When voice acting you will occasionally have to convey a sad emotion. It might be tough to get into the appropriate mindset so here’re some tips that will help to better convey a sad emotion and misery when voice acting:
- Speak slowly
- Use interrupted speech
- Nod down
- Slump down
- Listen to sad music
- Sigh and blow nose
- Remember something sad that happened to you
- Stay alone for a while
- Grimace
- Use slurred speech
Now let’s get a bit more in-depth.
Speak slowly
When you’re sad it’s natural to speak slowly. That’s because we’re usually not too excited to speak about our problems and naturally you wouldn’t be too hyped about it.
Try to speak slowly to convey the sad emotion.
Interrupted speech
Use interrupted speech to sound sad. It will help to convey the feeling that it’s hard for you to express yourself.
Make small pauses and add ahhhhs to your speech for more convincing sad voice acting.
Occasionally you might even add a long pause as if it’s hard for you to carry on speaking due to how sad you are.
Grimace
Make a sad face when voice acting a sad character. It’s much easier to sound sad when your face is contorted with a sad grimace.
Nod down
Nod your head down. Not only will it help to get you into a sad mood, but you will start sounding a bit more mumbly as if you didn’t want to tell what you’re about to tell.
When sad it’s often hard to express ourselves and that’s exactly what you want to convey.
Use sad body language to get into the mood
Again, to get into the sad mood apply appropriate body language.
It doesn’t matter that nobody can see you when voice acting. It’s all about getting into the sad mood. Slump your shoulders, nod your head down and look downwards.
Don’t move too much and lay your hands down. Avoid gazing right in front of you. You will feel miserable in no time.
Use a monotone voice
When pretending to be sad try to stick with a monotone voice. Remember you’re not supposed to be too excited when conveying a sad emotion.
Keep your tone quite bland and monotone.
Listen to sad music
To start feeling sad you can prep yourself with some sad music. Just listen for a few sad songs before starting your recording session and you should be good to go.
Remember something sad that happened to you
To start feeling sad remember something sad that happened to you in the past. Try to replicate every detail of what happened in your mind and remember what you felt at the moment. You will get sadder by the second.
Stay alone
To start feeling sad you might want to avoid other people for a while before beginning your voice acting recording session. Just stay alone and don’t contact anyone for an hour or two. Melancholy is easier to achieve when you’re alone.
Sigh and blow nose
Add some sighs when recording to add more sadness into your recording. Don’t overdo it, but a couple of good sighs will add some sadness to your recording.
Similarly to sighs, you can blow your nose once or twice while pretending to be sad. Especially if you want to convey a close to crying sad emotion.
Slurred speech
You can slur words to make your speech less intelligible. It will sound as if it’s hard for you to convey your emotions due to how sad you are.