Best career advice EVER for 2010: keep your job. Don't sweat the rest.
[David Roth Weiss] "there are only like two "Hollywood" directors who have control over the production process"
I remember hearing Robert Altman say that he never had final cut. Never.
He wasn't complaining exactly. He was saying it with a sigh. He came up in the studio system where directors had little control over ANYTHING, but he was obviously still something of a lion heading into the 1970s, and saw what the kids were getting. But he was willing to trade freedom for resources.
So yeah, if you have control, you have more than Robert Altman did.
And you have resources, which is to say, a job with benefits, and somebody paying you to be nominally creative.
If you ask your question another way, it might be, how can I find creative fulfillment within a corporate environment?
To reframe Bob's advice, what kind of work do you want to do? Then do it. Do it in your current job, where they will pay you to get better at your job.
Here's the deal. Even if they're telling you now, Take it easy son, nothing fancy - ignore them. Use your free time (nights, weekends) to make beautiful logo treatments. Easy way to get started, and makes a big impact fast. These guys watch TV. They may even go to movies. They're not going to object to seeing something beautiful, something "major market," something "Hollywood." And even if they do, it still goes on your reel.
When shooting interviews with yawn-inducing bosses, make your lighting better each time. Really WORK at it. Then practice doing it more quickly every time. Then add in some green/blue screen and add in some beautiful backgrounds that you've created and animated.
Make your lower thirds GORGEOUS. Maybe "elegant" is the word you prefer. Even if the animations are simple, you can practice keyframing and compositing.
I bet you're going to start getting traction with this. My experience is that value begets value - they're soon going to want EVERYTHING to look good, and they're going to start expecting to see this kind of stuff at your desk when they walk by. Since you've been practicing this all along, you're getting faster, sharper, and can now do everything you want to do ON THE CLOCK.
And you're putting it all on your reel.
And you're getting SALARY, and health care, and you're living where your wife is happy. Good god man, this may be the best gig you ever, ever EVER get.
The best gig ever that you get after this - in-house corporate video with somebody else. Now with a staff.
You feeling me?
I knew a guy who did in-house corporate video for Chrysler. He's probably long gone now, but here was the set-up.
Five full sound stages, two of them cycs with curved wall/floors.
They were doing HD VERY early on, because it was all in-house. Bob will tell you, some of these companies use closed systems to their advantage in a big way.
They did two newscasts every day, in both Spanish and English (a total of 4) that went to facilities around the world - manufacturing, dealers, partners, etc.
They did scores of demo videos - here's the new ordering system for the Jeep Cherokee spare parts, here's how to calibrate this new machine, etc.
They had a bunch of Avid Media Composers, a couple of Autodesk systems (then discreet - flint, flame, smoke), and all the storage you want.
On and on and on.
I wouldn't be shocked if my boy got his job with a corporate video demo reel.
Now, gigs like that are few and far between, but you can easily wind up with a smaller-scale version of this - 3 or 4 guys under you, doing pieces for the company meeting, fundraising pieces for investors, interviews with bosses who WANT to look like movie stars, etc. etc.
Figure out the kind of work you want to do. Then do it. NOW.
Seriously. You have arrived at nirvana. Embrace it. Cultivate it. Grow your skills to inhabit this land of milk and honey and SALARY and HEALTH BENEFITS, and a 401K, and a HAPPY WIFE.
You may be the luckiest SOB in this forum. Today. If you ACT like you are.
Yr pal,
Timmy
Tim Wilson
Creative Cow Magazine!
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