FCP Editors get paid less than AVID editors for the same work.....

How the world does change.

When I came in, it was all tape. Eventually I was managing a "small" million-dollar+ production facility which was multi-format tape (Beta SP, UMatic SP, S/VHS). Eventually we went AVID, systems which in those days were a bear to keep running properly. Plus, because it was integrated into the larger analog facility, had to be properly timed just like everything else. House engineers were either on staff, or hired by contract to be on call to keep things running. Prices were high in part because the maintenance cost was high, and we had to recoup the costs of that plus all the machinery. This was done through the hourly rate.

Now it's all different. I can make better-looking stuff (technically better-looking, that is) on a laptop. But does that make things cheaper across the board? Well actually, it should.

Hourly editor rates then had to include the cost of the facility. Now, from my perspective at least, editor rates pretty much pay for the editor's time; the systems are so cheap that either a) the first couple of jobs pay for it, or 2) it's just written off as a cost of initial startup, or maintenance. The systems are just too cheap to consider otherwise.

But does that mean that the editor himself should net less? No, of course not, but the gross per hour price for an independent should reflect the inexpensiveness of the systems.

But wow, I'm still bowled over by the technical competence of these systems (call it cost/benefit, for you MBA-types).

HarryD

Technical support for FCP or Avid is certainly not Edit Assistant Territory although having an understanding of technical issues is.

There are instances where I have seen both jobs advertised together in one role but they pay more due to the extra responsibilities. I would point this out to whomever is trying it on with regards to pay/salary - do some research into the salaries offered for this on broadcast freelancer or another UK TV jobs site.

It sounds like some people are trying to avoid paying someone or researching for themselves to keep up-to-date with technical issues and maintenance.

Small off-line jobs & some online work is Editor work and should be paid as such. (If you only do a small part of a whole programme then thats Assistant).

Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

As Ben said, technical support of the edit systems is not the assistants job. Nor is setting them up. That is either handled by a turnkey reseller, rental house, or post supervisor...who hires a guy to come in.


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
[itunes.apple.com]

I'm shocked the payscale is so lackluster.
You should be making $2,000 a week minimum.

Thanks Ben, Shane. I feel a lot better about standing up for myself now! Its a little tricky when people keep telling you otherwise!

Ive found its very hard to find decent information on pay and wages in post production - its pretty easy for production roles, and even some post roles such as FX supervisors or offline editors etc, but when it comes to the behind the scenes guys i've allways come up blank - (hence why you guys are so useful!)

Crikey, Standard, your not referring to me are you?!

You can find minimum wage scale over at the Editors Guild. Of course this is Union Scale, but it is a place to start.

[www.editorsguild.com]

Michael Horton
-------------------

Yep...Union Scale is a great place to base your wage. If you are in Los Angeles or NY or CHICAGO, or Miami, DC...other major markets. Smaller markets will pay less. But then cost of living is less too.

I'd be fine making $1500/week if I lived in Montana...


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
[itunes.apple.com]

Quote

As Ben said, technical support of the edit systems is not the assistants job. Nor is setting them up. That is either handled by a turnkey reseller, rental house, or post supervisor...who hires a guy to come in.

That SHOULD be true...but jeez...that must be nice. If I sat around waiting for the reseller to come in for tech support, I could miss a deadline (and I've never done that). I am the one on the phone with Aja / G-Tech / Apple & installing / upgrading all my hardware & software / installing & formatting RAIDs / bla / bla / bla

Even having an assistant must be nice.

Holy &@$!, am I underpaid

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

Hi all:

Great discussion! I thought that I would throw some other viewpoints into the mix. The production company that I freelance as a producer for has done something else that nobody else here has mentioned, transcription cuts. Keep in mind, most of the material we produce are 10 minute to 45 minute docs.

The producer will write an outline, then depending on the project, we will either hire a writer (on higher budgeted projects and especially projects for certain studios) or the producer will write the script itself. We actually begin with the outline, do research on the subjects we will interview, then shoot the interviews, b-roll and or tabletop footage. We then get transcripts of the interviews as Word files, then we put together the script, based upon the actual interview statements.

