Speaker 1: Hi my name is Pavla and welcome to my first vlog of 2021. I do hope everyone will have a better and safer year ahead of us and I'm just so excited to be able to do more vlogs for you guys. To celebrate the new year I will be doing my first ever giveaway on this vlog and it will be acting related so stay tuned for that in the second half of the video. I know I have not been able to post a vlog in about three months now but I was really surprised to see that even while I was away you continued to comment on my videos and subscribe to my channel. So since the end of October which was the last time I posted a vlog and up until today I've gained about 135 new subscribers. That is a lot for a small and relatively new channel like mine so thank you so much for that. I really do appreciate you guys for watching, commenting and subscribing. I am also so close to hitting that 500 subscriber mark. It has not been easy so that is another reason why I really wanted to do a giveaway to say thank you to all of you. I am also very aware that most of the traffic is coming from my acting vlogs so that is something I definitely want to continue this year. Definitely a whole lot more acting vlogs for you guys because when I started vlogging one of my main personal goals was to provide content that is valuable and useful to you specifically in relation to acting because I personally know how difficult it can be especially when you're just starting out in the industry. So vlog number one for 2021 right here. We are going to jump right back into acting and we are going to be doing an acting giveaway. I'm so excited for that. This vlog is actually part two of the last vlog I posted that was back in October about my Netflix auditions and how to submit yourself online even when you do not have an agent. If you have not seen it yet I do suggest checking it out first so you kind of understand what I'm talking about here in part two. I will link it up there and also in the description box below. So the reason why I decided to do a part two of that last vlog is because I was getting a lot of questions from you guys in the comments section and even by email and over the last three months I did try to reply to a lot of those comments but I felt like I couldn't give a complete answer to your question just by typing out a reply. So the purpose of this video is to try and answer some of those questions and to clarify the online submission process specifically through castedtalent.com. As I said in part one of this vlog Casted Talent is an online platform that I use to submit myself to open casting calls. These open casting calls are online auditions where you can submit yourself to the Casted Talent platform without even having an agent and just as I said in my last vlog I do not pay any fees to Casted Talent and also this video is definitely not sponsored by them. In fact I have never paid any fees to audition whether that's in person or online. Again important tip number one is you do not have to pay any money to do an audition. For those of you who left comments in part one of this vlog I think a lot of the confusion was coming from how to use the Casted Talent platform. I think I myself was not very clear about that and I do apologize. I'm going to try and clarify all that in this video. So a number of you ask if I pay a membership or subscription fee to Casted Talent and also if you pay any fees for submitting yourself to a specific audition and the answer to both of those questions is no. Again in my many years of auditioning I have never ever paid any fees or any money to do any type of audition. So how do you sign up for Casted Talent then? Because a lot of you were saying that it seems like you do need to pay a fee to get a membership or a subscription. So if you look more closely on that sign up or registration page there is actually an option to do a basic membership with them which costs no fees to sign up for. It was probably a little bit hard to see because once you click on the sign up page the first thing you'll see is the promotions they have for their membership which are all paid. So if you actually scroll to the bottom of the page I think I'll try to show this up on my screen here. If you go to the bottom of the page you will notice an option to sign up for the basic free membership by using either your Google or your Facebook account. So again my membership is completely free and I don't think you guys really need to pay for any annual or monthly memberships with them. Just scroll down to the bottom of that page and you will see the basic free options there if you'd like to sign up for a Casted Talent account. But what I want to clarify as well is that I don't use Casted Talent for any and all auditions. I am specifically looking for the open casting calls and the great thing about the open casting calls is you can actually access this page without logging in or signing up for a Casted Talent account. So I'm going to show you on my screen here how to get to this page. I'm going to start by searching Casted Talent on Google. I'm not going to click on the main website and go to their home page. I'm going to click on the Talent Searches option right below which brings me to this list here. These are the open casting calls and these are the auditions that I am more concerned about. To be honest I'm actually not quite concerned about the auditions you find listed when you are signed in or registered because here on the Talent Searches page this is where you can see the bigger projects that we would hear about and recognize. The first one listed is Superman and Lois. This is actually a new tv series adding