Carly Quellman is a movement artist, storyteller and disability advocate whose work challenges and strips perspective around the human experience. As an advocate for young women, artistic potential and the "anomaly" identity, Carly dedicates her time to spreading the power of expression. She resides in Los Angeles.
Not long ago, I was watching a movie where the sound of the antagonist's voice annoyed me, and while I couldn't do anything about that movie, it got me thinking: If I'm creating content, how do I get the voice that I'm looking for? One option is AI.
AI voiceover generators could come in handy for content creation with a low budget, like social media posts and YouTube videos. They could also be an accessibility solution for those with visual impairments.
I found Artlist, a hub of digital assets and tools for creators, in a long list of AI-powered voiceover generators (looking at you, Speechify, Rebind, Murf AI, ElevenLabs and WellSaid). What originally stood out to me about the company was its ethical, artist-first approach to content: Artlist's roster of more than 200 musicians receive compensation for their work -- about 2,000 tracks a year alongside existing voiceovers across music and video categories -- as well as a share of revenue.
Founded in 2016 by self-taught filmmaker Ira Belsky, the technology company originally launched to support the gap between high-quality music at an affordable cost. In November 2023, Artlist launched its voiceover tool with artificial intelligence as the driver. The voiceover tool's capabilities include a catalog of various voices and text-to-speech functionality.
Today, the company offers four features on its site: Artist-created music and special effects, AI voiceovers for video content creators, story footage from filmmakers, and Lookup Tables (photography color filters).
While I'm not a content creator, I (apparently) have opinions on how sound integrates into visual forms of storytelling. With Artlist, I could explore the possibilities of different voices -- and music -- within content.
Step 1: Navigate to Artlist's homepage and access a free version of the subscription, which provides you with a small taste of everything within its premium plan ($35 per month). This will give you access to 400 words of voiceover creation -- about three sentences -- before needing to upgrade to a voiceover plan ($12 per month) or a premium plan.
Step 2: From the left side of the screen, choose Voiceover and Artlist's voice catalog will open. Here, you can browse and filter by category and gender. (At time of publishing, only male and female options were available.)
Step 3: Above the catalog, a text box is available to create your own voice over. Type the text you want to generate into speech. One character equals one credit. If on a voiceover or premium plan, you can type up to 2,000 characters for each generation.
Step 4: Next, locate the three drop-down menus below the text box for customization. Choose your country of origin, including whatever accent you want, voiceover speed and emotional tone, which has the most robust of choices, including emotions like Optimistic, Sad and Surprised.
Step 5: Click the Generate button on the bottom right corner and give it a few seconds to create. Your file will show up below the voiceover generator box, and under the tab My Voiceovers directly below it. You can download your file, get AI-powered content suggestions or add to an existing or new Artboard, Artlist's AI-powered asset organization tool.
If you're having trouble with Artlist's voice-over generator, there are resources available to help, including an AI voiceover guide, tips to generate voiceovers and various voiceover blog posts.
Artlist stands out for its digestible learning curve and a more seamless integration into media projects. I appreciate its straightforward interface -- one that didn't take ample time to understand its landscape. Where its competitors like Murf AI and ElevenLabs focus on the quantity and types of voices available for its users, Artlist focuses on the production quality of its audio assets. (Shouldn't quality always supersede quantity?)
Yet, since Artlist focuses more on text-to-speech, its $12 voiceover plan (billed annually) isn't as bundled or robust as its competitors. Artlist has a vast library of multimedia voices that can replace the voices in your library -- but while there's an option to alter emotion across a "natural voice" spectrum, it lacks the natural-sounding voices and voice-cloning capabilities that other tools already have.
If you're a content creator seeking royalty-free music and sound effects -- with the option to utilize its AI voiceover feature -- then Artlist is a choice for bolstering your needs. (Or to bundle into a content creator-focused premium plan, $35 per month billed annually.) But for creatives that fit into a broader range of work, Artlist, while polished, could be too niche for your needs.