This "transcript cut" is then assembled by a lower-paid, less experienced "junior editor". These editors usually work at night usually and are usually very competent at pushing the right buttons but are definitely not mature storytellers. Once the cut is assembled, the producer and or writer reviews the cut for accuracy and to see if the transcripted sound bites work.

Up until this point, the "editor" has really been the writer/producer. It's ridiculous in our position to expect our editing staff to have the same level of knowledge and historical accuracy that the producer/writer, who has interviewed all of the subjects and has done at least a few days of intensive research, posseses. Once we are happy with the basic structure, the cut is sent to the client as a "content cut", strictly for legal approval and for basic creative notes on the content. The graphics at this point are temp, usually with just a few samples of what the finished graphics will look like. The music is sometimes temp, sometimes composed or finished. Little or no color correction, green screens are not composited, etc. at this point.

Once we receive legal and creative notes from the client, the cut is given to one of the off-line editors to address the legal and creative notes and to do a "beauty pass". At this point, the offline editor is still free to basically manipulate the content within the story's outline but the editor cannot add addtional content, unless we submit another cut to the client for legal again. Depending on the project, at this point, once the producer and offline editor are happy with the cut, it may be submitted to the client again for final review before on-line or we may just proceed with on-line (depends on the client, some of the studios are anal retentive and want to see every cut, some just look at the rough, give their notes, we address them and we on-line it and ship the masters.)

The project is then given to the on-line editor. Because we are shooting and posting all projects in Hi-Def, we are still in the traditional "must go to tape to tape on-line".

So in this workflow, three different editors are involved. That's the downside. But the upside is, that as a producer/writer, we are in control of the story and storytelling, not the off-line editor and we save more money by having a "junior editor" do the rough assembly. If we had more time, I supposed we, as preditors, could do the rough assembly, that's not rocket science, it's basically slamming together a paper cut. The real magic still happens with the off-line editor, they finesse and really polish the story and sometimes shift the structure around. But in this method, the off-line editors are used strictly for their creativity, not for their button pushing skills and not for their media management skills. Junior editors receive around $200.00 to $300.00 per day, off-line and online editors receive $400.00 to $500.00 per day.

Because of the business we are in (mostly historical documentaries with some television and feature EPK work), this system seems to work pretty well for us. For a typical 20 minute piece, the offline editor only gets the project for 5-8 days but because they are not on a treasure hunt for finding specific soundbites, organizing hours and hours of soundbites and footage, etc.), they can actually do a VERY impressive polish in 5 days.

Junior editors are promoted to full off-line editors if they are good. We only have two on-line guys, they are both techno nerds and none of the off-line guys like doing on-line. In this era of HD, it's amazing that we still have to worry about tri-level sync, matchframe edits, black and coding tapes and managing all of the individual formats and decks (ever compare setting TC on a D5, DVCProHD deck, HDCAM and HDCAM SR deck? It's amazing how different all of the decks are). After shooting mainly P2 for the past year, I like NOT dealing with tape and decks. P2 is awesome. I hope that eventually we can begin delivering QTs on hard drives and forget about tape.

Anyway, I thought you might find it interesting that we are the opposite of most places, we believe that we can put a lot more of the storytelling responsibility on the producer/writer and that off-line editors, because they are well compensated, should be used for doing what they do best, manipulating the media to tell the best story, not toiling through the drudgery of going through sometimes hundreds of hours of EPK, interviews and b-roll. We never tie the off-line editor's hands, if we have not selected the correct soundbites or b-roll to make the story work, they are free to still search for and use any of the footage, but the skeleton of the story, as we want to tell it, is already in place. It's their job to put the flesh and skin and hair on it, so to speak.

Comments?

Dan

OH Joe, that only happens at production houses that have many editors. Me by myself I do it all. Build the system, assist, online...post supervise. All of it.


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Joe/Shane

It gotta be said I'm the do-it-myself type as well - I can't bear to wait either, plus I need to make sure for myself that things are done correctly first time!

---

Hey Josh

I just spoke to a friend who used to be an Edit Assistant at the BBC and he was on about £15,000 per annum which is about the same as you where being paid

He did most of the things you mention with the exception of installation, DVD authoring or technical support which was handled by BBC resources or freelancers such as myself.

