Starting a Small Video Production Company

[Wanna Go Solo]

I'm in a small to mid size market and looking to get out of TV news and into the grossly undercrowded video production market.

Unfortunately, I only have experience with a bottom end Hi8 camcorder and Panasonic DVCPro cameras with nothing in between.

I'd like to produce local commercials at first (the commercials the TV stations do are crap, using news cameras and/or Super VHS cameras...nothing in between) and maybe work with some area businesses for corporate-style videos.

I've done a fair amount of research and figure start-up won't be terrible for a good light kit, mic set, and Mini DV cam....

But I really have no experience with higher end consumer equipment. I've read through the archives but most stuff pertains to ENG. Any insight on which direction I should go and what steps I need to be taking to make somethign out of this?

I was thinking of cameras in the Canon XL2 price range, and most def. a tram 50 mic and wireless, eventually getting a boom set. I've had success with Lowell kits for ENG, but heard tehy don't do well in production.... any ideas?

[Baltimore Shooter]

...Unfortunately, I only have experience with a bottom end Hi8 camcorder and Panasonic DVCPro cameras with nothing in between.

I'd like to produce local commercials at first (the commercials the TV stations do are crap, using news cameras and/or Super VHS cameras...nothing in between) and maybe work with some area businesses for corporate-style videos.

I've done a fair amount of research and figure start-up won't be terrible for a good light kit, mic set, and Mini DV cam....

But I really have no experience with higher end consumer equipment. I've read through the archives but most stuff pertains to ENG. Any insight on which direction I should go and what steps I need to be taking to make somethign out of this?

I was thinking of cameras in the Canon XL2 price range, and most def. a tram 50 mic and wireless, eventually getting a boom set. I've had success with Lowell kits for ENG, but heard tehy don't do well in production.... any ideas?

Dude, no offense, but do yourself a favor and try to find another production company in your area (or even one slightly out of your area) that does HIGH QUALITY work and work for them, first as a PA, Grip or something like that.

Why do I say this? Because, by your own admission, you have limited experience in professional, high end production. If you are truely interested in producing high quality productions, you would already know that a mini dv camera is not the way to go. High quality and mini dv is an oxymoran. You'd need to get at the very least a BVW-400A BetacamSP camera. The difference in quality is night and day.

Based on what you have said so far, it is obvious that you don't have the knowledge to pull off a high quality production, otherwise you'd be talking about a high quality camera from the start, not to mention all the lights, audio & grip gear you'll need.

BTW, of course the cabel commercials are crap. Hell, Stevie Wonder could do a better job, however, the client got what they paid for, which in the case of those cable commercials is anywhere from $200 to $500. If you want to produce a cable commercial with high quality production values, you'll either have to charge at least $2,500 which the compaies who advertise on cable don't want to pay for or you'll spend rediculous amounts of time to make it look somewhat like a high quality production which will blow a hole in your profit margin.

BTW, do you know how much time the production companies who produce those cable commercials spend on them? They give the company 1 hour of on location shooting and 1 hour of editing. So they come in throw up the camera wherever they happen to stop, throw up a couple of lights on the sides of the camera, do a couple of pans, a couple of zooms and they're out of there. Similarily, in the edit room, they just slap a few cheesy effects into some bad editing, toss in a lower third and away it goes. They're only getting $500 so they only give $500 worth of effort. See what I mean?

Like I said, I mean no offense and I'm sorry if this sounds a bit rough to you but it's better you hear the truth before you try to take on such an endevour. Do yourself a favor and work for a production house that insists on doing high quality work. You won't start out as a shooter or editor, you'll more than likely start as a PA or Grip, but you'll learn sooooo much and be much happier in the end.

I wish you luck.

Warren

[F4 Fan]

Gee, Warren sure has the Christmas spirit today – but as usual his advice is pretty spot on. But really – the world of production is hardly under crowded.

I spent 12 years working in the production department of a small independent station and our mantra was p & z (pan and zoom) and shot the sign. Can’t even fathom how many cheesy car, restaurant, lawyer, carpet commercials I shot over the years but we never took more than two and half hours to shoot a 30 second commercial – this in the number 5 market in the country. Editing was the same 2-4 hours of AVID time – over and out. Problem was that the clients just didn’t have big budgets and the sales department wanted the money to go for the air buy and not the production.

Equipment wise you will need a lot more than a mini-DV camera with a Samson (or equivalent brand) wireless microphone. I had good luck with a DVCAM outfit but even that was close to 12k and you haven’t even mentioned a tripod, vehicle, computers, insurance, software or decks plus all the other myriad of grip gear that can run into many more thousands of dollars.

Really consider this before you step off the cliff, the phone may not ring for weeks at a time and it can take years to pay off your equipment in the mean time you’re left eating cheerios and worrying about the rent. Find a production house and work for them for a while to see if you like that kind of work – you can learn awful lot that you can you use later in your career.

Good luck.

[freedom]

Yet again another new person who wants to start at the top. Sheees.
I learned 70% of everything I apply regularly in 3 years of working as a grip and assistant cameraman. THEN I jumped into the market doing decent productions. You start at the bottom and you will stay at the bottom.
Get in with a good shooter as his grip/soundie and you will learn tons of great stuff in a few years.
You have to walk before you can run.

[Nino]

A mid-size market with under-crowded video production?

Am I to understand that there’s a place on this globe where the productions demand actually exceeds the supply? This has to be the Shangri-la of video productions, my bags are packed and I’m off in search of this mystical land.

Hey kid, do the Lowel lights do well in productions?
Let's put it in this way, a skilled professional can do magic with household bulbs. Does this answer your question?

Listen to the old timers. Learn, learn and then learn some more, and this is a good place to start.

[PHX Shooter]

There's a general business rule that's behind successful start-ups and that to find a need and fill it. You want to look for an opportunity that's "big enough to drive a truck through" and sieze that opportunity. For example, doing work for a market research group that uses videos for client projects or doing Web video for corporate or online companies. These are video projects that can be done with less expensive pro-sumer gear, get you some good experience and help build out a network. Look for niche markets and verticals.
I totally agree with the other guys here that you need to crew with someone more experienced. The newsgroup can be a good resource (but it can be hard to get real feedback when you ask for it, or maybe that's me cuz I pissed someone off at some piont).
Anyway, some additional food for thought.

[jajack71]

The other shooters are right to a certain extent but as we all know most people starting out did not start with a 40k rig trust that. My old station shot BETA until the new Sony XD cameras came into effect. There's a thing called cruel experience meaning you can learn by hard lesson which we all have had at some point in our careers. Or you can take the route of learning through working with an experienced company our shooter.

The issue with that depending on where you live is that the economy is tight and most shooters are independent because they can't afford to hire other shooters outside the fact they just want the freedom that this kind of work can provide. You can work you way up to where you want to be in this business. It will take alot of persistence and patience but you can do it if that is your goal. True a mini dv camera is not a Beta cam or even a DVC Pro camera. (which we use at our station for broadcast news.DVC PRO50) but, you have to start somewhere. Good Luck on your quest.

[A Step Above Productions]

I started off much in the same way… I hade 15 years of experience as a staffer before jumping out on my own late last year. Now nearly a year latter I am doing great, I don’t have the big high-end client I thought I would have, but I also haven’t had to weddings and events.

You do have to find a niche; I started off doing VNR’s for several local companies. But what I mainly do is… believe it or not is I shoot and produce pilot shows. I just wrapped up my fourth show yesterday. I don’t know how I feel into it but I did a show for one person and that led to another and so on.

As far as gear… get what you can afford at this time. As your business grows put as much back into your business as you can.

When I started off I purchased a Sony HDV Z1U, lowel light kit, wireless mics , sticks, a full NE edit system, and ton of audio gear and support gear. Just do the research as to what you can afford. Just don’t expect to start off at the top… no one ever does. Start off small and build a name for yourself and go from there.

Here is why I went out on my own. My wife and I had started a family and were living in Naples FL. We wanted to move back to the West Palm area where both of our families were.

