One thing that all five of us at Red Film share is an experience as film and television extras, supporting artistes, background, call it what you will, but we've done it.

This kind of work is often mocked by the industry and we've seen a pretty good example of that with Ricky Gervais' latest show, 'Extras'. However, there is no getting away from the fact that it is the easiest way to get onto a real film or TV set, engage with real actors and directors and get an honest glimpse of how things are made, who does what, what the actors are really like and so on. Not to mention you get paid for it.

You could also find yourself being treated like a Rock star, flown out to Japan and signing autographs for screaming fans. See our new documentary write up here.

It's an extremely eye-opening(sometimes jaw-dropping) experience working as an extra and observing the rather dated, almost feudal pecking order that exists on the smallest to the largest budget productions. I'll never forget the time I was told in very clear terms by the wardrobe assistant that my fake moustache was far more valuable and important to the production than I was. For example!

Between us we've doubled for James Bond, guarded the Emperor in Star Wars, worked as bouncers in Eastenders' Scarletts nightclub, engaged in magic with Harry Potter, fought on the front line in Band of Brothers, bleached hair to double as a young Michael Cain and so on. The list is quite literally endless. In fact, some of our best mates from the extras days have their own Star Wars figures and collectors cards. And by this I mean they actually have the character they played as an extra, printed on cards and made into real merchandise figures. In fact, Sebastian has just returned from an all expenses paid trip to Japan to sign autographs at Star Wars conventions and even sell pictures of himself as an extra.

If you have experienced life as an extra and would like to share your anicdotes and experiences for our forthcoming new Extras Journal section, please click here and fill out the Quick Brief form, we will then call you back.

We will be adding lots more information and experiences on film extras work and working the films soon, until then we have one of us, Jos, being interviewed on ITV's 'This Morning' by Fern Britton about his life as an extra and body double in some major movies. Click here to watch the interview. There are some sponsored links below too if you want to have a go yourself. pays not bad at all and lots of time to catch up on reading if your studying or just a bookworm.