Dulce Ruby is a professional model (Marc Ecco, L’oreal, Tommy, Maxim), actress,  and Photoshop guru. We somehow managed to convince her to share her wisdom with Kroycom blog readers for this exclusive series of articles on mainstream and fashion modeling.

The following is part 2 in Dulce’s series of modeling tips on Kroycom.

PART 2 – Find The Light & Know Your Angles

If there is one thing you need to know about modeling, is that it’s not as easy as it looks.  A true common misconception is that all beautiful people take beautiful photographs or that the opposite also serves as true.  In all reality, a MODEL is one who leaves an impression – one who knows how to show EXPRESSION.

Confidence
You have to remember that it’s not perfection that creates a great model, it’s confidence, the ability to find the light and the awareness of your pose that really help create a great image.

Find the Light
To begin, an essential tip for any model to know is that your photograph will always be better if you’re seen.  Of course, it seems like an obvious and simple concept – Find the light – but you’d be surprised how quick we’re likely to forget after all the make up, hair, and styling have been done.  Finding the light means you will be able to highlight your features and essentially create the perfect photograph.  In order to do so, face towards the light – if not the most important, definitely one of the most important tips in our business.

Being able to find the source of light is essential, but really we’re just getting started -  After you have made sure that your expression and face are literally FACING the light you must then be aware of your body.  How you are positioned and the pose you hold are entirely up to you, but be sure that you are looking your best, accentuating all the right features and of course that you are comfortable.  Awkwardness does not show up well on camera as I’m sure most of you are aware; We all know what feels right and even more so what LOOKS right so be sure to remember that as you get in front of the camera and beneath the lights.

You’ve heard it before and I will say it again just in case you’ve forgotten – PRACTICE, LADIES! It makes perfect.  Whether you know your own poses or have to dug through all your magazines, blogs, videos, etc studying the models you admire and aspire to be someday – all you really have to do is take the time to work on yourself and find what poses suit you best and make for the best images.  Easy ways of going about this would be to have a friend come over with a camera, have some fun and get some shots, practice in front  of a mirror or whatever works best for you to perfect your self for your career.

Remember – A pretty person takes a picture, but a model makes that picture a photograph, worth a thousand words.

- Dulce Ruby

Read Dulce’s article “Your First Casting Call”

Dulce Ruby on Facebook

Dulce Ruby on Twitter

Dulce Ruby on Model Mayhem

1) Go to http://amazon.com/myk

2) On the left panel, click “Manage Your Devices”

3) Your device will be under “Registered Kindles“. Next to your name there will be an “Edit” link. Click it, change the name to whatever you want, then click “Update”.

4) Turn on your Kindle, go to “Settings” (tiny icon next to the WiFi icon in the top right corner), and click “Sync“. Your Kindle will now display your new name.

Dulce Ruby is a professional model (Marc Ecco, L’oreal, Tommy, Maxim), actress,  and Photoshop guru. We somehow managed to convince her to share her wisdom with Kroycom blog readers for this exclusive series of articles on mainstream and fashion modeling.

PART 1 – Preparing for your first Casting Call

Like with any other job, you must first make time for your interview prior to being hired; A casting call for us is just that.  Casting directors will see numerous possible candidates in hopes to finding the right person for the role to wow them.  In order to do so, there are a few things you must consider and plan in advance to place yourself at the top & above all the rest.  

1. Do Your Homework
Research the client, production company, producers, photographer and the role.  Knowing and learning as much as you can about who you will be working with and what role you are trying to book is crucial and always extremely helpful in the audition process.  If you have a script in advance, read it over with a friend a few times so you feel comfortable with a run through; if no script or lines are given to you prior to showing up – know if you will need to do a cold reading or have a monologue prepared.  

2.  Know Your Audience
After running through your role, you will come to understand what the client is looking for and who it is they are trying to sell this work to.  Understanding who your targeted audience will be is also helpful in preparing you even further. Know what style of shoot this will be and what style, genre and what audience this role will be given in order to act accordingly and make sure you yourself feel comfortable with the part.  

3. Prepare in Advance
It’s the night before and you’ve already learned your role and audience, now to the fun part.  With an audition you can never be too sure of how long it will take, how many people they will be seeing or what they will be asking of you – unless of course they have specifically told you in advance.  So, with that said it is always better to be prepared and pack essentials.  Firstly and most importantly, do not forget your headshot and resume if you have one – always bring more than one copy as some directors tend to ask for multiple copies. Plan what you will wear in advance so you feel comfortable going in the next day sure of yourself with something that flatters you and best compliments your shape.  Knowing what type of clothing is expected for your casting call is also helpful, but if you are unsure always pack a change of clothes in case you arrive and realize what you are wearing isn’t quite appropriate or fitting for the part.  Also, keep a kit on hand in case of touch ups, or makeup change – You want to be sure to keep up your appearance and freshen up as needed, a kit can be simple but effective with just a brush or comb, essential makeups for touch ups such as powder, gloss, and mascara, whatever you feel is necessary to have you at your best throughout the process.

4. Directions
Do not forget to search the location in ADVANCE.  Write it down, confirm and reconfirm if need be – it is very important to plan ahead and arrive AT LEAST 15 minutes prior to your audition time slot in order to show that you are responsible, reliable and professional.  Remember, it is always better to be early than late.

5. Go with Confidence
The industry we work in is a a business in its own and a way of making a living for everyone you meet during your casting call.  As you walk into the room, they are looking to see if you fit the part but also if you can help them make money or advance in their careers.  Show up with confidence, you want the part, so SHOW IT; they are just as eager to find what they are looking for as you are to have the role.  

