Mike Cohen
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COW Coin
Forum Replies Created
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[Rob Ainscough] “This is a first that I’ve ever heard of any online “free” support site even fielding phone calls”
I assume you are joking!!
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I have received a few emails over the years from people, usually people who have read a blog or article I have written. The emails usually begin with “Dear Mike Cohen, I did not know how to contact you so here is an email.”
Well, to clarify, you contact me by posting a message on the blog, article or forum page and I am sure to at least see the message.
Likewise, I had one crazy person read a blog and then leave a phone message on our company voicemail – she didn’t even attempt to use the spell by name feature in the voicemail main menu and at least try to get my extension. That’s just lazy.
On the other hand, a surgeon read something I wrote, had a question, and posted on the Business Forum seeking my response. Sure, it is something like walking into a large room and shouting out someone’s name, but that is generally what you do in life unless you already know how to contact a person.
On one of my early blog posts, I wrote about my college experiences. One of the responses posted to that page said “Oh, you’re THAT Mike Cohen” – it was someone who graduated from my school years later – we had never met – but we have been friends ever since.
So, contacting strangers on or off of a social networking site has potential positive benefits and a slight risk of encountering a whack-job. Lucky for us, whack-jobs are few and far between.
Although it sounds like most of them have found the COW’s main number.
Mike Cohen
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Congrats on the FAQ feature – it is a great addition – and you made it easy to add threads to the FAQ
Mike Cohen
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When I interviewed for my final internship – you know what they observed in my reel? A match frame edit with a field error. This was a head switch caused by a poorly functioning A-B roll edit controller at our school. I seem to recall working through the night to finish that 30 sec spot for a campus advertising customer for that exact reason.
Kids these days – if you only knew about the technical trivialities of linear editing. Those were the days!Mike Cohen
Even that experience was valuable – when I got my first paid editing job it was in an ACE 25 edit bay cutting from MII to 1″ – head switches all around!
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Speaking of immigrants with unknown legal status, recently I picked up a co-worker at the train station in Brewster, NY. This is a sleepy little Bedford Falls style community at the junction of Rt 84 and Rt 684, about 40 miles outside NYC. I was startled because around 9am the streets are lined with immigrants seeking work doing odd jobs or landscaping on the numerous estates surrounding the town. Later in the day they are all either on the job site or back in their apartments.
Legal or not, these people are willing to work – heck the have to work to pay for their dwellings, food and presumably to send back home to their families.
Mike Cohen
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The following is a list of ambitious / character building things I did between age 18 and 21 – Gen Y-ers take note:
1. Worked at McDonald’s – since I was over 18 I was tasked with emptying the grease trap at midnight and carrying the bucket to the grease dumpster, (where I would actually pass it off to Tyler Durden.)
2. Also worked at Burger King – given my experience with grease and fat and cooking food that had dropped on the floor, I was a natural.
3. Worked at Home Depot – I got an upgrade to cashier. This was in the 1800’s, so we had to manually count change and call VISA each time a credit card was used, then use those carbon copy slidey things. And at the end of the night if your drawer was off by more than a few dollars, you had to fill out a form for the manager.
4. Worked as an intern at an ABC affiliate. While this was actually quite a valuable experience, about half of each day was spent making copies, tearing multi-page carbon feed scripts.
5. Worked as an intern at a CBS affiliate. This was pretty boring – calling the state police looking for stories, answering the phone (I talked to Oprah a few times!) and fielding calls from deranged people thinking they had stories. I did get to go in the field with reporters, which was cool – I met Jesse Jackson, Mrs. Bush and Dr Henry Lee.
6. Worked as an intern for a cable advertising office – edited 30 second spots for local supermarket each week – shooting video of steaks, milk, ice cream, etc.
7. Final internship for a corporate communications company. Learned a lot, but also got to clean bird droppings off of XLR cables, load and unload gear daily, empty garbage etc. But I did learn how to make a B-reel for online edit sessions, time decks, backfocus a camera, trick the white balance, run a teleprompter and innumerable other skills that serve me to this day.
8. Worked as an usher at the campus theater – took tickets, prevented deranged fans from getting near Suzanne Vega, Wynton Marsalis or some crazy kids calling themselves Phish.
9. Worked audiovisual at a campus auditorium – hitting play on a VCR, turning lights on and off, etc.
10. Worked as a studio assistant – logging tapes, helping teach classes. This was cool since I was the only one other than professors with a key to the studio for a while – great opportunity to LEARN.So as Nick said – young people wanting to make it in life in general and in our industry specifically, need to go out and learn, be ambitious and SHOW UP.
But then, as now, such an approach was rare.
I took the road less traveled and that has made all the difference.
Mike Cohen
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Don’t spell anything wrong on your resume!
Seriously, coming out of college, you generally will not have much to show for yourself, except perhaps some student work and what you say about yourself – so put your best foot forward – but don’t exaggerate.
If you put “Photoshop” or “Final Cut” on your resume, make sure you know those inside out.
Opinions vary on this forum, as in the world at large. Some see college as a waste of money, others, like myself, who got their first job partially because of what they had learned in college, tend to think it is a good idea. So try to know something about the folks interviewing you – that’s a good question to ask during an interview or phone interview actually.
So it is not so much what is on your resume, it is how your resume relates to YOU and gives a hint at what YOU can do for your potential employer.
Mike Cohen
PS – If you have a reel, make sure it is available online – such as here on the COW – and keep it brief and to the point. There is no excuse for not having your reel online nowadays. Years ago I met one of the honchos at ESPN – he told me if he is sent a reel he throws it in the garbage – he wants to hear from people what they can do for him.
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I could envision a Leader Board to the right of a forum – let moderators vote on threads for the board
It would have to be somehow differentiated from an advertisement, which currently take up both sides of the page
I never noticed the TAG link – seems like that should be within the post, not at the top of the page – but now that I know it is there…
Mike Cohen
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What’s the message?
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If you want a per minute cost, figure out the ACTUAL costs to create a video s X minutes, then divide the ACTUAL cost by the minutes and you have your per minute cost – if the client REALLY REALLY wants a per minute cost, then give them that number and say it is only applicable to THIS project.
But if the client did not ask for a per minute cost, then give them a per video cost with line items if need be.
Saying $XYZ per minute is like saying XYZ hours of editing per finished minute – that too has to be based upon the actual amount of work.
Mike Cohen