We were building a new home in that area and I started looking for job at one of the local stations. I was offered a job at all three locals but the money (and schedule) was less than I was making in Naples, so we knew with a new home, new car (I was losing my company car), day care for my son I had to make at least twice as much as I was making in Naples. So what better thing to do than go out on my own, it was scary (and still is at times), because I had no idea what I was doing, but I did research and learned through trial and error (and I am still doing that).

Going out on my own was the best career move I have ever made I am making great money, have more time with my family, and for the first time am in full control of my career and life.

I am lucky because my wife works and I have health insurance through her, before going out on your own you have to think about heath insurance, if you don’t have it you will have to get it and that can be a huge expense.

Lastly when I am not booked with a client I freelance at the locals helping them out when they are short and people are on vacation.

[Stoney]

Go out on your own. I did and it has been good. However, it is a business and after two years of freelancing I still have to come to terms with that. I don't have high-end clients who shoot all HD on F900's. My clients are meat and potatoes, BetaSP. I don't go after high end these days because it is out of my range right now to do so. I am realistic and it works for me.

The nugget of wisdom that I and others wish to share is that you have to be realistic and smart to succeed. Good luck.

[Michaelrosenblum]

I have been in the cable production business for the past 13 years, and it has proven to be a very good business. For many years, I shot all of my shows in MiniDV, and that proved no problem to Discovery, Showtime, National Geographic and others. Now, everything we do is on HDV using Sony Z1s. Again, there is no issue. We edit everything on FCP on G5s. Over the past two or three years we have seen more and more of our business related to the Internet, and producing for webcasts and webisodes as well as conventional broadcast. I would say that per se, hardware is less important (so long as you attain a baseline quality in audio and picture), as good writing and good storytelling. But for sure, there are lots of opportunities out there, and more appearing all the time. Be sure to keep you eye on video for phones. Very very big burgeoning market.

[Baltimore Shooter]

Mike, just shut the hell up right now. Your shows, all of them look like sh!t and even 'Wanna Go Solo' can see that your method sucks ass.

Go flip a burger or something.

Warren

[Ken]

I know there has been a lot of hate here concerning the small cameras. I have always taken the view that we have to appreciate every tool available to us and have looked at these cameras as tools since the pd-150 first became available. Last year I bought a Sony Z1 and was unable to make any money with it as a rental item and sold it. I have replaced it with the Panasonic HVX200 HD mini camera. This camera is paying for itself and more. I have been incredibly impressed with it as well. It records 4:2:2 in real High Def, will record in 720P or 1080i, has the ability to use variable framerates (24p, 30P etc) and can overcrank and undercrank. I did some experiments just last week using a 35mm adapter attached to the camera. The result was like I was looking at 16mm film. I've posted the tests here:
http://homepage.mac.com/getken/hdtest/iMovieTheater47.html

http://homepage.mac.com/getken/hdtest/iMovieTheater48.html

HD quality, incredible DOF, yet as many would say here...a toy not worth messing with. I tend to disagree and can see much potential for this tool. It will work great as a second camera to a Varicam or F900, even without the the 35mm adapter. But with it you can acheive similar or greater DOF than a 2/3 inch chip. Pretty amazing. Keep in mind these tests are compressed for streaming so you are not even seeing full resolution.

[Michaelrosenblum]

Dear Warren
I have made a point on this board of answering any intelligent question. In your case I will make an exception.

Wanna Go asks about starting up a video production company. This happens to be something I know something about, having produced hundreds of hours for cable. My guess, and feel free to correct me if I am wrong, is that this is something you know next to nothing about.

I am happy to hear, or at least endure, your opinions when it comes to cameras and shooting. When it comes to running a successful production company..... you must be kidding.

[Baltimore Shooter]

Wanna Go asks about starting up a video production company. This happens to be something I know something about, having produced hundreds of hours for cable.

Oh, you have got to be kidding me. Mike, everything you started has failed - NY 1, NY Times TV, KRON, WRKN, the list goes on and on. Hell Mike, the only thing you've been successful at is conning the GMs and NDs of bottom feeder stations to try it your way, anf they're STILL failing! If Wanna Go follows your advice, his business is doomed to fail before he even gets started.

Warren

[Walter Graff]

"If you are truely interested in producing high quality productions, you would already know that a mini dv camera is not the way to go. High quality and mini dv is an oxymoran. You'd need to get at the very least a BVW-400A BetacamSP camera. The difference in quality is night and day."

Don't know if I agree with that. I shoot nearly 150 commercials a year on mini Dv cameras in the top twenty markets and no one would know or care, as long as it does what it's supposed to do. Most folks can not see the difference between beta and Dv as the difference is slim at best. A camera is just a tool, it's what you do with it.


"Based on what you have said so far, it is obvious that you don't have the knowledge to pull off a high quality production"

And that might be the bigger issue. You say Tv stations produce crappy commercials. Most do. Tv stations are about sales and the production "department" is to simply offer more bang for the buck when selling commercials. But don't let anyone here get you down. If you can pick up a client, you might find yourself producing Tv spots in your local market. It can't be worse than some of the stuff I see folks do in some of the markets I produce commercials in.

[Hiding Under Here]

I sit back and read this stuff and think about how stupid it is to get in the middle of it. Then I start thinking about the cowardice I feel by retreating from it. So, in an effort to underscore how idiotic I am, I will now offer my two cents -- again.

I don't think it's fair to belittle Mike Rosenblum in an open forum such as this. Certainly anyone who wants to can argue with him all they'd like. But to write shameful things about him and the work he does is inappropriate, unwarranted and just plain unfriendly.

I honestly believe that Mike comes here to commune with us. I also believe that Mike thinks he is showing us a way to stay viable in the future. Just because his methods involve the use of smaller format cameras doesn't, in my view, make it acceptable to stab him in plain view. Personally, I have a great deal of respect for what Mike Rosenblum does. And what he does is MAKE things that people watch. Me? I work for other people who make things. Mike Rosenblum? He makes things. Period.

Mike has taken some very arduous hits here over the years. It's actually been fun to watch. Most of the time. Mike gives as good (if not better) than he gets. And he hangs in there even when the debate starts veering out of control. He's civil. Smart. Sure of himself. He has real world experience pitching and packaging documentary-style television production. Frankly, I think it would be a shame to lose Mike and his contributions to this forum. The more voices, the better. The more diverse those voices -- better still.

I'm not a fan of the VJ model. I believe it will succeed or fail on its own and it will not impact me one iota. Given my druthers, though, in a small market, I'd rather be a VJ, a "voice", a "personality", someone trying to communicate with a larger audience, than exclusively a news photographer. But that's beside the point.

We need divergent points of view. We need debate. We need perspective. We need intensity, urgency and desire. We need ideas to help us formulate other ideas. We need information. And in order to create an environment where those essential elements of professional survival circulate, we also need to be respectful and civil to one another. I'm challenged to adhere to those values myself at times. Some writers grate rather quickly. Yet we are bound by a common interest and it is in our best interests to be polite to one another. If we are not, the forum breaks down quickly and the ideas dry up.

[Nino]

Welcome back to this side of B-roll Michael, and still making friends I see.
It’s still us Michael; nothing has changed since a few years ago when you came around with your innovative methods of producing programs. You actually have become quite famous in the industry, everybody I work with knows about you, you gained the distinctive reputation of having produced some of the worst programs ever, you must be really proud.

Yes Michael, you have produced many shows with the mini DV, but the format was never the issue, you just have a gift of turning potentially good stories into pure disasters. This has nothing to do with the format, it’s the people. What makes a good manager or a good producer it’s the ability to pick the right people to do the job. You have many qualities but quality in itself is not one of them. Your shows have been and are still the same, a cookie cutter format. Different places and different faces but the same old crap. Actually when I thought that your work was bad you surprised me by doing something even worse, time after time, at least you are consistent.

