November 13, 2006

• NEW REEL

  I’ve been busy the past few weeks updating my reel for the upcoming pilot season.  

  However, this project is almost 6 months in the making because every time I was just about ready to put it together, another project I’d done would be near to airing and I’d have to wait to possibly include that footage as well.  

  In fact, so much time elapsed that I was even able to get some of my scenes from “HATCHET“, which has received distribution and should be in theaters, March 2007.  

  But now it’s all done and you can take a look at it here: NEW REEL (and until I delete it, you can compare it to the old one, here: Old Reel). 

  The major difference, besides adding new footage, was excising the Kermit Intro I shot in college and replacing it with a photo slide show collage (I ‘m pretty sure I was inspired by the “Slide” show I recently added in the left column).  Since it cost $80/hr. to hire the editors, that new 5 second intro shot wound up being an $80 FX shot because it took the editor an hour to figure out how to make the photos drop in and fly out like I wanted.  But the good thing is, I can use that segment for my future reels.  

  Then I used Memorex’s great DVD label maker to create some nifty looking labels to match the translucent blue DVD cases I purchased.

  I slipped in a shruken resume in the back jacket of the case and kept the ”photo” theme on the case’s front jacket.  I first trimmed the top and sides of the photo’s white border and my wife realized they began resembling polaroid photos.  So I decided to leave them untrimmed on the bottom and placed the photos in the DVD jacket crooked from the start — but at first I didn’t know why.  I just knew I wanted them like that. 

  And then it hit me…. I fumbled through my DVD library until I found it.  Ah, of course.  I was channeling the jacket cover of “Memento“.             

  This latest version should tide me over until I receive footage from “THE GENE GENERATION“, and then it’ll be back to the drawing board slipping in those scenes.

      

   

  Man, how things have changed in 10 years.

   

   

   

   

  Here’s how the pricing broke down to give actors about to do their reel an idea.   Editing/digitizing footage takes up the most time.  I had a lot of new footage plus the new intro, so that’s where the bulk came from.  If you have access to an editing program you can do it yourself, but keep in mind the editors have done tons of reels and can offer a lot of great outside perspective.  It may seem like a lot, but it’s part of your marketing tools — you need to spend money to make money. 

  $80 x 6 hrs editing time =  $480

  $5 x 14 copies =   $70

  $30 x 1 DVD Master Rendering=  $30 

  $30 x 2 (Quicktime & Windows Version for website)= $60

  Air Check  (high quality recording ) of “Veronica Mars”=  $35

  Memorex Dvd Labels= $10

  .50 x 14 Dvd Cases= $7 … Grand Total: $692.00 

  • 4:57 pm
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