How Acting Affects My Podfic
Podfic is more than just saying words aloud-it's performing them, expressing one reader's experience of the story and sharing it with the world. To find out more information on acting in podfic, check out Pod Aware on DW, LJ or Tumblr.
Today's Podaware topic is acting. Acting is one of the things I love about podfic. I am actually a great public speaker, I have generally gotten over/owned the whole stage fright thing. It happens, I blow right past it. However, I am not an actor. The only acting thing I've done since high school was our college's production of Dr. Horrible where I was fangirl #2 (I can sing, and act like a fangirl, surprise). I doubt I will ever take on Hamlet (or whatever), and this does not trouble me. As a tween I used to fantasize about becoming a famous voice actor for which I blame anime. I still sometimes think about that (mostly because of how much I love podfic) but voice actors are *actors* and so that's not going to happen. It's a bit sad for my pre-teen dreams, but happily podfic totally fills that interest.
I know some people think of podfic as reading, or interpreting the text. I think of all podfic as acting, reading is in itself acting. Okay so maybe to say "I'm playing the text!" sounds weird but I do think of it that way sometimes, particularly with something very lyrical or where there's an overall feel to the story I'm trying to embody in my style of reading. There are so many different possible ways to read, and not just between readers, but things I can do between one reading an the next. Sometimes this is obvious like, "this stories enthusiastic, I'm going to read it happily and with verve!" or "this is a lullaby I will read it like I'm reading someone to sleep" or "this is porn, I must read it with the sensuality it deserves!"
Beyond "playing the text", podfic gives a reader the wonderful opportunity to play a whole cast of characters themselves. I *love* doing that. My crazy long Ion Arc project is all about this. 50% is the fact that somewhere in middle school I decided I was Duo Maxwell. I basically internalized the inner monologue that fandom depicted of that character. I occasionally still find myself going "oh, that was a Duo Maxwell thought pattern, huh". So it's fairly easy for me to slip into that character and mindset. But more than just that, it's the experience of living in a character's head and feeling their experiences with them. This is why podfics of 1st person stories are so interesting/fun to do for me. I basically get to act a character and *be* them. And sometimes this is a bit silly, like in the latest part I've been working on where recording basically mean "I'm off to go yell at myself!" because I'm recording a fight scene. Before I started podficcing, I wasn't sure how reading all by oneself a reader could get the scope of emotions from characters coming from really different places (and different places from the reader) but I've found that I am actually able to play my character voices off each other. I am literally talking to myself, but sometimes, while recording, it honestly doesn't feel like that. It's a bit surreal, but also kind of awesome being both the character who's concerned and confused lying in a hospital bed, the character who's freaking out and crying over them, and the calm narrator describing the scene.
It's probably obvious, but one of the ways I act characters, and distinguish them from each other is how I read their dialogue. I didn't start out doing podfic with intention to do voices, I wanted to just *read* something aloud, like you do. The first podfic I recorded was a Spiderman/Smallville crossover and somewhere in there I couldn't help myself from playing with how I read Lex's voice. He was so smooth and in control and Lex-like. He deserved a deeper register and more purr. So that happened. I mentioned in the How I Podfic post, that at this point, it's just easier to have a voice for each character because otherwise I'm going to do it accidentally. This can get overly complicated when you've got a large cast, or side characters that appeared 2 chapters ago come back in a long work and you have no idea how you originally voiced them, and can't find the moment in the podfic ~40 minutes ago where they spoke. If this happens to you too, you're not alone. Sometimes characters will have really similar voices and I'll only push a difference between them when they're talking to each other. Some characters have really obvious speech patterns and reading them is about how they talk not their register/tone. I could probably pitch Rodney McKay anywhere but the speed, eye rolling, frustration, elation, and pride would probably be there wherever I put his voice. Stiles similarly has a unique cadence, a particular way I speak when reading him. What's fun is after working with a character enough I can start pulling their voices out any time, to say anything, whether or not there's fic involved. The most obvious example of this is probably Miria Harvent, she's the most extreme voice I've ever read: the bubbly, high pitched, over excited and enthusiastic soprano of glee. Even if I occasionally hurt my own ears, she's very fun to be/voice.
Podficcing has probably made me more aware of my own vocal mannerisms. A voice can be light or deep or smooth or bubbly or nasal or bright or hoarse/growly all in the same pitch. Or you can differentiate just with the variance of pitch range. It can be hard to keep those aspects consistent for a character over a long period of time, but as long as the most basic distinction is the same it generally works since actual people's speaking voices are not all that consistent. Though for the life of me I still can't have my voice crack on command. One nice upshot of focusing so much on how my voice sounds, and speaking is that it's made my job so much easier. I've spent most of the last few months cold calling people about scientific studies as a research assistant. I think podfic and the ability to sound polite, sweet, and happy/enthusiastic definitely made it easier on me (I got yelled at less).
