smpproductions
Well-known member
I landed a full time creative producer job through this board. It's all about networking, so spell words correctly and use proper grammar when you post.
where to start?
- Thread starter nho
- Start date
I landed a full time creative producer job through this board. It's all about networking, so spell words correctly and use proper grammar when you post.
Robbie Comeau
Como's back. back again
I wlil start that then!
Robbie Comeau
Como's back. back again
"Yes, like this one!" Stated TheComo.
The night was ending, and the cloud- ok ok ok
The night was ending, and the cloud- ok ok ok
Robbie Comeau
Como's back. back again
Maybe do a year of likee business.........im going to go back to my coop im at right now, after highschool and get paid, and look for jobs like weddings and such
DerrickTempleton
Well-known member
the talent naturally rises to the top regardless of attending film school or any university. For many people, college is a necessary transition from being a kid to being an adult. That's why I went. And I chose film as my major because I didn't want math or science homework. I got good at filmmaking on my own; much of what I was taught in class was a waste of time. I got all my own equipment from production grants and don't use my school's equipment for anything. I don't work on school projects either, just my own stuff. Yet having 'student' status is invaluable. You get all types of rebates, discounts, and connections from being in school. At least a handful of your classmates will go on to do great things, and if you latch onto them then you have a team to rely on. And at least a few of your teachers can offer really good advice and hook you up with jobs.
I highly recommend avoiding film-only schools like fullsail or vancouver. They have a bunch of hacks running the administration and people will laugh at you if you show them your degree. Any state school or private university with a film program is better.
I highly recommend avoiding film-only schools like fullsail or vancouver. They have a bunch of hacks running the administration and people will laugh at you if you show them your degree. Any state school or private university with a film program is better.
nho
Well-known member
Well... at the moment, based on everyone's opinions on film school, I think i'm going to try and just get a job or volunteer or internship with anything I can find that has to do with any aspect of filmmaking. I just want to learn everything about filmmaking, everything, everything, everything. I'm going to read any literature I can find that has good information. If all else fails, which I highly doubt it will, I suppose i'll try to attend film school. But at the moment, I see that as being a sort of "last resort".
I'll have to build up some confidence, though. I think that if I do find something on craigslist or any of the other sites I may have a little bit of trouble calling them and telling them I really have no actual experience whatsoever :undecided. But I just have to get passed that first few times where I will have to say I don't have any experience, because I will land a job or internship that will then give me experience and boost my confidence for the next call i'll have to make!
:grin:
Math wasn't my favorite subject either, but it's the one subject that comes into play more often than I thoughy it would. I foolishly believed this business was all about a great story, good imagery and decent audio. And then the math showed up to the party: square pixels, non-square pixels, 1920 x 1080 converted to 720 x 480, anamorphic, 30 base calculations, data rate calculations, etc. There's no hiding from the math in Film & Television.
Robbie Comeau
Como's back. back again
DeSica
Well-known member
We're partially at fault, too...my response was more for you, especially since you're in Toronto and can get to Ryerson with no trouble.
Robbie Comeau
Como's back. back again
No i can't ...I have all college english's...Cant you tell?
Doesn't Ryerson want like 2-4 Uni English's?
Doesn't Ryerson want like 2-4 Uni English's?
JonathanLB
Carbonite Member
I agree with one of the first guys in this thread who said don't bother with film school. I think it's a giant rip off in today's world. You may find a film school that is great for you, but it depends so much on how you value your time and how your financial situation looks.
For me, I had the money, and I took the plunge, spent $37,000 for L.A. Film School's one year program. I quit after less than 8 weeks, with another guy from my class, we both come from backgrounds of money in other industries, so we ultimately decided to start our own production company. I got $28,000 back from the school and I spent it all on equipment and startup costs for the new company. I couldn't be happier. The best way to become a director is to start a company and make yourself a director. There is also the whole working your way up the ladder for 10-15 years, but we said no thanks to that. Anyway, you don't go from grip to director, that's a pretty funny myth, one I hope people will keep believing. But when I see someone with a resume full of "grip" positions, I think, "Oh, great, a grip!" I won't hire you to be the DP, of course not, I want to hire DPs to DP my projects, and grips to grip. The only way to move up in the real world is to do your own projects and make yourself whatever position you want to be, then eventually someone else might give you a chance, too.
My perspective of film school is also influenced by the fact I already went to university and took every film theory class offered, screenwriting, etc., and I come from an exhaustive background in film criticism and film theory, not to mention I've published several books about film history, so I wasn't learning anything from their "film school basics" nonsense because any smart moviegoer already knows all of that. The more I learned, the more I realized you can hire people who know the technical stuff you don't want to know, and even if you did want to know it, it's still cheaper to hire others. Ok, so you want to be a DP? Great, go work on as many sets as possible as a grip or a 2nd A.C. or whatever, you might get paid, but you darn well won't pay a film school for that knowledge, at least. Get a bunch of books and read them over, see what you can learn. Play around with a few cameras. If you still think you need more hands-on training, post on Craig's List: "DP wanted, will pay $300 for 6 hours of private instruction." Seriously. My film school was costing me $80/hr anyway, there are thousands of good DPs who would be happy to earn $80/hr teaching you what you want to know on your own schedule where you're the boss and you ask the questions you want.
