MLPaudiobooks.net — Forum

Great job!   Very good points and tips..and such a smooth velvety voice!  It's like butter in my ears...

Aye, great video. The only bit I feel like adding is stressing how important it is to do a "character study" before working on a play: understanding who your character is, where he comes from, what's his personality etc. so you can determine how he's supposed to talk and sound at all times. It's a detail that often gets refined in time like EN noted, but top tier productions (like the excellent We're alive) establish their creative direction already from the start.

Also, a link to Nowacking's tips on voice acting, which are always an interesting read: http://nowacking.tumblr.com/post/42768221351/voice-acting-and-you-and-stuff

I suppose you guys have a point with all this character studying business.

...I don't know though, I tend not to worry about it much myself and focus more on the situation. It seems to me that focusing too much on a given characteristic may lead to that whole monotony thing I mentioned.

Also how did you embed that YouTu- *faceplalm*

Embed code, duh! I'm such an idiot.

Oh yeah, you have to have the situation the character is in as well.  I take what is going on to account in how I voice a character, to the extent of adding FX even.  Are they out of breath, are they yelling at someone far away, are they hyped up on goofballs etc. et al.

You know, to be honest it's the whole audiobook format that I don't get too much. Let me clarify by making a (silly) distinction between an audiobook and a dramatic reading, though.
I see a dramatic reading as a performance delivered like a theater piece, with proper shifts in intonation and speed, characterization etc, resulting in something that is very engrossing but also demands full attention and can be a bit tiring. On the other hand, I'd call an audiobook a recording made in a more flowing tone, with less accents and intensity, meant to be listened to in a more leisurely way.
The distinction is silly in that, if you take the literal meaning of "audiobook" as "a recording of a book read out aloud", then a dramatic reading is a subset of it, not a separate category.
At any rate, both require much skill, the audiobook possibly even more so as, like you say, it does present the pitfall of falling into a drone and a good audiobook has a very narrow sweetspot of intensity vs. dullness to find.
Still, I don't really get the appeal of it. I'd much rather read on my own than have someone just neutrally recite a text to me. Of course it's a different medium for different occasions: you can't (or at least shouldn't...) read while you're walking down the street. But I'd take a good dramatic reading or, even better, a good audio drama over ten audiobooks.

Went on a bit of a ramble, there. tl;dr: I very much agree.

That is true and I do admit to rather limited knowledge in the field. It's quite evident, though, that there are degrees in the amount of dramatization one can put in an audio production.
Say, compare these two audiobooks:



These are two good examples of what I mean. Both are very appreciable (as much as Ellison is way better at narration than dialogue, good Lord), the former I'd classify as an audiobook, the latter as a dramatic reading.
I'd pick the second in the blink of an eye, excessive as it is. The more emphasis the merrier and too much wins over too little any time, imho.