The Art of Voice Acting

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For as long as there have been cartoons there have been voice actors.In reality, voice actors are some of the best in the business, relying on nothing but their vocal talents in order to bring their respective characters to life. Their contribution to the media is as utterly phenomenal as it is uniquely challenging.

2Much of a voice actor’s career is spent in a booth reading lines to the surrounding air in a variety of tones and styles for each take. As Tom Hanks has been keen to emphasise, the transition from ‘regular’ acting roles to animated ones (specificallyToy Story1美国迪士尼公司出品的系列动画电影，汤姆·汉克斯在其中为胡迪配音。) is not an easy one, an often-gruelling process involving hour after hour of line reads to find the perfect take. Anyone who has enjoyed the pleasures of the Matt Berry sitcomToast of London2英国电视剧。will have some small appreciation of the frustrations endured by diligent voice actors at the hands of their overbearing sound producers.

配音演员这一职业，自从动画片诞生起就存在了。在现实中，配音演员多为业界翘楚，全靠发音天赋来演活自己的角色。他们为媒体做出了杰出的贡献，他们的工作也有着非同寻常的难度。

2配音演员的职业生涯多半是在录音棚中度过的。每一场录音，他们都要对着周遭的空气，用不同的语调与风格念台词。正如汤姆·汉克斯一直热衷于强调的那样，从“常规的”真人角色到动画角色（具体地说就是《玩具总动员》）的过渡并非易事。在为动画角色配音时，配音演员往往要经历一个饱受折磨的过程，在一个又一个小时的反复尝试中，找到最令人满意的一版配音。每一位享受过马特·贝里的情景喜剧《伦敦榜样》所带来的乐趣的人，多少能了解勤奋的配音演员们是如何在专横的配音制作人手下饱受折磨的。

3The great skill of the voice artist,then, is to be able to conjure characters through the power of the voice alone,often with minimal external resources.While performers may be gifted supplementary materials ranging from sketches to projections of footage, the general lack of other actors off which to bounce makes proceedings akin to working in a creative vacuum. Since cartoons aren’t quite so adept at conveying the infinitely varying subtleties of the human face,the importance of a decent voice behind the lines becomes even more acute.

4The quality of voice acting has coincided with the rise in quality of most animated fare in general, a trend accelerated with the ascent ofThe Simpsonsin the 90s. Combining the vocal dexterity of an impressionist3impressionist 模仿演员（常模仿名人言行）。and the emotive skills of trained actors, the exceptional ear that many great vocal performers possess is akin to that of a great jazz musician able to improvise melodies purely by virtue of hearing the notes in his or her head.

5A voice actor’s voice is their weapon,their predominant tool in crafting characters of a range and variety, as well as depth and subtlety, of which most‘regular’ actors can only dream. The Simpsons’ Hank Azaria has lent his talents to stalwarts such as Comic Book Guy, Cletus, Professor Frink, Snake4原名Chester Turley，Snake 为其昵称。,The Sea Captain5原名霍雷肖·麦卡利斯特（Horatio McCallister）。, Superintendent Chalmers, Disco Stu and of course Mo Szyslak, while Family Guy’s Seth Mac-Farlane, a skilled voice actor in his own right, stretches his vocal capacity to the limit in order to voice Peter, Brian and Stewie Griffin, as well as Dr. Hartman,Carter Pewterschmidt, Sheamus, Tom Tucker and God himself.

3还有，配音艺术家们技艺的精湛之处就在于，他们往往依靠极少的外部资源，仅凭嗓音的魔力，就能令角色栩栩如生。虽然配音演员们会得到一些辅助材料，比如从动画的草图到镜头投影。但总体来看，他们缺乏其他演员的配合，如同在一个创意真空中表演。由于动画片不擅长呈现人脸变化多端的微妙表情，一个契合台词的配音就显得尤为重要。

4总体看来，配音的质量与多数动画片的质量在同步提升，这一趋势随着20 世纪90年代动画片《辛普森一家》的成功加快了。许多杰出的配音演员兼具模仿演员的灵活发声技巧和成熟演员的情感表达技巧。他们拥有非凡的听力，一如优秀的爵士音乐家仅凭脑海中听到的音符就能即兴创作旋律。

