Meet Cb Studios

We were lucky to catch up with Cb Studios recently and have shared our conversation below.

CB Studios, so good to have you with us today. We’ve always been impressed with folks who have a very clear sense of purpose and so maybe we can jump right in and talk about how you found your purpose?

CB Studios was founded in January 2024 by the Los Angeles based filmmakers Cayleigh Pine and Ben Bernard. Their goal is to give actors agency in the talents they showcase and how they are portrayed. When actors early in their career are not able to produce their own work, they are at the mercy of someone else’s creative vision and have no control over how they are portrayed. This can limit the roles they are cast in because they don’t have the perfect scene to showcase the true extent of their range.

CB Studios writes and produces custom scenes specifically created for a performer to utilize in their demo reel. Unlike in most productions, our clients have full control over their artistic image, ensuring they present their best self to agents, casting directors, and creative collaborators.

As multi-hyphenate performers/creators, Cayleigh and Ben have a deep empathy for actors entering the industry and are personally committed to offering affordable solutions to those who may not have the tools or resources to showcase their talent. While enrolled in a college acting class, Cayleigh was tasked with creating a two-person scene as her final project. While Cayleigh majored in filmmaking, the majority of her classmates were theater actors who had not worked behind the camera before. Many did not have the resources or technical wherewithal to create a production at this scale, but Cayleigh found herself at an advantage.

She decided to enlist the help of Ben, who owned much of his own film equipment and had skills as a director, cinematographer, and editor. Their collaboration resulted in a scene that Cayleigh’s professor commended as incredibly high quality and professional. Other students began reaching out to Ben for support on their own assignments, and these requests continued semesters after his graduation. As Cayleigh expanded her network of acting contacts and honed her producing skills through professional on-set work, she proposed merging her strengths with Ben’s. Together, the two founded CB Studios to help the many aspiring actors in Los Angeles develop professional scenes for their demo reels.

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

Cayleigh and Ben write, produce, and direct professional, high-quality, narrative scenes for actors’ demo reels that are up to 50% less expensive than most of their competitors, making their services accessible to the everyday actor.

Their process begins by identifying a 2-page scene the client wants to perform in, whether it’s selected from the CB Studios catalog of original scripts, a preexisting movie or show, a script their client has written, or a totally new concept tailored to the performer’s vision. Next, the scene is workshopped and developed, a team of professional scene partners and crew members are assembled, the script is filmed over the course of one day, and finally, in collaboration with the client, editing and post-production services are completed on the project.

CB Studios offers three packages — Monologue Package ($250), Standard Package ($450), and Premium Package ($850) — including discounted group packages, customizable options to provide clients with the exact package they are looking for, and discounts for students and recent graduates.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

CB Studios takes pride in their ability to provide exceptional value and service to actors of all levels, ensuring that their clients’ demo reels stand out in the competitive industry landscape. Reflecting back on the journey of how they got to this point, three elements which were critical to the company’s success are confidence, adaptability, and trust.

Confidence comes in the form of knowing your strengths, as well as your weaknesses, and who can help you balance them out. Cayleigh and Ben, while both writers and directors, have their own unique strengths, visions, areas of expertise, and blindspots. The reason they started working together even back in college was because they both recognized the talent each other had and what they could bring to the table in order to elevate each other.

Adaptability is critical in both creativity and business because nothing ever goes exactly according to plan. Preparation is critical, which is why it is important to always cover your bases, but frequently the plan ends up going out the window, and you need to be able to adapt for the benefit of the project you are working on.

Trust comes not only from CB Studios’ clients entrusting them to shepherd their performance from development to final product, but also in a connection established between every single collaborator on the production. A majority of the success of your final product is determined by the people you are working with, and while talent, communication, and adaptability do most of the leg work, mutual trust and respect is what carries the day.

Anyone just starting on their creative journey needs to discover their voice, strengths, and weaknesses for themselves. Nobody can teach you how to create, but you should never stop learning from those around you. Your best resources are always your collaborators, and whatever allows you to work and grow with each other is going to be what advances you furthest towards your ultimate creative goals.

One of our goals is to help like-minded folks with similar goals connect and so before we go we want to ask if you are looking to partner or collab with others – and if so, what would make the ideal collaborator or partner?

CB Studios is always interested in new partners who want to build up their demo reel and showcase their range as a performer. According to CB Studios co-founder, Ben Bernard, “The key to doing any job in this industry well is telling a good story. So, the actors we enjoy our collaborations with most tend to view themselves first and foremost as storytellers.”

If you have a vision of what kind of performer you want to be, or a story you want to see produced, or even if you need help developing your identity as an actor, Cayleigh and Ben want to work with you. For more information on how to get started on your scene with CB Studios, go to hellocbstudios.com, or follow the instagram page @hellocbstudios!

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