Skipped a week of blogging for no reason beyond sheer laziness. What's up with that?
I've been quite the harried hornet recently with a production design position that slowly, painfully became mine and then quickly vanished like pollen on the breeze. At least I learned something.
I applied to a small production design gig for a thesis film. The following proceeded to take place over a 3-4 day period: director emails me back and asks for a mock-up of sorts. I design a mock-up of sorts. Director asks me a logistical question. I answer logistical question. Director asks me another question. I think in my head, "These are a lot of questions to be asking someone whom you haven't hired. Am I hired? Am I giving away secrets freely? What would I do for a Klondike bar? What has a Klondike bar ever done for me?"
I ask him if he would like to meet in person. So we do. He tells me what he wants. I tell him what I can do. Student film budget wants nothing crazy, with the exception of a painted portrait of the actress, a casket, a fake axe to break said casket, and ideally wall-to-wall wallpaper. Oh and PS jellybean, we're shooting in a week.
People. Be kind to your production designers. We can only make your movie look good if you let us make your movie look good. In this scenario, I would have six days to build a casket, paint a portrait of somebody, and address all the other set needs like gathering props and visiting prop houses. This is realistic, if you are a zombie and do not require sleep within a 72-hour period. But not even that is accurate, since everyone knows zombies are terrible carpenters.
I see a hand in the audience.
Yes?
"Yeah, hi. I'm a visiting student from Washington. My question is, why don't you just rent a casket?"
An excellent question. You may sit down. Well, as much as I would love to rent a fancy casket, fancy casket rental would be approximately 75% of my allotted budget, and we would not be able to send any axes through that bad boy. So, here we are.
Another hand all the way in the back there.
"Hi, I'm Chad Wallace, reporting for Time Magazine. How exactly does one build a casket?"
You know what, Chad, I'll tell you. I don't fucking know. But after doing a little bit of digging around on the internet I found a simple way of making a realistic-looking casket out of foam. Lightweight, destroyable, and cheap-- perfect!Like a small, dirty prostitute that you feel like killing.
And that's when things got shitty. I would send the director an email asking for very basic things, like-- can we set up a prop house account? Can you send me the contact info of the person you said could help me? Can you send me the photos you told me you would send like three days ago? What are your thoughts on Klondike bars?
Silence. Utter silence. I had a crap ton of work to do and I had been given zero resources to complete them. Mind you, I wasn't bombarding this guy. In a three-day period I sent 3 emails total. Compare this to my inbox last February when I was PD'ing for Scarlett and I came home to at least 4 unread emails and texts every day. When it's crunch time, it's crunch time.
Three days went by and I had not heard from him. I had already spent money on props and had begun the laborious task of building this casket. I began to panic. What if this guy is purposefully not talking to me? What if he's avoiding me? Who is going to reimburse me for all this shit? Was I even hired to begin with? Oh god, this is how it all ends.
After his lapse of silence I decided it would be wise to cover my bases [ass] pronto with an independent contractor agreement, which I do with all projects, and he never responded. Paranoia sunk in as I realized nothing in print held him accountable for all the work I had done so far.
It was in this torrent of frustration and anxiety that I learned a valuable lesson: don't do ANY work until that contract is in place. In the past when I've been hired on projects we have always verbally agreed that I would do X work, and one of us would eventually send the other a contract somewhere along the way. Never in my days did I worry about doing all the work and then fretting they would do takesies backsies half way through.
Which this guy did. He said he couldn't afford to have me on the project anymore, which I interpret as some excuse or another. However, he has asked how much he owes me, meaning he doesn't have plans to leave me high and dry.
Just to leave me.
So in the end, I will not technically have lost any money, but I will not have not gained money I thought I was going to earn. Oh yeah, and I spent like a solid three days of my life putting in hours that I most likely will not be compensated for. Heed my tale, friends. It seems obvious but it can get forgotten about easily. Contracts before work, not during or after.
Or you will end up with a weird space-looking 15% completed casket that you need to clear out of your boyfriend's back yard at some point.
I've been quite the harried hornet recently with a production design position that slowly, painfully became mine and then quickly vanished like pollen on the breeze. At least I learned something.
The Story of How Jessica Learned Something
I applied to a small production design gig for a thesis film. The following proceeded to take place over a 3-4 day period: director emails me back and asks for a mock-up of sorts. I design a mock-up of sorts. Director asks me a logistical question. I answer logistical question. Director asks me another question. I think in my head, "These are a lot of questions to be asking someone whom you haven't hired. Am I hired? Am I giving away secrets freely? What would I do for a Klondike bar? What has a Klondike bar ever done for me?"
 |
| Answer: nothing. |
People. Be kind to your production designers. We can only make your movie look good if you let us make your movie look good. In this scenario, I would have six days to build a casket, paint a portrait of somebody, and address all the other set needs like gathering props and visiting prop houses. This is realistic, if you are a zombie and do not require sleep within a 72-hour period. But not even that is accurate, since everyone knows zombies are terrible carpenters.
I see a hand in the audience.
Yes?
"Yeah, hi. I'm a visiting student from Washington. My question is, why don't you just rent a casket?"
An excellent question. You may sit down. Well, as much as I would love to rent a fancy casket, fancy casket rental would be approximately 75% of my allotted budget, and we would not be able to send any axes through that bad boy. So, here we are.
Another hand all the way in the back there.
"Hi, I'm Chad Wallace, reporting for Time Magazine. How exactly does one build a casket?"
You know what, Chad, I'll tell you. I don't fucking know. But after doing a little bit of digging around on the internet I found a simple way of making a realistic-looking casket out of foam. Lightweight, destroyable, and cheap-- perfect!
And that's when things got shitty. I would send the director an email asking for very basic things, like-- can we set up a prop house account? Can you send me the contact info of the person you said could help me? Can you send me the photos you told me you would send like three days ago? What are your thoughts on Klondike bars?
Silence. Utter silence. I had a crap ton of work to do and I had been given zero resources to complete them. Mind you, I wasn't bombarding this guy. In a three-day period I sent 3 emails total. Compare this to my inbox last February when I was PD'ing for Scarlett and I came home to at least 4 unread emails and texts every day. When it's crunch time, it's crunch time.
Three days went by and I had not heard from him. I had already spent money on props and had begun the laborious task of building this casket. I began to panic. What if this guy is purposefully not talking to me? What if he's avoiding me? Who is going to reimburse me for all this shit? Was I even hired to begin with? Oh god, this is how it all ends.
After his lapse of silence I decided it would be wise to cover my bases [ass] pronto with an independent contractor agreement, which I do with all projects, and he never responded. Paranoia sunk in as I realized nothing in print held him accountable for all the work I had done so far.
It was in this torrent of frustration and anxiety that I learned a valuable lesson: don't do ANY work until that contract is in place. In the past when I've been hired on projects we have always verbally agreed that I would do X work, and one of us would eventually send the other a contract somewhere along the way. Never in my days did I worry about doing all the work and then fretting they would do takesies backsies half way through.
Which this guy did. He said he couldn't afford to have me on the project anymore, which I interpret as some excuse or another. However, he has asked how much he owes me, meaning he doesn't have plans to leave me high and dry.
Just to leave me.
So in the end, I will not technically have lost any money, but I will not have not gained money I thought I was going to earn. Oh yeah, and I spent like a solid three days of my life putting in hours that I most likely will not be compensated for. Heed my tale, friends. It seems obvious but it can get forgotten about easily. Contracts before work, not during or after.
Or you will end up with a weird space-looking 15% completed casket that you need to clear out of your boyfriend's back yard at some point.
 |
| RIP casket. |
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