Michael, the public is paying more than ever for having television in their home. Cable companies share that revenue but some of them, mainly those that you get involved with, instead of providing quality programming the money goes elsewhere. Not once in the many years that you’ve been hanging around here I have heard you saying anything about the right of the consumers who are supporting us with their hard earned money and their rights to get decent programming. That’s the main difference between us Michael, when I turn on my camera my only thought is how I can do the very best work for the viewer, because in reality that’s my boss not the company that hires me. You on the other hand is how much money can you screw them out of it.

Programs should be educational, informative or entertaining. I have yet to figure what yours are. And please don’t bring back ER and those other shows, you already told us that your former wife was behind those, as I said, everything that you have producer since she is no longer in the picture has been a total disaster.

And please don’t criticize or ridicule people like Warren, we are all for quality, this is what we were trained for and quality is how we make a decent living. We take pride in our work; we never compromised quality or prostitute our ideals for the mighty dollar. This might come as a surprise to you Michael but there are many ways in life to measure success beside the size of the checking account.

And by the way, you might be surprised to learn that the industry is not going the way that you have been predicting for years. the croppy programming way, but keep on trying, even a broken clock is right twice a day. I just finished a five days shoot for National Geographic all done with the F900. As you like making car analogies, you are the Yugo of productions while we are the Mercedes.

[Hiding Under Here]

Ah, Walter Graff makes an appearance at B-Roll.net Freelancer Forum. I used to read you jousting with the smug West Coasters on www.cinematography.net.

Welcome.

[Nino]

Tom, I have no problem ignoring Michael, but if you recall he was the one who told us that we are extinct, that our ways of doing business are things of the past, our skills are no longer needed, lighting is wasteful and intrusive and to either jump on his bandwagon or we are out of business. To prove his point he created extreme examples and plain lies of how expensive and wasteful is hiring people like us. This guy was and still is on a mission to discredit us for his own benefits, his ultimate goal is to put us out of business and you think he deserves respect?

[Michaelrosenblum]

I offer my advice. You are free to take it or leave it. That is your choice. I do so without personally attacking you. On the contrary. If you want to see my resume, google me. It is all there. From Trauma to Current to 5Takes to the BBC to KGTV. What you do with the information I offer you...that's up to you. I have made and continue to make a very good living in this business. If you want to join in, you are more than welcome, and I am happy to help. There is plenty of room. If you don't want to, then that is your call as well. And with that, I gladly depart this thread. In the UK, where I spend half my time these days, there is an expression I like a lot. It is called "a hiding to nothing". That is what this has rapidly become. If Wanna Go or anyone else would like advice on producing for cable, please feel free to contact me offline.

[Hiding Under Here]

Well, maybe I haven't read every word of what Mike has written, but I do recall him saying explicitly that he believed that there would always be a need for higher end video photography. So he can't be saying that we're doomed for extinction. And even if he was predicting our demise, so what? Isn't it important that SOMEONE make that argument? What more motivation do you need to stay vital than having someone forecasting professional doom?

Now Nino, I'm not debating you on this. We're just swapping thoughts. But you seem to have carved out a production niche that is somewhat evocative of what Mike R. is preaching. You offer a full-service menu to certain clients, shooting their projects with your small camera. That you are a stronger photographer than Mike and his hybrid followers makes sense. You've been concentrating on that craft for a long time. However, you could teach the damn VJ course because you have all the skill components it requires.

I'll say this about Mike Rosenblum, you ask the guy a question and he gets right back to you. He considers what you have to say and he does his damnest to help you out. You want to see some examples of what these VJs are doing? Mike has one of his disciples send you a DVD in the mail the next day. I know people he knows. By and large they like and respect him. He has real world experience producing at CBS. He worked with people with whom I work now. I have corresponded with him maybe three times. Each time we exchanged emails I was thankful for having access to someone with his knowledge and experience. Mike never flames anyone here. With one excepetion (that he susebquently apologized for) he is always respectful of other posters. Whether he's out there in the TV journalism field working against some peoples' interests or not is irrelevant to me in terms of him deserving reciprocal respect here. You cannot deny that he does what we do. He does it independently. He makes his way in the world using the same basic tools as we do. I think chasing him away makes us very small. I'd also suggest that he reconsider this most recent retreat. i thought he was tougher than that.

[Nino]

C’mon Michael, what advises have you been giving us? Giving advises is what we do on this board everyday, helping each other out with day-to-day problems. Sharing ideas and dedicating precious time from our daily lives to assure that a high standard of professionalism in maintained in our industry. All you’ve been doing for the last three years is spreading your doctrine for your own agenda. You don’t give crap about us; it’s all you, you and you. You jump on this board once every six months just to remind us how successful you are, and that's the contribution that you make? When was last time that you took any interest or participated in any discussion that did not involve promoting your agenda? Or use your experience that we've heard so much about, mainly from you, to help somebody else? There wasn’t any wasn’t it? You want to help? Then help, don't just help yourself.

I always told you that you are a great salesman; you could sale a glass of water to a drowning man, but your methods are totally unethical, with one face you pass yourself off as trying to help us while on the other face you discredit us with lies and false information to those who could potentially be our clients. And you don’t think that’s personal.

Resume? You want us to look and believe your resume after what you’ve been saying about our profession? Words are cheap to write, in this business we don’t give out resumes, we give out demo reels, our work is our credibility, and we’ve seen yours.

[Spacey]

SP may be superior, but quite honestly I haven't seen more than 4 or 5 people that could tell the difference between a SP cam footage, and DVCam (DSR350/450) footage. 3 of them were engineers, the fourth was watching a waveform/vectorscope.

(Pro) DV is more economical.
SP is more quality
MiniDV is if you're barebones and are planning to upgrade. Soon.

Nice to see you back MR.

[freedom]

Tom
There's being polite and then there's dealing with rubish. I totally agree with Nino's assesment of MR. What tiniest piece of real knowledge has he shared on this board. All he can promote is that we are extinct.
It is just BS.

[Hiding Under Here]

I never read Mike that way. Perhaps I haven't read enough of the MR schtick to stick my neck out. If you were to go back and look at the threads, you'd find that I disagree with him vehemently. Maybe I missed a thread or some posts where he showed his more negative cards. And frankly, I don't really care what his assessment is of the future of this industry. I understand he flacks his business. Moreover, I also understand that he sees this strictly as a BUSINESS.

If you look at the General Forum, you will see that it was me who posted the link to the VJ school. I put it in view because I believe that it shows the cynical aspect of the VJ system. Someone is going to try and make money from every aspect available from any shift the news business makes to Video Journalists. So, I am hardly an ally of Mike Rosenblum's point of view. In fact, we couldn't think more differently. I believe the world needs more stories. Better stories. And VJs are simply not equipped to make those stories. Nor are stripped down television news services that have been streamlined using the VJ method.

That said, I believe in freedom to express one's point of view. And from what I have seen, Mike R. doesn't swagger in here and tell people they're rubbish, or idiots, or any other combination of adjectives that insinuates we are crap. Again, maybe I missed school that day. I don't read everything here. But I do think Mike R. is ultimately more GOOD for this board than bad because he stimulates discussion. He makes posters work hard opposing him because he's bright. And he's willing to take more heat than just about anybody I've ever seen at B-Roll.

I didn't contest Nino's right to opine about Mike R. because I think that's the process. It's give and take. What I reacted to was another poster jumping down Mike's throat so vehemently and harshly. I will admit that reading Mike's first post here gave me pause. I was bothered that he wants to be a member of the production company community while creating such a huge wake over on the photographer side of the debate. I just didn't think he deserved to be punctured so viciously. Take him to task for the duality? Certainly. That's when things get interesting.

But hey. Who am I? Just one voice. The majority will rule in the end. It's dog eat dog. I was just having a difficult time keeping my fingers off the keyboard. I wrote my piece. I am merely one opinion among many. Thanks for the response Freedom. I appreciate it.

