The Great Divide - Professional and Amateur

Was funny. I was trying to be nice to him. He has wife and kids and the night before I offered to bump up he fee 30% because I felt bad for him (biz is real slow out here). Everyone was in shock, as we have all worked together for over a year now. No reason except that he is I think feeling very stressed with this onslaught of newbies like me. Having just blown a small fortune to be able to shoot more than I can afford to pay others to do for me, I feel his pain, in my own way. My using yesterday as an example was to show how much of a convergence there is and how it can play out. It was just a way to show the "Great Divide".
 
Chadfish said:
Not a comparison between the old and new version. Just a listen to the RE50 N/D, and I compared it to my old Peavey, and an SM57.
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I rather enjoyed it, actually. Ironically, you partly played a role in my asking him to use a handheld! Small world :-) (Note: I say that mostly in jest.)
 
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olindacat said:
Sarcasm noted. I don't think many people who are starting out here are competing against Cameron, at least not me. Being lectured about the merits of having a team after I just got done describing a situation where I paid for just that, is getting us nowhere.

As far was 'good audio' being an 'almost meaningless phrase', I guess it is, from your perspective. The good thing is we all agree to disagree and I totally disagree with your analogies and logic. (Thank God I didn't have you advising me when I started my one-man publishing company! Had I followed your reality, I'd still be dreaming instead of doing!!!!!)

My point is only that many here, by necessity or desire, want to or need to work alone. For those who are lucky enough to have crews and budgets and have the people skills to get volunteers, bully for them. I see lots of great things I like to watch (and hear) created by people who work on their own, independently.
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There wasn't any sarcasm in my post. You said you were all bummed out because you bought a decent recorder and now someone (me) says you also need to know how to use it.

For the record I did not say you need a large crew. You have a one man publishing house. Do you think you are neck and neck with Time Warner? I doubt it. You are in a part of the publishing world you can do a one man company. One man though could not be the only person at Time Warner. Different beasts different requirements.

It's the same with film. If you are trying to compete with Hollywood you need to do certain things. They don't have to cost a hundred mill but it will take a crew. There are however a LOT of people on this list that are not trying to compete with Hollywood and they don't need a full crew and maybe not any crew.

I'm not sure what you were shooting, it sounded like an ad for something you were publishing. I wouldn't put you in the big team category probably. BTW a sound guy is not a "team". Maybe you had a team on that shoot but you only mentioned one other person. I was not lecturing you, I was explaining a point that many seemed to have a problem with. You described your self as being on the low end of the divide which would put you pretty squarely in the little or no crew category.

I wouldn't dream of advising anyone on the publishing business. I know of many of the things I don't know anything about and that would be one.

My point and it's one I think you would agree with is that your skills have developed with experience. I think I saw that you have been doing the publishing for 17 years? You are certainly better now than you were when you started out. Sound isn't any different.

By all means "do!!!!!", I did, it's the best way to learn. It took you 17 years to get to where you are today. And I'm assuming that is decently successful since Hawaii is not a cheap place to live. So I would assume you wouldn't think you could pick up sound experience by buying a box.

I probably was being sarcastic on the talk people into crewing bit. My point was if someone has such poor people skills that they cant get some friends to help them out then directing is probably not going to be a good choice for them. People skills is the one essential for a director.

Luck and having a crew have little to do with each other. Not everyone or every project needs the same crew some don't need any. But not getting the crew you need is not bad lock but bad planning.

And a clarification. When I said "good sound" was meaningless it wasn't a snide comment. It was a reference to the fact that people mean radically different things when they say that. It's not so much that it has no meaning but that it has so many meanings that nobody knows which one a poster means. And one common meaning has to do with the confusion many people have over how the sound they hear on the big screen comes to pass. It's not their stupidity but decades of Hollywood passing it off as magic that all happens on the sound stage. Post when it's covered at all is made out like a voodoo workshop where the anointed wave a wand and make more magic happen. So it's very understandable but it makes it difficult to talk realistically about post sound with folks who think it's all done on the stage except for some magic in the mix.
And to be clear I am not saying you are one of those folks.

So short form.

Congrats on staying in business in these times. You don't need a crew, unless you do. Practice and experience will teach you how to get better sound. Good equipment will help but not nearly as much as experience. Really the last two points are what you are advocating, "doing!!!!!!". I agree completely.

