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I QUIT…. Working for nothing.
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“Oh no, you DI’N’T!!!!!”
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[Ronald Lindeboom] “But you insult people with attributing it mostly to luck.”
When I read posts that come off as if the person is completely immune from the current market forces, yes I call that lucky or fortunate? How many people are in that kind of position?
If you say that despite market forces causing me problems, I did xyz and we are doing OK, that is a little different. But still there is a bit of good fortune involved. I know people that don’t work hard, do crummy work and still get gigs. What do you call that?
Hard working people, despite the best of efforts often fail in business, due to outside forces. Do you not consider that bad luck? And if those type of things don’t happen to you, would you consider that good luck? For some, being left alone without any outside forces, good or bad, influencing your business would consider themselves fortunate.
IMO business is as much a poker game as anything, you and I don’t know what the next card is. There is always an element of luck.Scott Sheriff
SST Digital Media
Multi-Camera Director, VFX and Post ProductionThe Affordable Camera Dolly is your just right solution!
“If you think it’s expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.” —Red Adair
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Scott, that blog post has been discussed before and it is far more relevant to the big production houses around the uk and USA who have huge overheads and rely solely on post production work from film and tv. Also, that list includes some pretty established trades and is pretty subjective.
As for your analogy, I would never advise someone close to me on business. But if I had my arm forced on your question I would tell them not to be silly. Because, your scenario shows no immediate income, no guaranteed income, no experience and no skillset. If someone I loved had a good case for dumping life savings and their house on a business that had potential for growth I would offer them my money so I could make a profit. Let’s not get misty eyed about video production, we are running a business that has to make profit. Let’s twist that scenario back to you-if your loved one said they were going to dump all their money and house and take out loans to run a new plumbing business, but had no experience, no skills, no clients and no connections, what would you say?
Our industry has changed. You now can offer more, for less. -
You cannot and do not address any of the other comments I rebutted to POINTS YOU MADE and now rather just dive into the intellectual safety of the gray area of “luck,” eh?
Not a very worthy debate, Scott.
I notice that you did the same “ignore the points you raised which we addressed” response to Walter Soyka, me and others here. You like to raise points but you aren’t so good about staying within the lines that you yourself draw, when others respond to your points. Sigh…
As for luck, the old adage goes: “Time and chance happen to us all.” It’s what you do about it that separates the men from the boys.
Best regards,
Ronald Lindeboom
CEO Emeritus, Creative COW LLC
Publisher Emeritus, Creative COW Magazine
A 2011 FOLIO: 40 honoree as one of the 40 most influential publishers in America
http://www.creativecow.netCreativity is a process wherein the student and the teacher are located in the same individual.
“Incompetence has never prevented me from plunging in with enthusiasm.” – Woody Allen
“Be who you are and say what you feel because those that matter, don’t mind — and those that mind, don’t matter.” – Dr. Seuss
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I remember that WSJ article and I remember it being kind of off-base in two areas. Pertaining to mobile home production, it didn’t look at manufactured or modular homes, which are booming with some commanding “McMansion” pricing. Check any issue of “Dwell”.
As far as the video post business, the WSJ writers used numbers for some large high-end, film-transfer-based post houses and applied their numbers industry-wide, ignoring the ever-growing number of smaller and one-man shops.
Call that denial if you want, but IMO , under new management, the WSJ is sloppier than it used to be.
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[Andy jackson] “I feel the only reason there is no honest negativity here by most of the cow leaders is due to the fact they do not want to upset and lose their advertising sponsors.”
Then I guess you missed it when I stood up to Apple, Autodesk and others and threw them out of the site when they tried to muscle me, eh? That was a while back so you likely were busy being so successful that you were predisposed counting your money or something.
I wrote my own rules for advertisers and did NOT follow any of the industry’s “norms.”
But you are free to think whatsoever you want. You should ask yourself though why you are so confident about your thoughts when you are admittedly not doing anywhere near as good as the people you are criticizing?
Just a thought…
Best regards,
Ronald Lindeboom
CEO Emeritus, Creative COW LLC
Publisher Emeritus, Creative COW Magazine
A 2011 FOLIO: 40 honoree as one of the 40 most influential publishers in America
http://www.creativecow.netCreativity is a process wherein the student and the teacher are located in the same individual.
“Incompetence has never prevented me from plunging in with enthusiasm.” – Woody Allen
“Be who you are and say what you feel because those that matter, don’t mind — and those that mind, don’t matter.” – Dr. Seuss
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[Scott Sheriff] “So if you think the video production biz is still viable, and don’t think the industry is in a terminal decline, let me ask you a question.”
I’m not going to pretend to answer for Tom, but I’ll toss in my two cents anyway.First off, and I’m not doing this to be pedantic, but what exactly is the “video production biz”? Weddings? Hollywood films? Reality TV? Corporate training videos? Commercials? There are so many facets that some can be fine while others are not and I think that might part of the problem w/this thread is that we have people coming from so many different places and experiences that coming to a true consensus is impossible. It’s like having a global discussion about todays weather and trying to get everyone to agree if it’s cloudy outside or not.
On a more philosophical note I think perspective plays a big role as well. For example, is the video store business pretty much dead? Yes. Is the video rental businesses dead? No. If Blockbuster took the perspective of being in the video rental business as opposed to the video store business they’d probably be in much better shape today. Compare that to Netflix. First it was DVDs in the mail, then it was streaming and now they are producing their own original content. If Netflix just saw themselves as a DVD-in-the-mail company they’d go down the tubes right behind Blockbuster. Netflix’s core business, content delivery, hasn’t changed even though their delivery method has.
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Hey there, I don’t post a lot but I do read the posts I am a “noob” to the business. I have my point and shoot cannon hfm31, my rode mic, my tripods, my dolly, my dead cat and every time I do a small job I put that money into buying more equipment or upgrading. I am 41 myself but I am not necessarily new to the job. I worked for audio visual companies for most of my career. I would set up projectors, screens, sound systems etc for trade shows. I saw the industry change from overhead projectors to computer and powerpoint to having to network them together and now I-pads etc. I got laid off my IT job 2 years ago where I was tracing ip addresses and went back to school to learn photoshop,after effects,illustrator etc. The thing they don’t teach you is what to charge and how to get clients. What I have done is hit miss and depending what people what done I charge from 15 to 25 an hour. if its just straight shooting and dumping the footage, if they need it edited etc. My lastest thing is I really enjoy after effects and motion graphics which a lot of people especially ones that have been shooting a long time don’t know.I have started making more money going in and tweaking there videos buy adding in the FX. I would love to get in to a production facility but the all want 5 years of experience.
That being said this has reminded me of when the car was introduced and put the horse and buggy out of business. In this industry you have to constantly look at the trends and adapt. I don’t shoot big commercial things. I shoot things as simple as someone that wants to film there kids sword fighting then turning there swords into light sabers.I don’t do it because of a big pay check. I do it because I love to make videos.
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I remind you that the entire context of this was the production business, aka shooting and post. I have mentioned this several times in this thread, and not something new. Just to be clear. If you’re in, as your primary gig in the production business, I’m letting my remarks stand, agree or disagree. If you are not in the production business primarily then I’m not talking about you.
Scott Sheriff
SST Digital Media
Multi-Camera Director, VFX and Post ProductionThe Affordable Camera Dolly is your just right solution!
“If you think it’s expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.” —Red Adair
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In sports – it’s the ones that have trained, worked, practiced, and generally done more that tend to look “lucky”.
The Brit in Brisbane
The Pomme in Production – Brisbane Australia.
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