[Michaelrosenblum]

13 years ago I started a very successful independent production company. I still make a very good living at it. It is not hard to do, and almost anyone on this board already posesses the necessary skills to do the same. The market in cable is massive and growing all the time, and the market in both video on phones and webcasting is growing incredibly fast. If you think I have contributed nothing to the boards, (an assessment I don't particularly agree with), I am happy to answer any questions you might have as to how to get started, how to pitch, how to sell and close a deal. As for equipment, I leave that entirely up to you. How's that?

[IraJK]

Michael Rosenblum,

Check your PM please

[Icarus112277]

SP may be superior, but quite honestly I haven't seen more than 4 or 5 people that could tell the difference between a SP cam footage, and DVCam (DSR350/450) footage. 3 of them were engineers, the fourth was watching a waveform/vectorscope.



Do you work in a home for the blind?

[freedom]

MR
I thought you were done with this thread.

There have been numerous posts asking for advice regarding pitching to cable networks, doing pilots on spec, producing , etc, etc. You haven't posted on one of those threads until now. And what is the common denominator on all your threads...that the mini dv revolution is the way to go, that you too can be a sucessful shooter with about 5 minutes of training. The rest of the production methods are ancient and outdated and due for the scrap heap.

Our original poster on this thread can follow your methods and stay at the bottom of the food chain or he can work with talented, experienced, professional shooters and learn real, usable skills that will take him far in his career leading to rewarding, quality work.

[Hiding Under Here]

This program was shot with DVCam. It was done in a day with the exception of the expert (also DVCam) interview. I'm not saying this is high art. But I work in many formats. I don't see where the DVCam aspect detracts from the story or the message one iota.

www.massgeneral.org/livingwithtsc/families/laurie.htm

Actually, I think Ken might have shot some of this program. I didn't do the ethnic looking doctor in the office visit.

[freedom]

Tom
What's the relavance? Other than it was shot with DVCam. What camera? Full size type DVCam or pd150? There's good lighting, good camera work, good sound, etc. Doubt it was done with an MR VJ kit by somebody with 2 years experience.

[dhart]

Micheal: When ever some one starts telling me how great they are I immediately start to get very sleepy. Make your points without all the chest thumping and we'll decide if you have any valid points about "the direction of our business". Actually the tend in my business is more people on site not less. I'm getting more requests for field producers, extra cameras and operators, PA's, gaffers and grips.

[Hiding Under Here]

The relevance is that someone above said that few people could tell the difference between DVCam and Betacam. Another person responded facetiously asking if they worked in a home for the blind. I'm with the person who says that the difference between Betacam and DVCam is lost on viewers. If the process is the same, the technology takes a back seat.

What I don't understand is this need to constantly validate Beta SP as some sort of Gold Standard format. I apprceiate that at the root of all these arguments is the idea that freelancers are losing work to formats beneath the Betacam level. Who among us wants to work at a decreased level of quality? Who among us WANTS to make less money?

Beyond those anxieties, I believe, are intellectual arguments that just annoy me when they go unchecked. If you use Beta on a shoot or a full-sized DVCam, what's the difference? They're both dying formats. They aren't going to be around in a couple of years so it's wasted typing sniping about them. But the "truth" is, that the person making the claim that few people can tell the difference is a valid one, in my view. Saying (in so many words) that only a blind person would make that claim irritates me.

I've been around here long enough to know these are unwinnable arguments. I should resist the urge to get the last word in. Somehow, that good sense seems to have eluded me this week. I am in a contentious frame of mind.

My point is, show me the difference between Beta SP and DVCam. Moreover, show me the difference between the two on the internet. The truth is there is (virtually) no difference, particularly if the person with the camera is well versed in both formats. There are so many variables today that have changed the way video images are received. You can shoot something all wrong, over-exposed, not white balanced and it can be corrected to look almost all right. You can shoot something in HD that a good number of viewers will watch on an iPod. Or, you can shoot something in MiniDV that will be transferred to film and projected in a movie theater. So why waste energy debating what's a "good" camera and what isn't?

It's such a dumb argument. It blows my mind how often it arises. I think when someone asks how to get started in this business, the principal advice shouldn't be what level of camera to buy. Instead the more efficacious challenge, in my opinion, is to urge them to learn how to tell a good story. Without that, they'll never succeed. No matter what camera sits in the shelf in their garage.

[SimonW]

Absolutely.

As well as that, outside of the US BetaSP is pretty uch dead. Certainly here in the UK it is almost none existant, as is DVCpro. Digibeta, DVCAM (DSR-570's etc) and SX (in small quantities) are the rulers of the roost here.

There is too much technology chasing going on. But at the same time I don't subscribe to the view that it is entirely operator driven as to the quality achieved. A noisy camera will always be a noisy camera no matter what the operator does for example. A camera with weak contrast handling will always be bad in that respect, and it isn't going to be possible to work around that in all situations.

So I always see it as a fifty fifty balance. A great camera operator will make a great camera look amazing, and will make a rubbish camera look okay. But they won't make the rubbish camera look amazing.

But at the end of the day people shoot with what they own, and what their market demands, so the debate about which format is best is a moot one.

[freedom]

Tom
Sorry, the tread started with Mini DV cameras and somewhere along the line DVCam popped in. We need to diferenciate between camera heads and recording formats. The PD 170 is DVCam but isn't going to look near as good as a D50 with a DVCam back.

[Nino]

Michael, very gracious of you to offer your expertise to this group. As intelligent adults I'm sure that we can find some common grounds that we can all benefit from.

A good marketing point of view and advises are sorely needed in this business and will be welcomed here. Keeping conversations civilized might be a challenge but not impossible.
We all know your record and your ability to make the critical initial contact with clients. Getting into the right door is half of the battle.

I’m sure that you are well aware that the individual production methods will remain controversial and there’s no getting around that; nevertheless our objective remains the same, and that’s producing or participating in the production of television programs.

Indirectly and often controversially we have been giving you a great deal of advises mainly by blasting the many things that we’ve seen wrong with your programs. A critique, even a nasty one, is also a very powerful learning tool.

I know that you have many silent followers from B-roll, mainly those who can relate to your styles of productions but are afraid to come out in the open, and if you become a frequent participant you’ll be getting a lot more of PM messages. Actually there’s a great deal of underground activities taking place via PM on B-roll. I get messages and often even job with information that are better be kept private. I get and give out names and contact that we can all benefit. Understandably they can not be placed on the open board. So please feel free to start any thread and post anything, business related, that would be beneficial to the freelance community.

Now I have the first question. I’ve been hearing a lot of talk and many politicians are getting on the bandwagon about requiring the cable companies to offer a-la-carte channels as an option of having to buy packages or group of channels. It might not happen under the current pro business administration but it will happen. That makes sense to me as I probably only have maybe 15 channels (if that many) that I watch semi-regularly, this out of more than 200, and I have no clue what most of them are. This has to be a major concern particularly to those channel with programs of low interest as one of their primary sources of income is the cable sharing revenues. The cable industry is of course opposed to these changes and must be a major concern, what's their outlook.

[Walter Graff]

If they go ahead with this expect to see many cable channels simply vanish. Already many cable channels suffer from zero ratings like E, the nine other Discovery channels, MTV, History channel, etc. and when folks pick five channels out of two hundred, it will be a death sentence. BUt then again I can't see it happening because it would seriously do harm to the structure that exists. BUt the reality is that such a program would not actually save most folks money. Only subscribers who pay for fewer than nine channels beyond the basic tier would save under a la carte. BUt fear not it's very unlikely Congress would pass an a la carte mandate.

[Nino]

Walter, I’m not saying that people will buy nine channels; this is not what the advocates of this program are saying. You will still have to buy packages of channels but you will pick which channels are in that package. Let me give you an example. Several months ago I switched from cable to satellite; the main reason that I did that was to get some direct foreign channels and Dish Network was the only one who has that service, of course that’s a-la-carte. I have to have ESPN because they are my main client. In order to add ESPN Classic alone to the rest of ESPN channels I had to buy the additional package that consisted of another 100 channels, I still don’t know exactly what’s in that package, half of them are music, so now I’m buying television so I can hear the radio? I think that my cable bill is about $70 a month for over 200 channels, I would gladly give back 170 of those channels even if my saving would only be ten dollars a month. I would rather pay a premium price for something that I can really use than pay more for a “bargain” that I don’t even know or care that it's there. And yes, the weak channels will drop like flies. Channels will have to sell themself to the public in order to get into people's homes and in order to stand a chance to be accepted they'll have to offer quality programming. I can see how MR would be opposed to this, it will not be anymore "let put something together to fill 24 hours of programs".

