Shots of My Head - Part One

After a lovely conversation with Ben Whitehair about transparency and sharing in the LA acting community, I decided I would share every awkward moment of my New Headshot pursuit with readers of my blog. Everyone's experience is different, but I'm super duper happy with my final product, so learn what you can and enjoy my naivety in the meantime, k, meow?

In the beginning...

...There was this. My incredible roommate from studying abroad took me around the college green and snapped up shots of my head for a playwright's festival I was doing in NYC. They were relatively flattering and sufficient, but I look kinda green and sorta like I'm about to fart or something. Nonetheless, I take these various shots to LA with me when I move.

Yikes! LA is the epicenter of the media universe!

As all of us discover one way or another, LA is an incredible place where really random things happen. I land a manager after my first show in town, and after several months of hand-holding and development, I get the dreaded command. "You need new pictures!" But wait! I'm still working three jobs seven days a week and barely making rent in my shared apartment! How the hell am I supposed to pay for that?! Oh, I know... I will have my photographer friend take them for free!

My personal beauty consultant (and current roommate) Brittany did my face for the shoot and the uber-generous & truly very talented Tamea Agle took the pics. I wasn't very prepared though, and you can read it on my face in almost every single shot. Rushed, sweaty, unclear, and desperate, they were pretty much unusable.

Wait! I have more friends!

...And they have fancy cameras that they shoot movies with all the time. Why not set up in their back yard and take some photos of my face?

Ah, yes. This is me. Rocking the earth tones with a coy confidence. I still look like I might be suppressing some gas, but my friends Steve and Clay have great instinctual composition skills and I'm happy. I submit it for #HeadshotTuesday on twitter and get warnings about my cleavage: "There's a subliminal thing going on that's no fair, but it exists. For whatever reason, cleavage=sex, so unless you are going out for vixen roles, be cautious." Hmm...interesting. One little picture says so much - and right now mine seemed to be saying "I'm kinda slutty and don't care enough to pay for professional photographs." The picture looked like a picture a friend took in their back yard (which it was). I finally got it through my head that I should spend money and invest in my career. Duh. What the hell was I waiting for?!