Lip-sync: 3 Simple Tips

While correct phonetic mouth shapes are important, they are not crucial for effective lip-sync.

If they were, you wouldn’t be able to re-record dialogue after a character has been animated, without people noticing (but you can).

01 Emphasise Key “Accents”

Not regional accents - the emphasis placed on words in a sentence. Some words will hold more weight than others, depending on how an actor has delievered a performance.

“I told him I couldn’t be late!” contains a different emphasis to “I told him I couldn’t be late!”

Some words hold more weight than others. Highlight these moments, and ensure your character hits a key pose when they say these words. For instance, they might gesture with their hands - is this gesture going to happen on “late” or “couldn’t”?

You should leave the mouth shapes until last - perfect the character’s performance first.

02 Mouth Shapes

The reality of animation is that it takes a long time, and that means it is expensive. When you’re trying to use time & budget effectively, you might be faced with a choice. More time on accents (explained above) or more time getting the right mouth shape?

There is no doubt: step 1 is more important.

Once you have a character performance, animate all the open/close mouth shapes. This might be as much as your schedule allows. No problem; you could very well leave it here and publish what you’ve got.

The counter-intuitive fact is that phonetic shapes don’t matter as much as strong performance. If your character gives a strong performance and they open/close their mouth at the right time, what you have is probably pretty good. If that didn’t work, the Muppets wouldn’t feel like they were really speaking.

If you do have more time, you can focus on individual mouth shapes. Note: You don’t need as many mouth shapes as you do letters in the alphabet, take a look:

Thankyou Christine O'Brien

03 Sync Early, Not Late

To ensure your lipsync feels natural, aim for an early delivery. Sometimes sounds fall between frames - if in doubt, put shapes one frame early. Usually, if dialogue that is technically “perfectly synced”, it will appear late when you watch it in real time.

04 Conclusion

Using these tips will help you either animate, or review animation you have commissioned. They will ensure your character isn’t a lifeless blob with a mouth going a million miles an hour. The character on screen will be giving a memorable performance.