[Walter Graff]

Walter, I’m not saying that people will buy nine channels; this is not what the advocates of this program are saying.


Neither am I. It would work very much like your cable now other than slightly more choice. You would still get the basic tier, but after that you can choose what you want more on an item basis. Such a plan would not really save you much in cost as they would restructure it making sure to deal with cost per subscriber for the services and their profit. In the end many of the fringe channels would suffer greatly from such a plan such as MTV, E!, etc. Since $80 million a year is pumped into the pockets of our legislature by the cable consortium, I wouldn't bet on seeing anything that does anything but cost you more (or the perception of savings).

[Michaelrosenblum]

Hi Nino
First, I have indeed been contacted by people through the PMs, which I am always happy to answer, asking advice on how to start or expand production work. Maybe this a more productive venue for me.

I don't think the a-la-carte option will gain much traction. It might in the short run, but in the long run, the technology that allows so many channels will simply overwhelm legal limitations. I suppose it is like RCA's early attempt to suppress FM because it offered too many stations. You can't escape technology.

That having been said, in my own experience, both broadcasters and cable companies have been running as fast as they can to broadband and starting new broadband channels. Admittedly the platform is not perfect, but it is going to get there and no one wants to become the CBS of cable, if you follow. Hence, they are already carving out new territory, even if it is a bit rough at the edges.

At the same time, the phone companies, Verizon and ATT in particular, are moving very very fast into the home video/tv/internet delivery basis, mostly becuase they understand that VOIP is going to eat their calling business very very soon as well. So everyone is gearing for a seismic shift, which overall is going to open vast new channel capacity.

Will it all be filled? Probably. Will it all be watched? This becomes a function of what the market can bear, and that is very much a function of revenue vs. cost. So long as a channel or platform is profitable, it will stay in business.

This leads us back to the reduced cost, both of operation and production. On the operational side, costs have dropped because as you can understand the capital investment to maintain a 'station' is vastly reduced. One no longer needs the building, the transmission tower, the staffing and so on. By the same token, as the price point for paying for product drops, there opens a whole new market for content production.

Does this mean high end network programs will go away? No. They may be a bit diminished, but the high end will always be there - and the target of many people in a market of 300 million people. However... there are whole new opportunities among what will be a plethora of smaller channels and urls.

How does this work?

If you walk into a magazine store (there is one near me where they have perhaps a thousand different magazines - no exaggeration. Most of these I have never heard of. Wooden Tennis Racket. Doll House Builder... etc.. But they are all profitable. If you open to the masthead you will see that they have staffs of 8 or 9 people. that's it. The rest, in that, almost all the content, is written by freelancers sitting at home on their computers. Video production for the plethora of video channels will be the same. And there will be the inevitable shake out. How many can surivive? Search me. But a lot.

All this means vast opportunities in the produciton side, but of course, of a different kind of production - most of it driven by people who can hit the lower price point. If you can crank out good stuff with a laptop, editing yourself, turning it fast, but keeping up a reasonable level of quality, the opportunities are vast. And I don;t think this is a 'survival' market. I think the opportunities for a very profitable business are here - but it is about volume. Lower tier cable, for example, pays 30-40K a half hour, but they buy in lots of 26 and 52 shows per run. There are economies of scale to be realized.

Most of the people on this site, I think, (based on what I have seen so far in the field) have most of the skill sets that necessary to make the product. And do it at a reasonable price point, as they can do most of the production work themselves, or understand what has to be done so they can not be taken by someone they hire.

What they don't know how to do is find the client, pitch the product, and close the deal. If you think this would be worthwhile, i am more than happy to open a thread along these lines. There are no guarantees of course, but I can offer what I can.

[Ed_Scott]

http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/488/bangingheadvt9.gif

[Hiding Under Here]

Michael, I agree with your analysis likening the cable industry to magazines. But only to a point. If you look at the advertising in those small niche magazines, they are not huge national corporations. Rather, ad sponsors are niche businesses selling to the specific demographic caught in the net cast by the publication's subject matter. And while the small magazines MAY be profitable, they certainly aren't generating huge windfalls for their owners. Most likely, the niche publications are owned by larger syndicates much like the ones that are gobbling up small newspapers.

Television is different in some very critical ways from magazines. And in certain key areas, the similarities between the two mediums falls apart. Researching and writing an article about quilting stitches, then taking a few still pictures to round off the effort, isn't nearly as complex as making a a 30 minute pseudo-documentary about the same subject. And the dollars generated by the minute audience interested in that kind of information certainly isn't enough to sustain the program on a cable station. And there are other problems as well. A magazine can be picked up and put down and re-read. It lies around the house so the interaction with the advertising in it is importantly different from television viewing. In short, cable television can only compare itself with magazines on some levels. In other significant ways, cable TV viewership demands almost opposite kinds of advertising that small niche magazines, if profitable, rely on.

Television advertising is dependent on either large(ish) viewership or the ability of programming to attract an identifiable, eager, receptive and, more importantly, financially viable audience. TV and cable will only work for a particular kind of program and viewer. Local cable ads, isn't really a hugely profitable enterprise. They help augment subscription revenues. But they have never been big income generators.

Like eveything in this country, cable channels will, inevitably, consolodate and/or disappear. And viewship will fall in line. As the number of viable channels is reduced, viewship will probably rise at the better "networks" and channels. Or it will be lost altogether, to the internet.

TV and cable programming can only afford to relax production standards to a point. While the bean counters may have felt it neccessary to cut production costs as TV audiences diminshed, television viewers (I hope) will only tolerate a limited reduction in programming standards. So what if sitcoms are shot with HD and not film? So what if the reality program cycle has bumped news magazines out of favor? If the quality dips below a certain level, you can bet that audiences will seek entertainment elsehwhere. So it behooves the television production industry to keep the programming "look" in the professional (rather than amateur) domain. By contrast, the cable channels have to compete with the stronger, more established, network competitors. If the History Channel decides to let lightly trained, inexperienced children of Mike Rosenblum produce its documentaries, well, you can pull the plug on that venture almost immediately thereafter. The VJ thing and the MiniDV reality show will work only on a case by case basis. Not every advertiser wants to appeal to the small niche audience they attract. Some corporations will need a more robust demographic to keep them afloat.

[Michaelrosenblum]

I am not making the case that the laptop/hdv production paradigm will supplant conventional production, but rather supplant it. i doubt very much that we will see the day when Steven Spielberg totes his own P2. He does not have to. There will always be some high end. But... and this is a very big but... the laptop/hdv will certainly supplement the production quotient. Many of the new venues for content will be largely if not entirely web/broadband/vod based. Hence, much like magazines, you will be able to pick themup and put them down on request. As well, the advertisers for those lower end products will not have to be national chains but can very well be the local pizza store or the local yarn suppliers. This transition to online will inevitably cannabilize ad dollars that previously went to print, also driving those former print only publications to move to video on the web as well.

Smaller niche audiences will attract smaller audience numbers and hence smaller ad dollars, but they are very much there to be had, and so I expect you will see a plethora of small niche content offerings and a later amalgamation of those those mom and pop operations into larger holding media companies. This is much the model that print and later to some extent cable pursued. Now the video/web is virgin territory waiting to be staked out. Who will claim it is anyone's guess, but the barriers to entry are remarkably low.

You can also achieve a very professional look with HDV and cutting on FCP. Very professional. It is all a function of whose hands the cameras are in. I recently produced Drew Careys Sporting Adventures - shot on Z1s, cut on FCP. I would say it looked a professional as most things on cable (not the Sopranos, but it was not, and incidentally never would have been made at those kinds of budgets).