PS you might be surprised by how many people think they could compete with Cameron. Some are probably right;~)
 
Being a newbie: I am the first to say that I need to learn how to use a recorder. In fact, I'm unloading the one I own and getting one that is more realistic for my needs. The point is that it is very easy for some (pro and am) to get caught up in the forum and real world in this ever-changing industry. BTW: I'm embarrassed to say I have been in publishing since 1981; and have just owned my own business since 1994. No, I'm not Time Warner. Actually, I had a great staff of five until three years ago when we got hit by the economic tsunami. The big hotel companies suffered staggering losses as tourism fell through the floor. They owed us and defaulted like crazy. Blah, blah, blah. Result was I had to lay off the staff and be a lone wolf or close down. I now do their jobs myself, and continue to churn out books while also doing four websites and a community TV show (which was what we were taping yesterday). Honestly, I know a sound guy is not a 'team'. Yesterday's 'crew' actually consisted of six people. Five were volunteers and one was a pro. I honestly think I am very lucky to have one. Just my .02.
 
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Your results will matter more than the gear, in many cases. Hey, believe me, I *could* have afforded a higher end SD gear, but opted out for a Tascam HDP2 because it's going to be good enough. If I reach a new level of production, I'll pop and get the SD gear. But it's absurd for me, in my neck of the woods, to buy the absolute top fo the line gear. I just won't pay for it with my work load fast enough. I started with Zoom, and here I am. Inching my way up. It's ok, but you need to get good enough gear sometime to do the job. The best will come later.
 
Olindacat,

Well you get even more kudos then. The Economy bla, bla, bla pretty much destroyed the film biz in the Bay Area (the decently budgeted stuff anyway). I went from working on large crews to doing lots of smaller films with micro crews to just me (this is post here not production). Every once in awhile something larger comes along but it's been mostly ads and small budget films for awhile, and theatre. A couple of years ago I had a production default on a project that had taken up most of my year.

But hey now I'm in Detroit so WTF!

I think what we are both sort of saying and is pertinent to this thread is that you can work lean and mean at a very high level. But it's important to what size the pond is that your in for whatever project your doing. Different rules apply and crisscrossing them can get you in real trouble.

I have worked for months on big budget features that had a crew of thirty or more and Mini-Indi features where I had three days to clean, polish and fix and fill what ever I could squeeze in.

If you try to work the same way for both you will fail miserably. I do find that having a lot of experience lets me make better choices in what to focus on and get more than I ought to on the tracks in a shorter amount of time. But I do miss working on a crew.
 
8string said:
Your results will matter more than the gear, in many cases. Hey, believe me, I *could* have afforded a higher end SD gear, but opted out for a Tascam HDP2 because it's going to be good enough. If I reach a new level of production, I'll pop and get the SD gear. But it's absurd for me, in my neck of the woods, to buy the absolute top fo the line gear. I just won't pay for it with my work load fast enough. I started with Zoom, and here I am. Inching my way up. It's ok, but you need to get good enough gear sometime to do the job. The best will come later.
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I'm not sure you made much of a compromise. If you really want the input features of SD you could add a MixPre as a front end. Heck with the MixPreD you will bypass the analog section of the Tascam completely.

I'm using a Marantz PMD-671 with a MixPre as a front end. I like the mechanics of the Marantz a LOT but if I were doing more production I would probably go with Tascam now. I trust them more. I personally find the SD recorders a bit cramped and I don't like having the battery hanging off the bottom. Also that battery style is I believe not being used by Sony anymore so replacements may start to get hard to find.
Quality is great it's ergonomics I have a problem with. I think it's a minority opinion though.
 
Noiz2 said:
The Economy bla, bla, bla pretty much destroyed the film biz in the Bay Area (the decently budgeted stuff anyway). I went from working on large crews to doing lots of smaller films with micro crews to just me (this is post here not production). Every once in awhile something larger comes along but it's been mostly ads and small budget films for awhile, and theatre. A couple of years ago I had a production default on a project that had taken up most of my year.
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Devastating.

Noiz2 said:
But I do miss working on a crew.
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Hopefully, things will turn around. Lord knows entertainment is one thing people still want, even when the chips are down.
 
Noiz2 said:
I'm not sure you made much of a compromise. If you really want the input features of SD you could add a MixPre as a front end. Heck with the MixPreD you will bypass the analog section of the Tascam completely.

I'm using a Marantz PMD-671 with a MixPre as a front end. I like the mechanics of the Marantz a LOT but if I were doing more production I would probably go with Tascam now. I trust them more. I personally find the SD recorders a bit cramped and I don't like having the battery hanging off the bottom. Also that battery style is I believe not being used by Sony anymore so replacements may start to get hard to find.
Quality is great it's ergonomics I have a problem with. I think it's a minority opinion though.
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Would you believe I haven't even opened the box? I am selling this puppy an going back to the bush leagues where I belong. I'm sure I can record roosters and birds and balls landing on greens and loudmouth show hosts just fine with something simpler and more apropos. I have no doubt you'll be akamai to whatever that turns out to be ;-)
 
olindacat said:
Would you believe I haven't even opened the box? I am selling this puppy an going back to the bush leagues where I belong. I'm sure I can record roosters and birds and balls landing on greens and loudmouth show hosts just fine with something simpler and more apropos. I have no doubt you'll be akamai to whatever that turns out to be ;-)
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Unless you can break even and need the money I would probably keep it. I don't want to come off like I'm trashing it. The SD recorders are really good. You can get used to the quirks and it's a personal preference of mine that I like the slide switch much better than a button. But that is in part because I'm recording FX in the field most of the time and it's really easy to work the slide blind.