I think you should write down a proper rate card and hand it to them - for anything that ends up being more than just edit assistant you should invoice them accordingly.

Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Hi, Dan

You asked for comments, so here it is:

My first internship many years ago landed me the job of logging tapes. Which I thought was a really dumb thing for me to do, given that me - the student - was becoming intimately familiar with the footage with which the producer would work. I knew more about the story than they.

Then there's the topic of the paper edit - which sounds really like what you're referring to when you say "transcription cut." Again, IMO not good to have such a junior person do that. It's a very powerful position, since, again, they become very familiar with the footage, and actually create the cut that the editors assemble. I've worked like this many times and often found it better than fumbling with the footage trying to make something fit. Focusing on the words focuses on the idea, which is most important.

As for me, I like to log and review all my own footage, as well as edit it. If I'm the one telling the story, and especially if my name is on it, it's going to be my work from my perspective; my story, not a take that a film student has. And Lord knows, that can be bizarre at times.

Maybe this is why media in general has seen a definite down-spiral in the last decade or so - producer laziness. And BTW - I used to teach production and advanced editing in a baccalaureate film/video program. I was floored when I discovered that half of the class didn't know what an EDL was, and 99% of them had never made one.

YMMV, and it sounds like your system definitely works for your firm, so good for you! :-)

HarryD

I have to agree with Harry here...

Although that process can work well for many productions, I myself often find it a restriction that is be better served by doing the digitising and going through the story with the producer/director myself.

Leaving the story lines to a novice (in my opinion) has also lead to a decline in intelligent, well thought out and crafted programmes/films and an increase in factual or continuity mistakes.
Not to take anything away from the new guys but if you are going to be the story (offline) editor then you should not be handing off the responsibility to anyone else.

In addition, the downside to having a junior digitise for you; is that you only ADD time to the edit [albeit at a lower pay rate] because you as the offliner generally want to look through all the available footage for good sync or money shots and familiarise yourself with the footage, which would have already been done on ingest.

Obviously in the case of well scripted films there is less choice than say for an ob-doc but I still regard digitising as a great way to start thinking about the edit, despite how dull it can be.

It sounds to me like you have a system of Junior editors, creative "repair job" onliners AND some techie onliners for delivery, rather than a traditional offline/online. I can imagine that you are increasing the amount of time spent on these project further as the "offliner" will have to not only familiarise themselves with the available footage, but also the edit adding yet more time.

Now I suppose your business model must be cost effective and that the extra time is actually cheaper using juniors than a full fledged offline editor for these tasks. However if I were a betting man I would place money on the cost difference being almost negligible but the quality suffering more than the cost saving is worth.

Still, it would be good to see some of your output and judge for myself whether I am totally off the mark here.


Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Ben King Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> Still, it would be good to see some of your output
> and judge for myself whether I am totally off the
> mark here.

But how can we know? We only see the final cut, not what it could have been.

As an example of how young people can ruin an edit, watch HGTV's Designed to Sell, particularly the episodes which are done in Washington, DC and surrounding areas. This show focuses on home improvements and staging in order to sell problem houses, therefore it is critical to the story to be able to convey to the audience the images of what the property was in the beginning, and then how it was improved.

But no, the editing is SO fast-paced (I counted in one episode - no shots longer than about 1 second) that the viewer's mind has no time to process the image. Bear in mind, these are often panning shots of entire rooms - sometimes sped up to fit the 1 second model.

Now, I'm not one of those against fast cuts, I just require a reason for EVERY cut; a cut has to promote the story, however it's done.

This is a case of editing for editing's sake, the worst evil of all. Whatever happened to editing being seamless? What's on here is just tasteless. And I have no doubt that HGTV uses these editors not for their style, but for their willingness to work for almost nothing.

And I haven't even mentioned the uber-annoying hip-hop music in the show...

Sorry, had a rant there...

HarryD

> As an example of how young people can ruin an edit

Though young editors are prone to using too many techniques, too many shots and too many cuts, it may not necessarily be the editors in this case, either. Modern-day producers are also afflicted by severe ADD. And since commercials and many TV shows aren't test-screened, they are also oblivious to that classic lesson directors learn:

Just because you know what the shots are doesn't mean the audience does.

