Dubbing anime is a pretty thankless job.

T

the overlord

New member
Dubbing anime is a pretty thankless job, when you think about it.

Take a look at this interview with Vic Mignogna:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Lag-c24Uqo

As you see from that interview, dubbing is ten times harder then pre-lay work and the pay for dubbing is a fraction of the pay you get for pre-lay work.

Not to mention it seems like many otakus will accuse a dub actor of "ruining" the show if his or her performance doesn't completely match the Japanese VA. I never heard of anyone saying Billy West or John DiMaggio ruined Futurama with their voice work. Not to mention some otakus seem to complain about hearing the same VAs over and over again, but with this level of pay and difficulty, it makes sense the talent pool is kinda limited.

So frankly I think most dub actors should be admired to dedication to their craft.
 
I agree that people are usually way to hard on the English VAs and dubs in general, but suspect this thread will soon burn with the incendiary flames of a sub VS dub war which never end well.
 
I don't see why that has to be the case, one can prefer subs and yet still be mindful of the fact that dubbing anime takes a lot of skill and effort, that many people don't have for a job that pays a lot less then other jobs in the voice acting profession.

Now clearly there some cases where bad dubs have ruined a how, like most shows done by 4kids, but those really are the exception not the rule. Even with 4kids its more the fault of the voice directs and writers that the dub is bad, rather then the VAs themselves. They have done some good stuff when working for other companies and even some of the non anime 4kids projects have been well voice acted.
 
I've said a couple of times now in the old sub vs dub debate (which isn't relevant here, I'm just making a point) that dubs don't work for me because english voice actors have to speed up, slow down and awkwardly dub english lines to match the japanese mouth movements. I don't decry the work of english voice actors, because I don't envy the monumental task they have to complete. What he talked about underlines the problem for me with dubs in general - it's hard to pull off and emotional and believable part with this constraint of fitting the voicing to the mouth movements. I completely agree that any english VA who does manage to pull it off is highly deserving of praise, because it has to be incredibly difficult to do.
 
I watch most anime dubbed. Why? Well because my native tounge is english & when I want to READ the series I will get the Manga or Light novel. But don't mind subs at all if a dub is not avalible. (as long as its a legal sub stream.)

But yea, Dub work is indeed a hard thankless job. Personally I like most dubs...Only a small handful I would say are downright BAD.
 
Yeah you won't normally hear people talking about how Billy West or John DiMaggio mess up on Futurama, because lets face it there is no comparative for fans to make. West and DiMaggio own their respective characters on that show. However you will hear complaints about Kevin Michael Richardson and John DiMaggio when the subject of the Joker comes up in animation. The benchmark for many people is Mark Hamill and goodluck waddling through the fan reaction to any Batman not voiced by Kevin Conroy.
So having two or more performances for the same role or show means people will have a preference and say what they like or don't like about the non-preferred performance.

Not to mention some otakus seem to complain about hearing the same VAs over and over again, but with this level of pay and difficulty, it makes sense the talent pool is kinda limited.
Click to expand...

What is this "level" of pay? How much more difficul? The multiplier 10x is mentioned for both but that is highly suspect as being an embellishment. Well it is the general observation of working that the better you are at your chosen field the more you can make with less or similar effort to that of a less talented person.

English dubbing does not look like a thankless job to me. The talent gets paid decent wage, aquire fans(some zealots) that support them. can get freebies and benefits like free airfare and opportunities to attend many of the anime/manga themed events across the globe. That "thankless" job looks a hell of a lot better than flipping burgers and salting fries.
 
The difference between Billy West and Vic Mignogna is that Billy West has talent.
 
ArsenicSteel said:
Yeah you won't normally hear people talking about how Billy West or John DiMaggio mess up on Futurama, because lets face it there is no comparative for fans to make. West and DiMaggio own their respective characters on that show. However you will hear complaints about Kevin Michael Richardson and John DiMaggio when the subject of the Joker comes up in animation. The benchmark for many people is Mark Hamill and goodluck waddling through the fan reaction to any Batman not voiced by Kevin Conroy.
So having two or more performances for the same role or show means people will have a preference and say what they like or don't like about the non-preferred performance.
Click to expand...

People didn't like Keven Michael Richardson because that version of the Joker sucked and the Batman show wasn't very good, I have heard most people liked the John DiMaggio Joker.

Plus frankly I haven't heard many people complain that Conroy didn't do the voice in the new Batman cartoon.

ArsenicSteel said:
What is this "level" of pay? How much more difficul? The multiplier 10x is mentioned for both but that is highly suspect as being an embellishment. Well it is the general observation of working that the better you are at your chosen field the more you can make with less or similar effort to that of a less talented person.
Click to expand...

Not if you work for company that is small and can't afford to pay you as much as a bigger company can. The fact is anime dubbing aren't very big and can't afford to pay the same rates that Disney, Viacom and WB can pay, as noted here:
http://wii.kombo.com/article.php?artid=6530


Like I said, when asked, most voice actors will comment that dubbing is harder and pays less then pre-lay work. Why else would some some voice actors refuse to do dubbing on a regular basis? What evidence do you have to the contrary?


ArsenicSteel said:
English dubbing does not look like a thankless job to me. The talent gets paid decent wage, aquire fans(some zealots) that support them. can get freebies and benefits like free airfare and opportunities to attend many of the anime/manga themed events across the globe. That "thankless" job looks a hell of a lot better than flipping burgers and salting fries.
Click to expand...

Saying a job is better then working in fast food, is kinda of meaningless. That's like saying living in Iran is better then living in Afghanistan, its true, but doesn't mean much.