The only things I don't like about the SD recorders is that they went with a 2/3 size (compared with other boxes which are about the same size as the old DAT field recorders). For my stubby fingers it gets a little congested. If the battery ever disappears, you can always use external power but I am certain that SD will offer a refit to a new battery. They have a great track record of fixing design flaws for free and providing hardware upgrades at a very reasonable cost. If I ever get around to sending in my MixPre they have a battery spring replacement (it wasn't originally designed to work with NiMH batteries, because they weren't out when the original design was done) for free and I can have the external power switched to the current version for some small charge. They also update their firmware (on the recorders) on a regular basis. Some are just "fixes" so things work the way users have asked them to and some add new features. So despite my issues with some of the mechanics I would trade the Marantz and MixPre for a 702 with no qualms at all.

You do need to read the manual because there are a lot of options in the menus, but once your set up you will probably rarely change anything. And you get it all in one virtually indestructible box. that doesn't weigh much.

I always associate "Bush leagues" with sloppy work and sort of general incompetence, maybe wrongly. I sincerely doubt you are either.

If you are switching I would stay with the same rough tier of recorder, so Tascam HD-P2, Marantz MPD-671. I wouldn't go down to something like a Zoom H4n. When they get small they actually get harder to work with and you start hitting some serious compromises. Now if you can sell the SD for around $2K you could pick up the Tascam and a really nice mic so...
But I have a lot of old boxes I hardly ever use because the used market for sound gear pretty much sucks. Field gear tends to fair better than studio boxes but in this economy, it's really a buyers market.
 
I have stubby fingers too. Trust me: I am also sloppy and incompetent. I mean well and try my best, but am the type to trip over my own shoe laces, regularly. The continental divide is huge IMHO. I do a lot of graphic design and am good at it, but I'm not a real artist. A lot of people play golf but they aren't on tour. I might be able to record something but I'll never be you of chadfish (I am just dying to call him catfish). I try to use pros when I can afford to b/c I know the quality is that much better, and that's my real goal in life: to do the best I can with what I have. My gear purchases or training is only to keep me afloat while I try to get gigs that'll support a small crew that can HELP make BETTER Q. It's funny: you need money to make money, but sometimes, you don't have enough money to make money so you have to bootstrap, DIY, etc. F---ing sucks. If you were on Maui I'd be all over your case trying to get you to do half days for a buck and a half. That's what it's like for me, and I'll bet it's that way for a whole a lot of others in my shoes, who have this fantasy of finding the pot 'o gold at the end of the rainbow b/c they are so disillusioned with where the world is going. What really sucks is I don't have that buck and a half to pay for a pro every time I need to get something, so I have to DIY and I wince at that. It keeps me from ever becoming that bigger player, and keeps making that dream harder and harder to achieve. Who TF, in their right mind, would want to deal with researching and buying and rigging and running a camera, doing everything again but to do what it takes to run audio, learning how to and writing scripts, storyboarding and planning shot lists, doing location scouting and permitting and getting all the okays, casting, coordinating transport of yourself and your gear and everyone else, budgeting and banking and bill paying, sales of everything from your concepts to whatever it is you do to stay alive as well as selling your wife or partner on letting you continue on, ass-kissing clients and volunteers and vendors, editing yourself and your footage and your audio and you copy and your posts, FX and foley creative and execution and post, titling and visual effects and 3D and b-roll and searching for stock and editing and grading and rendering and output to DVD or web, IT for your NLE and your DA and managing your ISP and your hosting and your web site/s, content creation, photo, photo editing, writing blogs, tweeting, FB updating, photo gallery management, and posting here on dvxuser.com? What kind of idiot/moron would every think of doing all of that?
 
