3:54 am - Fri 10/8/04
Hundreds of Pictures of Me

Well, for what it's worth, it's been a very full "weekend"...

On Wednesday, I had the photo shoot for my new headshots.

The photographer lives high on a hill just outside Burbank, in a lovely ranch home with a circular drive and a pool, just overlooking a stable. Somewhere down below, someone had chickens, because from some far distance, I could hear what sounded like an army of roosters crowing.

I imagined I could be...comfortable there. Maybe even happy. Frankly, it seemed perfect�It felt for all the world like you were a million miles from L.A., when it was only about a half-hour drive.

(I joked that "Photography has been very good to you...". Turned out he was just renting the place, but still...)

The guy even had a really hot wife...she was running around, in a pair of short shorts, with a sexy butt and just the kind of legs I like (On the muscular side, but shapely), and she reminded me, to a disconcerting degree, of Kristie D. back in Lansing (They could have been very attractive sisters).

I had to keep telling myself, "Don't stare. Don't stare. Don't stare...".

Kevin�the photographer-was a cool guy, probably in his early 30s, originally from Canada, and there seemed to be a good vibe right from the start.

I'd brought about half the clothes in my closet�and pretty much all my dress clothes�and we really got a lot of different "looks", from a "wifebeater" t-shirt I'd bought just for the occasion (Easily my least favorite "look" of the shoot, though I think we got a couple pictures JS will like) to something more like "The President and CEO of Hoffmaster Ltd."

We took over 215 shots, and other than the fact that he shoots in "natural light"�which was tough for me at times, and led to a couple of delays and improvisations (I'm pretty light-sensitive)�I had a pretty good time. As I told him at one point, "I'm just pretending I'm a big star...".

And I'm very happy with the results, and think JS will be too (I'm just hoping that I may get some more auditions out of them. That's really all that counts here).

Kevin�who's worked with JS a lot in the past�suggested that instead of bringing the two Cds in to JS, that I choose about 10 pictures of each different "look", have them printed up, and take those in to him instead (Apparently, JS doesn't like looking at pictures on the computer, and having done it last night, can't say I blame him�It's kind of tedious).

So last night I looked over all the pictures, and ended up having 58 of them printed up at Rite-Aid this afternoon. Then I emailed JS, to see when he could go over them with me.

It feels good to have done it, because it's something I've been holding off on for awhile (Honestly, as soon as JS expressed any misgivings about my current headshot, I should have been off to get new ones). And seeing these pictures, in color, done by a professional photographer in natural light, with a wide range of "looks" represented, I can see that, in this market, in this day and age, a black-and-white photo of me basically looking "pleasant" doesn't quite cut it.

But that said, I still find myself stressing over the money. This guy is actually pretty damned cheap, and as I said, I'm really quite happy with the results (More on that in a moment...). But the shoot cost me $250. The prints cost me $16.50. Getting a couple 8x10s at Cinema Prints, along with however many lithos, will cost still more money. And LA Casting.com (Which is how agents submit actors for commercials now) charges for every additional photo on their site, beyond a single headshot.

Running right alongside the movie business here in L.A. is the business of people making money off of actors.

But what are ya gonna do? It's gotta be done, so you do it.

It was interesting, in a way, looking at hundreds of pictures of myself...I have flaws to spare (Balding, dark circles under the eyes, crooked teeth, misshappen jaw, etc), but in a lot of the pictures Kevin took, I still, in my own estimation, am almost/sorta good-looking. My eyes kind of kick ass, dark circles aside, and while I don't really "get" why dimples are a good thing, they are. They just "work" somehow.

But beyond "flaws to spare" or "eyes that kick ass", what I saw as I was looking at my photos is a guy with something going on behind his eyes, which is what you want in a headshot, and I think, in terms of attractiveness, it makes up for a lot of physical flaws.

But of course, I could be full of shit.

previous - next