Frequently Asked Questions: Voice Over

The cost for a voice over recording varies depending on the language and the voice talent. For example, English language voice overs are usually cheaper than rarer, more complex languages such as Swahili or Faroese, a language spoken in the Faroe Islands.

When you choose to work with Matinée Multilingual, a 1-hour studio recording with a professional voice talent starts from £370. This cost includes an experienced sound engineer who will be on standby to assist with all audio needs as well as direct the voice artist if necessary.

Visit our voice over rates page for more information, here.

This is dependent on the length of the script and the availability of the selected voice artist.

In a one-hour WILD recording session (not to picture), we can record up to 1,500 words of voice over. When recording to picture, we can record up to 10 minutes of video in a one-hour session.

Usually we can turn-around urgent projects in just 24 hours. Most projects will require two to three days to schedule, record and edit, depending on the size of the project, and the number of languages.

When you pay for a voice over recording, you might also pay usage fees in addition to the standard recording fee. Whether you pay these fees and how much depends on how, where, and for how long you plan to use the voice recording.

Usage fees are paid to the voice artist if their voice is used to help make a profit. Also called buy-out fees, these are essentially a licensing agreement between you (the client) and the artist.

For example, if you use a voice recording exclusively within your company, such as for a staff training video, usage fees typically do not apply. However, when the recording is used publicly or for commercial gain, usage fees are usually required.

Read our in-depth guide for more information on usage fees.

We can record all types of voice-over, for all types of projects including: commercial, documentary, eLearning and training, corporate, telephone messaging and IVR, animation and announcements.

Matinée Multilingual offers premium voice overs in over 80 languages and 30+ accents. We offer multilingual voice overs from a database of over 2,500 professional voice artists.

View some of our languages. Can’t find what you need? Get in touch with us today and we’ll reply within the hour.

Depending on what your project requires we can provide either. We focus on providing the right voices for each and every project to ensure high-quality work from initial talent casting to delivering final client files.

With a database of over 2,500 human voice artists available in over 80 languages, we can accommodate large projects with quick turnarounds.

Browse our trusted and talented human voice artists in your language.

Can’t find what you’re looking for? Get in touch and our talent manager will help you source the right voice for your project.

AI voices can suit projects that have limited budget or very quick turnaround times for large amounts of content. If you would like to use AI voices for your project, browse our sample selection of AI voices.

Need more AI voice demos? Let us know and we will be happy to look into your request.

Matinée Multilingual is based in Reading, UK and we have been operating from the same address for the last 40 years.

We work with clients worldwide and offer both in-studio and remote recording sessions.

Many of our international clients join sessions remotely for live-direction using platforms like Microsoft Teams, Source Nexus or Zoom. This ensures seamless collaboration no matter where they are based.

Voice over, dubbing and subtitling are three distinct methods of delivering audio or visual content to audiences in different languages or formats, and choosing the right one depends on your type of project, budget and audience.

Voice over is a production technique where a narrator or speaker is recorded over the original audio. It is widely used in corporate videos, documentaries, eLearning, training content and marketing videos.

Dubbing replaces the original spoken audio entirely with a new recording in the target language, carefully lip-synced to match the on-screen speaker. It is most commonly used in film, television and long-form video content where a fully immersive viewing experience is required.

Subtitling plays the translated or transcribed dialogue as on-screen text, leaving the original audio intact. It is a popular choice for streaming content, social media video and any situation where preserving the original speaker’s voice is important.

Having trouble deciding which is right for your project? Talk to our experienced team today.

There are five different ways of recording voice over for video projects:

• Wild voice over narration – not recorded to picture and with no timing constraints
• Time-synced voice over narration – recorded to picture
• UN Style voice over (see its own FAQ)
• Phrase-sync dubbing – the phrase is in sync with the mouth movements, but not exact
• Lip-sync dubbing – the most difficult process where the mouth movements are exactly synced to the audio

The method you choose is a matter of budget, taste, and the audience’s preferences.

The original speaker can still be heard in the background so that the audience is aware that the translated voice over is acting as an interpretation of what is being said.

A UN Style voice over, is a perfect fit for films with a serious subject matter, and it’s often used in documentaries and in news broadcast, where interviews are conducted on camera, in a language the target audience does not understand.

The actors’ voices are replaced (dubbed) with those of foreign actors. Lip-sync dubbing is commonly used in video games, animations, and films, as well as corporate dramas and e-learning video.

Lip syncing requires extensive preparatory work to adapt the scripts to fit with the actor’s lip movements. Producing a lip-sync recording is a time consuming process, and it can take considerably longer than a standard voice-over to produce.

