You are going to need to be somewhat computer savvy, luckily, I’ll probably put up a video tutorial on the lower end of these programs to give you a hands on look at how to get your voice from the mic to the computer then on to the web.
Here are the paid software programs that you can use. If you already own them or are familiar with them, then there is no need to purchase any new software, these should suffice. If you don’t own them, don’t go buying them until you have read the FREE options.
PAID
1) Any Kind of Video Editing Software. If you already know how to edit video, the stretch into audio would be fine. Just make sure that you can EXPORT to an mp3, wav, or AIFF software. Of the top of my head, Vegas Video, Avid, Final Cut Pro, and Pinnacle’s video-editing equivalent would work as well.
2) Adobe Audition: This is the high quality application created by Adobe primarily for composers or musicians, however I’ve heard it works very well with voiceover as well. Expensive but does the job and if you ever want to utilize various plugins on the sound engineering end, this may be a good choice, but to the beginner, not worth it.
3) Pro-Tools. The avid GOD of audio. Unfortunately, the investment is WAY too high compared to the fact that you could probably spend years in a private college learning the ins and outs of the program. If you have this and are familiar, then do it. There are things that this monster can do that no other program can do. It’s kind of like using a hummer to go to the post office. It get’s the job done, but you wonder why exactly you bought it.
FREE (or combined)
1) Garage Band: Macs have an application that is very basic and I know a few voiceover peeps who use it. All you need is something that you can press record and the wav will move from your microphone to the computer. It works. Though this was made for other things, and the bells and whistles may confuse you.
2) Pro-Tools SE: This is a program which I received along with my M-Audio Mobile Pre. The Mobile Pre is a PreAmp and a PreAmp is required to get an XLR Microphone to the computer. Bundled with it was a version of pro-tools. It is terribly limited, but if you do end up buying the Mobile Pre, probably one of the cheapest options out there, why not check the software off your list.
3) Audacity: A free audio editing software that is FREE compact and does everything you need it to. Nothing fancy just a way to get from point A to point B. Best of all, free free free. Simple in design and gets it all done. I remember doing a webinar with a few voice actors and the teacher was explaining ProTools only to find that only 2 people owned pro-tools. The rest were either Garage Band, Audacity or a slough of others. Why go overboard?
In conclusion, just get audacity, unless your comfortable with some software you’ve used to edit before. I familiarized myself with Audacity while i was on vacation and had to do pickup voiceover with a friends computer. It did the job, worked fine with my Mobile Pre. No problems whatsoever.
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
Use this link and have it downloaded and ready to go before, god forbid, they stop giving it away for free.
everythingvoiceover 