I fight against this syndrome all the time. People push me for "shorter, shorter", "more to the rhythm of the music", and I often have to argue that if every cut is short, there's no impact. Just watch those YouTube "tribute" and "music" videos and you'll see young editors being seduced by music and letting the 4/4 beats dominate rather than the beats within the shots.

And I agree with Ben as well. Leaving the log/capture process entirely to an assistant -- who these days can be a novice trying to get experience, because FCP's operations are so easy to learn -- can be damaging to the editing process. I just did a commercial where the inexperienced assistant, at the urging of the impatient boss of the company, logged an entire 90 minutes of footage for a commercial as "1", "2", "3", "4", regardless of whether two logs are takes of the same shot, regardless of positioning in the story! Rather than save time, it merely forced me to have to spend 60 minutes reorganizing the footage and adding a custom "Shot Name" column following proper formatting. Except they are now paying my rate, not the assistant's. And if I hadn't done the reorganization, it would have easily slowed me down by 75 per cent in the long haul. Also, the assistant didn't log some of the footage, and so I never saw it until I consulted the producer and found the missing timecode stretches on the logs. So in essence, my choice of footage was limited to what an inexperienced logger/assistant had thought was useful.


www.derekmok.com

To be clear, it isn't the young editor's fault; they don't know any better. Universities sure as hell don't teach them, because 90% of the teachers don't know themselves. I've been there and have seen it.

What he have here is what should be an apprenticeship situation, and therefore, the apprentice needs to be corrected, rather than allowed to work on honest-to-God, for-real broadcast work. Perhaps they should pay for the experience.

Whatever happened to the iconic heavy-handed but ultimately benevolent old codger who teaches the next great director everything he knows?

A model for how it should be: Industry, particularly how folks who work with metal get their mastership. To see it (sort of), watch those hot-rod shows on cable (Coddngton, esp). NOT the pimp-my-ride type of thing.

We are so lazy not to teach these kids.

HarryD

> Universities sure as hell don't teach them, because 90% of the teachers don't know
> themselves.

Amen.

I taught editing at a small "film school" two years ago and was chastised by management for teaching proper logging, capturing and file-management techniques. They preferred that the students came up with their own "systems" and left their file systems in a mess. Probably because the other instructors weren't active editors who had to deal with the crap that came of poor file management.

And as in my example two posts ago, if I were to succumb to the boss' naggings, my organization would be a mess as well. People are often either too inexperienced with the nuts-and-bolts editing or too shortsighted to realize that 45 minutes of proper organization now will save hours, even days and weeks, later. You don't rush the AC when he's checking the gate, and you don't rush the stunt co-ordinator when he's planning out how the star of the picture is going to fall ten stories. It's also our job as professionals to refuse to skimp on processes that really matter. I have a "No typos allowed" rule for my editing assistants that must drive them bananas, but that's the way it is.


www.derekmok.com

We almost need to start another thread with a petition for those tutors to understand the real-world!

If I had my money and my time from University again I'd have bought my own kit with the cost and the few books that were given to us on the reading list and got a runner's position and self taught myslef without having to weedle through the bull that these guys were spewing out.

Honestly I learned 3000% more in my first year as a runner than my entire 3 years at uni and I paid for the privilege!?!

The rubbish that some tutors believe is also incredible.

For instance one tutor at the University of the West of England in my home town, told a student to be (who was working in one of the largest FCP post-houses in Bristol) that Avid is the defacto standard for broadcast TV... and that FCP isn't used.

FCP is actually the defacto standard for the BBC, Granada TV and many others, Avid is still used by some but it is far from the standard it was.

This simple lack of understanding of the industry causes many of the headaches that I face when having to correct and unlearn people then re-teach them either in real life and on forums.

NOTE TO TUTORS: TEACH STUDENT PROPERLY!!!

Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Man...everyone complains that they didn't learn much from film school....I have the opposite experience. I learned TONS. I learned how to make a film from every angle. Directing, camera, sound, set dressing, writing, editing. We cut on film, we had 3/4 tape rooms, and we had ONE Avid. This is back in 1994 where Avid was the main guy in town (Lightworks was the main competitor). We learned the basics and had fun. Plus I got a college education...took other classes like Math and Science and literature....well rounded.