So yeah, I do voices, I try to "embody" the text, I try and match a characters emotion, all that's acting I think. But what you don't see is the physical acting that goes with that as well. I'm not hopping around the room, but while recording I often do the characters actions to some extent. When reading Sheriff Stilinski I find myself pinching the bridge of my nose a lot. Issac and Miria come with large gesticulations. I find it frustrating when a fic says that a character puts a hand over their eyes because then I can't read the next sentence. I didn't notice any of these tendencies at first, not until a few years ago I was recording in the lounge of our dorm which has one wall facing the corridor entirely made of windows. I was flailing and vehemently yelling at the other character and realized that the pointing and gesticulation and fighting-with-myself probably looked really weird to anyone walking by. This is one reason I actually like recording with my laptop mic, I'm less likely to actually start moving about the room. I'm afraid if I head a headset mic there would be actual full body character impersonation and it would be bad (depending on the length of the cord).
But mostly, what I love about acting and podfic is getting to experience the range of emotion for a character vicariously. I am not someone who gets angry easily. It's a very, very rare occurrence. Reading character fighting with one another, or a character being angry in general can be really fun because I get to act out those feelings outside of myself in a way I don't do naturally. Similarly, I am not someone who cries easily. I have been teased since forever by friends and family about having a heart of stone because I don't cry at sad books/films. I certainly cannot cry on command, but I've been able to get into that mindset through podfic where I can almost cry (at least tear up!) along with the character. It's actually really awesome. Somehow bringing those emotions into my voice forces my body to feel those emotions as well.
Of course, I still haven't addressed porn. Affection is an easy thing to voice, but mostly when it comes to actual sex scenes my acting strategy is to run around the room a bit so my voice sounds a little more breathless. From my perspective the basis of reading porn is in the breath because that has to be distinctly different from a normal narrative pace. On the whole, porn dialogue got easier once I gave myself license to not read "nngh" as literally what the letters say. "Ah" and "oh" also are not necessarily those sounds. Once I filled in "non-verbal-mouth-open-sound-here" and "non-verbal-mouth-mostly-closed-sound-here" everything made more sense because then with the combination of breathing, the sound is more natural and not like I'm attempting to sing badly about vowels. Honestly I think porn is always somewhat awkward to read. I have gotten brilliant at saying explicit, dirty things without blinking/stuttering/stopping, but trying to figure out how *that* character would sound can be awkward, and hilarious. My major suggestion is to record in a space where only you will be an nobody else is likely to arrive. That helps a lot.
Today's Podaware topic is acting. Acting is one of the things I love about podfic. I am actually a great public speaker, I have generally gotten over/owned the whole stage fright thing. It happens, I blow right past it. However, I am not an actor. The only acting thing I've done since high school was our college's production of Dr. Horrible where I was fangirl #2 (I can sing, and act like a fangirl, surprise). I doubt I will ever take on Hamlet (or whatever), and this does not trouble me. As a tween I used to fantasize about becoming a famous voice actor for which I blame anime. I still sometimes think about that (mostly because of how much I love podfic) but voice actors are *actors* and so that's not going to happen. It's a bit sad for my pre-teen dreams, but happily podfic totally fills that interest.
I know some people think of podfic as reading, or interpreting the text. I think of all podfic as acting, reading is in itself acting. Okay so maybe to say "I'm playing the text!" sounds weird but I do think of it that way sometimes, particularly with something very lyrical or where there's an overall feel to the story I'm trying to embody in my style of reading. There are so many different possible ways to read, and not just between readers, but things I can do between one reading an the next. Sometimes this is obvious like, "this stories enthusiastic, I'm going to read it happily and with verve!" or "this is a lullaby I will read it like I'm reading someone to sleep" or "this is porn, I must read it with the sensuality it deserves!"
Beyond "playing the text", podfic gives a reader the wonderful opportunity to play a whole cast of characters themselves. I *love* doing that. My crazy long Ion Arc project is all about this. 50% is the fact that somewhere in middle school I decided I was Duo Maxwell. I basically internalized the inner monologue that fandom depicted of that character. I occasionally still find myself going "oh, that was a Duo Maxwell thought pattern, huh". So it's fairly easy for me to slip into that character and mindset. But more than just that, it's the experience of living in a character's head and feeling their experiences with them. This is why podfics of 1st person stories are so interesting/fun to do for me. I basically get to act a character and *be* them. And sometimes this is a bit silly, like in the latest part I've been working on where recording basically mean "I'm off to go yell at myself!" because I'm recording a fight scene. Before I started podficcing, I wasn't sure how reading all by oneself a reader could get the scope of emotions from characters coming from really different places (and different places from the reader) but I've found that I am actually able to play my character voices off each other. I am literally talking to myself, but sometimes, while recording, it honestly doesn't feel like that. It's a bit surreal, but also kind of awesome being both the character who's concerned and confused lying in a hospital bed, the character who's freaking out and crying over them, and the calm narrator describing the scene.
