On the internet, she goes by many aliases such as "Kagome" and "Rina-Chan", but in real life, she goes by the name of Kira Buckland.  Kira is an American voice actress who has acted in over a thousand internet productions including web animated shows.  You can find her work on sites such as Newgrounds and Youtube.  I remember back in 2005, I was told about her by a friend of mine.  He said she had been gaining lots of popularity from an animated short called "Metal Gear Awesome" which was an animated satirical spoof of the Metal Gear Solid games.  Obviously, you would understand the humor of the cartoon if you've played the Metal Gear Solid games.

Every week, people send her emails offering her starring roles to voice in animated flash cartoons or other productions of that nature.  To say she is a hard worker would be an understatement.  With over 1,000 flash productions and counting, I truely believe she will become a legend among the Newgrounds and Youtube community in the long run. On top of her real job and juggling obstacles in real life, she is constantly trying to meet deadlines to submit her voice over lines.  You would think she is getting paid for most of the voice acting she records, but she does most of it for free as a hobby.  Not only that, but she runs a site/message board (http://voiceactingclub.com/) where amateur voice actors can go to get recruited for projects.  Many will donate money to her to show her their appreciation for taking the time to record lines.

In a world where nothing is free, I think it is somewhat admirable to see Kira Buckland aka Rina Chan, constantly helping people out with their projects without always demanding money.  Unless of course it's a ridiculous number of lines, then that's a totally different situation.  She rarely complains about the people she works with unless they are incredibly rude, not flexible, indecisive, or never satisfied with anything.  She is always willing to give up her time to help you out, unless a situation arises where she doesn't have time.  In that situation, she will politely let you know.

I use to hear people unfairly trash her and say she acts "snobbish" or "bitchy".  This couldn't be farther from the truth.  Kira Buckland is one of the nicest and most professional people ever.  What people don't understand is that Kira does voice acting as a fun hobby.  If a great professional opportunity comes along her way, then fantastic, but she has never claimed to be the greatest voice actress ever.  With her rising popularity, the haters will always take shots at her.  But the 100's upon 1000's of producers she's done animations for will always defend her and stick up for her.  Being a famous female on the internet is hard work because there will always be people who will be in a nerd rage to put her down at every chance they get.  And with her being an extremely talented female, some will go as far as to post  videos or articles full of lies and fabrications and exaggerations to put down her character.   

I've heard complaints from people who say she steals all the roles from voice actresses who make voice acting a living.  That is not true at all.  Yes, she has been in a lot of flash videos, but she has never went out of her way to steal anyones roles.  She did a phenominal job of marketing herself, and making herself well known among the Newgrounds and Youtube community.  So is it such a surprise that producers would want to work with her?  Why should haters hold it against her just because she positioned herself to gain a wealth of opportunities? Another complaint I've heard is that all of her voices sound the same.  But the reality is, a lot of people hear her voices on other toons, they end up loving those voices, and they keep asking her to do the same voices.  Producers will come to her and say, "Hey, can you do that voice that you did in this video (insert link to random video)".  If people like her voice in a video, they will keep asking her to use those specific voices.

Kira Buckland, a big fan of anime, became the founder of the first Alaskan anime convention known as Senshi-Con which is based in Anchorage, Alaska.  Over the years, it has gained more and more popularity.  She also majored in Japanese, which makes her an even bigger asset when it comes to English dubbing for Japanese anime productions.  Kira had played a role as Kanae Sumida in the English dubbed version of 5 Centimeters Per Second.  When Kira started to gain notoriety around the Newgrounds community, Tom Fulp, the founder of Newgrounds, asked her to contribute some voice overs for the game Castle Crashers on Xbox Live Arcade.  You can her her voice all the princesses and Medusa in the game.  Not only that, but she did voice acting for Luminous Arc 2 on the Nintendo DS playing Karen and Elicia.

Being a semi-celebrity on the internet can be both rewarding and nerve wracking.  You can only imagine some of the hate mail she receives.  But the difference between Kira Buckland and other internet stars, is that Kira (Rina-Chan) is not a fame seeker.  She truely enjoys voice acting and loves working with different producers.  She understands that producers make the actors, not the other way around.  She learned that it takes one short film such as "Metal Gear Awesome" to make someone, and that is why she gives producers a ton of respect for their hard work animating everything.  I've talked to producers who have told me that they've asked her to record some of the craziest, crudest, and most vulgar lines, and she'll record them without a single complaint.  Now of course there are some things she won't record.  Everyone has their limits, but for the most part she is unlike other actresses who constantly want rewrites or changes to the script because they feel uncomfortable saying a line.

Kira Buckland is one of the best things to happen for indie short animations.  In a time when the economy is a mess, and filmmakers can't get the proper funding raised to help fund their animated films or indie videogames, it's good to see Kira Buckland helping the indie film and indie game developer community one producer at a time.  She is one of the least selfish people I've ever seen, and I hope that one day some of her "haters" will eventually see things my way and embrace her.  Even if you dislike her voices, you still have to give credit where credit is due, and that is she is one of the hardest working voice actresses out there, and she doesn't even get paid most of the time.