Hi everyone! Hope you all are enjoying the holidays with your family and friends!!
I have a surprise guest blogger today. My hubby! He’s an actor/writer/producer and he teaches at The Acting Center in Hollywood. Besides teaching, he does career consultations for actors. In this article he shares information on headshots that he gives to actors during these consultations. Thanks!
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As a producer, acting teacher, career consultant and actor myself, I know exactly what is needed in a professional headshot that will grab the attention of agents, managers and casting directors alike, in Los Angeles, (or anywhere else), and have been advising actors on how to get this for years.
What constitutes a great headshot is one that captures the actor just being there comfortably. When an actor is doing their job they are to be the character and live without any attention on the audience that is watching them be that character. Whether you are in an audition or on a stage or on set, the job doesn’t change. The actor is simply the character and lives as them. A great headshot shows that you have the ability to do that by capturing you, just being there, living as you, with different attitudes, without any attention on the fact that you are being photographed. A headshot like this gives the agent, manager, casting director, producer and/or director the first glimpse that you are able to handle that element of your job, being able “to be,” while others watch.
The headshot photographer that gets my highest recommendation is my wife, Melissa Burns with Captured Moments by Mel. I don’t recommend her because she is my wife. In fact, despite the fact that my wife was an award winning and published photographer, I continued to pay other photographers to take my headshots for years. In the past couple of years I have worked with my wife to help her understand the difference between a great headshot and a great photograph. While I have no idea how she does what she does from a technical aspect, I was able to help her understand what the finished product of a great headshot was. She has used this information and her knowledge of camera and lighting to be able to now consistently capture the best headshots I have ever had, and she is now the only photographer I will shoot with as each time we shoot she captures shots that blows my reps away.
An actor needs headshots that cover a range of characters and looks now, so that their reps have options that best match the characters they are submitting your for. And as you can see from the headshots above, Mel knows how to do that in spades.
Another crucial element in capturing great headshots, beyond the technical, is being able to be comfortable with the photographer so that you can just “be there” while they get the shots. This is another area in which my wife excels, and not just with me. One of the things that endears my wife to her friends is that she is a great listener. She loves people and loves to help them and is extremely good at creating a safe space in which someone can relax and be themselves, and it shows in the headshots.
The last thing that makes Mel the headshot photographer I would recommend at the top, is her price. 😉 In my opinion, as a producer, acting teacher, career consultant and actor, she is now consistently capturing headshots that are on par with top industry photographers like www.theoandjuliet.com, but only charging $250 per session instead of $800. This is again because she wants to help people.
With pilot season right around the corner, now is the time to get those great headshots that will blow your reps away and help them open casting doors for you, or to help you get those reps in the first place. Hit up Mel and get your spot reserved now before she is too booked up, or I talk her into increasing her prices… ;-))
You can see more examples of Mel’s headshots at http://www.capturedmomentsbymel.com/headshots/
Sincerely,
Lee Burns
Founder/President Awareness Entertainment
Melissa Burns Photography 