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Yagrum Bagarn Demo Reel

Submitted by DrMinky on

Hey everyone,

I thought the character Yagrum Bagarn looked quite interesting so I gave a shot towards what I think he would sound like. The original morrowind audio he has seems a bit comical considering the extensive and sad backstory he has, so I made it a bit more serious. His accent is slightly different at the start compared to the end just to show him with a more 'common' voice and a more serious noble voice, I think I prefer the accent at the start. I've not eq'd or put any effects on the voice asside from a touch of reverb since his character resides in a cave - Apologies if I pronounced anything incorrectly. 

On a seperate note, there are quite a few characters that would be fun to voice (the Argonian shop keeper and some of the priests) but I couldn't find any scripts to voice off of on the wiki or in any of the spreadsheets. What should I do if I want to have a shot at recording some demos for these characters but can't find their lines?

Any feedback is really appreciated, if you suggest some changes I can re-record a new demo with those changes :)

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Don't really know if it's a bad thing but what I hear is a perfect generic fantasy dwarf. Not some noble, slightly crazy perhaps, unimaginably ancient, sullen, almost alien being descendant from the sophisticated semibabylonian Mers. I don't know. Maybe try talking very slowly, like if you'd have an infinite time to go on, mumble something between comprehendible words, play with accents to show this is not a native language to this Dwemer. Just my ideas. I guess I'd be quite happy to hear Yagrum as you played him right now anyways.

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Do you know of any characters with a voice like that I could listen to? Elder scrolls or not, would be good to have a reference :)

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QtSEwhaNGoY

Neloth - start from 9:25. Add more slurring and talk as if you love hearing your own voice. I imagine Yagrum speaking in just a bit irritating way. He is bitter, ill, tired and severely mutilated after all. Your original voice is... too lively I guess :)

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First of all, awesome quality! I love your acting too. As Guji pointed out, he sounds more like a typical fantasy Dwarf rather than Dwemer (who don't have much in common with typical fantasy dwarves, except for beards and metalworking).

As for his voice - it would be rather sophisticated, but also with a slight middle-eastern type of accent. Thinking of it, I think the taxi driver from Bloodlines would be the best reference but then... If you didn't play that awesome game giving you any sample of his dialogue would be a massive spoiler and I don't have heart to do that - it's one of the best RPG's ever made :P

He did voice another character - Andrei. Of course Yagrum has to be WAY less intimidating, but we're just talking about the accent here. Wouldn't hurt to make that accent a bit less heavy too (as the cab driver this guy's voice was as I just described).

Overall though, I think Yagrum except maybe for some rolling rrs and few other accents should also speak proper Shakespearian English. I think there's another character from Bloodlines whom we could use for reference - Aleister Grout :D

Voice acting in that game was just brilliant.

Another thing you could work in there is some gargling and coughing, since Yagrum is diseased with corprus.

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great quality voice but not the style I imagined for the last dwarf.  We're making them quite exotic, whereas your accent is best for some northern dunmer, almost like the ones in dragonborn.

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I remember in Morrowind, Yagrum's voice sounded like a Kebler Elf or the Pilsbury Doughboy. His voice is more of a pre-lotr Dwarf. 

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Thanks for the feedback guys! So here we go..

First re-do, bit of an eastern twist to his voice, more labored breathing. Forgot to roll the r's though :p

@GendunDrup, I though about the dwarves in LOTR but they all have sort of scottish accents.. It fits dwarves quite well but not sure if it works in the world of the elder scrolls.. Could always give it a go though,

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@DrMinky

MUCH better this time, thank you!

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ok thats fucking brilliant. no further crit necessary.

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Your voice has a nice quality to it - but please record without the reverb for your audition.  We need to be able to assess the quality of the sound as well as your voice.  Right now I can hear some noise other than just the 'cave' effect - a hiss that sort of fluctuates in waves.

You might want to post instead in the voice hub with a full audition real - I think you could pull off Argonian very nicely.  You may even be able to try Dunmer?

As for the voice of Yagrum, their culture is influenced by Babylon, but a lot of their architecture and locales seem Russian in style.  I'm thinking Yagrum might sound like a mixture between Hassan Rouhani and Vladimir Putin. http://youtu.be/Rl3EGL5eRuQ

Though I do like your voice, I would personally rather have someone from Russia or Persia actually do the voice - you just can't beat an authentic (if exaggerated) accent.

