Me

Hi, my name is Alex Mitts, and I’m a voice actor. Well, I’m a lot of things, but voice actor is one of them. I don’t post a lot about my voice acting endeavors — and I think that has a bit to do with feeling imposter-y about it.

I’m not a full-time voice actor, though about 25% of my overall income does come from voice acting in various forms. Some notable bookings I have under my belt are creating content for Netflix, IBM, DeVry, and Credit.com, and for more character-driven work, I regularly work with the studio that produces content for Mobile Legends, and I also ended up in the game Cris Tales (on the Nintendo Switch and PS4). I have other character projects I work on regularly, but this video isn’t going to be that long.

I also make references to a lot of people and things in this video, but for their sake, I won’t name drop.

Coming To Terms

It’s hard to admit to myself that I’m an actor despite how much of my time is devoted to acting in various formats. I think a part of it has to do with not wanting to be labeled as a starving artist or having others label what I do as a “hobby.” But I’m finally comfortable enough — after many years of acting — to call myself a full-fledged actor.

I wanted to make this video to give an overview of how I got here and to sort of kick-off more videos ABOUT voice acting. I don’t talk about it enough, and I want to change that.

I started voice acting because I was an audio nut. I used to play in bands, and one of the biggest barriers to getting heard was not having recordings. So I learned how to record. And over many many years, I became the okayest audio engineer. Really, I’m not that good.

A Shift

Then my focus shifted to acting in my adult life around the age of 25. I got back into stage work doing community theatre, and what I thought was going to be a quick tour in theatre-land turned into an ongoing love of the craft. After a while, someone said, “Why don’t you voice act?” And I thought, “I can’t do that. I don’t live in Texas, NY, LA, etc.” and they went, “Uh, you have heard of the internet, right?” So I jumped in.

Like most newbies, I cut my teeth on those platforms we don’t like to talk about. I made a little money but knew that if I wanted more, I had to move on.

I couldn’t get a straight answer as to whether I was ready for P2Ps or not, so I decided to just go for it. And sure enough, I was. I made my money back pretty quickly and was having a great time… Then I stalled out. I doubted myself. Hated myself. You know the drill.

So I got coaching. I started coaching with one coach, and then I started booking again. And so I thought, if one coach can help me this much, imagine how much I could learn from a variety of coaches! So I branched out. I started coaching with more and more people, and I got better and better bookings. It was wild.

I also joined some voiceover Discord groups, and those have been instrumental in my self-education and success. I highly recommend doing that. I learned a lot about technique, room treatment, microphones, the works. It was a master’s level education.

What’s Next?

So, naturally, I wanted more. So I asked my coaches, “What’s next?” The answer was, “It’s time to cut some demos and send out to agencies!” So I did that. Based on a lot of recommendations, I opted to go with demo producers who weren’t going to charge me thousands of dollars to produce my demo, and they came out really good.

So I sent them out to a bunch of regional agents, and a handful of them picked me up. I thought, “Gee whiz! I made it!” and that couldn’t have been further from the truth. I do get some really cool auditions from my agents, but they’re fairly sparse. Moral of the story: Love your agents, but they aren’t going to pay all your bills.

I also tried going the direct marketing route, and I have had SOME success there, but not a lot. The bulk of my VO income comes from relationships I have built along with recurring work. And I’m sure most people who are moderately to wildly successful in VO would tell you the same.

Anyway, that’s where I’m at so far. I have done pretty well for myself over the past few years, and I owe that to my background in acting as well as the guidance of my coaches and peers.

As for what’s next? Who knows. The landscape is changing rapidly, and I think a lot of VAs are playing it by ear.

Thanks for listening to my story, and feel free to reach out if I can help you in any way.