on to the CW's superhero lineup and this one's actually filming here in Vancouver right now. Movies like Star Wars and Crazy Rich Asians have also used this platform when they were looking for new talent. You can go through this whole list if you're curious to see. There are a lot more movies here that you would probably recognize. Also another thing to note is Freeform which was called ABC Family usually does an open casting call each year when they're trying to find some new talent. This is something that I've even submitted myself for. I think I've done it maybe twice already. Maybe in the future I can show you my self-tape for those open calls. And like I mentioned in part one of this vlog, Netflix productions definitely do use casted talent to do the open searches. I'm going to show you this production here in particular because I did get to audition for the lead role of the half of it. Obviously you're going to see now this casting call has ended back in 2019. Unfortunately there aren't any open ones right now so I can't really show you what it looks like when a casting call is open for submission. If one comes up in the future I will try my best to show you guys, make a video about it, but right now I really can't because none of it's open. So I'm going to go back on the page for the specific audition. Normally if you're looking at your screen on the right hand side, you're going to see this little form. They're going to ask you to select a character if you're looking for one or more. And you're also going to have to put in your email address. Once you submit the form, casted talent will send you the script and instructions for the audition by email. And again another very important tip that I mentioned before in my other acting vlogs is please make sure that you do not share that script or any information sent to you because they still consider it confidential even if it is an open casting call. You should only be using that information to make your own self-tape and they will actually know who is sharing the content because when they send us those documents they actually put a watermark or a label across the pages with your name or email. So if you do end up sharing it, they're going to know who it's coming from. And once you are done taping yourself, you will go back to that page with a specific open call and there will be a form for you to fill out when you're ready to submit yourself. On the form you'll be filling out your personal information and attaching your files for your video, for your headshot or photo, and for your resume if you do have one. And again back to tip number one, you are not going to be asked to pay for this. This is going to be a free submission. It is free to submit for the open casting calls listed on that online talent searches page. Personally I only use cast a talent for the talent searches page. I don't use it for any other auditions. I know you're now thinking how do you keep up with the online talent searches page? Like how do you know if there's going to be a new audition? Like do I have to keep checking every day? Every week? Especially when I said in my Netflix audition vlog that these open casting calls do not happen all the time. When they do, we obviously don't want to miss out on any of it. So what I'm going to do here is I'm going to show you how I get notified when there is an online talent search available. So I'm going to go back to the online talent search page. I'm going to show you the page again for the half of it. It actually doesn't matter which production or movie title you're going to click on. Any of the titles on the list will have this. At the bottom of the page you're going to see something that says sign up for our free newsletter here and here is going to be in green. So that's what you click on and you're going to be prompted to put in your email address. There's no logging in or signing up for a membership required to get that free newsletter. I think this may actually be a more important step if you're like me and you just want to use it for the free online talent searches. So just to give you a heads up, the newsletter is going to give you information about the industry in general especially in relation to casting. You're probably going to see a lot of information about actors getting roles in certain movies or what projects are going into production. That's what it will look like for most of the time but I get really excited when once in a while a notification comes up saying that there is a new open casting call or online talent search available. And again I just have to stress here it's not going to happen all the time but when it does I'm like really excited for it and I'm especially happy when I see that the specification for the actor or character they need does fit me. Again it's always it's not always gonna fit you but what I've noticed so far is that casting and productions tend to use these open casting calls especially when they're looking for new younger talent. I hope that clarifies how I use casted talent and how you can possibly use it too. So again I do not pay for any fees. I am looking at the online talent searches page. You do not need to log in and sign up to access this page and I would suggest signing up for the newsletter if you want to receive any updates about any new open casting calls on the online talent searches page. So now I'm going to go into other questions I receive through comments and even by email from you guys. One of the questions or one of the things I noticed from the comment section is a lot of you are concerned that you are not living in the U.S. I'm actually also not in the U.S. If you