Glossary

Here, a short, free recording of part of your script, so you can hear the voice on your own text before booking.

Here, a license for any use, in any medium, with no end date. It costs more than a license for a set use. Elsewhere the word is sometimes used for a usage fee limited in time, so check what a quote means by it.

An agreement not to voice a competing brand or product for a set time. It applies only if the quote includes it.

One minute of the edited, delivered audio, used to price longer work such as e-learning.

Permission to use a recording for what’s agreed: the media, the territory and the period, such as a year of radio in Croatia.

A contract to keep a project, its script and anything unreleased confidential.

A surcharge for delivery faster than the usual one or two business days, or for evening and weekend work.

The time from an approved quote and the final script to delivery.

Narration that describes what happens on screen, such as actions, scene changes and on-screen text, for blind and partially sighted viewers, voiced in the pauses between dialogue.

Replacing the dialogue of a film, series or game with a recording in another language, timed to the picture and usually to the actors’ lips.

An automated phone system that answers callers and routes them by keypad or voice. The voice-over records its prompts, such as “Press 1 for sales.”

Adapting content to the language and culture of another market, so it sounds written for that audience, not translated.

A character in a game that the player doesn’t control, such as a shopkeeper, a guard or someone who hands out quests.

The range of ages a voice can believably play.

Voice-over is the voice of a speaker you don’t see: ads, e-learning, narration. Voice acting is playing a character with the voice: games, animation, audio drama.

Services that carry studio-quality audio over the internet, so a client or studio can listen to and record a session from anywhere.

A session where the client or director listens over the internet and guides the read as it’s recorded. Booked by the hour.

A line or phrase recorded again or added after the session, to fix a slip or a technical fault or because the script changed.

Recording a line or a whole script again. Here, the retakes included in a quote are new reads in the original direction.

A few seconds of the room recorded in silence, also called presence. Editors use it to fill gaps, so the background never drops out.

Recording without a director on the line, following the script and the brief. The default.

A short spoken label at the start of a take, such as the name and the project, so the file can be identified.

A small, closed space for recording voice. A treated booth has absorbers on its surfaces, so the voice is recorded without echo.

The level of digital audio. 0 dBFS is the loudest a file can hold, and anything quieter is a negative number, so -69 dBFS is very quiet.

A filter that cuts sound below a set frequency, such as low rumble, and lets the voice through.

Two measures in delivery specs. LUFS is how loud audio sounds on average: European broadcast aims at -23 LUFS, US broadcast at -24. dBTP is the highest level the signal actually reaches, and a ceiling such as -3 dBTP leaves room so it never distorts.

The level of all the background noise in a recording, from the room and the equipment, heard when no one speaks. The lower it is, the cleaner the recording.

A recording as captured, with no editing or processing.

How finely digital audio is measured: samples per second (48 kHz is 48,000) and the precision of each sample (24-bit).