Audition 2021 — Finally Finished & Behind The Scenes

With several thousands of auditions, it was a challenge, but we’ve finally come to an end. We know that many of you were waiting impatiently for an official response. So here we are, ready to give everyone some clarity and mark an end to this audition.

The submissions we found interesting have by the end of today already received an email with information about the next steps. If you haven’t received an email by now, consider your application unsuccessful. Nevertheless, there might also be a slim chance that some might get an email in the next months. But generally, this is rare. Think of it as a ‘late callback’ commonly known in other industries like Movies & TV, for instance. Therefore asking us “when has x…ended or started” will not yield helpful answers.

So please remember that in all creative industries, long-term patience, politeness and grit are key. Good things take time…no shortcuts here. If people want to get in contact with you they will. Do the best you can, get used to not getting (instant) feedback or any at all, be patient, be humble and work on improving yourself even when no one is looking. Competition is naturally very fierce for these “dream jobs” and getting a callback is a rare exception and not the rule and also demanding “feedback” is unusual, can appear impolite since simply no one really has the time to really do that. If there was no fit this time there might be something that fits better the other time.

Now let us give you a bit of never-seen before behind-the-scenes information, a list of frequently asked questions below, which was wished for by many on Tellonym.

But before we start: Thank you all again for sending us your submissions and taking your time to prepare them!

I. Behind-The-Scenes of the Black One Audition Team

This is how our audition backend looks:

Green marking means interesting/potential. Yellow means the aforementioned potential late callback. Grey is unsuccessful. Purple means file was not accessible/missing/erased. Statistically about 1 out 100 is a green and 3–5 yellow and 3–5 are purple. This time out of the thousands we had quite a lot of green and yellows meaning the quality of auditions got even better but also competition fiercer.

Some of the people out of this audition that we would like to get to know a bit better. Check your email inbox. This is to show: yes people exist who get into the next round and also into the challenges. And to give you a feeling, this list still goes on and more than 10 this time were straight away green. Plus a few of the yellow (which is many more) might be also contacted later.

II. Some Interesting Insights and Funny Incidents

Some very “exotic”, far-away, and uncommon locations (showing how global this audition was): Las Vegas, Berlin (USA), Pristina (Kosovo), Guatemala City, Lima (Peru), Mexico City, Mumbai, Brunei, London, Buenos Aires, Hong Kong, Cairo, Grand Cayman Islands, Nepal, Milan, Tehran, Marrakech (Marroco), Barbados, Pretoria (South Africa), Mauritius, Israel, Moldova, Kingston (Jamaica), Costa Rica, Cyprus, Hot Springs Arkansas (USA)

Most submissions by country: US, UK, India, Germany, Canada, Spain, Italy, South Africa, Turkey, Indonesia, Philippines, Portugal, Mexico

“Funny” Incidents / Uncommon auditions: These are some anonymised examples and are not intended to make fun of anyone*, but we think they are cool to share and can create a smile for all. But also note that being featured here doesn’t mean anything in regards to whether you were marked green, yellow, or grey.

*If you recognize yourself and aren’t happy with us sharing just reach out at info@blackone-entertainment.com. Use the email you used for your audition (all other emails will be ignored).

Upside down but pretty T-Shirt :)

Cool, all these instruments and jazzing with the Saxophone.

Some people with “art skills” / cool song cover

Lots of living rooms from all around the world (we have seen many many hundreds by now:):

Big sofas :)

The christmas decoration on the door also cool :)

Great location with great weather and the barbecue grill *envy*

Other common locations: bedroom, dance school/practice room, outside, but most of the time some plain background (which is great too). After all, we care most about your performance after all and not where you are :)

III. Common Questions & Answers

Have you “really “ watched all submissions? — Yes, it’s in our interest to find the best (matching) talent. But beware checking the submission doesn’t mean that we’re going to watch long playlists of videos (unless we’re interested). It’s also important to mention that all data stays confidential and isn’t shared with third parties.

Why does my Youtube Video not have x views / still zero views? — Around 50% of all submissions are uploaded to YouTube (unlisted or public) and YouTube (and its algorithm) has strange ideas of when and how to count a view: sometimes that means watching the video several times to make a view count especially. Sometimes at least 80% of the video needs to be watched without skipping once. This is then made worse by us skipping around a lot within the videos. Check it out yourself, too.

Then next about 30% used Google Drive or Dropbox to share their material with us. And here there is no way to check. Google Drive shows embedded videos and Dropbox is just a plain archive and video player. To make matters worse a lot of people forget to give outside permission, usually, this would be a disqualification in itself but we made exceptions this time and tried to contact where possible (requesting permissions via G-Drive etc.)

The remaining 20% used iCloud or inserted a link to their Instagram, a Youtube Short or TikTok. Strangely many iCloud links were faulty and did not lead anywhere.

So to sum up: every submission was checked but that doesn’t mean every single video was watched (some have a playlist of 30+ videos).

What if my link was wrong — Where possible we try to contact you via email but it is your responsibility to make sure the link is working and that there are files to be watched.

All these above are real examples out of this audition. These technical problems were in all cases caused normally by the person who auditioned. So please make sure to check before submitting and keep the files online as long as possible (it is free after all and if you keep it private no worries that other people might see it).

Why did I not get an email? — Some might not have gotten the notice beforehand, or were thinking of a previous audition but during this final audition of 2021/2022, there were no confirmations or other emails sent out during the submission process. Only those who are in the next round will be notified by email. So if you did not receive an email by now, consider your audition not successful.

Are there any new Auditions planned for 2022? — No, not at this moment. And for sure not during the first half of this year. We have enough work with the people we’re already working with. Plus, as you have seen a long list of possible callbacks is still waiting and might be contacted. Nevertheless, please subscribe to our newsletter to be notified of upcoming things.

Greetings and stay healthy,

Your Black One Team