But yes, I did learn a LOT during my 6 weeks on a feature set. I might have been a bit lost had I not had the basics I learned in film school. But the basics were taught properly, so they weren't incorrect.

MY stepdad teaches graduate film up at Univ of Washington in Seattle...and they use Avid. Why? because it is still the industry standard, and once you learn that, learning FCP is a breeze. Most of his students have FCP on their home systems, so they learn that as well. Now they know both...which is good. But he knows his main job is to teach the ART of storytelling, not the technology. That is a bonus, but what he wants the students to get is "This is how you tell a story. And here is one tool that you use to do that."

I agree with that.


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
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I had a student in one of my production classes who took me up on a heretical off-hand statement I made in class: If you really want to learn this stuff and particularly want to work in the field, get a job in the field. Any job, and move up. You'll learn more.

He was a junior and actually doing fairly well. And I have to say he was in the top 5% of motivated students I've ever had. Nevertheless with a year to go, he left school, was able to join the union local, and now works regularly on a couple of HBO series. Bought his own house and yadda yadda... He's a real success story because he left school. And he'll go back one day and finish, when he needs to.

But truth be told, 4 years after doing that, he probably now knows more than I.

HarryD

Hey Shane,

There is always going to be the exception which I think is one reason why you are so well rounded, enlightened as well as employed! But the vast majority of students never get the chance and its not because of late nights drinking, promiscuity and partying.

I'm glad to hear that some are doing so. My point about Avid and FCP was broadcast not film and honestly in the UK the move has been to FCP for this round. My disgust at the tutor telling the prospective students that learning Avid OVER FCP was the way it was is preposterous (as we suggest learning both is the preference). But if you look at the market in the UK, its FCP that have the most positions available. A simple net search by this tutor would have corrected his ignorance.

The thing I just don't get is this: courses for media production or creation often don't teach the correct use of tools that are required, let alone the correct or up-to-date processes.

Now compare this with a carpenter or plumber on a course - if they did not learn the correct use of tools (usually taught to them by a pro with very detailed instructions) then they would be useless in the real world.

This is exactly what is happening in the universities, only its worse in media. Not only do they NOT get taught to use the tools correctly but they are being taught the wrong things too. Only the self-taught (or nepotistically hired) actually succeed with any ease.

Now film schools are often a lot better (as Shane makes note and in my own experience of Film School Students), but the vast majority of people I have met, conversed with, worked with or had to interview for jobs, have been churned out of these ill conceived courses that profess to give you a grounding in the industry.

I hope one day our combined knowledge from forums such as LAFCPUG and the training from the pros here actually gets disseminated to the institutions proper, because if I have to explain myself one more time to someone who holds a title that says they should understand the basics of film & video production I swear...

Grrr

Thats my pet rant - if you are paying to learn, the least you should expect is useful knowledge.


Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Ben...I realize that many many film schools don't do well in teaching students the proper way of doing things. One of the requirements of my film school is that the professors be working professionals..meaning that they, on top of course work, they must produce or work on one project a year. This ensured that the students were taught real world techniques. PLUS...the would fly in guest speakers who work in the industry to talk about the areas they work in. And this school was VERY focused on teaching CREW talents. Not a lot of emphasis on theory. Many many many of the graudates of that program are working here in LA. Every year there is an alumni meeting locally and there are always 100+ people there.

I do know that many many film schools are taught by academics, who don't have a whole lot of real world working knowledge. And that is sad.

I have seen threads from people teaching FCP asking mundane and basic questions on the forums...and THAT scares me. Especially since a majority of people are getting the information they need from forums like this. IN FACT...One student AT my college posed a basic HD question that I assisted with. That answer lead me to being invited to the college as a guest expert. So I gave 3 talks on post production and working in HD. My head hurt after that day.


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
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Ben,

You're swimming upstream. I've been involved in academia in one form or another since 1993 (I'm also a filmmaker and producer, won a Telly this year, so don't hold the teaching against me :-) ), and the problem with the faculty is that they, first and foremost, will protect themselves and their position. Often the unfortunate result is that the residing, tenured faculty will never hire competent people, because the tenured staff will be exposed for what they are - theoreticians, not pragmatists.

