Who is your favorite voice actor?

Mel Blanc tops them all easily.

Incidentally, the way you have Mel's last name spelled in that poll is actually the original spelling of his name. But, professionally he spelled in B-L-A-N-C.

mark hamill isn't in there...

voice of the Joker in all of WB's Batman stuff

Truly, there's Mel Blanc and there's everyone else.

If you're talking about living voice actors, I'd say June Foray.

I like Elizabeth "E.G." Daily though. She's cute. :)

Here's some information about Mel Blanc at the Big Cartoon Database. :cool:

June Foray is as good as Blanc. Chuck Jones called Blanc "the male June Foray"

Daws Butler was amazing. I heard an old demo of his where he altered his pitch gradually as talking and changing accents and dialects, done naturally without spfx.

Oh- where's the multi-talented Stan Freberg?

A lot of good voices today too.
A lot of the bad ones seem to dub anime.

In no particular order off the top of my head (and far from complete):
Mel Blanc
Stan Freberg and the gang (his radio show is STILL hysterical)
Dan Castanella
Hank Azaria (pretty much the whole cast of the Simpsons)

There are quite a few good ones out there.

how about Sterling Holloway? How could you have missed him? snif... His voice was soooooo sweet... He was teh original Winnie the Pooh, Kaa fro jungle book, the Cheshire Cat, amongst many others.

Jim Cummings is, I think, rather versatile. There are a handful of voice actors who fit a certain kind of character pretty well, like Christine Cavanaugh, Kath Soucie, Earl Bowen and Danny Delk. Paul Winchell was pretty perfect for his roles, too. No better wiley cartoon villain voice than Dick Dastardly's. :D

for sheer exuberance.

rob paulsen!!!

For performance and nuance, there is no better than Mel Blanc

For flexibility of vocal cords, it's all Daws Butler

Jabber, it's Denny Delk, not Danny.

Contemporary voices - Roger L. Jackson, Hank Azaria are my faves

my favourite is Tara Strong and Cree Summer pure genuis, don't you agree?

Well...we could just keep on naming names.

But ask yourself what makes a good voice actor?
There's this apocryphal legend about a doctor telling Mel Blanc he had the same vocal chord structure of Enrico Caruso (how the doctor knew is a question). I can believe it. When I asked myself what I find appealing I always compared it to listening to a good singer.

Bad voice actors grate like they are out of their range; off-key. Nasally (this is especially done by many women doing little kid voices) or Grating at the back of throat, usually done by guys doing the bad guy. It's just plain bad acting....or a grating inconsistant squeaky voice when doing teeny characters.
Years after I formed this theory from asking myself what I found appealing in good voices, a few months ago I saw Candi Milo on a talk show and she said all the great voice actors she has known are great singers!

I'm a terrible singer (to use the comparison) but when I do a voice for myself I make sure it is within my range, however limtied that is compared to the great actors.

Watch whats opera doc? and listen to elmer say ''SMOG!'' that one word shows mel blanc's talent.

Actually, it shows the talent of Arthur Q. Bryant, the voice of Elmer Fudd. Mel didn't do Elmer until Bryant died, and the difference is obvious. As good as he was, Mel never really got the hang of Elmer's voice.

Nobody went for Charlie Adler, either (the Red Guy and I.R. Baboon crack me up, anyway).

Other notables
-Ken Nordine
-Jean Shepard
-William Shatner (Yeah, that William Shatner)

Actually, it shows the talent of Arthur Q. Bryant, the voice of Elmer Fudd. Mel didn't do Elmer until Bryant died, and the difference is obvious. As good as he was, Mel never really got the hang of Elmer's voice.

Sorry, I have to interject here. The name was Arthur Q. Bryan. No "T" at the end.

Also, Mel didn't take over Elmer's voice right away. (And when he did it was under duress). Arthur must have been feeling ill sometime in the late '50's because in Prehysterical Hare (by Robert McKimson c. 1958), Elmer is voiced by Dave Barry known mostly at Warner Bros. for his Humphrey Bogart impression (which the directors used on more than one occasion). But then he recovered enough to voice Elmer in A Mutt in a Rut (by Robert McKimson c. 1959) and Person to Bunny (by Friz Freleng c. 1960). The latter was released in theatres shortly after Bryan's death in 1959. Then, Hal Smith (the worst one of all IMO) took over the voice in Doggone People (by Robert McKimson c. 1960) and What's My Lion? (by Robert McKimson c. 1961).

