Make an Anime Voice Changer in Adobe Premiere
Professional anime voice actors are highly skilled artists. The specifics of the genre and the unique aesthetics in sound design mean that your standard voiceover sounds very different to an anime voice over. You can find anime voice artists on sites like Fiverr and Upwork – a voice over can cost anywhere from $5 for a few sentences of dialogue to $480 per hour.
However, you can use normal voice actors – or even your own voice – for your anime project as well. As non anime voice actors are less specialised, they are usually easier to find and cheaper – you can even fill in if you like! You can then give the work of voice actors a tweak in post production to give that anime effect.
In this guide we’re going to be looking at how you can work with standard voice performances in Adobe Premiere Pro to achieve some anime effects. We’re going to be using stock Premiere Pro plugins so everyone can follow along. Most voice changing effects can be achieved with a few simple stock effects.
Pitch Shifting voice to sound more femine or masculine
The femine and masculine aspects of human voices are often quite exaggerated in Anime. Of course this can be achieved by trained voice actors but, if you or your voice actor struggle to achieve this sound, you can use pitch shifting to get there.
Step 1: Load voice audio
The first step is to either record your anime voice over into your Premiere Pro project, or load a voice recording in Premiere Pro.
Step 2: Load Pitch Shifter
We’re going to use Premiere Pro’s built in Pitch Shifter effect. To apply it to our audio track search “pitch shifter” in the effects window and then drag and drop the effect onto your audio file.
Step 3: Pitch Shift your vocal track
The final step of the process is to pitch shift your voice recording. If you want to make the voice more feminine then shift the voice up. Shifting the voice by a semitone will change the pitch quite a lot. If you want to fine tune your pitch shifting use the cents fader. This will change the pitch by a much smaller amount.
Similarly, to make the voice more masculine, pitch shift it down. The more you shift the voice recording, the less natural the voice will sound. Experiment and see what works best in the context of your video. You’ll sound like an anime voice actor in no time.
Make voices more nasal with EQ
You may want certain characters in your anime project to have quite nasal voices – this can be especially effective for teenage characters. This is something that can easily be achieved with an equaliser (or EQ), and luckily Premiere Pro has one built right in.
Step 1: Load an EQ
Assuming you’ve already loaded your anime voice over into your Premiere Pro project, the first step is to load an EQ onto your voice over.
To find an EQ in Premiere Pro search for ‘EQ’ in the effects window. The equalisers are located under Audio Effects > Filter and EQ.
You’ll see there are many different EQ options available in Premiere Pro. The most versatile equaliser is the Parametric Equalizer. Load this EQ by dragging and dropping it onto your voice recording.
Step 2: Boost and cut
All you have to do now to get that nasal effect is boost the nasal frequencies and cut the frequencies either side.
The nasal frequencies fall in the 1k – 1.2k Hz range of the frequency spectrum. Boost in this area – experiment with the exact frequency you boost at and with how much you boost by. Each voice will behave slightly differently.
To accentuate the nasal sound you can the frequencies outside of this frequency range. You want to cut all the frequencies consistently by using a high and low shelf. Check out the below image to see how this looks.