Western cinema goers generally prefer subtitles or closed captions instead of lip-sync dubbing, but lip-syncing is preferred by many other cultures, particularly if the literacy of the audience is low.

Phrase-sync dubbing is similar to lip-sync, but the new voice-over is not matched to lip movements, it’s simply matched phrase by phrase, so it is not as costly to produce as lip-sync.

Yes, we only ever work with voices native to the country or region required.

It’s all to do with making sure that when the translated script is read, that it synchronises well with the video image. Most languages are ‘longer’ than English in that they contain up to 40% more words. German is a good example of this.

Timed voice over: (wild and not to picture) We’ll need to create a time-coded transcript and/or a time-coded bilingual document to assist the engineer in the recording session. It’s no good recording phrases and sentences that then don’t fit the time available within that section.
Time-sync voice over: (recorded to picture) The new voice track for a time-sync voice over will be recorded to picture and phrased as possible to the original voice over. We’ll use the same time-coded transcript as above.
Lip-sync voice over: (recorded to picture) The translations will require an additional pre-production stage in order to adapt each phrase to fit the mouth movements of the character on screen. Otherwise the voice artist will have to speak at an un-natural pace and the intended lip-sync will not to be achieved.

Some of our voice artists are not based within the UK and record from their own studios in their home country. Each voice artist that records from their own studio has had their voice audio checked and approved by our engineers before being added to our database. This process ensures the audio that they produce meets our quality requirements.

In reality we tend to work with ‘preferred suppliers’; these are the voice artists we know and trust, who will be around in a few years’ time when you need updates, and who respond quickly to requests. That’s why we prefer to recommend talents, rather than present you with a huge list of talents to choose from that we rarely work with and don’t know very well.

Whether our voice artist is based locally or in-country, a live-direction session enables you to act as the host and director of the recording session.

You will need to create a session meeting link (Zoom, MS Teams, etc) and we’ll pass this on to the voice artist. This means you can add as many parties as you require to be present within the session.

You will have complete creative control of the session, and be able to converse with the voice artist and the recording engineer directly. This often helps prevents the need for re-recordings due to mispronunciation or other misunderstandings.

We can deliver the audio as a raw, unedited file, or we can clean, edit, name and deliver the audio in any format and resolution you require.

We can also re-integrate the audio back into the video, and encode the final video in any video file format and resolution you require.

Generally we ask for 50% up front and the balance on 30 days for new customers. This is negotiable in some instances, and a credit check is run on all new customers.

For small, one off projects, we may ask for payment in advance.

Regular customers will establish a credit limit with us, with projects payable within 30 days of invoice. If you would like to apply for a credit account, your account manager will provide you with a form, which when completed, we’ll pass on to our finance team.

Matinée Multilingual Terms of Business:

• All quotes are subject to sight of source material.
• All prices exclude VAT (if applicable).
• A purchase order or project reference must be given prior to start of production.
• All customer information is treated as strictly confidential.
• Any quote is based on the information you have supplied, and on the project scope
  stipulated in this proposal. If the project scope is incorrect or changes, we reserve the right to
  adjust the quote accordingly.
• Quotes are valid for 2 months.
• Once your completed project files have been delivered, approvals must be given within 10
  working days. If more time is required for approval, this must be agreed with your Account
  Manager in advance as this may affect payment terms.
• Two full working days’ notice is required to cancel a booking, otherwise a 50% cancellation
  fee will apply.
• Project files are deleted after three years. If you would like a permanent archive of your
  project, we will charge an extra £50 for this service.

Payment Terms

For new clients we will issue an invoice for 50% of the project total plus VAT (if applicable), on receipt of your purchase order or written instruction to proceed. This must be paid to Matinée prior to commencement. The balance plus any authorised extras will be invoiced upon completion of the project, and is to be paid by return. If you wish to apply for a credit account, we may agree to a variance of the above terms upon satisfactory completion. We can also accept payment via credit card.

For existing clients this will depend on whether a credit account has been agreed with us or not. One of the following options will apply:

• Without an agreed credit limit we will issue an invoice for 50% of the project total plus VAT (if applicable), on receipt of your purchase order or written instruction to proceed. This must be paid to Matinée prior to commencement of the project. The balance plus any authorised extras will be invoiced upon completion of the project, and is to be paid by return.
• OR, 100% of the project total plus VAT (if applicable) will be invoiced on completion, payable by return.
• If a credit account has been agreed, an invoice for the project total plus VAT (if applicable) will be sent on completion of the project for payment within 30 days.