The Process

Personal Reflection: Staring at my Hands

I’ve been at these skills for almost a full year, and it still feels like I’m a neophyte in many ways. I’ve been a theater kid throughout high-school and college, and the decision to immediately set out to pursue voice-acting has been both sobering and terrifying in many different degrees. For all the experience I’ve gained on stage, I assumed it would give me this great foundation to start my career at such an early age; to rise above my peers and colleagues. Instead, it has humbled me in helping me realize how much there is in exploring this new world of voice-acting. I feel lost in the messiness of young adulthood and the burgeonings of my career, and yet I take great comfort knowing that what I’m doing right now is what I’ve always wanted to do since I was four. To make my imaginations come to reality.

Characterization: The Power of Visualization

Hand/Eye Coordination is one of my weaker skills. Certainly, growing up with rhythm games has attributed to that particular strength, but you throw me in sports and I couldn’t throw a football to save my life. This one fluctuates depending on the circumstance, and so too was it in embodying the voice. I always Hand/Eye Coordination to be a “straight-shooter” when it comes to his speech. Someone whose direct, concise, and self-assured; this was someone who didn’t mince their words. My inspirations were primarily coming from Rusty from True Detective and Mike Erhmantraut from Breaking Bad; their relentless drive to accomplish their goals with such effortless and minamlism was what I wanted for Hand/Eye. There was a certain risk I took for Hand/Eye, and that was just the matter of using a Texas accent for sakes of characterization. In my head, that “gruff cowboy” persona is something that is beyond my typecast, but why the hell not? Let’s try it and see if it works.

Sound Design: Review of my Workflow

This skill took approximately 4-6 hours to bring from conceptualization to final product. Recording took about an hour (because I’m trying to fight against that perfectionist attitude) and 3 hours for the editing. Everything from EQ to sound-design to video-editing. Compared to Shivers, where that one took an ungodly amount of brooding due to the complexity I wanted to express, this one was fairly simple again like Drama. A dry and present voice with very little reverb because I wanted to keep this skill tangible. So too was the sound-design; in terms of where this takes place in Disco Elysium, minimal ambience was needed to help ground the character. As a milestone, I’m glad that the process does feel “easier” in a way, but there is a whole level of confidence that still needs to be established.

Conclusion: Where to Next?

Round 4 is done, and that means there are only 8 skills left. But so too, with the work-season finally done for me, that gives me the needed freetime to start pursuing other personal projects. One of them involves poetry actually, but I will keep it as simple as that. I’d rather not establish daunting expectations so early. But this project was spurred from my desire to help make these voices feel tangible. My parents tell me that I have a “strong brain:” that for all the overwhelming thoughts that swim through my head, they are also united as this single entity. Desires, self-criticisms, daydreams are all coagulated under this one brain. This project was to help deconstruct those thoughts and help make them feel more “digestible.” I can ramble on about this, but that will be enough for one day.

19 May 2024