Film school is often for inside-the-box thinkers, and I'm an outside the box thinker. I could only tolerate so much of that crap before I said this is ridiculous, why am I paying these clowns? Not to mention most of them had 3-5 years of experience max, which was unacceptable to me. Also a common thread in film school is how everyone thinks the same, the teachers all tell you the same crap, so if you listen to carefully you'll end up like them -- a lot of losers. Yeah, the great schools have great film industry professionals. But a lot of the rest of them didn't make it, and they didn't make it because they're not businessmen. They think like workers and they will therefore always be workers. "Well when you graduate you will be happy as heck to find a job for $50/day as a script supervisor, even if someone offers you free work being a PA if they pay for your lunch you should be happy." No you shouldn't. You paid big bucks to go to film school, you have a reasonable expectation of making money right out of film school. And if they can't tell you that's what you should expect, you should quit and find a better way. Why should you work as a grip right out of film school especially if you spent 3 years and $80,000 attending for your MFA? How about this -- find someone else who was about to waste their money, start a production company with that money instead, and if you have the business sense you can hire everyone on set for the same lousy wages the film school professors told you that you should be happy to receive and now you just became a Hollywood producer.
There's only one thing to say about an industry where you post an ad for crew offering $50/day and get tons of responses -- great industry to be a employer, bad industry to be a worker.
I don't know where people get off thinking if they "put in their time" on set they'll magically realize their goals. When did that ever happen? Can someone tell me of a grip who kept on being a grip and eventually got to direct a big feature? Hmm, sure never heard of that one before! "Wow you were amazing moving those lights around, I mean you set up those C-stands so well, how about this... how about you come to my office next week and we'll discuss a three-picture deal?!" Sorry, dream on. Ain't gonna happen. Best case scenario, "You really are a hard worker, how would you like to grip on another shoot next week?" Tarantino didn't work his way up by being a tool. He wrote a great script and he made it a reality, directed it, got it off the ground, and seized the power for himself. Robert Rodriguez did the same thing. Even Lucas and Spielberg didn't work their way up that way.
The only use of starting off on sets as low-level positions is to see how it all works, learn about the process, make some contacts, and see whether this is something you're going to want to do. But to think that you should have to pay for film school to tell you that you then can be a grip for 5 years after you graduate, that's absolutely absurd.
The attitude is, "Well look everyone starts at the bottom, ok?" No. Not ok. If you graduate university do you start at the bottom of Home Depot? No, you don't. You start in middle management. The high school dropouts work the lower jobs. To say you should have to work the same types of jobs as other people who never went to film school and don't know as much as you do, even though you spent huge sums of money and time going to film school, is really unreal. If film school can't guarantee that it's talented people start far above those who just moved to town two months ago and started working, there's clearly no use for it. And that is in fact the case, because nobody really cares where you went to film school. They just want to see your reel. You'd be better off spending a few months gripping or being a PA on some music video shoots, doing anything you can, seeing how it all works, then putting together a $15,000 music video shoot of your own where you direct it, then at least you just created a reel for yourself that's cheaper than film school and probably a lot better product, too.
I'm amazed by the film school phenomenon but god bless it. Graduate people with some knowledge who are desperate for work because everyone else is looking for work, too. Sure makes being a producer easier! But as for the poor saps who come out massively in debt to a film school and start working for $100/day on set if they're lucky? Well, that's just cruel. At least someone needs to tell these people before they get involved. It's not that hard. Move to Hollywood. Work on any shoot you can find. How could they possibly be an less professional than film student shoots? Or maybe you think it's worthwhile to pay someone $50 to $100 per hour to drone on about stuff you already know, don't care about, or don't know but also don't understand because of poor teaching style. I just would caution anyone not to take that route. School is great for engineering, medicine, etc. For something like film I think it's downright stupid.
For me, I had the money, and I took the plunge, spent $37,000 for L.A. Film School's one year program. I quit after less than 8 weeks, with another guy from my class, we both come from backgrounds of money in other industries, so we ultimately decided to start our own production company. I got $28,000 back from the school and I spent it all on equipment and startup costs for the new company. I couldn't be happier. The best way to become a director is to start a company and make yourself a director. There is also the whole working your way up the ladder for 10-15 years, but we said no thanks to that. Anyway, you don't go from grip to director, that's a pretty funny myth, one I hope people will keep believing. But when I see someone with a resume full of "grip" positions, I think, "Oh, great, a grip!" I won't hire you to be the DP, of course not, I want to hire DPs to DP my projects, and grips to grip. The only way to move up in the real world is to do your own projects and make yourself whatever position you want to be, then eventually someone else might give you a chance, too.