That's the basic conflict: have a program that's all training and no theory, or the converse. A good blend is ideal, but often not possible given the length of time involved.

I always debated how much of each I should bring to my classes. We could discuss Baudrillard and Godard all day long, but at the end of it, did that give the students anything to put money in their pocket? In my university, you should have seen them glaze over just when I would spend 10 minutes on Bauhaus, especially Itten's color theory. Color theory is critical to practice, but for the most part, all they wanted to do was push the buttons and see pretty colors.

And that brings up another issue: How schools in the US have become mills to make money. They cater to their customers, which results in the dumbing-down of the entire institution. Face it, education is an industry, and the MBAs employed there have made it so.

I swear, 50% of the students I had should not have even been on the campus at all. They'd have been happier, too, in the long run, pursuing whatever muse floated their boat. One guy, a very affable fellow whom I liked a lot, I ran into one day long after he had graduated; he was a rental car agent. And he was happy, because he knew he didn't have any talent, he was just extending his youth for 4 years at college. And he wasn't the only one who admitted that to me. If he'd gotten into the rental car gig 4 years earlier, though, he'd have been a manger with a fat paycheck by the time I saw him.

Colleges have become very strange places indeed...

HarryD

Yeah its is sad - I mean its hard enough to get a job for someone starting out let alone having to re-learn it all on the job after 2 to 4 years of study and incurring a massive debt or spending your entire college fund.

Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Well, I thought I was pretty well prepared out of school, being at the top of my class, Summa Cum Laude and having garnered some pro recognition through internships. Then, my first gig: I didn't know how to read a scope, keep an analog edit bay timed, nor even what a matched-frame edit was. Took me down a peg or three.

I tried very hard to make it so my students didn't go through that. But you can lead a horse to water, and all that.

HarryD

i am not a PREDATOR i am a CANNIBAL.

i got sick of working for people who keep doing carbon copy stuff and changing one name or so and calling it new. i use to turn my stomach to not at least attempt to be some what original. so yes i will under cut if i need to mostly to piss off my competitors who have big leases to pay. my basement acts as my main studio and if i need something larger i have a friend who has plenty of unfilled open warehouse and office space that i can use for free.

fcp opened a entire new world for me. i guess at heart i am a producer/score person. however after taking 3 intense classes in fcp my skill set switched to editor/producer/score guy. in my market ( ATLANTA ) the scene is just plain lame. its not a big chummy community of people pooling together for a greater purpose. everyone tries to step on you here ( which i am sure is every where just not as pronounced in some markets).

i kinow people who have edited shorts in vegas and they did a good job. the pay that some receives is just like that in new york. if you can sell better the money will come, as $$$ comes any passionate editor/producer will buy more knowledge and get better at his story tellin'.

i dont care what networks pay really because i dont depend on them. i am still at the non-broadcast client level for 65% of my projects. the projects that end up as commercials on tv have been just fine.

as for working in a weekly show environment i have no idea. but i have seen better story telling out of fcp than avid ( on the indy level ). avid is great also but who wants to pay that much for a system when fcp can do the same job with less hassle.

EXPERIENCE and STYLE is what you are selling to create your rate, and those should be the only factors taken into consideration. the nle really doesn't make a diff.

stick with me for a sec here.

when i was 14yo (which is more than 20 years ago) i had already been in 2 live performing bands, 5 fashion shows, and was working on my second play. i have always been creative and could not understand life without creativity. my story telling skills then was pretty good as 3 of the 7 plays i wrote by graduation were performed at my high school ( one of which was a revision of a play i wrote in 7th grade).

Story telling is a talent that i dont think can be taught. the ones who say i learned to story tell are somewhat lying. they didnt learn to story tell they just learn how to remix other peoples stuff. i see this in all action movie, romantic comedies, commercials and sitcoms.
i mean whats the difference in the original " war of the worlds " and "independence day". what the difference between "valmont" and "cruel intensions" or " ER " and " greys anatomy ".

you can even look at LOST and see how eclectic that show has become. That show is a perfect example of people who are natural story tellers. they keep pulling these things into the story cause i dont think they know how to close it. if they did they wouldnt need to bring in a bunch of stuff that seems a bit unrealistic even for that storyline. its not even being rooted in logic at time.

i say it take a special person to have a story telling style and skill and no nle will ever change that. companies will eventually get the picture and that pay disparity will disappear.

