Audition confusion – English voiceover artist!

Oh man, now I’m not ridiculing anyone here but learning to read a voiceover audition request can sometimes be a daunting task!
But, as a public service and a bit off topic, I’ll let you know that if you’re into that sort of stuff visit some of the Voiceover groups on Facebook for your daily dose of client roasting!

So let’s get to it.

A client is looking for an English Voiceover Artist so they post an audition request. Nothing weird there you say.
You’d be right, as English voiceover artists – or any kind of voice over artist, voice actor, narrator or whatever you call yourself for that matter auditions are our grist to the mill…the type of things that any performer must endure in order to get the jobs we need and love.

So, when an audition hits the inbox that actually has some direction in it everything looks great! Just in case you don’t know, most auditions come with little or no direction and we as English voiceover artists are expected to guess, become mind-readers and put our best try forward to the client in the hopes that when they choose their English Voiceover Artist it will be us they choose!
Back to this audition…In it comes all looking great!
It even has a YouTube link to a video they like so you can hear what their preferred take is of an English voiceover artist. Fantastic!
Then the main direction starts:

male, firm (not soft but not too authoritative…if it makes sense), “international” accent – not American but not too British either

‘clear, engaging, well-paced. It’s a software demo video so your delivery needs to constantly engage the viewer and not come across as detached or robotic. It’s about striking a balance between delivering the material enthusiastically without obviously overdoing it’

A recent audition request’s direction

Oh well! At least they tried 🙂

Can you see that this is slightly contradictory and a little confusing. Ok, maybe I’m just weird lol. But I just shrugged my shoulders and …guessed what they wanted out of this English Voiceover Artist request.

Having said that this client is probably great to work with! They really want the chosen English Voiceover Artist to be absolutely clear on what they need.

Let’s hope more clients try as hard in their audition requests.

Do you have any nightmare audition requests? Leave a comment below and let’s have a laugh!

Chris

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