How to Record a Quality Voice-Over (and Why You Should Do It)

Published on January 8, 2015

A voice-over might be the perfect thing to add to your next video, but unfortunately if you're like a lot of video creators, you won't use one.

That's potentially a huge mistake.

Now it's true that a voice-over isn't always a good idea for every video (a reel comes to mind). But here's the important thing to remember...

A voice-over is frequently the ideal element to add to your video.

And yes, I'm talking about all kinds of videos. If you're making a product video for your business, it likely needs a voice-over. Watch several commercials on television, and you'll see voice-overs are enthusiastically present.

But I'm also talking about videos you make of family events, vacations, club outings, or even the simple montage video.

At a minimum, a voice-over can help make an otherwise confusing video become clear. Best-case scenario, a voice-over can take these videos to a whole new level.

Why do you need a voice-over in your video?

The voice-over is a powerful and versatile tool.

It can help set the mood and tone of the video. It can share information with the viewer. It can answer the important questions: who, what, when, where, why.

Like a travel guide, a voice-over can help the viewer know what's going on, what to pay attention to, and what this all means.

When a viewer clicks play on your video, they'll immediately start asking themselves questions:

"What am I watching? What is this about? Why did that person just do that? Should I keep watching?"

The voice-over can help answer these questions.

Warnings

A voice-over can also harm your video, so you need to watch out for a few things.

Excessive mouth noises, hesitations, overly-repeated words, and other issues can make a video nearly unwatchable.

For example, have you ever watched a video on YouTube where the person narrating the video sounded bored (with audible sighs and a bored tone to their voice)? I have witnessed this myself, and I think it's sad. If they're not interested in the subject, why should I be? (And it's a bit surprising when the video has 40,000 views with 1,200 thumbs-ups. Imagine how well the video would do if the person sounded interested!).

Yes, voice-overs can be problematic, but we should still use them.

How to Record a Voice-Over

What do you need to record a voice-over?

Technically all you need is a microphone and some way to capture the audio, such as a computer, phone, or audio recorder. Yes, technically this is true, but you can get far better results if you put a little more effort (and funding) into your equipment.

For someone just starting out, I think a good USB microphone and a set of studio headphones is enough to get you going. You can plug the USB microphone directly into your computer and capture darn-good-audio-for-the-price.

I haven't personally owned this USB mic, but the Blue Yeti is certainly a popular choice. And the audio quality it records is quite good.

By the way, I'd recommend staying away from using your computer's built-in microphone for voice-overs. The sound quality would be too horrible, and it would hurt your video's watchability.

If you're already using a separate microphone when you shoot video (such as a shotgun microphone), then you could use the same microphone for voice-overs. You might need to invest in an audio interface to get the audio from the mic into your computer. (The audio interface I currently use is the M-audio Fast Track Pro.)

If you're always trying to level up your quality, then you might find yourself moving up in microphone standards. I've done this myself. I'm currently using a Neumann TLM-103 microphone for recording my voice-overs, but I've been through several other low and mid-range microphones on my way up to this one.

For headphones, I'm currently using the industry-standard Sony MDR-7506 Studio Headphones. They're lightweight, comfortable, and the audio reproduction quality is good. Also, they're not super-expensive at about $100.

Where should you record your voice-overs?

I record many of my voice-overs in my bedroom closet. I'm not kidding.

Closets are great for recording because all the clothing stops sound waves from bouncing around.

You don't want bouncing sound in your recording (aka reverb or echo).

If you're somewhat newish to voice-overs, you might not even realize the reverb is there. Here's how to test it:

Record a voice-over and listen closely with headphones and your eyes closed. Can you hear the sound of the room? Does it sound like the recording was done in a specific space?

If the answer is yes, then you've accidentally picked up bouncing sound waves. You don't want that. You want the voice-over to sound like it's coming out of nowhere.

Like your voice is coming from an empty void.

What if you don't have a closet you'd be comfortable using? Try recording inside your car (with it turned off).

And yes, if you have the budget and time, you can acoustically treat a room or get a vocal booth if you're completely serious about this voice-over business.

That said, the closet or car is acceptable if you lean more video-enthusiast and less video-professional.

Tips for the Voice-Over Performance

Almost nobody starts out feeling natural when they record voice-overs.

It can be a challenge, because on the one hand, you should probably be reading from a script. But on the other hand, you don't want to sound like you're reading from a script.

So what can you do to make your voice-over sound more natural?

Here are a few tips you might want to try that I've personally found helpful:

• Gesture a lot with your hands, the way you would in a real conversation. This makes the voice-over sound more natural.
• Stand up if you can, or at least sit up in your chair. The posture shows up in the sound of your voice.
• Smile if you want the voice-over to sound happy. Don't smile if you want it to sound serious.
• Talk a little louder and slower than you usually would. For me, this translates to a better voice-over.
• Give yourself plenty of chances to get the take right. I do many (sometimes an embarrassingly large number of) takes until I'm happy with the result. (If you're a professional voice-over artist, you likely won't have the luxury of doing endless takes, but since you're reading this, I'm assuming you're not already a V.O. pro.)

Now Hit Record...

The most important thing to know about voice-overs?

More videos need them. So please use them. Yes, they require more effort, but the benefits of using voice-overs are too numerous to ignore.

A voice-over can help your video be more understandable and entertaining, so it's worth the effort.

Frequently Asked Questions about Voice-Overs

Question: "What post-processing should I do on my voice-over?" It depends on the recording, but I don't do a lot of processing myself on my voice-overs. In post, I usually add a tiny bit of compression, adjust equalization a tad, and then normalize the levels. (If you're not familiar with those terms, don't worry about it. At the beginning it's best just to get started with making sure you have the voice-overs when they're needed. The super-technical stuff can come later.)

Question: "What software should I use to record voice-overs?" There are plenty of options. Frequently I record voice-overs directly into Final Cut Pro X. The Final Cut Pro X audio tools are intuitive and powerful. That said, if I need even more oomph, I'll use Adobe Audition to do the more serious audio work. That's about as advanced as I (a non-audio engineer) get.

Question: "I already recorded echo/reverb in my audio! What can I do to get rid of it?" Bad news on this one. I'm not aware of any way to get rid of reverb from a recording. That said, with technology rocketing forward at its current pace, I wouldn't be surprised if this exists in the future (It might already exist somewhere). For now, it's best to record clean reverb-free voice-overs.

Question: "I don't like the sound of my voice. What should I do?" Well, you could have someone else do the voice-over for you. But really my recommendation is to learn to like the sound of your voice. It's unique. It's you. And almost nobody starts out liking the sound of their voice. With practice and persistence, you can learn to use the uniqueness in your voice to your advantage.

Question: "Should I edit out the breaths from my voice-over?" That's up to you. Some people prefer no breaths. I personally don't mind them as long as they're not too distracting. Sometimes I'll lower the volume of a breath a bit in post.

Question: "Should I sound bored when I'm recording my voice-over?" I thought I already answered this earlier. ;)

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This article was last updated on October 6, 2020