(1) What is your essential question? What is the best answer to your question and why?
What is most important to consider when developing the voice of an animated character?
Knowing your character types. It kind of goes hand in hand with knowing your vocal limits because there are some roles that are difficult to do. Such as, I found that I cannot play clumsy, young female characters, but I can play more of a tomboy-esue kind of role.
(2) What process did you take to arrive at this answer?
In the beginning, my EQ was 'What is the best way to prepare for Voice Acting,' until I was slapped in the face by the realization that the senior project had to be much more minimal than that. Since it was voice acting and not voice over, I decided to focus more on the animation characters and the life that is put into it when making them. So before when it was about training and vocal exercises, it turned out to be more on trying to find the best character that suited you and vocal types. I found out that knowing your voice is always the first step. You gotta walk before you can run, right? Also on making personal connections is helpful because it allows you to piee together you and the character and can make the feeling much more realistic. My best answer was knowing your character types because I heard that you don't truly know what you can do until you know the different types of characters and how your voice fits them.
(3) What problems did you face? How did you resolve them?
I had problems finding mentorship. Bang Zoom Entertainment didn't take in my resume for an internship there and I didn't really know where to go. Eventually, by December, I was able to help out in the drama program at Bassett High School. Another one was interviews. I didn't know who to interview or how to contact them. Especially by the 4th one, and it was barely cutting it short. I resolved that by my sister, Jessie, since she knew a guy who was voice actor and that helped a lot.
(4) What are the two most significant sources you used to answer your essential question and why?
Crispin Freeman's Character Types and Pat Farely's Knowing Your Own Voice. You need to know the basics and get used to hearing yourself. And knowing what types of characters are out there. There are more than just the 'boy/girl' characters, there are like sub levels that you need to pay attention to. You need to know what they are and what makes them that character and then trying to find the voice that best suits it. For example, Freeman is known for playing older, protective brothers, and because he leads that kind of voice, is why he is able to get the job for those characters.
(5) What is your product and why?
Finding out what type of voice I can create. As I stated before, I found that I could play mostly tomboy types of characters . It's important to know what you can play because now I know what characters to look for and I can try my best focusing on those and knowing that I have a higher chance on getting the role rather than not working on a character I know I can't do and then getting disappointed in the end.