Besides for every fan of someone who dubs anime there someone who seems dislike the VA just because they didn't copy the Japanese voice actor exactly.

Its not decent wage, because many voice actors have commented fact that you can't make a living solely on dubbing to make a living.

Joshua Seth for example, commented that his bit role in the Spongebob movie earned him more money then every Digimon episode he did, so its not a very good wage.
 
I gave you examples that show the complaints present when there is a viable comparison to be made. Well if I am forced to limited my examples to things you are aware of I will not know where to start. You seem very selective about accepting things that agree or help prove your point and easily dismiss examples that run counter.
How about The Transformers. Many fans were dismayed in Hugo Weaving being picked for Megatron instead of Frank Welker.

I have not said anything that contradicts that statement that some work pays more and some work could be easier to do. What I did say was that 10x mark was an embellishment with no actual numbers given and that generally the better the actor is the better chance they have at getting jobs that pay more.

If a voice actor is in the position to refuse lower paying work, then good for them. However not every voice actor starts off being able to pick and chose who signs the next paycheck. It would not have mattered what job I gave as an example. To appease you how about a CAD engineer at Ford, server admin, and air traffic controller. Any given CAD designer is not given credit for his work on designing the cars we drive. Server admins don't get pages and pages of thank yous for doing their job. Air traffic controllers may very well get free flights but when flying SouthWest no customer is asking if Steve the controller is on shift. Anime dubbing is still part of the entertainment media and there are a lot of thank yous and perks available to them that are not available to labor jobs, regardless of the importance.

Yes it is a decent wage when you consider time worked. Working on one dub is not the equivalent of working one 9 to 5. Dub actors have to stack the jobs in order to make money to live. Unless the dub actor is signed on to something insanely popular. That would be the exception and not the rule.
 
I think people were mad that Weaving was chosen over Welker, because some people are unhappy that celebs get voice acting jobs in movies over regular voice actors and so having Weaving picked Welker ticked people off for that reason, as well as nostalgia. There didn't seem be a huge outcry when someone else voiced Megatron in the latest Transformers cartoon.

Whether its 10 times harder or 5 times or 2 times harder, is irrelevant, dubbing is harder and it certainly pays a lot less then pre-lay, its a fact. That's my point, its harder to do and therefore harder to give a good performance dubbing anime then doing pre-lay. That's something some people don't take into consideration, when talking about whether a dub is good or not and the difficulty of the task is something ignored when people complain about how small the talent pool is in dubbing. Dubbing is a skill not everyone posses, so its hard to recruit new people, especially when there is more profitable voice jobs out there. Frankly I have heard anime companies can't afford to do more then few takes, so of course your performance is going to suffer under those conditions.

Also frankly I'm not saying dub VAs should be worshiped as gods, I just don't think they deserve some of the scorn some otakus heap upon them. None of those other professions you mentioned, have a ton of strangers criticize that person just because of the nature of the job they do.

And as noted by Joshua Seth, its not a good wage, because doing a bit role in Spongebob paid more then every Digimon episode he ever did. It doesn't matter how much dubbing stack up, you can't make a living out of it, it is not a career.
 
Stop trying to explain away examples that prove the simple idea that voice actors get compared and some fans complain. That is the point I am making. For every role that as an already established performance there will be fans of that performance who detract from performances that don't match their lofty desires.

There is no need to try and argue with me about the pay and difficulty. The fact is not every job has high pay and easy tasks, there is a discrepancy. That does not mean every actor is in the financial position or talented enough to pick and chose what kind of work they do. If we are talking about dubbing then we are talking about acting and their are wannabe actors doing menial jobs and willing to audition for any open call. Just because there is bigger pay check out there does not mean everyone is going to get it just because they want it. There actors that can hold out until the next big paycheck while there actors that will try to get any job available for the money, exposure,and experience. You theories are far too one sided and completely ignore the fact not everyone is going to be employed where they want to be.


This thread you made is not about jobs that get criticisms but if you think those jobs are free from criticism try reading the news when one of them do mess up. The thread is about being "thankless", which is completely untrue for any entertainment profession.

Dubbing is a career that people have made a living out of. Where an actor tries to take their career is up to their talent, opportunities, and decisions. There are plenty of dubbers that primarily do anime and are able to live comfortably with their pay, paupers they are not. If you want to continue saying they are not able to make a living out of their pay, you may want to include what there pay is. Not just x paid more than y, therefore people that work for x are not making a living.
 
I've always thought the repeating voices complaint to be silly because it happens in japan too. there have been many times I've not only heard a Japanese VA from one anime show up in another but they've even played the same character type. so you can't really blame American companies for doing the same thing Japanese companies do.
 
penguintruth said:
The difference between Billy West and Vic Mignogna is that Billy West has talent.
Click to expand...

To be fair that's like the stupidest comparison ever. It's like comparing theatrical actor to just a regular movie actor. I'm not sure Billy West has ever done anime voice work but I'm sure he had done some video game voice work but still comparing to him Vic Mignogna is kind of unfair in my opinion.

I would say Vic Mignogna is an alright voice actor but he's the guy that gets typecasted and while he plays the same character every time, in my opinion anime voice actors deserve more recognition than criticism.

I'm always annoyed at hardcore otakus nitpicking every little thing when I bet he can't do half the better job and clearly he's damn biased. I tend to agree with OP, out of all the acting profession, Dub VO would seem to be the most thankless and probably hardest. And that's why number of Dub VO are kind of limited, it's at least slowly getting better.
 
Back
Top