A voice actor for the past two decades, Teresa Lim voices commercial and corporate brands across all platforms, and has won LearnX Asia Pacific’s Best Audio. She was the female channel voice for Cartoon Network and Boomerang TV for seven years, and became the female network voice for Fox Sports Australia in 2021 for Netball Australia. As the vice-president of the Australian Association of Voice Actors, Teresa gave evidence last year at the Senate Select Committee on Adopting Artificial Intelligence. As cloning technology advances, the AAVA is seeking legislative safeguards.
Q1. What has been your best career move?
The idea actually came from my mum. I graduated with a journalism degree from UQ in 2003 and ended up working in newsrooms. The hours were brutal – like 4am until midday – so it was really hard to think about having a family. Mum had read this book by an overseas entrepreneur and said, “You could build a home studio and do voiceovers from home.” I thought, “That sounds crazy”, but with the help of friends I made a demo and ended up becoming very successful. I freelanced that way for years until I was picked up by a Sydney voiceover agency as the first Asian talent on their books – because Mandarin is my first language. My career just skyrocketed from there. It was a brave, scary move to step away from a stable news career into something that wasn’t common. It was quite revolutionary back then.