 

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I believe that hiss may just be my computer fan, will just plug my microphone into my macbook instead and record from there with no background noise, will make sure not to bother with the reverb from now on. I'd like to do a full demo reel but I can't really find very good character lines and bio's to work off of - the current document with lines didn't seem to have any really expressive lines to show off a character.. Is there just a generic strong character line that I could read in different voices?

Third try, more russian-y instead of eastern. (no reverb)

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I think I like this one even better!

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Holy crap that's good. I usually hate it when people post auditions as threads, but this time? No. It was simply awesome.

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Spot on!

 

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I think your 2nd and 3rd attempts are spot on. Your first attempt would make a great Telvanni character, so I think you should do multiple voices!

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Haven't listened to it yet but by the looks of it is say your doing good. Just wanted to say ya leave the reverb out, the game will add its own because he is in the cave, other audio overhauls donthis aswell to a larger extent
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This sounds fantastic!

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From my personal point of view authentic Russian accent will do no good - it is simply too plain. The real Russian accent unlike its "American" counterpart from the 80s' films is quite soft and muffled. I think this owes to the way Russian-speakers pronounce sounds: the vowels are mostly short and toneless, while consonants often tend to lack phonation.

Again, I may have this opinion only because I'm so used to hearing this accent, but I find it really dull. The stereotypic accent on the other hand is more memorable, but keep in mind that many Russian speaking people find it grotesque if not offensive.

@DrMinky, I really liked your voice, but maybe you could make your voice sound a little bit more sophisticated. Also, I don't know about all of the Corprus effects, but I imagine Yagrum having some breathing difficulties.

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Sound quality still needs a lot of work. You are a sound engineer so you can figure it out. Record with a dry mouth, 6-8 inches away from a microphone that is either elevated in the air or on a soft surface. Keep it away from fans and loud electrical equipment and keep the mic cable away from electrical cables.

You probably already know this stuff.. but that is what to do. If it is your mic that just isn't up to scratch, see if you can get a hold of one.

Fix that and your voice will be in this game.

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Your second demo is my favorite, your voice sounds just as I'd imagine him sounding! My only opinion is that you should talk slower and with more of that heavy breathing you're doing, corprus is a terrible disease and I feel his voice should reflect that, sounding as if it was painful just for him to be speaking.

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Thanks for the great positive feedback guys! I want to produce a demo reel showing a range of the voice types I can do, recording it properly (I did these in a rush job). A couple of questions first though:

1. Where should I actually post a demo reel? You say I shouldnt post it in a new thread but I couldn't see anything in the main thread about where to post auditions for a character.

2. Where can I find some good generic character lines to read?

Thanks again :) Want to produce something good for you guys.

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We're keeping auditions to the 'hub' thread.  Stijmunkey, Langotriel, and Gigaflare go through that one thread, eventually providing feedback in large spurts.  As the main thread is constantly updated, it keeps your auditions from being lost to the bottom of a pile of topics, as it's readily available on one of the pages of the main hub.  Soundcloud is a good host site for auditions - file wipes are common in these forums so I wouldn't trust audition files to be hosted here.

When the time comes to actually upload your sound files, you're going to want to first run them by Langotriel to check for quality, and then upload them to Gigaflare's SkyDrive in MP3 form, with the files titled as stated in the Excel file.

In addition to what Langotriel said about having a proper recording environment, I would also add that it is a good idea to do the recording for all the lines in one sitting.  Yagrum has a lot of lines, but it will be worth it for consistency.  The sound environment is changing all the time, so if you take a break and come back the next day you'll be hard pressed to match recordings from the two different days.  Take all the time you need to edit, just recording all at once seems the better way to go.

Your performance is pretty good - I really liked the third go.  As I said, going for a mixture of Persian/Russian seems fitting.  Be comfortable with an accent and way of speaking, and if there's any question as to the pronunciation of a name or place... actually maybe there should be a thread for that?  So when other voice actors encounter those places they'll be able to have some consistency between performances.

