 Do I need a reader for my self-tape auditions? A real-life reader? And does that reader need to be an actor? By the way, my name is Beljika and I make acting related videos all of the time. And right now I'm doing vlogmas. So yeah, I'm posting every single day. And if you have been watching my videos and you're not subscribed, I would really appreciate if you would consider subscribing and leave me a comment and tell me you're here. Yes, I believe that you should definitely have a reader for your self-tape auditions because it's going to make it that much better. Really, if you prerecord the other lines, you are not going to allow yourself to do it different ways and do it however you happen to naturally do at that time and be able to play with it. If you prerecord your own lines, it's going to be very confusing to the person watching it and it's going to sound strange and then you're not going to be able to perform as well. I truly believe that if you have a reader, it's going to be so much better. When you have a reader, you are able to interact with another human and that is exactly what you do in scenes. So whenever you get a scene, a self-tape audition scene, let's say there's five other characters, usually for auditions, there's maybe one or two other characters in that scene that you need to do a self-tape for, that one reader can definitely read all of the lines for you. It's absolutely fine if it's male or female, it doesn't matter. And they should be positioned either directly to the left of the camera or directly to the right of the camera of, unless other way stated, by the person that's asking you to film the self-tape. Usually for commercials, you do look straight into the camera but if you're doing a scene for basically anything else, they should be right off camera and that person should be positioned slightly further away than you from the microphone or camera because you don't want them to be louder. You will have to fix that yourself when you're editing it before you send it out but you definitely don't want to send out an audition where the reader is really loud and then you're a lot softer. Your reader can be there in person, you can have them on Zoom. I've been doing that a lot but I would not suggest you pre-record it. Does that reader need to be an actor? Absolutely not. In my opinion, your reader should either make your audition better or make it stay the same. Examples of how they can make it worse is if they're giving you unwanted feedback. In that case, you need to be able to communicate with that person and say, hey, I appreciate it but please no feedback. Just say the lines. For example, for me, if I ever had my mom help me with the self-tape audition, we are essentially the same person and we fight all of the time because of it so I know she would try and help or she would make a joke or she would say something and I would just get angry and be like, oh my god please just read the lines and you don't want to get frustrated when you are trying to film a self-tape. You want to be in a good place where you can read the text and be as truthful as you can be and deliver a great audition and also not bringing too much attention to them. For me, when I'm a reader, I try to give the other person as much energy and as much of that text as I can without bringing too much attention to me because of course they're the ones that are auditioning. I am simply assisting them. Yes, this takes a little bit of preparation but you guys, it is so worth it to be able to have a go-to person or a go-to app in order to film your self-tape auditions. Let me know if you have any other questions regarding readers on self-tape auditions or just anything else in general. At the end of every video, I do feature another channel. This is today's feature. If you would like to be featured on my next video, make sure you're subscribed, like this video, and leave me a comment.