Along with the tips that I give you in the video above, here’s a few ways that I warm up my voice and my body before I start working on characters for games and animation:
- Singing exercises from Jeannie Deva are really great for breath support, especially for exploring higher pitched characters and yelling in video games.
- I have numerous diction and vocal warm-ups from my theater days that really help me connect to my breath (SAV gives you some too!). Vocal and diction exercises relax me and help my voice grow in vibration. The goal: a fully vibrating vocal experience is tension free!
Do re mi! Explore your vocal range.
- If you do yoga, or any type of stretching routine you can hum into different parts of your body as you stretch/explore poses. I often hum, feeling the vocal vibration and then let out a big sigh or sound to release any tension in my body, or just be present with how I am feeling before I perform. Being in a relaxed neutral state of mind is best.
- Sometimes, I simply go for a walk. Any physical activity to connect to your breath and release tension is really good for character acting.
- I bought a mini trampoline years ago and use it to wake up my body if I only have a few minutes. After bouncing on the trampoline, I feel energized and connected to my breath.
- Dancing to music and singing not only warms up my voice, it’s fun and I can practice connecting to my emotions via the lyrics.
Being in a playful mood and releasing stress before you begin is important when creating characters. You want to set the stage to have FUN and allow yourself to feel, imagine and pretend you are other people, much like you would when you were a little kid. There is no wrong or right…except when you are tense and over-criticize yourself.Tension and self-criticism just add more blocks to finding new characters, however, it’s normal and most people do it. When I am overly critical, I try to catch myself, stop the inner critic by embracing it and then breathing through it…to move past it and release it.
I hope all this helps you to allow your inner kid to come out and play!
Jessica Straus is a Coach at SAV and a working voice-over artist. Check out her site here!
