“I love all my characters,” Amanda Winn Lee said. If a voice actor does not have this attitude, “it comes through in your voice.”
Winn Lee, who has voiced anime and video game characters, participated in a press junket at ConnectiCon last weekend with Danielle McRae, Rachel Robinson, and Carlos Ferro, fellow voice actors.
McRae, a newer actor, has voiced Hagara the Stormbinder in World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, among other characters. Robinson, who has participated in ConnectiCon several times previously, is the voice of Oerba Yun Fang in Final Fantasy. Ferro is known for voicing Dom Santiago from Gears of War.
When asked why military shooter games are so popular, Ferro stated the obvious: “everybody likes to shoot shit.”
The actors explained their routes to voice acting. Some “fell into” it, while others trained. Later, Jim Cummings, speaking by himself, would tell about his own path into this industry.
Cummings, who has voiced just about everything, including Tigger and Winnie-the-Pooh, knew since he was four that he would do something artistic. He recalled learning that voice acting was a thing: “This guy’s getting paid really good money for something that’s getting me kicked out of class,”Cummings said. From an early age, he said he knew he “wouldn’t have a time card or a tie.”
The path to determining what voice a new character gets is more of a “circuitous route,” said Cummings. He said he has to “look at the critter,” then work with the director while mixing in personality and character traits. Sometimes he’s told a character should sound like a known actor. Other times, he might go for the unexpected voice — a tiny, high-pitched voice for a large, oafish character.
While known for some cuddly, family-friendly characters, Cummings said he prefers to voice the evil characters because it lets him be “a little more vitriolic” than normal.