My perspective of film school is also influenced by the fact I already went to university and took every film theory class offered, screenwriting, etc., and I come from an exhaustive background in film criticism and film theory, not to mention I've published several books about film history, so I wasn't learning anything from their "film school basics" nonsense because any smart moviegoer already knows all of that. The more I learned, the more I realized you can hire people who know the technical stuff you don't want to know, and even if you did want to know it, it's still cheaper to hire others. Ok, so you want to be a DP? Great, go work on as many sets as possible as a grip or a 2nd A.C. or whatever, you might get paid, but you darn well won't pay a film school for that knowledge, at least. Get a bunch of books and read them over, see what you can learn. Play around with a few cameras. If you still think you need more hands-on training, post on Craig's List: "DP wanted, will pay $300 for 6 hours of private instruction." Seriously. My film school was costing me $80/hr anyway, there are thousands of good DPs who would be happy to earn $80/hr teaching you what you want to know on your own schedule where you're the boss and you ask the questions you want.
Film school is often for inside-the-box thinkers, and I'm an outside the box thinker. I could only tolerate so much of that crap before I said this is ridiculous, why am I paying these clowns? Not to mention most of them had 3-5 years of experience max, which was unacceptable to me. Also a common thread in film school is how everyone thinks the same, the teachers all tell you the same crap, so if you listen to carefully you'll end up like them -- a lot of losers. Yeah, the great schools have great film industry professionals. But a lot of the rest of them didn't make it, and they didn't make it because they're not businessmen. They think like workers and they will therefore always be workers. "Well when you graduate you will be happy as heck to find a job for $50/day as a script supervisor, even if someone offers you free work being a PA if they pay for your lunch you should be happy." No you shouldn't. You paid big bucks to go to film school, you have a reasonable expectation of making money right out of film school. And if they can't tell you that's what you should expect, you should quit and find a better way. Why should you work as a grip right out of film school especially if you spent 3 years and $80,000 attending for your MFA? How about this -- find someone else who was about to waste their money, start a production company with that money instead, and if you have the business sense you can hire everyone on set for the same lousy wages the film school professors told you that you should be happy to receive and now you just became a Hollywood producer.
There's only one thing to say about an industry where you post an ad for crew offering $50/day and get tons of responses -- great industry to be a employer, bad industry to be a worker.
I don't know where people get off thinking if they "put in their time" on set they'll magically realize their goals. When did that ever happen? Can someone tell me of a grip who kept on being a grip and eventually got to direct a big feature? Hmm, sure never heard of that one before! "Wow you were amazing moving those lights around, I mean you set up those C-stands so well, how about this... how about you come to my office next week and we'll discuss a three-picture deal?!" Sorry, dream on. Ain't gonna happen. Best case scenario, "You really are a hard worker, how would you like to grip on another shoot next week?" Tarantino didn't work his way up by being a tool. He wrote a great script and he made it a reality, directed it, got it off the ground, and seized the power for himself. Robert Rodriguez did the same thing. Even Lucas and Spielberg didn't work their way up that way.
The only use of starting off on sets as low-level positions is to see how it all works, learn about the process, make some contacts, and see whether this is something you're going to want to do. But to think that you should have to pay for film school to tell you that you then can be a grip for 5 years after you graduate, that's absolutely absurd.
The attitude is, "Well look everyone starts at the bottom, ok?" No. Not ok. If you graduate university do you start at the bottom of Home Depot? No, you don't. You start in middle management. The high school dropouts work the lower jobs. To say you should have to work the same types of jobs as other people who never went to film school and don't know as much as you do, even though you spent huge sums of money and time going to film school, is really unreal. If film school can't guarantee that it's talented people start far above those who just moved to town two months ago and started working, there's clearly no use for it. And that is in fact the case, because nobody really cares where you went to film school. They just want to see your reel. You'd be better off spending a few months gripping or being a PA on some music video shoots, doing anything you can, seeing how it all works, then putting together a $15,000 music video shoot of your own where you direct it, then at least you just created a reel for yourself that's cheaper than film school and probably a lot better product, too.
I'm amazed by the film school phenomenon but god bless it. Graduate people with some knowledge who are desperate for work because everyone else is looking for work, too. Sure makes being a producer easier! But as for the poor saps who come out massively in debt to a film school and start working for $100/day on set if they're lucky? Well, that's just cruel. At least someone needs to tell these people before they get involved. It's not that hard. Move to Hollywood. Work on any shoot you can find. How could they possibly be an less professional than film student shoots? Or maybe you think it's worthwhile to pay someone $50 to $100 per hour to drone on about stuff you already know, don't care about, or don't know but also don't understand because of poor teaching style. I just would caution anyone not to take that route. School is great for engineering, medicine, etc. For something like film I think it's downright stupid.