ArticlesIn my opinion way too many people are unhappy in their job, the SOLE reason they work is money and day after day they don´t have the feeling that they are doing something with a meaning for them. In our civilization the main reason for not doing the job you would like to is laziness. That fact may seem a little bit harsh and of course this statement is exaggerated, but for most of the people it is true.
The only thing you ever wanted to be was a doctor but you think you didn’t have the opportunity to study? When “opportunity” means that you didn’t get any financial backup of your parents it certainly is harder to study, but it’s possible nevertheless. When it comes down to the bottom line the main reason why you are not “living your dream” is laziness, because you can earn your money easier, because starting over again means to cut back, because you are afraid of change or because you don’t believe in yourself.
Please note that by talking about “our civilization” i mean the so called first world situation, and not people who are struggling to survive and don’t know when they will have something to eat in the near future.
My situation
Why especially i am writing about this topic? Because i am living it, during the past few years i am on my way to get a foot into film and theater business. I have not yet reached my goal, but i´m on my way and i can tell you that despite all the downsides i really like it.
When i was a teenager my dream job was to be a programmer, sitting in my little office and code hours for hours. It was completly obvious to me that i would attend an IT college right after army service, and later on i decided to study Software Engineering. During my study i got interested in movies more and more, and after some time i realized that watching movies is not enough for me, i missed something. I started to read books about screenwriting and also started to work on my first screenplay (which by the way i read last week or so and was really shocked how crappy it is…).
Is it too late for that decision?
Besides the “it is never too late” phrase it has to be noted that it gets more complicated the older you are. Your job, experience and also your living circumstances change when you get older, so apparently it gets harder to take a step back (as well financially as your position), but nevertheless, if you are willing to sacrifice some of your earned luxury for a fulfilling job you should take your chance.
You may say that any other person who knew from the beginning that he/she wants to be in movie business deserves an opportunity more than me, well, i don´t know. I think everyone who works hard on it and is desperate to work in that business deserves a chance, and for sure it doesn´t mean that the job would be done better by somone else. Life is constantly changing, and some know from the beginning what their way is, others have to figure it out, but before i drift of to a philosphy discussion i better get back on topic.
My first steps
Right, so i recognized that my way has to change, it was not enough to make movies just as a hobby, i had to take steps in my life into the right direction. The first thing that was clear to me was that i would not study any further after my bachelor, i could have done a master study in about two years, but i knew that such a study wouldn´t bring me any further to my dream, so i finished the bachelor and quit.
I worked as a part time programmer to make some money and got my first few shorts into production. After three years of working that way i felt it was time for another change, just doing shorts was not enough anymore, so i decided to also quit that job and focus fully on my career as filmmaker. I´m presenting these facts as if it has not been a hard decision, but believe me, it was not and still isn´t. I have got job offers where i could have made about 3000€ - 4000€ a month, thats a good salary, i could have a nice life with that.
But could i really? I would have to work at least more than forty years and spend my time with stuff i don´t care about, and if you ask me, thats not worth it, no money on earth is worth spending your life in a hated job where the first thing in the morning is a crappy feeling that you have to get there again, day after day, year after year. Life is just too short and valuable for that…
Well, during the last years i am working on my career, i don´t say that i´ve always done right, you also learn from mistakes you make. I think i have got some experience by now and i can give some tips, but don´t take anything for granted, anyone has different premises and each situation is different, but i think there will be some points that could help.
Another little disclaimer: i am talking about my personal experiences, and i am trying to get into movie business, so probably not everything in this article will be of help in other businesses, but i am trying to bring it down to a common denominator, so my tips might be of value even if you are trying to do something completely different.
So lets get started, my small list of (at least) ten things you should consider if you want to live your dream…
1. Things to consider before changing direction
In my intro everything sounds so easy, you don´t like your job, change it. Well, it´s not. It is a very hard decision if you want to turn your life upside down, and before you do that you definitely have to make sure that you know what you are doing. The first thing you should be aware of is that it is hard work and there are benefits but also downsides.
Benefits and downsides
- + You life your dream
- + You do something with a meaning to you
- + You could never do a job you don´t like with the same energy
- + You don´t get up with that ugly feeling to have to go to that job again
- + You don´t think that you waste your life
- - It will take some hard times to get there
- - There will be problems and throwbacks on the way
- - The grass is not always greener on the other side
- - Every job has downsides
- - You will have to make sacrifices
Realizability
Even if many dreams can be achieved, some cannot. If you want to be an astronaut and are at the age of 55, have to wear glasses and got a bad knee your chances will be quite low. You have to be honest to yourself, because if you´re chasing a dream that cannot be reached you´d be better off with a reasonable job, because at some point you will realize that you´ll never reach your goal but you already spent so much time trying so. So always be honest to yourself and try to be realistic.
