I just got back from the Milliken industrial shoot. It was a two day shoot located in Spartanburg, SC, about 3 hours from me. It paid a day rate and was a local hire only. Luckily, I have my camper van and stayed in it so there was no hotel costs involved. Gas was about 100 dollars and I was fed during the shoot.
If you don’t know, industrials don’t really go on your resume, footage isn’t really used for reels, and no one will really see it as the video is used by the company internally, so the only benefit to do them is the money. They pay fairly well and even after manager and agent fees, I made more per day than my bartending job.
Another benefit that I wasn’t expecting is the people I met. Two of the actors involved with the shoot were SAG actors. One lived 5 minutes from me in Atlanta and the other is originally from LA, but lives in South Carolina now. I also hit it off with one of the wardrobe girls and the director.
The bad. This project was so unorganized and I spent a lot of my off time stressed about call times and location since I never got any call sheets and the AD had my cell phone number wrong. The only saving grace was Tara, the wardrobe girl, who took my number so she could pass my on the info once she got the call sheet. Even after getting the call time, it ended up getting changed three times by the time I got on set.
Ultimately, it was a good experience and I did it for the pay so it was worth it. The job was easy and there were no lines and everyone on set was super nice.
Simon Shih 