I think the discussions about cameras are in some ways a great distraction. If you want to go out and pitch a series to Bud TV (see ad age this week), or TLC, you are free to shoot it in any gear that you feel fits within the budgetary parameters of todays market. It is, in fact, a fairly minor point. The greater driver of change here is the edits - fast, portable, field operable, etc.. This, now compounded with the P2,s which I worked with last month, really change the basic calculus of field production and turn time.

[Hiding Under Here]

If you obliterate the advertising media into micro markets something will be lost in the end. You may kill television altogether. Maybe that's not a bad thing. But you might destroy the single greates marketing tool ever invented. The internet is anarchy at this point. Attempts to consolodate it and corporatize and control it for the sole purpose of connecting web users with advertising will, in my view, result in either futility or a significant rise in cynicism regarding the internet resulting in lowered useage. In order to give something (attention and buying action) users need to get something in return. What does the internet have to offer? It's either an involving medium that allows users high levels of control. Or it gets slowed down and polluted with adcertising -- lowering the pleasure and viability involved in using it.

[Michaelrosenblum]

The one truth about technology is you can not hold it back. There was something magical when the entire country watched the same program together every night. In those days, Cronkite could indeed move the nation by saying we had made a mistake in Vietnam. Everyone saw the same I Love Lucy at the same time together. As an advertising medium, it was truly phenomenal, but also as a deliverer of political messages. To a great extent the war in Vietnam was ended because of the power of television; the civil rights movement was greatly expanded and gained massive support because of the power of TV. In perhaps its first and greatest moment, the evil of Joseph McCarthy was brought to an almost instant halt because of the live transmissions of the Army/McCarthy hearings and See It Now.

All that, alas, came to an end with the rise of cable, and now that fractionalization will only continue. Is it a good thing? It has its good points and its bad points, but surely for those old enough to have lived through it, we will never see anything like it again; at least not in our lifetimes.

[Nino]

Is anybody keeping track of how many time this thread changed directions.

Michael is true, you can’t hold technology back but you can’t either keep shoving down people’s throats whatever the industry feels like. We can make predictions and assumptions of what is going to happen in the future but until it does it’s only sci-fi. Basing our business methods and philosophy today for what might happen tomorrow is wrong. It’s good to plan ahead but doing business now with something that’s not here yet could lead to disaster.
Now back to the present and to the methods that cable companies are currently shoving down consumer’s throats what they want people to buy with the attitude of take it or leave it. How long do you envision this to last? And why should it last. Until now cable companies have dealt with volume, “get 200 more channels for only $ 30 a month” This initially sounded good for my generation that until 20 years ago we only had 8 channels, and that was in NYC. But the public is getting smarter, the volume game is over. People want quality. Discarding any consumer movement as “it will never happen” is living in denial, it will happen. No pro consumer action has ever failed once it picked up steam. And this one that’s asking to cable to provide a-la-carte packages is picking up a lot of steam. People just don’t want to pay anymore for something that they don’t want or even worse, paying for crap.
Cable is a government regulated industry and government is or (should be) regulated by the people. No politician will ever be crazy enough to take side with a business against the public outcry, that’s the very definition of political suicide. I’m not even putting religious or morality groups in this consumer movement, I’m not part of that demographic, but you can bet that they will jump on the bandwagon too and start telling their followers to start choosing only cable that they feel are morally acceptable. As you can see this will get very messy if cable executives don’t act and act soon. But executives are intelligent and not smart, they will not do anything until the situation is out of hand and the mandatory solutions will be ten time worse as if they would have taken a voluntary initiative to correct the problem.

One of the problems is not just you in particular, but you are the only one that I know with a programming philosophy of “let’s fill 24 hours of air time” not matter with what. I’m sure that you are not the only one. You would not have achieved the success that you have without full support of cable television managements and decision makers. This is a spreading disease among television executives who are isolating themselves from the people who’s paying their salaries. The public started realizing that they’ve been taken. And if they don’t know it yet, consumer’s groups will soon make them aware.

The reasoning given by the cable companies of why they have to provide these packages is as strong as thin ice and will melt away with a little heat, and there's a lot of heat coming their way. There are already several option offered of a-la-carte packaging on cables and satellites TV such as sport and movie packages as well as foreign language packages. The technology of customizing the packages is there, so whatever argument they come up with it will be quickly shot down.

Michael, you love to talk about technology, we all are, we always made a living with the latest technology. But did anyone stop and think of why there are there so many technologies available and in the making intended to replace traditional methods of how we watch television? Could it be that the public is tired of the way that television is being offered to them, could it be just as simple as reorganize a very successful business that has the capability of delivering the very best quality images by concentrating on the quality potential of that media instead of lowering the quality of the programming delivered to television in order to make the same programming accessible to other methods of delivery that currently is of considerably lower quality, is not perfected or not even here yet.

[Michaelrosenblum]

Nino
You could be right. No one really knows where this is headed, and even in the past, the best technologies did not always replace the poorer ones, as VHS v. Betamax clearly proved. You can only place your bets.

As deepthroad said in Watergate, follow the money, and if we do that, it all comes down to the advertising dollars that fuel the whole business. As long as cable providers are making a profit, they will continue to do what they do.. that is, so long as there are enough people to watch enough channels at a profitable point (deducting the costs of production) they will continue. Its like weeds. Where the number of channels outpaces the desire or ability of the audience to watch them, those channels will die, and no doubt, cable companies will replace the shelfspace with pay per view movies or something else.

The explosive growth of VOD on cable is probably an example of searching for alternative products, but between you and me, how many times have you ever gone into Discovery VOD and searched for a back edition of Guess Who's Coming to Decorate and watched it? For the most part, who cares? For the Sopranos, sure. But for most of the cable pap? I don't think so.

Which takes me back to your quality vs. quantity point at which point I have to say, I am not sure.

I would imagine that a spectrum would emerge, from very high end with great demand down to the 'Wooden Tennis Racket Maker" magazine niche. All profitable, just in varying degrees - and all carrying the same spectrum of quality, both production and editorial.

One thing I think is fairly sure is that the market will determine which way this goes, and the legislation will follow the market. Anything else is suicide.

[Hiding Under Here]

Viewing habits are changing because young people have been brought into a much different world than we, baby boomers, were. I don't think my family had a color television until the early 1970s. My children would freak out if all we had was one black and white TV available (in the kitchen no less) to watch in our house. So it is true that you cannot hold back technology. What you CAN do, is reduce the amount of hyperbole in your predictions for the future. And I think that's where you, Michael Rosenblum, take a lot of understandable and warranted criticism.

I'm not good at finding old posts. But I do know I wrote something back in the early VJ argument about the sales pitch aspect of it and how Mike was assasinating us, as a group, to make his point. Obviously many of the photographers on this board think Mike has opined that we are "obsolete". It's difficult to debate that claim. I don't know if anything like that was written. However, if it was, it's absurdness is obvious.If we were obsolete, we wouldn't be working. And if the prediction was that we would "become obsolete" well, that too is understandably controversial. Who can know such a thing with any certainty? And aren't you contributing to our demise by trumpeting our inevitable obsolescence?

For some reason, this issue reminds me of the argument around school vouchers. There are people who are convinced that privatizing much more of the American educational system by handing out vouchers will result in more people receiving a better education. Personally (and I do NOT want to debate this issue, it's an example only) I think that's an incredibly wrongheaded and silly idea. I believe you will kill the system and it will be crippled for generations afterwards. But how will you know unless you try it? It's the same thing with the VJs. If you sell it hard enough and it is adopted by station management eager to lower their bottom lines, and the end result is that the system is destroyed in some important way, is it the fault of the VJ concept? Or was the whole decline inevitable because the technological and cultural shifts were so great that they would have resulted in new paradigms anyway?

(Nino, if you're reading this, bear with me because I do have a point.)

