Active vs. Passive sentences

DEFINITIONS
The active voice is what you think of as a normal English sentence that follows the normal word order of subject, verb, and then the compliment or object, if necessary.

The passive voice is what we use when we want to change the focus to the the action or the object of the sentence. You can think about it as shining the spotlight on a new part of the sentence.

We often use the passive voice to shift the focus from the artist to the artwork with works by a writer, painter, or musician. The name of the person or artist appears at the end and is is often preceded by the preposition “by.”

Instead of, “Beyonce choreographed the video.”
We say, “The video was choreographed by Beyonce.”

Sometimes we use the passive voice to focus more on the action:
A doctor injected ink into my blood.
Ink was injected into my blood by a doctor.

The passive voice can be formed in every tense in English.

Formation of the passive voice:

verb “to be” (in the same tense as the active verb) + the past participle

present simple = am/is/are + past participle
Fedez raps the verse.
The verse is rapped by Fedez.

present continuous = is + being + past participle
Fedez is rapping the verse.
The verse is being rapped by Fedez

past simple = was/were + past participle
Fedez rapped the verse.
The verse was rapped by Fedez

past continuous was/were + being + past participle
Fedez was rapping the verse.
The verse was being rapped by Fedez.

When we speak about the future we use the helping verb “will” before the verb “be” + the past participle to form the passive voice.

future = will + be + past participle
Fedez will rap the verse.
The verse will be rapped by Fedez.

To form the passive voice in the perfect tenses: the correct form of the verb “have” + “been” + past participle of main verb.

present perfect = have/has + been + past participle
Fedez has rapped the verse.
The verse has been rapped by Fedez.

present perfect continuous = have/has + been being + past participle
Fedez has been rapping the verse.
The verse has been being rapped by Fedez.

past perfect = had + past participle
Fedez had rapped the verse.
The verse had been rapped by Fedez.

past perfect continuous = had + been being + past participle
Fedez has been rapping the verse.
The verse has been being rapped by Fedez

future perfect = will + have been + past participle
Fedez will have rapped the verse.
The verse will have been rapped by Fedez

future perfect continuous = will + have been being + past participle
Fedez will have been rapping the verse.
The verse will have been being rapped by Fedez.

In addition to these uses, we can also use the passive voice with modals:
e.g. That bathroom must not be entered by guests.
The hotel bedrooms do not have to be cleaned every day of our vacation.

The passive voice can be formed with causatives:
My father had his motorcycle washed by my little brother.