http://vfxlaw2012.wordpress.com/2013/02/05/organizational-skills/
At one point in my career I was a Visual Effects Producer, and am a current member of the PGA. Is it possible that I am responsible for some companies having gone out of business because I squeezed them too hard on prices? Yes. Is it possible artists lost their job because of the decisions I made? Yes. Is it indeed possible that the visual effects industry finds itself in dire straits with nowhere to turn? Yes.
How do we fix it, and more to the point, can it be fixed?
Here is a short list of VFX companies that have gone out of business, been bought, or otherwise failed:
ESC
Giant Killer Robots
Imagemovers Digital
Cafe FX
The Orphanage
CORE Digital
Asylum
Illusion Arts
Digital Domain Florida
Sony Imageworks New Mexico
Fuel VFX
Riot!
CIS Hollywood
Warner Digital
The Secret Lab
Meteor Studios
and today, Rhythm and Hues.
Sadly, I know I missed some, and this list goes on and on. How many small companies aren’t even worth mentioning?
There is no question if others will join this list, it’s only a matter of whom, and when.
People that speculate might say Pixomondo or Sony Imageworks Los Angeles offices are due up next. I have too much inside information to divulge so I will tread lightly.
How do you stop the bleeding?
Organizational skills are severely lacking in the visual effects portion of the film industry. How many times have I seen a producer screaming at a VFX Supervisor, or a studio head perplexed by the dramatic range in the bids from facilities? Too many to count. They wonder who comes up with these numbers. Sometimes I do too, and I used to come up with the numbers. One of the first things a studio will look into is if a visual effects company is solvent and will be able to finish their job without going bankrupt. Any payment terms that ask for too much up front, and the studio gets queasy and backs off. No-one wants to write a check to a company that later goes out of business and can’t finish the work.
Fortunately there are still enough VFX shops and practitioners out there to get a show done, no matter how imminent failure appears. As long as they are able to keep coming across the finish line, the studio will keep pushing the limits of what’s possible.
How could the VFX industry be better organized?
For one, visual effects artists, supervisors, producers, and coordinators are all loners. They go through their entire career with no support system in place, no guild, no watchdog, and no rules. Each person is responsible for his or her career, and that is the end of it. Now extend that to the vfx shop owners, and the same applies. There are no rules, only winners and losers.
The film industry, advertising, feature animation, all of it is project dependent.
A typical project will deal with several unions, guilds, agents, and lawyers, just to get the thing off the ground. Without set contracts in place for DGA, SAG-AFTRA, IATSE, Teamsters, PGA, and others, it would take each movie infinitely longer to see the light of day. Imagine if every single person negotiated their rate, back end, hours, travel, per diem, etc. It would never work.
Yet the VFX industry takes that out of the equation by offering up services for a price. I pay you X amount of dollars and you get Y service done- and I don’t want to know where it’s all going. You just send me the bill and I will pay your invoices.
It’s this 3rd party relationship that keeps VFX artists employed. After all, there are no job posting for studio jobs when a movie gets going. That’s left to the executives, production companies and film makers- they get the team and organize it all themselves.
In my opinion the visual effects industry has no chance of becoming anything greater than it already is. There is no place to squeeze leverage. It would take every artist in the world coming together and forming some kind of arrangement for all film work. The task is impossible, and the artists are unwilling to cooperate together. They fear what would happen without the 3rd party in place to do their bidding and write their paychecks.
For those of you who are on the sidelines screaming at your teammates to please join arms and do something, I have more bad news for you. For as much as it would be an amazing thing to see the VFX artists finally organize themselves and stop working with no guarantees or rights, it’s simply not going to happen. Years ago, I used to be one of you, and I have sat beside you and discussed it. Not one of you cared.
Do I sit safely in my ivory tower immune from your disease? Yes.
Do I look down upon you and laugh? No.
Do I have pity for your disease? Yes.
I see the weak, the beaten, the complacent, the apathetic, and the damned.
If a vfx artist ever did get a royalties check, their eyes would come rolling out of their sockets and surely land straight onto the floor. The mere thought of getting paid more than once for the same job is enough to blow most of your minds. If you had any inkling of what it was like on the other side of this coin, you might do yourself the favor and get mad enough to do something about it.
Not likely.
VFX Law, out.