This is why I ultimately support Michael Rosenblum. The system is going to be reconstructed ANYWAY. People on this board seem to think that Mike is motivating those seismic shifts. I disagree. I think Mike is merely a.) reacting to the inevtiable and b.) exploiting change for his own profit. Sure it'd be great if he'd tone down his rhetoric. People wouldn't get so upset. But what's really bugging us isn't that he's the prophet of our doom or even single-handedly capable of causing that demise. It's that he's saying that the way we define ourselves by doing what we do for a living is changing -- that we will HAVE to change. I think that scares people. This is a very very unstable and anxious business. Being freelancers, none of us has security. We have lived day to day, week to week, job to job for years. Speaking only for myself, it's a very scary way to live life. I wish things were more stable and secure. It would be a huge load off my mind not to have to worry about whether there will be enough work tomorrow. When someone puts a target on my back saying my extinction is inevitable......it's understandable that might cause concern.

The discussion here has to stay as proactive and positive as possible. People are looking for tools to stay viable. No one wants to read things that predict an end to the world as we know it. However, change is INEVITABLE. We also have to keep in mind that we will need to adapt in order to survive. So when messengers stop by and say things we might not want to hear, maybe it's incumbent upon us to tune out the anxious, negative components of their predictions and focus on the things that are more important to us.

[SimonW]

All I'll say is that audiences will always want to watch a good story.

[freedom]

I like to fish. So I've watched a few fishing shows over the years. There's one that runs on the local PBS station that is incredibly bad. Imagine watching some guy for 5+ minutes reeling in a fish; no jumping fish, no screeming reel, no nothing except standing there just reeling it in. Peppered, occasionally with some incredibly simplistic commentary. It was painful to watch, but the show keeps getting renewed.
There are a few really well produced fishing shows and quite a few nutty ones but this one is just plain terrible, but it keeps running.
So who's to say what will sell and what won't. I just have a hard time fathoming how there's any money to be made. I don't feel like shooting for minimum wage.

[Michaelrosenblum]

If you think its bad probably a lot of other people do also. Maybe the local PBS station is in the market for a replacement. Is it produced in house or is it acquisition. If its commissioned or acquired, you have an opening. Depends on a lot of issues, what is the budget, how is it apportioned? Is the show syndicated? Does it have sponsorship? But a little research could pay off. Is it weekly? Does it run 52 weeks or 26? Is it half hour?

Lets say, hypothetically, (and this is all supposition before you do the research), that it is a run of 26 at 30K per half hour. That is a total budget for the production run of 780k. If you could shoot it and edit it yourself, (with a little help), hire a researcher and an AP, charge for your own gear, your time, your office (home), you could probably eek out 200-300K for the series. Of course, this is all a lot of ifs and based on a lot... a lot of unknowns. But you can make a pretty good living out of it, if..... and I mean, there are lots of variables. But a good place to start is some basic research.
You already know you could make a better show. That's most of the problem solved already.

[Grip]

Hey speaking of fishing, nice bait Mike

I would of suggested the Mepps empowerment with a 900k spinner

But atleast its not the same ole jet-setter schtick.

And I see you are using a new chicken little scent trail.......

Can we make a reservation for one or two fake posters that are near to follow?


For those that have missed out, an insult is still an insult
no matter how nice you say it.

Go ahead and play nice, but some of us will not forget about your past here.

Did you ever pay to use this board for your advertising?

[Ed_Scott]

I do not know Rosenblum personally, but I think after reading his many post here, I get an understanding of where he is coming from. My hat is off to HUH for having a civil conversation with this guy.

Rosenblum rants about how he started this and that company, how he was a producer for CBS, how he produced all these shows for cable and basically puffs out this chest and tells everyone his d**k is bigger than yours. Big Fu**ing Deal.

We all know people that are insecure in this businesss and the only way they can get recognition is by telling you how good they are.
I've found the best shooters and producers in this business tend to not rant and rave about how good they are. They let the product speak for itself, which I greatly admire

I forgot where i was going with this...

Oh yea, Rosenblum is just another producer who you probably do not want to work for. We all have worked for them in the past, book a half-day, but try to squeeze in a full day of shooting. Probably try to skirt around any permit issues, yell at people in a public area to "shut up we are trying to shoot here", shows up in his Lexus but trys to get a cheap rate from the crew. And they will tell you how good they are, drop a name like Brokaw into a conversation that has nothing to do with Brokaw, etc. etc.

Mike, here is some advise, go about doing what you do but shut up about it. There is no need for you to gloat about your successes. We all know you have tapped the market of stations that are in last place. If you can turn them around, good for you. If you put people out of work, well, I guess you can sleep well at night knowing that.

As far as I'm concerned, unless the networks adopt your policy, or you start convincing the higher end productions they are wasting their money by shooting HD with a crew of four and you have a better method, you're just another salesman who thinks his product is better than anyone elses.

In five years, time will tell if you preached the future or sold ice to an eskimo, but between now and then, go about doing what you do, but stop gloating to the masses how good you are...because if you were really that good, you would not have to tell us.

[freedom]

MR posted..."That is a total budget for the production run of 780k".
Yea right, like a local PBS would pay that for this kind of Sh*t. From the looks of the show, their budget is more like $78 for the 26 episodes. As I said, I'm not shooting for minimum wage.

[Michaelrosenblum]

why dont you make a phone call and find out.

[Nino]

Michael I’m with you when it comes to follow the money trail, but I can’t figure how accurately this applies to cable TV. How is the viewership of this immensity of cable channels measured or rated so an advertiser can plan and budget for an advertising campaign. On broadcast TV there are ratings and that's how the cost of advertising is set. The last time that I was involved with cable TV the only available way was based on the number of subscribers, this was about 10 years ago, with the advances of technology I would think that cable companies can accurately track the viewership of each channel.

I’m also a bit confused on the ways that you budget your productions. I went thru this a few years back with you when I compiled a budget based on the information you gave us and on your methods of production and felt that your numbers were way off. I never got a reply.


Then you posted this just a few weeks ago:

__________________________________________________ _______
You say you can produce a really top quality 30 minutes for $30,000? Please show me the budgets. I don't understand how this can work.
Lets say you do the whole thing in 2 weeks. Questionable at best, but lets see. You find my 3K a week low? Lets pay you 5K per week? Fair? And remember, I supply the gear.

Camera - 2 weeks at 5,000 per week 10,000
including all gear
Edit 2 weeks at 5,000 per week 10,000
Producer 2 weeks at 3000 per week 6,000
Avid system rental 5,000
PAs and research 5,000
Travel and hotels 5,000
Rental cars and vans 2,500
Pro tools and audio mixing 2,500
Color correction and conform 5,000
Talent and/or narration 2,500
Phone, fax, fedex 1,500
Legal (errors and omission ins) 2,500
Production manager 2 wks @ 1500 3,000
Office rental 1,000
Tape stock 500
Resarch/writer 2,500
Graphics/open 2,500
Music rights/clearance 2,500

Sub total $69,500

Production fee 10% 6,950

TOTAL $76,450

This, of course, is very very rough. It is missing a lot. A lot! I must assume that during all your careful pre-production research people are being paid. Producers are on salary. Office, phone etc are being paid. Maybe you do pre-production site visits. I have no idea. How long do you post for? I assume the producers are paid during post. Why don't you share the budget for a high quality 29 minutes for 30K. I would be fascinated.
__________________________________________________ _______
Then you posted this a few days later
__________________________________________________ _______
I have never screwed anyone and I know that you get the best work when people are well paid and happy. But trust me, this is not an easy business. I like your idea of not working for anyone unless there is a realistic budget. I just told the Food Channel I would not produce their shows for less than $400,000 an hour. I told them that when they were ready to meet my price they could find me in front of my building - I would be the guy with the tin cup and the dog.
__________________________________________________ ______
Your budget above is for a 30 minute show, so let’s double that for a 60 minute show, now we have $152,900.00
Then you ask the Food Channel for $400,000.00 for an hour show, are you telling us that you generate a profit of $247,100.00 per each one hour show?

Or better yet, why the $400,000.00 budget?

I’m impressed but something is not right here.

