Social media casting in K-pop

[Anii]

I was thinking about how each LOONA member was discovered and realized that a few members were cast through SNS. Heejin was contacted by BBC through social media. Vivi got scouted after posting pics of her trip to SK. Kim Lip and Jinsoul were contacted by BBC through Instagram as well.

This got me thinking. Is SNS casting common? Has it been happening for a while? Do you see this practice becoming more popular in the future?

[lighterxx]

24 minutes ago, PurpleAnii said:

I was thinking about how each LOONA member was discovered and realized that a few members were cast through SNS. Heejin was contacted by BBC through social media. Vivi got scouted after posting pics of her trip to SK. Kim Lip and Jinsoul were contacted by BBC through Instagram as well.

This got me thinking. Is SNS casting common? Has it been happening for a while? Do you see this practice becoming more popular in the future?

Tbh its not common at all, I see street casting alot, hell majority of svt is street casted, but sns casting? That's such a rarity bcs pics are very easy to edit and make changes on

[namidaone]

edit: That show abt CEO's (I forgot what the name was) Boss in the Mirror where the CEO of Esteem was one of the panelists 
In one ep, Esteem had an audition in NY
and the CEO said (im just paraphrasing bc that ep was many mths ago) that they also look at sns and look at their pics/vids and if they find anyone who has a distinct  image -- not just physical looks, but art and/or fashion  sense too. 
edit: here's the clip 

 

Edited September 12, 2020 by namidaone
added vid, corrected info

[Anii]

13 minutes ago, lighterxx said:

Tbh its not common at all, I see street casting alot, hell majority of svt is street casted, but sns casting? That's such a rarity bcs pics are very easy to edit and make changes on

That's what I was thinking too. A lot of people edit their pics heavily so it must be difficult to assess the visuals of a person on SNS. BBC either have very good casting agents or they were just lucky with these girls. I still think street casting will remain popular, but anything can happen. 

Edited September 12, 2020 by PurpleAnii

[Anii]

12 minutes ago, namidaone said:

That show abt CEO's (I forgot what the name was) where the CEO of Esteem was one of the panelists 
In one ep, Esteem had an audition in NY
and the CEO said (im just paraphrasing bc that ep was many mths ago) that they also look at sns and look at their pics/vids and if they find anyone who has a distinct  image not just physical looks, but art and/or fashion  sense too.
 

It's very interesting that they look for people with distinct looks/fashion sense. Vivi was a model and (in my opinion) she has good fashion sense. That's probably why she caught the eyes of BBC's casting agents on SNS.

Esteem is a model agency so that's probably why they have such criteria too. I'm curious if any other K-pop agencies do such casting. The way BBC cast must be similar to Esteem's.

Edited September 12, 2020 by PurpleAnii

[lighterxx]

12 minutes ago, PurpleAnii said:

That's what I was thinking too. A lot of people edit their pics heavily so it must be difficult to assess the visuals of a person on SNS. BBC either have very good casting agents or they were just lucky with these girls. I still think street casting will remain popular, but anything can happen. 

I assume they scouted ALOT of people and lucked out with few

Afterall we are seeing people they debuted, they must have communicated with alot of protential trainees and asked them to pass the first audition, that way they can see their faces and see whether they are fit to be in their group

To me, they really lucked out with Chuu, not only she has a very idol like charisma, ones I see at Nayeon Hoshi Arin Hyojung, aka shamelessly cute if needed, she is also quite talented in vocals too. Tbh I'm more surprised no one tried to get her as a trainee before lol

[namidaone]

oh w8 i think there's another idol who got casted via sns (edit2: Kr sns apps) --- Wonwoo 
Wonwoo's teacher (?) uploaded his infamous Heartbeat dance cover and Pledis casted him right away. 
The performance (edit1: not orig vid  bc it got deleted, this is another fancam but longshot ver ) 

Wonwoo's reenactment of his audition (and other SVT members audition reenactment) 

 

Edited September 12, 2020 by namidaone
see edits 1 and 2

[Anii]

18 minutes ago, lighterxx said:

I assume they scouted ALOT of people and lucked out with few

Afterall we are seeing people they debuted, they must have communicated with alot of protential trainees and asked them to pass the first audition, that way they can see their faces and see whether they are fit to be in their group

To me, they really lucked out with Chuu, not only she has a very idol like charisma, ones I see at Nayeon Hoshi Arin Hyojung, aka shamelessly cute if needed, she is also quite talented in vocals too. Tbh I'm more surprised no one tried to get her as a trainee before lol

You're right. They probably did scout a lot if trainees, with only a few making it. I read somewhere that BBC had ~100 trainees for LOONA

Chuu auditioned for JYP but she didn't pass . She passed the first round of YG Blacklabel auditions too. Chuu was a trainee at Music Works iirc but thank goodness she left. Even I'm surprised at how major entertainment agencies missed out on her. She was born to be an idol.

6 minutes ago, namidaone said:

oh w8 i think there's another idol who got casted via sns --- Wonwoo 
Wonwoo's teacher (?) uploaded his infamous Heartbeat dance cover and Pledis casted him right away. 
The video 

Wonwoo's reenactment of his audition (and other SVT members audition reenactment) 

 

Ooohhhh. This is definitely interesting. 

