Modeling Class

Last week she had her first modeling workshop.  They broke everyone into three groups and so she got to work on still photos, runway modeling, and her slate.  I got to go and sit in on each one so I could take notes to help her out later.  She had a lot of fun and met a girl that she liked a lot.  Unfortunately she is headed to the summer Shine whereas we're not going till January, so we won't be there when she is.  Most of the people at this workshop were getting ready for summer Shine, actually.  I'm glad that we have a little bit more time to get ready- I still feel like she has a lot to learn if she wants to be serious about this.

So, fashion stills.  She learned "chicken necking".  Head out, chin down, elongated neck.  It's kind of hard to describe in print but now she knows it when she sees it.  Makes your face the focus of your picture and alleviates shadows and double chins.  Good stuff for moms to know too!  They also practiced laughing out loud and looking natural while doing it, and jumping around for action shots.  The director had all the kids in the group work together.  The other three were 11- a set of identical boys, her new friend, and Gillian.  We haven't met anybody to room with yet- I'm hoping we will soon.  It'll be nice to be able to split the hotel cost.  She was hoping to room with her new friend Cami, but oh well.

Then she practiced runway.  She's getting pretty good at looking more natural, although she still tends to walk faster and look down as she's walking away.  Gotta remember that the camera is on you until you step off the runway.

She's been trying to come up good stuff for her slate- it's a thing you memorize to say to agents and casting people.  It's your name, your age (which she kept having trouble with because I told her to say she was nine.  She'll be nine when we go to Shine and I don't want her to memorize it with the wrong number in it.), your height if you're over 13, and then an "industry-driven fact" about yourself.  Basically that means something that makes you stand out from other eight year olds your height with brown hair, something that a casting director might be able to use in a movie or a commercial.  Do you play sports or an instrument?  Eagle Scout, won medals in anything, great swimmer, etc? 

She wanted to say that she got seventh place in the math competition this year.  And really, that was kind of a big deal because only 8 of the 63 third graders in her class got to go to competition, and then we were up against all 28 elementary schools in the district.  Lots of work, and seventh place is good.  But you don't have time to explain all that in slate, and seventh isn't first or second.  It doesn't sound that great until you explain it.  So she's saying that she's the catcher on her softball team, and that she won an award for third grade math.  Not sure how the math will matter for the industry, but they approved it, so maybe there's some kid version of A Beautiful Mind out there just waiting for her.  Miss Philipa seemed pleased about her being the catcher, since not all girls on the team do that.  She said one of her girls awhile back got cast in The Sandlot 2 based on her softball skills.

Monthly payment is under our belt and done!  Hubby has been working major overtime to make up the difference between the amount due and what we had raised so far.  Our garage sale was rained out and I'm going to reschedule it in a few weeks on a rare Saturday morning that there's no softball game.  I hope all the payments happen this smoothly.  We've felt the pinch a little, mostly in the fact that Daddy doesn't get home till after 7:30 some nights, but it's not killing us.  I like the feeling of pulling together as a family.

I have pictures of the workshop but they're on my phone and I haven't downloaded them to the computer.  Will update shortly.  :)