5配音演员的嗓音是他们的武器，是他们塑造形形色色角色的主要工具——这些角色或同类或多样、或深刻或细腻，是大多数“常规”演员无法企及的。在《辛普森一家》中，汉克·阿扎利亚出色地完成了多个角色的配音，包括漫画男、克莱图斯、弗林克教授、斯内克、船长霍雷肖、校监查默斯、迪斯科·斯图，当然还有酒保莫·希什拉克。在《恶搞之家》中，优秀的配音演员塞思·麦克法兰也将自身的发音能力发挥到了极致，为彼得·格利芬、布莱恩·格里芬、斯特威·格里芬以及哈特曼医生、卡特·皮尤特施密特、希默斯、汤姆·塔克和上帝进行配音。

6The king of the medium is arguably Mark Hamill, a man whose unusual career trajectory has taken him from the starring role in the most iconic film franchise of all time to becoming arguably the most versatile and respected voice actor of his generation. Hamill can do it all, his roles ranging from Skeletor inMasters of the Universeto Chucky in theChild’s Play6美国系列恐怖电影。remake. It’s a testament to Hamill’s extraordinary skills that his incarnation of The Joker is still held up as the truest and most complete version of the character, ahead of the likes of Jack Nicholson, Joaquin Phoenix and even Heath Ledger.

7The skillset required isn’t just restricted to TV and movies. From Roger Clark’s peerless evocation of Western antihero Arthur Morgan in Red Dead Redemption 27一款以美国西部拓荒史为题材的动作冒险类开放世界游戏。to Troy Baker’s nuanced portrayal of damaged survivor Joel Miller in The Last of Us8索尼电脑娱乐公司发行的一款动作冒险生存类游戏。, the gaming world has seen a rapid evolution over the past few years in the standard, and consistency, of its vocal performances.It’s little surprise that some of the finest voice actors working today do so through the medium of gaming. It’s an ideal showcase for a performer’s work. Artists can expect to have their work heard hundreds of times across thousands of cumulative hours of gameplay. With the meteoric rise in quality of gaming storytelling, chameleonic performers such as Nolan North, Troy Baker, and Hamill himself choose video games as their predominant means of employment.

6在这一行业中，马克·哈米尔可以说是王者。他职业生涯的发展轨迹非同寻常，从有史以来最经典电影系列的主演转变为同辈中最多才多艺、最受尊敬的配音演员。哈米尔可以胜任各类角色，从《宇宙巨人希曼：启示录》中的骷髅王到翻拍版《鬼娃回魂》中的恰吉，都是由他配音。他塑造的小丑超越了杰克·尼科尔森、华金·菲尼克斯甚至希思·莱杰的版本，时至今日仍被认为是对这一角色最真实、最完整的演绎，这证明了他非凡的配音能力。

7并非只有电视剧与电影才会用到配音技能。从罗杰·克拉克在《荒野大镖客2》中对西方反英雄角色亚瑟·摩根精彩绝伦的演绎，到特洛伊·贝克在《最后生还者》中对受到真菌感染的幸存者乔尔·米勒精准细腻的刻画中可以看到，近几年来，游戏世界中配音表演的标准及稳定性已经迅速提升。因而，当今一些仍在从业的最优秀的配音演员在游戏行业谋求发展就不足为奇了。对于演员而言，游戏世界是一个展示技艺的理想舞台。配音艺术家们可以期待玩家在累计数千小时的游戏中数百次地听到他们的作品。随着游戏解说质量的飞速提升，像诺兰·诺思、特洛伊·贝克以及哈米尔这些一人千面的配音演员便选择将电子游戏作为主要的工作领域。

8The talents of actors are often overrated, their suitability and success dictated often as much by circumstances of birth, attractiveness or other trivial characteristics. The voice actor, however,is an artist, a performer utilising nothing more than the human voice to craft characters as a musician employs the keys on a piano keyboard.

8演员的天赋往往被高估了。他们与角色的匹配程度以及所获成功常常也受其先天条件、魅力或者其他微不足道的特征影响。配音演员则是艺术家，他们塑造角色全靠人声，就如同钢琴演奏家运用琴键。