Aaron Marcus, an acting coach, explains how headshots should signal which roles you're right for. Your photo doesn't need to show everything you can do, just enough to get you in the room for the parts that match your type.
Hi, my name is Aaron Marcus. I'm America's premier acting and commercial modeling career coach. I'm the author of How to Become a Successful Commercial Model, founder of howtomodel.com, and I've been making my living for over 26 years as an actor and a commercial model. I, I was giving a private online coaching session the other day, and I was talking with this woman about headshots, and I was explaining to her the importance of creating a very specific look, you know, the kinds of areas that are most easy for you to get booked in. And so I showed her my headshot and she looked at it and she said, it's not telling me anything. It looks— there's nothing there. I mean, you're just smiling and looking into the lens of the camera. There's nothing interesting going on there. And so as I went on to explain to her and I asked her, Okay, so let's pretend you're a casting director and somebody is, you know, handing in this headshot and you're looking at it. And this was my headshot. And you are casting for a feature film and you need an auto mechanic for this particular role. And you look at my headshot. Would you bring me in to read for that role? And she looked at it and she said, No, probably not. So, okay. So let's say you needed a truck driver. Would you bring me in based on my headshot? And she said, no, probably not. And I was saying, how about a head of a gang? You know, would you bring me in for that based on my headshot? And so I'm going through this long list of all these things. And finally, you know, I said, well, how about if they needed a doctor? Would you bring me in for that? And she was looking at the headshot and she said, yeah, you know, I'd bring you in for that. And I said, well, how about How about a lawyer? How about a science teacher? How about a professor? And I'm going down this list. And I think finally, you know, she began to understand that sometimes what you don't see in the headshot can be just as important as what you do see. So the fact is, my headshot is very effective because it's telling the casting director very specifically not only what roles are not right for me, But more importantly, what roles are right for me? So basically, when you are putting together your headshot, make sure that you fit into a specific category so when people look at it, they know exactly what you are right for. Now, if you have any questions at all, feel free to email me at aaron@howtomodel.com. You can join me on Facebook, which is facebook.com/howtomodel. How to Model, and I have a great community of actors and models, and they post questions. I answer people there. And also, I've got an incredible Headshot Secrets online workshop, and you can get more information by simply going to howtoactandmodel.com/headshots, and that's plural. So it's howtoactandmodel.com/headshots. And I'm going to be interviewing Joe Henson, who is an amazing New York-based headshot photographer who actually has shot over 16,000 headshots in his career so far. So anyhow, I'm Aaron Marcus, and I look forward to talking with you soon.
