Well,
I spent the first two weeks of August working on my commercial reel, and I also had to put together a quick Animation reel as well for an audition and possible agent meeting. Through my class over at Voicecaster I met some excellent talent, and one girl got me in contact with Katie Von Till, a hardworking voice over artist and the new voice of Disney's Snow White!! :-) She gave me some great advice and then I set up a one on one coaching session with her, and we went over my commercial reel, and she was nice enough to go over my animation characters as well. With her ongoing help and support I was able to put two reels together that sound pretty darn good, I gotta say. They may not be complete professional quality, but they are pretty darn close, and get the point across. Here they are. Please have a listen
Animation Reel
Commercial Reel
Now, I still want to add some stuff to the animation of course and record them and mix them professionally, but for now, I need to focus on making more connections with casting directors and booking work on my own. With booked gigs and more connections under my belt, the agents will hire me. Without that stuff, it's literally just waiting for lady luck to knock on your door. I also have updated my website a bit to cater more to a voice over agent or casting director logging on. I took off my picture on the front page and made the first thing you come to my reels. That way, they aren't focused on what I look like when they hear the voices, and can rather, in their mind make out whatever they hear. Another useful note from Katie. www.JayPreston.com
As for my last class, I honestly don't think I learned much. But I did get some good practice in the booth, and the connection to Katie I think was the reason I took it. So I must save up for a class now over at Talkshop. If there are three big casting companies for voice-over, Talkshop is one of them, and it's the only one i haven't taken a class in yet. So, that will be in September when I can save enough money again. I swear, if I could go back, I would have skipped out on college, which has only given me horrible debt and bad credit, and convinced my parents to send me out here with even a quarter of the money spent for college. Alas...but then I wouldn't have gotten to experience this wonderful struggle that is talked about so often in "making it".
There is gold at the end of my tunnel. For now, I must enjoy my surroundings and sing the tunnel song. I hope you all like my reels, feel free to subscribe to my blog, and suggest it to anyone else starting this path. :-)
Be Wonderful!
