steps toward professionalism

Did some impromptu networking in the past couple of days. My cousin's husband knows a guy working down here and got me in contact with him. We had a phone "interview". I was nervous at first, but he was really nice and willing to get me in touch with the right people. It really helps if I smile while talking on the phone. I feel like it travels through the receiver, that he can read my excitement in my voice or even that trepidation. I felt like I was charming and funny, maybe more than usual, because he was laughing at my jokes. So that's a good sign.

I told him what I was interested in doing and that my plan for the year is to just to learn and experience and figure out what I want to do then try and focus on that. He said that that was a good plan and what he did out of college since he wasn't sure what he wanted to do. Casting and locations interest me right now, and he's got friends in those areas. He's also working on a commercial in the coming weeks, and he's going to find out if I can help out. He's not sure yet since companies usually don't want people knowing about their product, but I said that he's done enough already and I was sincerely grateful.

Met another guy at my ex-roomie's grad party. We lived together 3 years ago. Anyway, he works on a well-known reality tv show. He gave me his card, but I didn't have any to give him! Oh well. He was nice and gave good advice and said he could send me and Cat PA (production assistant) jobs our way.

Only thing was this: I was wearing a slightly low-cut dress at the party, and the dude was super tall, and I could tell he was checking me out sometimes, you know? And I wasn't bothered by it, in fact, I was actually quite flattered because he didn't come off as a douchebag during the 15 minutes we talked about film, he was actually a genuinely nice guy and not the "let's take advantage of the new person here to Hollywood" type guy. I'd like to think I've got a good barometer for these things. Not to say I judge a person within the first 10 minutes of meeting him, but I can get a feel for what a person's like and this feeling changes the more I get to know him.

I'm also finally seeing how appearance works into these things. Not that I was never aware of it, but it never really applied to me until now. I just want to be charming and smart, well-spoken and witty, and I want that to be the main attraction, something that people remember about me, and maybe my weird, slight cuteness helps too. I don't know. I just wish that was the way if works instead of physical appearances determining everything.

Moving on, I finally made business cards at Moo, and they look AMAZING, according to the computer screen. I don't have them physically yet. They're sort of my grad gift to myself since they're slightly expensive (50 for $21.99, although I found a link for 15% discount). I had 100 made. I'll probably just save them for "important" people (God, I'm Hollywood already). Meaning, people I really want to impress in the "industry" will get them.

I took some film-related photos that I've taken over the years and put them on the back of the card. The front of the card has my info. 50 of them have a photo of me looking through a Bolex camera. It's one of my favorites. Also, 50 of them have this on it:

We met on (insert date)
@ (insert film shoot)

So that people can remember what film shoot they met me on and what date. I got that idea from a friend's business card that had a blank line on it for him to fill out the shoot name. We'll see if it flies. I've been looking for inspiration in films for business cards, and I particularly liked this one in "Ocean's Eleven":
I love the simple, classic look of it. Then Danny just writes whatever on the back that the person needs to know. Raised lettering sounds expensive though, so maybe next time when I start making moneys.

Also, I've avoided pigeon-holing myself by writing "writer" on the business card. People will just think that's my focus, so I left the position blank. Once I figure out what it is, then it'll be time to make new cards, but these ones are going to be great for now.