Actor headshots are the single most important marketing material you will need to start booking acting jobs in Las Vegas. They show casting directors what you look like so they can decide whether to bring you (or someone else) in for the audition. Fair or unfair, most actors get hired not just for their acting ability, but because of what they look like. If a production needs an Asian person, they will never consider you if you are white, this is probably the only industry where they can legitimately discriminate against people based on what they look like without getting into trouble.
It’s the job of the casting director (who got hired by the production company in Las Vegas) to find the right actors for the part. They sift through thousands of actor headshots every day to find people who look perfect for the role and then they bring that person to the audition room. The first impression your headshot makes on a casting director in Las Vegas is critical.
For instance, just by looking at your headshot, a casting director can get a sense of how experienced you are and whether you take your acting career seriously. They can also determine whether you can act (yes, your expression can tell a casting director if you are well trained or not) and what your brand and type is. In order to get yourself booked in Las Vegas you will need a great headshot, footage showing your acting ability (demo reel) and a resume with your training and or credits. Without those three basic marketing materials, it is almost impossible to get booked, even for non-speaking background roles in Las Vegas.
So the question now is what should an actor's headshot look like in Las Vegas? To put it simply, an actor’s headshot needs to show you clearly, have a good expression and look like you spent some money on it. Low budget, unprofessional headshots tend to perform poorly because casting directors (who look at thousands of these a day) can tell right away if you spent money on it and shot it with a dedicated headshot photographer.
Their thinking goes, “If an actor has a low-budget headshot (one that doesn’t look expensive”, they probably won't take their career seriously and won’t be worth bringing in.”