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olindacat

It sounds like you are already a pro. I go through all the same issues, with the main one being money. Right now I'm making 20 second ads (no not 30) for 250.00 a pop, and not even at one a week. It's disgusting that the parent station to the one I do ads for is trying to maximize their own profit by offering 20 sec spots, so they can fit more in, and on top of it they use the length of the ad as a reason to cut my normally abysmal 300.00 for a 30 down by 50.00, even though it takes as much work to do a 20, if not more. Here's what I do for 250.00:
No lights or location audio. Just an EX1, a VO and a dream... They so don't deserve me. I scrounge other little jobs here and there and I manage to get by. Partially because my rent is cheap. I have to do most of my stuff myself because I can't afford to hire, and in the case of audio, I'm the audio guy as far as video goes in my little town. I will say that relationships are pretty important. If enough people know what you do, then they remember that when they need - what you do. I'm lucky in that I got in with a local station that needs lots of ads made. Every ad is an opportunity to better my reel, even though it doesn't pay much. And I still say that good gear is important even if you are just starting out. Not that you need the best, but really you simply couldn't do what I do, no matter how good you are, with a SD video8 camcorder. So you need to just be patient and save 20 bucks here, 50 bucks there. That's how I get my gear. I have a cash envelope that whenever any cash comes into my hands it goes in there. I'm up to 400.00 for the next cool thing! Also trade is a great way to get stuff. See something you need? Ask the person who makes it if they need something you can do. I can't afford EX1 base plates (300.00 for 2). I definitely found out I need them when I broke my stock tripod plate on my ex1 2 months ago, causing 2,700.00 damage - luckily covered by my protection plan. Anyway I hit up the maker of the base plate and will do a demo vid that alerts people to the risk of the crappy stock plate on the EX1, and informs them that there is a solution, and in return I get the gear I need.

Anyway I'm just saying to keep the faith, and find a way. Join the Rotary! All those a-holes are all about patting each other on the back and giving each other business. If you were the only video guy in Rotary you would be swimming in jobs. I would suggest cold calling businesses, but man, that's my idea if Hell... In Hell, everyone's job is being a telemarketer, having to do endless cold calls. But if you can handle that - it can drum up business. I can't do that though.
 
Hey Chadfish,

I'm hip on the cold-call tip. My partner and I do jingles and radio spots, and we had a contact in one of the radio conglomerates that brought us work all the time. He got out of the business, and a lot of the work dried up...

It's hard to be on the creative end and do all of the sales at the same time.

GJ
 
I don't pay the talent! I am the talent. Now, with the local station I can sometimes use the sales gal (the one shown in the Simply Mac ad) to appear. I also use my brother who doesn't mind helping for free. Or the clients themselves. In the case of this ad, the owners, a husband and wife wanted the wife to do the VO as she does them all on their ads, and I used the husband to be the employee helping. If a client is hip to actually going for a higher production value I'll hire an actor and have the client pay them. These quickie TV ads I do are so cheap that I don't go too much out of my way. I look for available light to use so I don't have to set up lights, I try to just do a VO with stock music, usually out of the FCP library. These people are used to getting such lame TV ads that what they get with me usually looks better, even though I'm sort of phoning it in. Sometimes if the client is game, and the idea lends itself to being fun I'll go for it even though I'm not getting paid any more. I'll look at it as an opportunity to make something for my portfolio. Below are 2 ads I did for 300.00 each, but went the extra mile. The liquor store had all these gnomes around it, so I suggested one of the employees dress up as a gnome. They were totally into it, so the ad and their business benefited for it. And I had the gnome do the VO. So it was not any extra work for me, but the ad looked awesome.

And for April fools I had an alien invasion idea, a la War of the worlds. I had the owners spread all this fake and real jewelry around their parking lot, and bring a bunch of friends to act like looters. I wanted to practice some Motion graphics, so I didn't mind running with this, even though they should have paid me much more. and I used my brother to be the close-up guy yelling "Woo-Hooooo!"

So you can take a little creativity and stretch it, and the clients love you for it. If you don't have many clients yet, then any job you get, give them the best work you can do. You have the time! And it's for you as much as for them. AND they will love you and use you again. For me slow time is time to give more.
 
I live in a pretty small TV market, although bigger than Arcata, and I've seen a lot of locally produced ads that were nowhere close to the quality of those two.

As an aside; back in the late -80's and early -90's I was a pilot with United Express flying in and out of Arcata/Cresent City. Spent many an hour sitting in the Arcata airport waiting for the weather to clear. The story was that the airport was built by the Navy during the WW2 to test out instrument landing systems. Arcata airport has about 300 days of fog per year. I can't confirm either statement, but it seemed plausible to me. Loved it though. We used to drop the airplane to about 800 feet when we spotted whales to let the passengers watch. That was a popular move. Most of them had never seen a whale in their lives and spotting a mother and her calf was awesome.
 
Ha cool man! I wouldn't say Arcata has 30 fog days a year. I think the weather has changed. I hear stories of it being way more foggy in the 60s - 80s. I lived around here in the 90s, and it was half and half. There was a 7 year drout, then there was a lot of fog but not much rain. It's still more than I would like, but that's life on the coast of the Pacific NorthWest. People are taking Vitamin D because we don't get enough sun, though 10 miles inland it's warm and sunny.
 
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