Be sure of it
Do you REALLY want to do that job or would it just be nice to be in that kind of business. Or did you just have some difficulties in your current job and think you´re better off with a new one? You really have to take your time to make sure you really, really want to do it and you´re not just acting on a result of a bad day. If you have doubts youre on the right way, doubts are part of the game and help you to keep both feet on the ground.
2. Contacts are everything
That fact is hard to accept, but it can´t be done without, it´s just a thing you have to deal with (you know, the world is not perfect). So if you face the situation having not a single useful contact in business you have to get startet somewhere. Don´t mistake me here, you don´t have to become an ass-kisser, in fact you shouldn´t, the thing just is that without contacts, nevertheless how good you are, noone will know you.
Your very first contacts should be aspiring young filmmakers (or whatever business you want to get into) you can work with. In these days it´s hard to do something professional really alone, so start your search and find some people you are willing to work with and that share your passion. This step is quite important, most of the jobs (especially in movie business) require teamwork, so practice it.
When you have done a couple of own projects (or even beside working on own projects) try to get a foot into business, search for production companies and see if you can get a job there. I don´t think i have to mention that you won´t get a job as a director or something, but remember, it´s the first step and getting into business requires to climb up the ladder. So most likely you will get a job as production assistant, and besides the chance to take a glance into professional productions you will get paid, and thats good.
No contact is useless
When you try to contact someone don´t forget whom you will be talking to first, most likely a secretary. Don´t underestimate the value of this contact, if you give him/her the feeling that he/she is just a little barrier on your way you´re screwed. Think about it:
Who is the person that makes appointments for your contact?
Who is the one who knows the time schedule of your contact?
Who is the first person you´ll probably talk to?
Yeah, you´re right, the one who answers the phone - be kind to him/her and they´ll probably give you a chance.
Keep in touch
You´ll here the sentence “we will keep you in evidence” a lot, if you´re lucky they put your cv and application somewhere, but the chances they take a look at it again are quite low. So the factor “luck” is a very important one, did you call just during a running production? Chances they need someone right now are quite low, so call later, in a month or two the situation could be a different one. Just remember not to bother them, keep in touch just to be kept in mind, don´t do it too often.
3. Avoid dependency
Don´t get me wrong here, you´ll probably be dependent on something your whole life, but what i mean is that you should avoid dependency where it´s possible. If you for example apply for a job and they keep you in evidence or tell you that they´ll call you soon - don´t take that job for granted. Continue your search, continue your work and keep on track, to be honest in most of the cases “beeing kept in evidence” means nothing.
So again the last point is important, keep in contact and take nothing for granted.
4. Get your own projects together
Many people think that short movies are useless, in terms of revenue they may be right, but they are a great chance to gather experience. In my point of view you should definately realize some projects on your own, of course you could apply for a job somewhere and climb up the ladder, but believe me, working on your own project where most of the responsibility lies on your shoulders and nearly everyone relies on you will give you a huge boost of experience.
Don´t underestimate the effort
But be warned, always take it serious, if you gather a team and you are in the middle of the creation process and then feel you are not able to manage the whole stuff don´t just quit. I´ve seen projects go down where the director leaves in the middle of the shooting and leaves the team alone, that´s not a good way to be remembered. Another huge problem in indie productions is that after the shooting it can happen that the motivation is gone, you think you´ve done well, everybody was fine on set, but don´t stop now. I´ve also seen projects that are stuck in post-production and are not likely to get finished, but if you spend your time working on a short movie, a commercial or a music video, if you don´t finish it, the whole work was almost worth nothing.
Hand off responsibilities
When i started i thought i could do many jobs at once, i wrote the screenplay, directed, produced, was my own directors assistance and associate producer, edited by myself and worked on marketing and the website. Thats a whole bunch of jobs, and the more you try to do by yourself the less professional you can be in each of it, there is a reason why these jobs are different jobs and not one. It is sometimes hard to hand off some of your work, but your colleagues are eager to work as hard as you (at least the should be), so if everyone tries to give his/her best the project will benefit from it.
An unfinished project is worth nothing
I know that it is hard work to manage your own projects and you will be facing different problems (some you didn´t expect to be problems as well), but always finish them. When you can´t afford to pay any salary (and i suppose you won´t be able to since rental and such definately is expensive) you will have to keep your team motivated. When your team feels that you don´t really care, you gave up the project or you are not working at least double the effort of the team, you failed.
I can´t stress enough how important it is to finish your stuff, if you apply for a job anywhere and your cv is full of “In Post-Production” you made a mistake. Nobody really cares about project that are halfway finished. Another thing is that many people worked for/with you, they spent their time, creativity and also money on something that apparently isn´t worth to be finished - it´s hard to convince that people to work with you again.