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There was a thread, but it never caught on. That said, if a new one is made, please use IPA. Trying to spell words phonetically in English is a fool's errand, as the pronunciations of various diphthongs, consonants, and vowels is highly regional and subjective. It should also be noted that even in-universe many words (especially proper nouns) have many pronunciations. For example: for Arkngthand, /ɑɾkŋ̌θand/ and /ɑɾkŋ̌tʰand/ are both (among others) legitimate pronunciations of the word.

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Maybe it's a good time to revive this thread on pronunciation of many ingame names? I believe we have many new auditions and new people coming to do voiceovers all the time so such threat could be very useful.

I really hate to hear in some games actors saying same name without any consistency, sometimes even the same actor says the same name different way each time. That's because they can't find a proper reference.

So please, please revive such topic. And maybe let someone read the names from A do Z to set the example how to spell each name.

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I can compile a list if you guys would like.

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Sure thing - just make sure to pronounce things from the lines I've already done the same way I've already pronounced them - heh.  I'm not doing those 400+ lines again.

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Smitehammer

... I'm not doing those 400+ lines again.

That's why I think it's extremely important to have such a reference material available for everyone.

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I posted this in the voice acting thread but it was buried in posts, thought id put it there aswell. 

Here's my demo reel! Just picked random characters from the script sheet. These arent auditions for these characters specifically, just to show what types of voices I can do. No effects, no EQ, no reverb. I'm aware theres a little bit of background noise too, I was recording this at home where I cant really do anything about traffic noise, if I get assigned to a specific character I can just head into the studio and record the full thing there in one session.

1. Aesliip, Nord Draugr (undead).   2. Effe-Tei, Argonian Monk

3. Hircine, Dremora Daedra           4. Nalion, Woodelf Trader

5. Yagak gro-Gluk, Orc Smith         6. Yagrum Bagarn, Dwarf

And an added extra, heres how I believe Yagrum Bagarn should TRULY sound if we want to realistically recreate the morrowind universe.

https://soundcloud.com/drminky/yagrumoriginal

[External image]

Attachment Size
Louis Arrigoni, SkyWind Demo Reel 01 2.19 MB
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I prefer Yagrums original voi, reminds me of Gizmo from Fallout. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTWvloK-Jhk

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Really?  You 'miss' the 3 lines of dialogue that weren't even included in the final game because they were so terrible?  You find quality voice acting to be an affront to your sensitive sensibilities?   I suppose you also miss Yagrum having the same sound file as an alit when you attacked him in the original game?   Get bent, Deep Space Bass.  You are nothing but a drain of energy on this project.

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Lol, the original sounds so damn stupid haha!

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Sounds like someone in Futurama or something, I would piss myself laughing if I heard that in the game.

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DeepSpaceBass

I prefer Yagrums original voi, reminds me of Gizmo from Fallout. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTWvloK-Jhk

That sounds like Mr. Smee from Peter Pan...

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I'm pretty sure those recorded in jest, hence why they didn't appear in game. Kind of like the bosmer reading Azura's lines from the beginning of the game. DrMinky has done some quality voice work, and replacing it with something of lesser quality would be a discredit to that.

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DeepSpaceBass

I prefer Yagrums original voi, reminds me of Gizmo from Fallout. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTWvloK-Jhk

That sounds cringey. Ours is so much better :)

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DrMinky

I believe that hiss may just be my computer fan, will just plug my microphone into my macbook instead and record from there with no background noise, will make sure not to bother with the reverb from now on. I'd like to do a full demo reel but I can't really find very good character lines and bio's to work off of - the current document with lines didn't seem to have any really expressive lines to show off a character.. Is there just a generic strong character line that I could read in different voices?

Third try, more russian-y instead of eastern. (no reverb)

This or the second one is fine, no reverb is good lots of that laboured breathing in! Im going to assign you to him so just make sure no reverb and get the quality as high as possible!

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Awesome! I'll record the whole lot when I get back from the Netherlands and can book out a studio. Let me know if there are any other characters you want me to do as well :)

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I loved all of your voices, definetly looking forward to hear you in game :D Only thing I didn't like too much was Hircine, as I had something a bit different in mind...

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You did the corprus effect very well, could you do some more corprus sounds, heavier, from a creature that is hostile. Ie, groaning, weeping, attacking, hurt, death etc?

i'm on the warpath for getting creature sfx started. I will request the help of yourself and smitehammer.

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