A Typical Day for an Independent Artist

A Typical Day for an Independent Artist

Being an independent artist is a dream come true. It’s one of the best jobs I’ve ever had. Yet, it’s one of the hardest. What you see on stage when I’m performing is only a small segment of what I actually do. Read on to find out what a typical day is like for an independent artist.

What it's like on a Reality TV Show

Ever since filming for a reality TV show, I've got a whole lot more respect for the Real Housewives and any other reality TV show!  Filming for a TV show is a lot more demanding than I thought it would be.  Honestly, it was like going to a 9-5 job. We showed up at 9 in the morning and didn't finish for the day until 7 or 8 in the evening. I will tell you from my own experience, it's not easy.  If you can believe it, we were filming all day! We had one camera man so we had to repeat most of the scenes.  There were wide shots, close ups, long shots, b-roll footage requirements and more. They were nice enough to feed us lunch and snacks every day, which was always great. When we first signed on to do the show, we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. All we knew was that we wanted to build a tiny house and it would be fun to be a part of HGTV's Tiny House Hunters. And that it was. I can't wait until our episode airs, but unfortunately they haven't told us when yet. So far, all we've got is 'sometime this Spring.'

Our audition process was a bit nerve wrecking for me. We had a short phone interview and then we were invited to do a video interview.  There was some waiting involved before we found out they wanted to move us along the process.  The video interview was with one producer, but it was recorded so that more of the producers could get a chance to see it and weigh in.  I kept wondering what they were thinking and if we were going to make it to the next phase or not.  They mentioned they needed to wait to see if the show was going to be ordered by the network.  They also mentioned that there were owners of the show that made decisions as well.  It turns out, TV is ran like any other business.  There's not much difference when it comes to budgeting and decision making.  There are employees, contractors, owners, and investors.  It's all based on what is profitable or marketable and what is not. You can't blame them I guess.  Everyone out here is trying to make a dollar.

When we found out we made it through the audition process we were ecstatic.  I've got to hand it to the producers, handling scheduling and locations for each episode is a huge ordeal. To cut down on costs they try to hire as many local contractors as they can. There's the camera men, the sound guys, and the assistant producers. We had the most amazing crew. They were super patient with us, professional, and a lot of fun to be around.

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That's Rob and I and Chaz, our sound guy. We're waiting to go view a tiny house. We viewed 3 of them overall. Although, we were on set all day there was a lot of downtime waiting on the crew to  shift things around on set for the next scene. I was listening to meditation music to calm my nerves.  Not sure what Rob is doing! Stay tuned for my next post reality TV post...