5. Budget issues
It sounds quite easy to get a team together and work on something, but don´t ever forget that nothing in life is for free. When you expect people to work with you they have the right to at least have something to eat and drink during shooting. Don´t you ever say they should bring their own meals (except you just work with three friends or so), keep in mind, they are working for your project to be finished, and while they still might profit with gathering experience and having something for the cv they still work for free.
No-Budget vs. Low-Budget
Under any circumstances don´t make the mistake and think that you can make a short movie without any money, there is no such thing as “No-Budget”. If the movie should be at least a little bit professional you will have to have a budget. Here is a really small list of things you will have to spend money on:
- Catering
- Light and camera equipment (somtimes dolly, crane or whatever)
- Transport (gasoline, …)
- Office supplies (print out the screenplay, shooting plan, etc.)
Pre-production
If you managed to afford the most basic needs for the movie to be shot you´ll have to face another problem: in filmmaking, lots of things don´t work out as planned. That means especially for indie productions: take your time for pre-production, plan everything as good as possible, because in the end there will be issues that can´t be planned. The pre-production is worth gold (not only for indie productions, but for them especially), everthing you didn´t manage in pre-production will get harder later on.
Where money is missing, creativity is the solution
Very often you face the problem that something won´t be affordable under any circumstances, for example you loved to do a shot on a special location, but you don´t have the money and a studio is also out of discussion. Well, you will have to face it that you have to improvise, the best solution would be to have thought of it right away when you wrote the script (if you did write the script by yourself). Always think ahead and focus on realizability, i once read a script that a teenager wrote and he wanted to shoot it by himself with no budget, i thought i´d give it a chance. But when i read something about 100 soldiers storm a nuclear plant i just had to laugh.
Anyway, if you lack on budget try to be creative, think about different approaches, is that location really necessary? Do we really need that many people? What could i change to achieve my ideas? The nice thing about movie making is that there always is another solution…
6. Be as professional as possible
For everything you do, even if you lack budget, be as professional as possible. What i mean is that money of course is an issue, but where you are short on money you just have to be creative and put more effort in it, nearly everything is possible. As i already mentioned you should take your time for pre-production, the more time the better. Even if you are exhausted because of the production, do everything you do with the most enthusiasm and effort, if possible calculate more time just to get a better result. I know that during shooting time is very expensive, every new day costs money for rental, catering and so on, but pre-production time is cheap (it just costs your time).
Beeing professional is not only important for pre-production, shooting and post-production, there is much more you should try to do. Figure out how you can attract people to work with you, how your product can be merchandised, not really in terms of selling something, but get your product known. Create a website (or find someone who can create one), do marketing and pr for your product (there are cheap or free ways to do so). What is also very important: get yourself known, you are not only promoting your product but also yourself.
Another quite important thing is that you give out free dvd copies for your team, they have worked for free and deserve at least a copy. Try to arrange a premiere of the movie, even if you just rent a room somewhere, make it as nice as possible. Always remember: the movie is not finished after the shooting, nor after post-production. You shouldn´t make a movie just for yourself and your family, now that you have the final product try to pass it around.
7. Be organized
This is one really important thing, organize yourself, make todo lists, be sure what you want to finish each day, try to avoid “lost” days. When you work on something do it with 100% or leave it. It sounds harsh, but just performing on 80% may be possible if you are employed somewhere and you don´t care about the work, but if you work for yourself you have to give everything (don´t get me wrong, everyone has good and bad days, but try to use the good days for work and the bad ones for rest).
Feeling lost on set is one of the most dangerous things that can happen, the team looses faith in you and everything goes down. Be prepared, be organized, so even under stress you know what to do and what should happen next. When you are really lost take five minutes to get yourself together, sit down (not in front of the team, you need silence to focus) and get back on track.
If you are organized the stuff that goes wrong goes wrong within a certain frame that you have prepared, if you don´t know whats going on right at the beginning there is possibly no way to get back on track.
8. Every previous experience is useful
It may sound a little bit philosophical, but every education and experience in your life can be of use for your career, you probably know the phrase that a human beeing is just the sum of his/her experience, to some extend this is true. I also sometimes regret that i didn´t start in movie business from the beginning, but in my opinion there is no education or experience that could not help on your way to your future job. For myself it is a technical study, but now i benefit from it in terms of a backup job, plus i can create my websites by myself. If you got some experience in marketing - perfect, if you worked on an oil rig - you are able to perform hard work, or you could just make a movie out of your expert knowledge.
Whatever you made before, benefit from it and don´t regret you didn´t find your way earlier, you can´t turn back time so deal with it.
