Voice Acting

Voice acting is the art of doing voice-overs or providing voices to represent a character or to provide information to an audience or user. Examples include animated, off-stage, off-screen or non-visible characters in various works, including feature films, dubbed foreign language films, animated short films, television programs, commercials, radio or audio dramas, comedy, video games, puppet shows, amusement rides, audiobooks and documentaries. Voice acting is also done for small handheld audio games.

Performers are called voice actors or actresses, voice artists or voice talent. Their roles may also involve singing, although a second voice actor is sometimes cast as the character's singing voice. Voice acting is recognized in Britain as a specialized dramatic profession, chiefly owing to the BBC's long tradition of radio drama.

Voice artists are also used to record the individual sample fragments played back by a computer in an automated announcement.

Voice actors provide voices for animated characters.

For live action production, voice acting often involves reading the parts of computer programs, radio dispatchers, or other characters who never actually appear on screen.

With a radio drama or CD drama there is more freedom given in voicing because there is no need to match a dub to the original actors, or to match an animated character.

In 1988–94, the United Kingdom banned broadcasting of the voices of people linked to violence in Northern Ireland; television circumvented this using actors' voices synchronized to footage of prohibited people speaking.

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