What should my demo sound like?
OK, your basic Professional Voice Talent demo...! Well, there's nothing "basic" about it, really - there's a great deal involved in making a proper VO demo. Before you do anything, you should have already done some basic training and you should be able to walk into a professional recording studio and perform the material on your demo without a problem.
You need to have a separate demo for each "format" of work you want to do voiceover in. IE: Commercials, Narration, On Hold, etc. Each demo should be a minute to 90 seconds in length. There should be 8-12 small segments of commercials tightly edited together.
Only put on your demo what you can perform comfortably. In other words, if it took you 12 takes to nail 10 seconds of your impression of Arnold Schwartznegger.....don't put it on your demo. Accents? Only if it's your mother tongue. If a producer wants an Australian accent, they normally hire an Australian. The key is to not "force" anything; if you can't pull it off in heartbeat, then don't put it on your demo.
As far as sound is concerned....well, it should "sound" like you've worked in a few studios...therefore, it should "sound" archival. One clip should sound like a TV spot, the one next to it a radio commercial, the one after that an Infomercial...etc. Try to avoid having more than two of the same "styles" run back to back so it doesn’t all sound the same. A professional recording studio should use a minimum of three different mics when recording to change up the overall sound and give the illusion that you’ve worked in a few different studios.
Many people ask me "what sort of scripts do I need?" Whatever you want, really. Grab something off the TV; it's being broadcast. Change a few words around...whatever. It's a voice demo - you're not going to have a lawyer at your front door because you used a few lines off a shampoo commercial on the voice demo you've posted on Voice123.
Where you can get into trouble is using popular music. I once heard a talent use a Frank Sinatra tune on his demo. Now, the likelyhood of him being sued was tantamount to winning the lottery. However, where he screwed up was using the Sinatra tune with his voice behind it, which was pretty average. You see, if a producer is using a Sinatra tune behind a real commercial, then that means "big budget" , because the rights to use the song on a commercial would be about $10,000. "Big budget" means....."professional talent."
"Professional talent" means the producer is using a casting agent, not wading through the festering heap of parrot droppings that is Voice123. So, to conclude....if a producer hears a Frank Sinatra tune behind a really bad VO he's going to quickly conclude that it's a homemade demo.
That said, you're biggest challenge producing a demo is to not misrepresent yourself.
While you're here, have a listen to my demos. I have a total of 14, because I'm capable of voicing in 14 different formats. Though 14 demos are a lot for the average VO talent, listening will give you an idea about what I'm talking about regarding different demo "formats."
There are also many other sites on my links page where you can listen to dozens of different demos.