Remember, you are the only one that can make yourself look good – be prepared, arrive early, be on your best – smile and be confident!

- Dulce Ruby

Dulce Ruby on Facebook

Dulce Ruby on Twitter

Dulce Ruby on Model Mayhem

Initially this wundercam was supposed to be priced at about half of what it’s now, but I still think it’s a potentially great deal for those content shooters who do extremely high quality stuff.

You don’t have to be a mainstream film maker to reap the benefits of this thing. Sure, the 4K motion picture resolution will be worthless to you if your content  only ends up on the web, but there’s a lot more to Scarlet-X than resolution.

I like that Scarlet can serve as one device to take care of both your still photos and your videos, and at a quality level that’s pretty much unmatched (for now). The newer DSLRs can do some great video but the limitations (storage, heat, auto focusing, audio, etc.) aren’t really ideal if you shoot longer videos and need to remain flexible. I think the Scarlet-X may be a better solution for that. If I was still in the content shooting game full time, I’d get one. (Might do that anyway just because the thing is so damn cool.)

The sensor is really where it’s at: imagine shooting video that looks more like your best still photos, with the dynamic range and color richness to match. And you shoot your videos essentially in RAW (“REDCODE RAW”) so you can make radical adjustments later in post. Love it.

From RED’s invitation email:

“Scarlet-X leaves one-dimensional DSLRs in its wake. With burst modes up to 12 fps at full 5K resolution longside 4K motion capture from 1-30 fps, the camera allows professional photographers and cinematographers to simultaneously capture motion footage and still content. Never miss a shot. Ever. Scarlet-X’s compact design, endless modularity and advanced feature set provide a future-proof solution catering to every shooter’s needs. Priced at under $10,000, Scarlet-X advances our vision to democratize superlative cinema and professional photography.

Scarlet-X comes standard with a Canon EF mount, which can be easily swapped for a PL mount using Scarlet-X’s interchangeable lens mount system. Panavision, Anamorphic, and Nikon lenses are also compatible with the camera, providing ultimate freedom when it comes to creative decision-making. The addition of HDRx reaches up to 18 stops of dynamic range, bringing digital images closer than ever to the natural perception of the human eye.”

You  need to look closely at their order pages, the base prices you see are for the camera body only. Half the game is the quality of your  ’glass’ (lenses), and you better either have a great set already, or are ready to fork out some serious cash for it, in addition to the camera body.

Kroycom has no financial interest in the company and is not compensated for this post.

If you run Strongbox, a paysite authorization and authentication system by BetterCGI, you already have the solution, but you may have missed it among all the other stuff it does. The feature you are looking for is called Secure Cross-Site Links. You simply put a link from the members area of site A to the members area of the one you want your members to have access to (site B), and append a short code. Here is how.

When the member clicks that link, Strongbox will authenticate and forward him to in to the target site’s members area. The only drawback is that members of site A can’t directly log into site B, they need to click the link inside the members area of site A. Also, there the security token name in Strongbox needs to be the same on all the sites you want to cross-link. BetterCGI can set that up for you if they haven’t already done so.

It’s a very cool feature, and it’s free with Strongbox.

An alternative solution is offered by a company called Proxigence. It works much the same way. Proxigence’s authentication solution is called ProxyPass, and the equivalent of Strongbox’ Secure Cross-Site Links is called Proxigence Single Sign-On.

Giving your members maximum value for their membership dollars has always been important, but now even more so considering all the stuff they can get for free. Cross linking your sites  -  basically building a site network – may be a good option for you.

Netflix will be split into two companies, Netflix and Qwikster. Qwikster. Really? There are too many ways to spell it (try it), and it’s confusing. It’s weird to say out loud. Plus it sounds close to Quickstar, which is one of the online arms for Amway.

Netflix will continue to exist – but only for its streaming content. Qwikster (I’ve misspelled this already three times in this post and had to backtrack) will take care of  shipping DVDs. You know, what freaking NETFLIX used to do just fine. You have to maintain your queues separately on both sides. Billing is separate too.

I agree that in the long run the name Netflix makes more sense for online-only stuff. I also think over the years, streaming content is where it’s at, not DVDs.

But here you’ve got brand dilution, consumer confusion, and from the sounds of it, this is going to be one big cluftersuck. Are queues synced? If I put a movie in my DVD queue on Qwikster, will it alert me that I can stream that movie on Netflix instead, and if so, will it forward me to my queue in Netflix with one click? How about Netflix-enabled TVs and players, are they going to work seamlessly…or at all? That’s seemingly little stuff but it matters to consumers. There are lots of big changes all at once – and consumers tend to not like change, especially not if it means any sort of learning curve and/or higher costs.

If you are interested in branding and consumer behavior, this is going to be an interesting case to watch and study.

It’s an insider secret and if you want your sheets and blankets as clean as possible, this is your machine.

You may also have an insider secret. Maybe there’s a favorite site you go to when you want to…take a load off. It’s got great content, it’s convenient and it’s easy to use. But it’s a secret because you aren’t telling anyone about it. Not even your existing customers.

If you find something that’s so good that even a jaded insider like yourself can appreciate it, wouldn’t your customers like to know about it? If you make a recommendation, would some of them click a link – which contains your affiliate code, of course –  from your cross sell area? So what if that site is a competitor.

Everybody is an insider of something. Try to watch your own user habits and preferences and figure out if others might share them. They probably do.

Apple telesales phone number: 800-MY-APPLE

Or switch to Avid or Premiere Pro. They’ll be around a while. Your call.