Don LaFontaine: The Man that Redefined Movie Trailers
Don LaFontaine (August 26, 1940 – September 1, 2008) wasn’t the most famous celebrity out there, but so many of us had heard his voice. The man did over 5,000 movie trailers and over 350,000 television commercials, network promotions, and video game trailers. The way that movie trailers sound the way they do has so much to do with this man. His unique deep voice became so popular that many started imitating him and people started to think that’s how trailers should sound like. (And I included a parody of that style as well in Episode 8: Nobody’s Watching.)
I’ve heard about the man and how much he influenced the world of voiceover artists, but I didn’t really know how he is, personality-wise. After seeing this video though, I thought, “What a great guy!”
What makes his voice so great for trailers? He said that he happened to have a frequency range that cuts right through all the explosions and sound effects. That might be true. For those who don’t know what EQing is, it’s something that sound engineers do to boost and cut certain frequencies. For example, if you are recording a song and the vocals have similar frequencies as this other instrument. To make the voice stand out (since that’s what you want to showcase), you will want to dial down the instruments in that particular frequency range. That way, the voice is heard clearly and the instrument still sounds good in the other frequencies. So maybe it did help that he has a voice like that.
But, even if you don’t have a sound that cuts through the other sounds, you can just do it with EQ in post-production, right? I think while there was some merits in that answer, it was really a humble answer from him. I think what made his voice great was that his voice is very expressive and versatile. Listen to the different spots he recorded in that video. You would find that although it’s that same deep voice, the tone and pitch actually varied a lot. It’s the same, but also very different. And really, good voiceover work is about communicating emotions, and he did just that… perfectly.
And here’s another parody of voiceover actors making fun of their own cliches. I found it interesting that all these voice actors have their own unique voice and ways of saying things. Really, if everybody tries to sound the same, there would be no fun in listening to these voices. While it’s fun to mimic the movie trailer guy every now and then, we shouldn’t forget that we should each find our own voice, because you can never completely become someone else and you’ll always be you (and that’s not a bad thing either).
(Via Bubble Boy)
Comments(2)
Kelvin,
Voice-over actors do NOT ever get the respect they deserve. I think of how many voice-overs people don’t even “hear” and find it sad. I’m not a huge TV watcher, but I do know that on “Desperate Housewives,” the voiceover actress – whose charcter’s “suicide” apparently started the series – is given credit as a cast member. Her voiceovers at the beginning and end are the best part of the show!
Great & original blog!
Rita
Rita’s last blog post..Prophet and Loss Statement – Part II –Surprise!
That reminds me of how each episode of Gossip Girl starts and ends with Kristen Bell’s voice. I think her voice adds a lot of personality to the show’s overall feel.
It looks like animated feature nowadays like to use celebrity voices. Some of them are actually pretty good at it, while the others are just not very interesting. But I guess it all comes down to marketing… Even if people don’t go to see a film because some celebrity voiced a cartoon character, these celebrities can increase the film’s exposure by going onto talk shows and such.
But yeah, I have a lot of respect for voice actors such as Fred Newman, Dan Castellaneta, etc.