""" What you do with what you have, is more important than what you could do, with what you don't have."

> > > Knowledge + Action = Wisdom - J. Corbett 1992 """"

Two things.

1. Don't know if anyone will see this since the one bad thing about this forum is that it doesn't keep busy threads at the top.

2. For those Final Cut editors that keep saying "I don't know why those Avid editors get paid so much more for the same work?"

The right question should be "Why aren't we getting as much as the Avid editors?"

Why are producers doing this?

BECAUSE THEY CAN.
That is the only reason.

If you are in a big market, $1000/week isn't going to pay your expenses unless you are living with your parents or your significant other makes good money.

I would really like to see Mark Raudonis chime in here or better yet someone who works for him.
Mark has loudly talked about their transition to FCP from Avid because it costs less.

Did they change the pay rates as well??? My guess is that Bunim-Murray and others save much more money via lower compensation for editors than they really do over the hardware costs.

Labor is usually the biggest cost in the edit bay.

1. Don't know if anyone will see this since the one bad thing about this forum is that it doesn't keep busy threads at the top.

They do if you turn on that option. It is at the bottom of the main forum page. Posts float.

I would really like to see Mark Raudonis chime in here or better yet someone who works for him.
Mark has loudly talked about their transition to FCP from Avid because it costs less.

I worked for Mark for a week, and he paid my rate. EVERYONE there gets paid a comparable rate. They saved money in the EQUIPMENT...a ton of money. But to get talented people you still need to pay the going rate. Everyone there is paid well. NOT half or 2/3 the going rate...they are paid the going rate. The only difference between this place and an Avid shop is, they don't have Avids.


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
[itunes.apple.com]

Shane, thanks very much for the post float tip.

My hat is off to Mr. Raudonis.

I think my point is true that many productions companies see more savings over the long run by paying editors significantly less than the savings they see on the gear. Several cable reality shows that I have had contact with here in LA pay poorly and work people into the ground.

Personally I have been fortunate to work with people who pay my rate.

Hi All

Can I just say what a great thread! I was supposed to go to the bank but just just spent too long reading all this ... and now its lunch time and the queues will be too long, ah well, later.

I used to do a fair amount of freelance in Hong Kong using both AVID and FCP, that was in addition to my regular job as an online editor in a multi machine tape suite (and AVID/FCP/Lightworks NLE suites).

I'd have to say that, for freelance, I pretty much got my rate, regardless of the gig or system I was working on. That said, the kind folks at CNN did suggest my rate was "too low for AVID" which suggests there may be some truth in the argument at hand. Needless to say, my rate suddenly went up, although I put it up across the board.

With respect to the "Preditor" thing, I wholeheartedly agree. I long ago realised that pure editor role was, to some extent, a dying breed in my particular environment. It was clear that all the "good stuff" was being handled almost exclusively by the Graphics department. Jobs that used to be handled by the senior editors in the super-suites were increasingly done in a purely graphics environment. Producers used to come to us with all the elements, mattes, fills etc and we would composite the whole thing in the online tape environment, making all th ecreative decisions along the way. No more. The super-suites were dinosaurs in short order, and the spots came to us as already finished pieces that just needed cutting in to the master. Writing on the wall. I often coaxed my "old dog" colleagues that it was time to learn new tricks or be left out in the cold. Some did, some didn't. Those that didn't were those with no ambition beyond the four walls they were already within. Most of those that didn't were laid off over the following 5 to 10 years or so.
Producers were expected to edit. Editors were pretty much relegated to setting up DMEM's for onlining, and basic color correction tasks. And dammit, some of those producers turned out to be damn fine editors, although many were not ... and that was clearly visible in the end product. Equally, many editors transitioned to the role of producer (where all the real editing was going on). Strangely (or not) this put the willies up many of the producers who felt their jobs were being threatened by know-nothing editors who suddenly fancied themselves as producers! But it cut both ways. What they didn't realise was that the editors had been "producing" for years, albeit from the editor chair. But it cut both ways, as some editors made good producers and some clearly did not.

The moral of the story? Talent will out.

Just my two ringgit.
Andy