We've been hearing this from our own people lately, and I find it really interesting. Casting directors are asking voice actors for video proof that they're not AI. Gabby and I talked about it on Open Forum Friday, and honestly Gabby hadn't seen it yet either. She was a little taken aback.

A former member of ours posted about it. They were about to be booked on a documentary job, and before the casting agency would hand it over, they had to send a video of themselves reading the script. And this was real. It wasn't a scam. It was a real casting agency doing its homework. They sent the video, and they booked the job.

So why is this happening, and what should you do about it?

Why casting directors want to see you

The first one is ownership. In the United States, if something is made by AI and there isn't enough of a human in it, it's basically treated as public domain. How much is "enough" is still a little ambiguous, and that's part of the problem. But if nobody really owns the audio, you've got a mess with royalties and contracts. A client who's paying for a voice wants to know a person made it, because a person can sign the contract.

The second one is what Gabby called a truth in advertising problem. There are so many tools out there now to manipulate audio that clients are starting to feel duped. What they hear in an audition doesn't always match what they get in the finished product, or what they get when they direct you live.

Gabby pointed out that agents have dealt with this with demos forever. A demo gets you through the first hurdle, and then a lot of agents will have you do some live reads or a mock directed session before they put you on the roster, because they want to make sure it wasn't an over-produced demo you can't actually do. Gabby has said for a long time that our audio tools are basically Photoshop for audio. If you're casting a model and the photos are too heavily doctored, you're not getting an accurate picture of the person. Same goes for us.

AI audio is clean. Yours has to be clean too.

AI is not going to take over. There will always be a place for human voices, and yes, there's clearly a place for AI narration too.

This is what I think matters. If you go to one of the big AI voice companies and get a voice, it won't have background noise. It won't have mouth clicks. It won't have any of the stuff that we as humans need to clean up. Those things make us human, and that's important, but people still want good audio.

Honestly, I think the only real reason we'd lose work is if we're too difficult to work with. It's not that they don't want human voices. And some of us (not all of us) have shot ourselves in the foot a few times.

Mouth noise is a good example. Gabby has seen so many talent who run a pile of processing to get rid of mouth noise, but they never fix the actual problem, so their raw audio is pretty bad. Then a client hears the raw stuff and feels duped.

You have to be seen now

It's kind of funny. We're supposed to be doing the one job where nobody needs to see us, and the audience will probably never know our face. But the people who hire you do want to know, and a lot of them want to picture you as their brand ambassador, the voice for their business.

Technology is part of this too. A few years ago a directed session over Zoom was unheard of. Gabby lived with a phone patch. Now it's all browser-based, with Zoom or Google Meet on top, and the more tools a client has, the more they're going to use them. Of course they want to see you.

I think requests for video proof (or some kind of proof) are going to increase. It's getting harder and harder to tell what's real. Gabby sees it the same way as a client asking for a noise floor test or a specific ten or fifteen second raw file. It's just going to be part of the portfolio we all need to have ready.

Proof is in the pudding, but you have to make the pudding

A lot of us are staying under the radar and not putting anything out. I'm not saying you have to go make a hundred videos. But you want something out there, somewhere, that shows it's really you. That's where your branding matters. When someone looks you up, they should be able to say, yes, that's real, that's who they are.

Someone asked on the live whether they should switch their samples on freelance sites from a headshot with audio to a video of them actually performing. Gabby's answer was to try it with one. Not all of your samples need to be video, but a couple of live performances can really help with the clients who want to see that.

And one more thing. If someone asks you for a video, you're allowed to ask who they are too. Proof goes both ways. There are a lot of scams going around, so check the company before you send anything.

How to film a no-edit self-tape

If a client asks you for video proof, this is how I'd do it. The whole point is that it's raw, so the less you do to it, the better.

Film in your booth or wherever you actually record. They probably want to see your space, so let them see it. Put your phone or webcam at about eye level and frame yourself from the chest up, with your mic in the shot. Business on top, party on the bottom. You can still be in your fuzzy slippers, just look presentable from the neck up.

Record the video and your mic at the same time, in one take, start to finish. Don't cut it together, don't punch in, don't add music. Saying your name and the date at the top is a nice touch. Then go straight into the script they sent you.

Don't run your noise reduction or mouth click removal on it. This is the time your raw audio has to stand on its own, which is why working on your room and your technique matters more than any plugin. If you flub a line, just pick it back up like you would in a live session. That actually helps, because it shows them it's real.

Then send it as a plain file or a private link, exactly as it came off the camera. If they want a separate raw audio file as well, send the mic recording from that same take with nothing done to it.

Want something to practice on before a client asks? Grab a script from our free script library and film yourself reading it, one take, no edits. Watch it back. You'll learn a lot :)

Keep building your business

What I see hurting voice actors most right now isn't a lack of work. There's still plenty of work out there. I'm still getting work. It's the marketing. The AI voice companies have a ton of money behind them and they're marketing their services constantly. They're running businesses better than a lot of us.

So don't let the fear stop you. Keep auditioning, keep putting yourself out there, and put your business hat on, because this is a business. Gabby made a great point too. More and more people use AI as their search engine, so you need a website and a presence that it can actually find and recommend.

And remember, no matter what's going on with AI, our job is still getting people booked. Come see how we do it. Our live classes are open to everyone during Free Class Week, 12 to 15 October. It's free, you just sign up. When you're ready to train with us every week, that's here.

Go film that self-tape. I'll see you in class.

Anthony