Day Three

A slow day leads to small doubts.

It was a pleasant day to say the least. I got free food! One of the productions left us whatever steak/chicken enchiladas they had left. I ate my steak quesadillas alongside some "bitter old men" as the employees over here like to cal themselves. Today I cleaned filters for the cameras. Each filter costs upwards of $300. I clean them if I see even a fingerprint. I'm being extra cautious in this case, but it's better there extra clean rather than slightly dirty. Busywork really. Look at each filter, clean them if they need cleaning. The matteboxes are their own beasts that I don't even wanna imagine how much they cost (but for the curious lenses can cost upwards of $65k+)

Joe spent a good hour and a half testing out equipment just for potential clients approval. Ryan stayed in the background. I stayed back too. I had no idea what exactly they were talking about. I mean, I knew they wanted a lens for their RED camera, but I couldn't tell exactly what they were looking for.

Joe took care of that business and while I watched I gained a better understanding of the business side. You see, everybody has a camera. Then they need a lens. Then they need motors for their zoom, iris, and focus remote changers. Everybody disagrees over which part works best for their camera. Nobody exactly agrees which lens will work best. They spend hours trying to build a camera for a video which, quite frankly, will look exactly the same to the mass audience no matter which kind of auto-zoom rock'n'roll handle you pick. No matter the brand of head you get for your camera a Lachster or something else you'll still get a picture that an average person would never be able to tell the difference. So why all the trouble?

I asked Joe and he said that a lot of DP's (director of Photography)'s like to craft their own particular image as a kind of trademark. That way anyone else in the business who know what their talking about can tell how well crafted a certain shot was with very specific elements. It's like proving your good at your craft to the people who can tell a difference. It still matters, even if the average person will never know the difference.

This plus accessories.
Too much troble

I also got into a smaller camera debate where Ryan showed me something ridiculous. You know those Nikon cameras that everyone and their mother uses because they all think it's a high quality camera and they love high resolution pictures? You see them everywhere now. Yeah, people use those to shoot video. The only problem I have with this is that camera rental companies like MPS have to build rigs for these faux-cameras, they have to mount them on tripods, find rods that might fit in the baseplate. They have to find ways to attach monitors, they have to power it all, they have to add in some accessories. The lenses they use on these cameras are worth 25x whatever the camera was worth. They have to add in converters for the monitors cause it's all in HDi whereas the monitor displays SDi. Don't even get me started on the audio! It's a still camera! Why would anybody use a still camera to shoot a video!? Especially when the audio they're capturing is going to be as good as your average soccer mom camcorder? Honestly it's not worth the trouble. It's like putting all the attachments of a sniper rifle onto a pistol. Seemingly useful to a specialist, but you might as well have invested in the sniper rifle since you went to the trouble to outfit a pistol. It's a personal problem really.


I dunno. Today I really got into my questions about the profession I want to go into. This all seems like madness. Go looking for unsteady work in a competitive market while still be a good-natured human being? It's dog-eat-dog out there. Anyone who wants to be an artist understands my sentiments. Live broke. Pray for work. Wish for success. Somewhere in the world somebody else is doing the same, and I like people too much to just stomp all over his dreams in pursuit of my own. It's weird. Happiness can be what you make of it, but giving up on the dream seems to be the mark of failure. Chasing after your dream, thats what everyone says to do. There's reward in just pursuing your passion, no matter how risky it is. Can I survive or even prosper in a profession like this?

Yeah, doubts kept piling up today as I realized just how large the film world is out there. Just thinking about how much time and effort goes into building a career is astounding. Ryan said a lot of technical experts come out of rental houses after two years and still have trouble getting jobs. I was certainly building a case towards being a lawyer, an electrician, or some engineer. Wouldn't life be so much happier if we could find a stable job, good friends, and a family? In my personal opinion 2 out of 3 ain't half bad.


My best reason for pursuing my dream, aside from "it's my dream" is the kind of experiences that will come with trying to make it. Even the stories I can garner from living broke would be enough to please me. I keep imagining traveling around the world with different film sets doing crew jobs just to pay my rent or something. That kind of dreamy artsy lifestyle where barely living is living large. I'll keep going. No point in turning back now from that far-off future. It'll bring me all kinds of adventures. Let's just hope success comes out of those adventures.