions...but I don't have a lot of time to futz around and figure things out for myself to save myself the embarrassment.

A friend of mine's making a cartoon animation.  He's asked me to record the audio of the narration for the animation.

Would I be able to come up with a reasonably professional result with my gear (see my sig)?

If so, how?

Mono or stereo?

Omni or cards?

Mic positioning?

Any other tricks I need to know?

Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.

[jnorman34]

mono.  cardioid.  about 8" from your mouth, with pop screen if you have one.  generally, an LDC is the mic of choice for voice over, but you can do just fine with any decent condenser or even a good dynamic.  you will want to add a bit of chamber reverb in post to give some space, perhaps a tad of short delay, just enough to be not noticeable.  if you vary much, you may want to compress a bit also.  best advice, however, is to find a nice example of voice over recording similar to what you want to acheive, and try to match it with your post processing - it will give you a general feel for overall eq (you will probably want to bump the low-mids and a small rolloff on top end to keep it mellow), verb space, compression, etc.

[whatboutbob]

Thank you!

[Chuck]

I record spoken word for a living.
I would say do everything jnorman34 said plus:

Make two copies of the script. One for you, one for the voice talent.
Monitor the recording (probably on headphones) as you are doing the record session. That way you will hear any problems, such as explosive P's, sibilance, external noises or page turning sounds.
Follow along with the talent to make sure the talent isn't missing anything they are supposed to say.
Have the talent stop if there is a mistake. Have them back-up to the last complete sentence and re-start there when they do a re-take. Mark on your copy of the script the number of re-takes the talent does on a section and which sounds best to you.
If it is a long script, have the talent stop, take a drink of water occasionally.
Listen for the talent speeding up. slowing down or changing the volume of the delivery. If there is a problem with the delivery, have the talent stop and explain to them what you are hearing.
Compression after the record session can help even out the volume.