Recording guide
How to self-tape an audition
A self-tape is judged on whether you are present, not on production value. The things that actually sink one are avoidable: eyes reading down the page, a take abandoned over a single fluffed line, and a watermark across your face. Here is the setup that avoids all three.
What casting is looking at
Almost every self-tape brief asks for the same handful of things, and almost none of them are about your camera. Get these right and the rest is performance.
Your eyes
The single biggest tell that someone is reading. Your eye-line should sit just beside the lens — on your reader — or into it if the brief asks for a direct address. Eyes tracking left-to-right down a page reads instantly as reading, and it is the note that gets given most.
A slate
Usually name, height, location and agent, either at the head of the tape or as a separate clip. Read the brief — some ask for it at the end, some not at all. It is a separate take; do not try to fold it into the scene.
Sound before picture
A clean room beats a good camera. Close windows, kill the fridge hum, and get closer to the mic rather than louder. Casting will forgive a soft image long before they forgive straining to hear you.
A plain background
Neutral wall, even light on your face, framed from mid-chest up unless the brief says otherwise. Nothing in shot that pulls the eye off you.
Where Recito fits
Recito puts the script high on the screen, directly beneath the camera, over the live picture. You read at the top of the frame, which is close enough to the lens that your eye-line holds — and you can see yourself while you do it.
Fix the pace mid-take
Scroll speed and text size adjust while you are recording, so a scene that starts too fast does not cost you the take. The pace coach shows whether you are running ahead of or behind the script.
Fluff one line, keep the take
Pause, go back, and resume on the exact word. The parts join into one video, so a single stumble four minutes in does not mean starting the scene again.
Takes stay side by side
Record the scene several ways and compare them before you send one. Slate as its own take and keep it with the scene it belongs to.
Nothing leaves the device
Sides are usually under embargo, and a self-tape is your face performing unreleased material. Recito has no account and no server — the script and the footage stay on your phone, and you can check that in Settings with the network off.
What Recito is not
It is a teleprompter that records. It does not light you, it does not have a reader in it, and it will not edit your tape. If your brief asks for a specific file name, a trimmed slate or a particular container, you will still do that part in whatever you normally use. And on the free tier a watermark is burned into saved video — for a real submission you want that gone, which is what the one-time unlock is for.
A run-through, start to finish
- Paste the sides in and split them into the scenes you were asked for.
- Prop the phone at eye height, lens level with your eyes, and frame mid-chest up.
- Put your reader just beside the lens on the side the scene plays to.
- Record the slate as its own take.
- Run the scene. If a line goes wrong, pause and resume on the word rather than restarting.
- Do it twice more, differently. Watch all three back before choosing.
- Export and send it the way the brief tells you to. Read that part twice.