After THAT, Mel took over Elmer's voice for commercials and any other things Elmer was put in, including Porky and Daffy Meet the Groovy Goolies in 1972. But Elmer never appeared in a cartoon made at the original studio ever again.

I gotta say, Seth MacFarlane is starting to grow on me as a voice actor. The guy does 4 major roles on the Family Guy, and he can sing in character as well. The Simpsons has some great talent also, it always amazes me how few people do so many voices.

Nobody went for Charlie Adler, either (the Red Guy and I.R. Baboon crack me up, anyway).

Other notables
-Ken Nordine
-Jean Shepard
-William Shatner (Yeah, that William Shatner)

What voices has Shatner done?

I'm excited about that, because I wanted to consider him for a part in my Frederator short (hey, someone else got Mark Hamill, so you never know). I didn't know he did voices, so it was kind of a pipe dream. May still be, I don't know, but at least I have hope.

you thought you were going to show me up huh?(i mean that in a very tastefull way) :)

Hardly.;) But many folks who don't know better assume that Mel did all the Looney Tunes voices, and have never heard of Bryan. I assumed that might be the case here, given the way you structured your post.

BTW, the only complaint I have about the "Bugs Bunny On Broadway" CD is that "SMOG" has been redone. It doesn't have nearly the same impact.

Haredevil, I went with my memory on Bryan's last name, rather than taking the time to use a reference. I think I did pretty well, spelling it nearly to a "t" :D

Thanks for the detailed info about the parade of Elmers; since what I said was that Mel didn't take over until after Bryan's death, I'm still correct (but less specific), based on your post.

Hello.

Sorry Folks, JUNE FORAY IS THE BEST VOICE ACTOR EVER!!!!

The voice of Natasha, Rocket J. Squirrel, Nel, all the women in the Jay Ward stable AND Grandma Gummy, Granny, Cindy Ho, Grandma Fa....and so on....

No one has such a varied acting portfolio- and she is still working!!!!

The president of ASiFA Hollywood, etc. and Chair of the animated shorts/liveaction shorts for the Oscars!!!!

NO one has contributed more to animation then she....

She is a GREAT TALENT!!!!

Thanks,

Well...

Shatner's done the voice of Captain Kirk (natch) in the Filmation Star Trek TV series. Also did the voice of "Mayor Phlemming" in Osmosis Jones. And Santa Claus in "A Very Merry Eek-mas" Special.

Nordine's done (and still does do) the most extraordinary voiceover work. Was really a big noise in the '70s with the Levi's ads. Has a radio show, Wordjazz that really can't be described (except that it's about words). If you can find a CD of his 1967 spoken-word album Colors, give it a listen.

I...um...put Shepherd in there because his voice is so distinctive- a storyteller's voice, a late-night radio voice (which is what he did. If you've seen A Christmas Story, you've heard Jean Shepherd's voice-work)

(If we're going to be sticklers, though, I'll simply add Hans Conreid and Paul Frees- nobody's mentioned them either. But it's still early)

http://www.dawsbutler.com/audio-daws/dawsdemo.ram

That's a RealAudio clip of Daws Butler from the official site that I'd never come across before. There's no question he's talented, but is he tops? I like when people can do endless variations on their own "self" theme (see: Billy West) but it's also nice when -in addition- they've got just as much work that is a complete deviation. Makes 'em more versatile in my opinion.

I almost forgot about Charlie Adler. I still think of him as Buster Bunny above all else.

Is that the same Roger Jackson from Scream, DSB? It might be an idiot's question but if it is, I'm in agreement because going from doing cutesy fluffy stuff to cold-blooded killer "effect" to Mojo Jojo deserves special recognition.

I'm glad someone voted for Mark Hamill. That's one of the best fits for voice to character -ever-. Obviously he's not the best voice actor of all time but no Joker will ever sound good to me unless it sounds just like that. It must have been what I was thinking before that show even came out lol

Is that the same Roger Jackson from Scream, DSB? It might be an idiot's question but if it is, I'm in agreement because going from doing cutesy fluffy stuff to cold-blooded killer "effect" to Mojo Jojo deserves special recognition.

One and the same, Scattered. I did some work with Roger back when he was getting started in voiceover, and he's one of the most laid-back, funniest, nicest guys you'd ever want to meet, and his skill was obvious even back then. For those of us who knew him when, there was never any question that he'd make it and make it big.