Report by Yashasvi Anika Tandon
Nidhi Basu ma’am is the founder and director of Logicbox Communications Pvt. Ltd., her media production house and studio.
She is a voice-over artist, audio producer, networker, podcaster, and writer. She did her post-graduation in GMT (Garment Manufacturing Technology) from NIFT (National Institute of Fashion Technology), Delhi.
She is the voice of all the Rajdhanis, Shatabdis, and luxury trains running in India.
It is her voice that you hear on the television advertisements of Fem, Tupperware, Odomos, Pearls Infrastructure, Tata Sky, State Bank of India, and many others.
She is the voice in the IVR (Interactive Voice Response – part of customer care) for Bharat Petroleum Automated Petrol Pumps, and Crompton Greaves.
You hear her on the toll-free calls in English, and Hindi, for Airtel, Airtel Live, Vodafone, Vodafone Live, Tatadocomo, and Aircel.
Nidhi ma’am gave her voice for the advertisement campaign featured by the government of India during the ICC ODI Cricket World Cup, 2011. She has dubbed for UTV, Topper’s Learning, Smart School Online, and also for a documentary on Nepal called ‘Flames of the Snow’, among other things. Currently she is partnering with Spotify, as the producer and voice, for her Audio Story Podcast, “Kissa Kahani By Nidhi Basu”.
What is voice-over?
A voice-over is when somebody gets behind a mic and they record from a script that has been given. Voice-overs may be for an audio product, announcement, or they may be recorded for a video. Mostly, everything that you hear or see, has a voice in it and the people who record that are voice-over artists. In a voice-over your face can’t be seen.
Did you do anything related to this in your childhood?
Loads! That’s how I started. My first experience was in school. Right from childhood, I was into a lot of commentating and even news reading. My first exposure to a sound environment was AIR (All India Radio) and Doordarshan. I went there from time-to-time as part of the school choir. That environment made a great impact on my mind.
When I was looking for a second career, (voice-over is my second career), my experiences at AIR and Doordarshan prompted me to take this up more seriously. Being behind the mic had always felt very natural and comfortable, whether it was singing, commentating for a play, debating, or addressing an audience. Besides, as we keep on doing something, we just keep getting better and better every day. There comes a point where we might want to try it for the rest of our lives, so that’s pretty much what happened to me.
How did you start off?
I had kids and was in no position to take up a full-time job. I had done my training in theatre, speech, and drama. After that, I taught children as a theatre teacher and loved it. The more I played with the spoken word, the more I loved it. About 12-13 years back when I was teaching in a school a lot of people told me that if I went behind the mic I would do well. It made me wonder if I should take it up as a career. You tend to take what people repeatedly say, a bit seriously about yourself. I loved fooling around with my voice and doing all kinds of accents. I would meet someone and probably not remember what they wore but always remembered how they spoke. I’m a very auditory person.
I had a friend who ran a voice-over studio. When I approached him, he really encouraged me a lot. After teaching at school, I used to go to his studio. I’d sit there for a while to understand a little more about voice-overs, and would even listen to the artists who would come and record. That was my practical learning. After he was really satisfied, he made me record a few projects. This is how I started off, and once I started off, there was no stopping.
In those days we had CDs, where we would record our voices and give them to studios and they would call back. Websites had just started coming in, so I put my voice on those, too. My CDs had been circulated to different studios and I started getting calls. It was really funny, because when I would go behind the mic, they’d ask me for how long I’d been doing voice-overs. I used to say I have just started!
What was your very first major project?
I started doing small voice-over projects, but my breakthrough came when I was approached by the owner of an e-learning company called “Smart School Online”. I was the main voice for their e-learning modules, mostly in English, and sometimes in Hindi too. They were just starting their project, and this gave would give stability to my career. I would record 50,000 modules for them for the next 10-11 years. That became staple, and my career as a voice-over artist became viable. After that one project, there were a whole lot of ads, announcements, and a lot of dubbing. Character dubbing has always been a very strong point for me.
What are the important parts of a voice-over?
The important parts of a voice-over are scripting. Once the scripting is done, it is tweaked, and then, you see if that’s what you want. When the scripting is final, you try to arrange for the right studio where it will be executed with a whole lot of equipment and facilities. Then, there’s the input, which has to come in a software. Once the voices are recorded during the input process, they are edited and then the output is ready.
What is done in editing?
Editing is pretty much a part of the creative process. When we are recording, we may not be able to record the entire script at one go, as there may be re-takes, also. Putting the voice-over together, with the necessary changes, is called editing.
Where can your voice be heard?
My voice can be heard in all the assignments you have mentioned, as well as on Spotify because that’s the podcast I’m doing. I have more than 80 stories to my credit, and I upload them every 10 days.
What new projects would you like to do in this field?
I would love to do narration for films – Bollywood, Regional Cinema, and Hollywood. It’s just a matter of reaching out and pushing my dream so that it becomes a reality.
What are the pros and cons of voice overs?
If you want to take it up as a career, you need to be very sure if you have the right voice for it and you have to make sure that you choose the right language. I would recommend that you choose the language in which you are most fluent. Don’t go for a language you aspire for. There are only positives about voice overs, provided, you know the language you want to work with. You need to be extremely patient. It’s not a craft that you will master in a hurry.
Which languages are you comfortable with?
Hindi, English, a whole lot of Urdu, and Bangla!
What is the current demand for voice overs?
The demand has sky-rocketed. It is so much, that now I have to pick and choose, whereas earlier I was looking out for assignments. Now, I have to be very careful because with the incoming of the digital era, content is so important. And, what I say or how I say, will be present in the digital space forever.
What advice would you give to those who want to take it up as a career?
The first thing is to choose your language very carefully. And the second thing is that you can’t be in a hurry to earn money in this field. It happens gradually. I would say that if somebody wants to take it up, they should take it up as a side activity alongside their main career, as it is not a very well paying profession, initially. If you think that you are making some headway, you can go for it full time.
How much freedom is there in your profession? Is there any innovation?
If you’re working only as a voice-over artist, there is freedom in a very limited way. Because when you are given a script, there will be someone directing you, on how you have to speak. If you want to create your own products, then you have the entire freedom. You can go berserk over your product and can work on it from many aspects. That is the magic of the internet era.