[namidaone]

Yonghwa (CNBLUE) 
 

Quote

FNC entertainment first noticed him when a picture of him from his personal page got posted on a "hot or not" site by some stranger. They tracked him down (name, number and address), contacted him and even though he firmly declined, they still chased him down to Busan to try to recruit him. They even went to his highschool and tried to meet him by saying that they're his relatives. He finally accepted the offer when his family talked him into it and then debuted in CNBLUE. [x]

 

[MicrowavedTeaforYourSoul]

It’s very common in model/fashion industry nowadays

[lighterxx]

1 hour ago, namidaone said:

oh w8 i think there's another idol who got casted via sns --- Wonwoo 
Wonwoo's teacher (?) uploaded his infamous Heartbeat dance cover and Pledis casted him right away. 
The performance * 

Wonwoo's reenactment of his audition (and other SVT members audition reenactment) 

 

Oh by sns I assumed other things like insta etc but yes, Wonwoo and Seungkwan and recruited due to their famous videos lol 

Perks of that is, company already knows there is no filters etc on the video bcs both of them were recorded without their permission

[lighterxx]

1 hour ago, PurpleAnii said:

You're right. They probably did scout a lot if trainees, with only a few making it. I read somewhere that BBC had ~100 trainees for LOONA

Chuu auditioned for JYP but she didn't pass . She passed the first round of YG Blacklabel auditions too. Chuu was a trainee at Music Works iirc but thank goodness she left. Even I'm surprised at how major entertainment agencies missed out on her. She was born to be an idol.

Ooohhhh. This is definitely interesting. 

Welp at least she shines in Loona, tbh she really suits jyp vibes I'm surprised they did not want her o.o maybe her talents were not enough at that time

[namidaone]

1 hour ago, lighterxx said:

Oh by sns I assumed other things like insta etc but yes, Wonwoo and Seungkwan and recruited due to their famous videos lol 

Perks of that is, company already knows there is no filters etc on the video bcs both of them were recorded without their permission

I forgot abt Seungkwan getting casted fr his singing video too. 
Yea I was referring to Kr sns apps popular before 3rd gen idol era: Kakao apps (Talk/Story, tistory), Naver apps (me2day, Band), Cyworld, Pandora TV, etc. 
A lot of those have become less popular in Kr nowadays though, so I can understand the confusion. Lemme edit that post again.
  

[lighterxx]

19 minutes ago, namidaone said:

I forgot abt Seungkwan getting casted fr his singing video too. 
Yea I was referring to Kr sns apps popular before 3rd gen idol era: Kakao apps (Talk/Story, tistory), Naver apps (me2day, Band), Cyworld, Pandora TV, etc. 
A lot of those have become less popular in Kr nowadays though, so I can understand the confusion. Lemme edit that post again.
  

Nahh its ok!! I think Wonho too was casted like that?? He was casted with his photos rather than video tho!!

I also just now remember, alot of svt members have predebut videos when they are not even trainees, probably companies follow things like that

This one is from when he was a trainee but he has many from when he was not a trainee, tho they are hard to find T^T

 

 

[namidaone]

6 hours ago, lighterxx said:

Nahh its ok!! I think Wonho too was casted like that?? He was casted with his photos rather than video tho!!

I also just now remember, alot of svt members have predebut videos when they are not even trainees, probably companies follow things like that

This one is from when he was a trainee but he has many from when he was not a trainee, tho they are hard to find T^T

 

 

Hoshi was scouted at one of the competitions where Deep Blue won (prolly dancing to Mirotic based on his reenactment)  
Pledis scout gave him ice cream and he accepted kkk. 

 

[namidaone]

https://www.koreaboo.com/lists/kpop-idols-youtube-predebut/
Tzuyu (Twice)  - JYP scouts saw her dance school's vid on YT  
Momo (Twice) - same as Tzuyu 
Young K (Day6) - JYP scouts saw his band's videos on YT and decided to recruit him and another band member 
Eric Nam - not sure if it fits the criteria bc it's not a Kpop company,
but MBC saw his viral song cover in YT and asked him to audition  on their survival show  

and last but not the least 
Jay Park - cancelled in 2PM when his "Korea is gay" Myspace comments went viral,
then was forgiven and set to reunite w/ 2PM but got cancelled again by JYP for a different "personal mistake" 
then was re-casted by Sidus when his B.o.B + Bruno Mars cover went viral on YT.  
 

[lighterxx]

10 hours ago, namidaone said:

Hoshi was scouted at one of the competitions where Deep Blue won (prolly dancing to Mirotic based on his reenactment)  
Pledis scout gave him ice cream and he accepted kkk. 

 

Yep!! I know o.o but deep blue was active alot before him getting accepted. I assumed pledis knowing about this because place where they hold dance practices is not somewhere you can accidentally come tbh, his hometown is at quite interesting place and I think he is only idol I know from there? 

I even remember one before deep blue where his friends were cheering for him and he was performing on the stage, from 2012? Those videos are so hard to find now T^T

Edit; I just remembered deep blue didn't win in that competition I think o.o I remember they were the 2nd place (tbh only hoshi was good dancer lol) but maybe I remember incorrectly o.o

Edit 2: REMEMBERED THE FULL STORY BLESS his cousin saw casting agent of pledis in university, they said they have a very talented dancer cousin and asked them to check him out, pledis then checked out his videos to see whether he is fit or not, later they came to competition to scout him and he was casted there 

His story is very interesting but I think wildest one is Jun's lmao

Edited September 13, 2020 by lighterxx