It's probably obvious, but one of the ways I act characters, and distinguish them from each other is how I read their dialogue. I didn't start out doing podfic with intention to do voices, I wanted to just *read* something aloud, like you do. The first podfic I recorded was a Spiderman/Smallville crossover and somewhere in there I couldn't help myself from playing with how I read Lex's voice. He was so smooth and in control and Lex-like. He deserved a deeper register and more purr. So that happened. I mentioned in the How I Podfic post, that at this point, it's just easier to have a voice for each character because otherwise I'm going to do it accidentally. This can get overly complicated when you've got a large cast, or side characters that appeared 2 chapters ago come back in a long work and you have no idea how you originally voiced them, and can't find the moment in the podfic ~40 minutes ago where they spoke. If this happens to you too, you're not alone. Sometimes characters will have really similar voices and I'll only push a difference between them when they're talking to each other. Some characters have really obvious speech patterns and reading them is about how they talk not their register/tone. I could probably pitch Rodney McKay anywhere but the speed, eye rolling, frustration, elation, and pride would probably be there wherever I put his voice. Stiles similarly has a unique cadence, a particular way I speak when reading him. What's fun is after working with a character enough I can start pulling their voices out any time, to say anything, whether or not there's fic involved. The most obvious example of this is probably Miria Harvent, she's the most extreme voice I've ever read: the bubbly, high pitched, over excited and enthusiastic soprano of glee. Even if I occasionally hurt my own ears, she's very fun to be/voice.
Podficcing has probably made me more aware of my own vocal mannerisms. A voice can be light or deep or smooth or bubbly or nasal or bright or hoarse/growly all in the same pitch. Or you can differentiate just with the variance of pitch range. It can be hard to keep those aspects consistent for a character over a long period of time, but as long as the most basic distinction is the same it generally works since actual people's speaking voices are not all that consistent. Though for the life of me I still can't have my voice crack on command. One nice upshot of focusing so much on how my voice sounds, and speaking is that it's made my job so much easier. I've spent most of the last few months cold calling people about scientific studies as a research assistant. I think podfic and the ability to sound polite, sweet, and happy/enthusiastic definitely made it easier on me (I got yelled at less).
So yeah, I do voices, I try to "embody" the text, I try and match a characters emotion, all that's acting I think. But what you don't see is the physical acting that goes with that as well. I'm not hopping around the room, but while recording I often do the characters actions to some extent. When reading Sheriff Stilinski I find myself pinching the bridge of my nose a lot. Issac and Miria come with large gesticulations. I find it frustrating when a fic says that a character puts a hand over their eyes because then I can't read the next sentence. I didn't notice any of these tendencies at first, not until a few years ago I was recording in the lounge of our dorm which has one wall facing the corridor entirely made of windows. I was flailing and vehemently yelling at the other character and realized that the pointing and gesticulation and fighting-with-myself probably looked really weird to anyone walking by. This is one reason I actually like recording with my laptop mic, I'm less likely to actually start moving about the room. I'm afraid if I head a headset mic there would be actual full body character impersonation and it would be bad (depending on the length of the cord).
But mostly, what I love about acting and podfic is getting to experience the range of emotion for a character vicariously. I am not someone who gets angry easily. It's a very, very rare occurrence. Reading character fighting with one another, or a character being angry in general can be really fun because I get to act out those feelings outside of myself in a way I don't do naturally. Similarly, I am not someone who cries easily. I have been teased since forever by friends and family about having a heart of stone because I don't cry at sad books/films. I certainly cannot cry on command, but I've been able to get into that mindset through podfic where I can almost cry (at least tear up!) along with the character. It's actually really awesome. Somehow bringing those emotions into my voice forces my body to feel those emotions as well.
Of course, I still haven't addressed porn. Affection is an easy thing to voice, but mostly when it comes to actual sex scenes my acting strategy is to run around the room a bit so my voice sounds a little more breathless. From my perspective the basis of reading porn is in the breath because that has to be distinctly different from a normal narrative pace. On the whole, porn dialogue got easier once I gave myself license to not read "nngh" as literally what the letters say. "Ah" and "oh" also are not necessarily those sounds. Once I filled in "non-verbal-mouth-open-sound-here" and "non-verbal-mouth-mostly-closed-sound-here" everything made more sense because then with the combination of breathing, the sound is more natural and not like I'm attempting to sing badly about vowels. Honestly I think porn is always somewhat awkward to read. I have gotten brilliant at saying explicit, dirty things without blinking/stuttering/stopping, but trying to figure out how *that* character would sound can be awkward, and hilarious. My major suggestion is to record in a space where only you will be an nobody else is likely to arrive. That helps a lot.