Auditioning at TFcon with David Kaye

Last weekend was TFcon Toronto, with one of the special guests being David Kaye. Some of you may recognize Kaye from some of his roles, including ProtoMan in MegaMan NT Warrior and Mega Man Battle Network 5: Double Team DS.

But seeing as this is TFcon, one is more likely to recognize him not only as the voice of Optimus Prime, Grimlock, and Lugnut in Transformers Animated, but also as Megatron from Beast Wars, Beast Machines, Armada, Energon, and Cybertron. He’s been doing this a long time, really, even longer than his predecessor, Frank Welker, who voiced the original Megatron back in 1984. And as it stands, the upcoming Transformers: Prime stands to be the first Transformers cartoon in about 14 years not to feature him.

Anyway, he was one of the special guests at this year’s iteration of the TFcon event, and I was fortunate enough to attend his Q&A panel, get his autograph, and partake in the auditions for this year’s script reading, of which he was of course a part.

Following is the audition video; it’s a big long and fun, but if you want to see me, cut to the 29:55 mark (or click here to skip to where that segment begins). I appear twice after that, auditioning for the last two roles, Sentinel Prime and Megatron. Sadly, I’m a bit rusty, though I apparently did a good job with… well, I’ll let you see if you can guess which one is me:

Here’s a hint: I was not one of the ones chosen to perform. And I couldn’t imagine depriving people of Vangelus’ Animated Megatron, anyway.

On the upside, I got a cool new nickname out of the deal.

At the very least, this did provide a nice warm-up for our Mega Man panel at Otakon next week. Still, I should get back into practice for next year.

Big thanks go to Vangelus, who has the reading itself here, and lots more fun from the con on his YouTube channel, including the David Kaye panel, the Mark Ryan panel (voice of Bumblebee in the Michael Bay movie), and the Derrick J. Wyatt panel (Art Director/Lead Character Designer for Animated).

I asked several questions in the Wyatt panel, including the last one, which made the entire room groan in unison. Still got it!

–LBD “Nytetrayn”

David Oxford

David Oxford, or “LBD ‘Nytetrayn’,” as he is sometimes also known, is a freelance writer of many varied interests who resides in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. If you’re interested in hiring him, please drop him a line at david.oxford (at) nyteworks.net.

For a full list of places to find him online, click here.