didn't catch this piece of information earlier or in any of my previous videos I'm actually in Canada. Specifically I am based in Vancouver so to those of you asking you can be outside the U.S. The thing is it kind of also depends where you are located. I am lucky that I live in Vancouver which is essentially an extension of Hollywood. Sometimes Vancouver is even called Hollywood North because the film and TV industry here is actually pretty big. So my answer to that question about being located in the U.S. is it depends. I don't know where all of you are located. If you're in a city like Vancouver or if you're in a country that has a big film and TV industry then you can probably pursue a career in the acting industry but again it really depends. I don't have a definite answer for each and every one of you and I don't suggest sharing your personal information in the comment section. No I would not do that. Don't put in where you're from or your age or anything like that. You guys definitely do not have to share that with me and everyone else on YouTube. Other questions I've been getting from you guys is how to get an agent, what do I put on my resume. Some of you have even asked me to take a look at your resume. I've also been asked questions like who to contact in your area, do I know any agents in your area. I've also been getting questions about practicing, how to prepare for an audition or what steps you should take even before getting started in the industry. And again my answer to these questions is I don't have a definite answer for everyone right now. A lot of your questions were pretty personal and very specific to yourself and even to the situation that you're in or the place that you're living in. I did try my best to type out a reply to some of the questions that I could answer briefly but I just would not be able to cover everything that I would want to say or share to you guys. So this dilemma actually brought me to my giveaway idea and how I can continue to help you guys more personally or more individually. So for years I've actually been doing some tutoring and helping ESL learners with their English whether that's for school or for work. So for example I've done a lot of coaching for people going in for college or work interviews. Over the last year all my teaching has now migrated onto online platforms. It's actually been a very rewarding experience especially throughout the whole COVID pandemic. We've been challenged to stay isolated and to lessen our social contact with others. Quite similar to vlogging, teaching online has given me the opportunity to share my knowledge and to exchange value with people all over the world. And this is something that I've just never expected to be able to do. Just like hearing from all of you through your comments and through your emails wherever you might be located. From not being able to properly and fully respond to your questions so I thought why not extend my online teaching and coaching to help people with acting as well. So to celebrate what I hope will be a better year and my being so close to 500 subscribers and most importantly to say thank you to all of you for watching and supporting my channel so far, I will be giving a free one-on-one coaching and consulting session to one subscriber. For the winner of my giveaway I will set up a 30 minute online zoom session where I can answer your questions more personally and help you with whatever it is you'd like help with with your acting. Whether that's how to start in the industry, how to get an agent, what to put on your resume, questions about audition preparation, whatever it is you need to know. But disclaimer I obviously don't have questions to absolutely everything but I will try my very best to help you out and answer your questions during the session and as I said earlier I want to help not just this one person. I want to be able to reach out to you who are watching and commenting on my videos as well. So I've decided to open my coaching and consulting services to all of you. This will be done online most likely through zoom. Of course I will continue to create this vlog to provide information that I hope is useful to you. So if you would like to enter my giveaway please click on like and subscribe. Don't forget to hit the bell to be notified about more new content from me and this is the most important part here. Comment giveaway below and let me know how you would use your 30 minute coaching and consulting session with me and also let me know why you think you should win the giveaway. So giveaway ends in a week that will be February 2nd 2021 that's a Tuesday. It will end 11 59 p.m Vancouver time that specific time. I will notify the winner by replying to their comment and requesting for them to reach out to me by email to schedule their session. For those of you who are interested about consulting and coaching with me, if you'd like someone to check your resume, if you'd like to discuss how to prepare for an audition, if you need some information on getting an agent and more you can always send me an email if you'd like to book a session with me. My email is always listed down below in the description box. I sincerely hope that this idea does work out. I would like to find more ways to provide even more value to you guys. I've been bouncing around ideas like maybe even doing live group Q&A's. Hopefully in the future I can even get other people who work in the industry on some vlogs with me to share their experiences with you guys. So fingers crossed that this does work out and good luck to everyone entering the giveaway. Thank you so much for watching you guys. Till next time. Bye.