9. Grinding work is part of the game
As i already tried to make clear: turning your hobby into a job will require hard work, and unless you are really really lucky you will have to do work you might feel is under your status. But it´s part of the game, you have to climb up the ladder and you will have to start with the first few steps on the ladder. Try to do your work as good as possible and the people around you will appreciate it and will judge you on their impressions.
Don´t be a smartass
Nobody likes smartasses, and never ever give others the impression you think you´re someone better than them. You are welcome to play a part in your work, but don´t tell others how to do their job, be kind and do your work.
10. Don´t give up!
This may be one of the most important tips above all, don´t ever give up. You are clear about your decicsion, you know what you are working on, so stay on track. Try to be realistic, keep focused, but there will be throwbacks and sooner or later you´ll reach the point where you doubt your decision, but stay on track. It won´t be easy, but living a fulfilled life with a job you love to do is worth it, the hard work you put into it will be rewarded!
The end
Well, so far my few hints i learned during the past years. I am still on my way, i am still working hard on my dream, but during the way you´ll be rewarded, not just in the end when you made it.
I hope this article can be of use for some people, you are welcome to drop me some lines about what you liked or not, or even on how you are working on your dream come true. I´d also be happy if you would subscribe to my feed.
13 comments zu “Job, hobby or both? 10 tips for the road…”
Leave a reply
Chrissi
, 08. November, 2007 at 8:06 pmI wholeheartedly agree. No salary on earth can make up for being in the wrong place, while every little step that brings you closer to your dream is priceless in itself. As long as you have the independence to leave behind what you don’t like and start anew, the only one standing in your way might be yourself.
ganesh
, 10. November, 2007 at 6:01 pmthanks a lot for your article.its very insightful.for an aspiring filmmaker like me or anyone who wants to make his big dream a reality,i guess its very important to know these things and follow it rigourlessly.
michael
, 10. November, 2007 at 10:01 pmthanks a lot for your comments.
it took me some time to figure this steps out, and even if they don´t apply for anyone, i´m glad that at least for some it might be of help.
venu.miryala
, 12. November, 2007 at 2:25 pmthank u
venu.miryala
, 12. November, 2007 at 2:31 pmmovie is my life
Rebel20
, 13. November, 2007 at 3:39 pmI have some questions for ya if you have time.
michael
, 13. November, 2007 at 4:15 pmjust ask, either via comments here or per mail, i´ll try to answer them…
Darth Pau
, 16. November, 2007 at 12:02 amThanks for you sharing your experiences , that’s really
useful for me and my crew
This is a short comment message from China
we are students in film production, and we are working
hard for our dream day and day. But unfortunately, in China
because we have a lot of people in this industry, “2. Contacts are everything” is the most important element in our daily life(though
i am not interesting on it), it can protect the own industry of the
“old men” in China for a short time, but in the future that must
be doesn’t work, with the WTO, China must take more foreign movie
to show in the cinema(Hollywood movie). so we youth must recognized
that working hard is much more important than to be a “ass-kisser”
Tanks for your article again, and we are appreciate that
good luck for your way to be the professional !
michael
, 20. November, 2007 at 12:04 pmI´m glad that this article is helpful for some of you.
Darth Pau, you´re right, sometimes it´s quite hard to get into business because people fear rivaly and the security of their job. But yeah, there are lots of different ways to get a foot into business, if you are lucky you make a movie that is so stunning and creates lots of attention.
I wish you lots of luck on your way, due my lack of chinese i wasn´t able to watch anything on your website, probably you could provide a link to some work of yours…
Darth Pau
, 21. November, 2007 at 5:42 amhttp://www.youtube.com/user/darthpauprc
Just some practice stuff
Hope you enjoy it!
Next step I want to make some short but unforgettable
clips, between 30seconed to 1 minute, I think it will be low
cost but good practice, the money is really a big problem
all we have is a hvr-z1, and our mind. So the good idea and
creative is the next level we are fighting for!
Thanks for your reply, best wishes!
michael
, 21. November, 2007 at 8:57 amHey, really nice camera work, and a good soundtrack (it´s Austrian
).
I wish you all the best!
Sam C
, 30. December, 2007 at 4:42 amHi Michael,
Thanks for the article, extremely helpful and insightfull. i think the most frustrating thing is, all of us have a lot of ideas and there are so many obstacles we feel its almost unachievable and the amount of talent and people that wish to get in to the industry is extrodinary. But I believe if we all try our bests, a lot of us will make it and hopefully have the pleasure of working together and creating films that generations can apreciate it.
thanks
michael
, 30. December, 2007 at 10:49 amI think you are speaking for all of the aspiring moviemakers, we just have to give our best and take our chances…