I'm sure that if any of us would go ahead and contact cable companies with this sort of budgeting, I doubt that we would make it past the front door.

[focusthis]

Solo: Having seen quite a few budget commercials, I'd say that editing/post can make or break a spot more than just the shooting . If the client wants cheesy graphics, so be it, but damn, polish the GFX skilz.

Mike Rosenblum issue:Don't know / don't care.
BUT.....I strongly feel that B-Roll is a place where a spectrum of experience and opinion need to cross paths. As a consumer and contributor to this board, I'm not looking for soap opera drama. I don't need to read D900 circle jerks, either. MR posted his $.02, and that's great. If someone has a problem with a personality or content, PM them about it. If you want to call bull$hit about MR, then PM Solo with your thoughts.



Just answer Solo's question already.

[freedom]

Focus
This is a conversation and conversations often jump off on tangents. I do think I and others have answered Solo's question and some of the answers have spawned the tangents. That's the way it is around here. This is another tangent! And, here's another tangent...can you explain 'D900 circle jerks' (OK, I've heard of circle jerks but not D900 circle jerks)?
Thanks

[Michaelrosenblum]

Nino
The 400K comment for food channel was meant to be ironic. The food channel does not pay 400K per show. They are more in the range of 80-175 for an hour... depending on what it is, of course. Budgets are a function of what is on the screen and the networks and cable channels are very aware of what stuff costs and budget or allow budgets accordingly. If you are interested, I am happy to walk you through a variety of scenarios, but here is the bottom line.

If you can pitch and sell a series (and I dont see why you can't), you can write yourself in for several budget lines at the same time. ie, EP, writer, camera, camera rental, edit, edit rental and production fee. You can also offset your office expenses, phones, car and so on.

The range for cable (lets say midrange and not HBOs), is anywhere from 25k for a half hour up to 250 for an hour for Discovery. (of course there is stuff below and above those). They purchase, once you get past pilot, in lots of 13 generally for hours and 26 or 52 for halves. This is why I was intrigued by the local PBS show.

There is money to be made in creating and producing the product as well as in working for someone else, generally more.

[freedom]

MR
Regarding the fishing show, you do understand what I mean by LOCAL PBS? This show airs in one large city and the surrounding area of that state and does not ever get picked up by any other market or by the national PBS. If they pitched it to Corp. for Public Broadcasting they'd get laughed out of the room.

[Michaelrosenblum]

There is still a budget and a production cost for everything. I understand it is terrible. There is lots of terrible television on the air. That only gives you an opening to seize the budget and prove you can do a better job. Nothing happens for free, ..especially at PBS. Trust me, I started as a producer at WNET/13 in NY. The budgets were incredibly fat. I understand this is not NY, but never the less, someone is spending money here, and probably not very well. Certainly not very well for what is on the air. Even if they are spending 20K a half hour (and that is really really low), and even if they are doing a run of 13, its still a quarter million dollars going to someone. Why not you if you think you can deliver better for the money. Is this working for peanuts? Again, not if you are doing the shooting and editing and prouducing. You keep the lions share... in fact, you earn it. My guess is if you are in a moderately large market the budgets are in fact much higher. Get a meeting with the head of programming at the station and poke around. I am sure they also would like to upgrade the quality of their shows and one day actually feed into the CPB system.

Nino. I realized I did not answer your question on ratings. Cable also gets ratings and every show I have ever produced I get overnights on them. The numbers are small but believe me, the cablecasters pay attention. A 1.0 on cable is genius. a .1 is more like what most of the shows get. Translates to 90,000 households. Remember they repeat the stuff over and over. To put this in perspective, Tina Brown on MSNBC (I think) gets about 24,000 viewers. The shows earn next to nothing. For something like TLC, which pulls 1.0 or better, that is 900.000 households and remember they pay for the show once and air it again and again and again. I have watched shows on cable I made ten years ago... still airing. You cant do that with news.

[Nino]

Freedom, I have worked on several fishing shows (and I don’t know a thing about fishing) some were well done but most were real dogs. All of them were syndicated shows, the sponsor(s) paid for the program and the stations run it on a barter system. The station gets the program for nothing and they make money by selling advertising space. I’m not sure how a public station will handle it because I don’t think they sale advertising but I would be very surprised if they paid for the program. See if at the beginning and at the end and sometime in between they have the “brought to you by…” or “sponsored by….” and see if they have the same sponsor on all the shows.

[circle7]

I'm glad to see Walter G. check in here, too. The pot always needs stirring.

[Nino]

(Nino, if you're reading this, bear with me because I do have a point.)

This is why I ultimately support Michael Rosenblum. The system is going to be reconstructed ANYWAY. People on this board seem to think that Mike is motivating those seismic shifts. I disagree. I think Mike is merely a.) reacting to the inevtiable and b.) exploiting change for his own profit. Sure it'd be great if he'd tone down his rhetoric. People wouldn't get so upset. But what's really bugging us isn't that he's the prophet of our doom or even single-handedly capable of causing that demise. It's that he's saying that the way we define ourselves by doing what we do for a living is changing -- that we will HAVE to change. I think that scares people. This is a very very unstable and anxious business. Being freelancers, none of us has security. We have lived day to day, week to week, job to job for years. Speaking only for myself, it's a very scary way to live life. I wish things were more stable and secure. It would be a huge load off my mind not to have to worry about whether there will be enough work tomorrow. When someone puts a target on my back saying my extinction is inevitable......it's understandable that might cause concern.


Tom, changes have been happening in this business since the day this business was invented. Let’s look back at our careers and just think about all the changes that we went thru.
It’s a constant change and we have to keep reinventing ourselves to stay ahead of the game. We’ve been doing it with such habitual regularity that we don’t even realize that we are doing it.

I always welcomed changes both technologically and in the methods that we conduct business; I was never worried about competition, it actually motivates me and forced me to constantly improve myself, in the business world competition is good, it’s the best motivator.

Let’s go back 10 to 15 years. On most assignments we had a grip truck, a generator, gaffers and grips, a tent for the caterer with food and refreshments and an army of people some of which I never really figured out why they were there for. When was last time we had all those things? We have gradually adapted to a different way of doing business and the only reason for the changes is money. Technology actually has allowed production to be done with lower budgets. The absence of all those goodies we once had did not result to a degradation of our work. Actually today when I look at the work that I did back then, I can see my work being considerably better now even without all those resources. It could be attributed to experience or technology but also today we have more responsibilities for the work that we do, we have to wear more hats than ever before but that also give us more control of what we do, and frankly having my hand on everything I like it a lot better. The main difference in today production compared to what we did in the past is that we have eliminated waste and have become increasingly more efficient in the way we do things.

Technology unquestionably has allowed us to do a better job. Editing is just one example of new technology helping our business. As I have also returned to do editing after a long absence I’m amazed at the things that I can do today that 10 years ago would have been cost prohibitive. The downside of this is that yesterday we had editors, skilled technicians who knew the aesthetic of assembling a program, there are some of those left but for the most today we have computer wiz kids that know which button to push but have no clue of why.

Changes are inevitable but they must always lead toward improvements. Not once ever was technology used to degrade quality, until now that is. What Michael has been doing is not progress, is regress. Michael has not created something new, he did not introduce some sort of unique shooting technique or a new form of art. Michael’s only reasoning for that sort of stuff is cost saving; well? We’ve seen and heard about those budgets from him, where’s the saving. Many of the projects that I’m hired to do have budgets lower than those, but yet even with lower budgets the quality of the production is infinitely superior to the stuff that he puts out. Actually smart producers who have low budgets to deal with, will hire the best people they can because they know that the production will be more efficient and less wasteful and they’ll be able to provide the best quality within the limited resources.

I always said it that Michael is a super salesman, an innovator; boy I wish I had some of his talents but I don’t, I’m at the creative end of the business and will not cross that line, I know my limitations. In reality what Michael has been doing he's been using his unique talents to actually move quality backward instead of forward, thinks about that, what a waste of talents.
He has to start planning those shows like real productions and start getting somebody that knows what they are doing technically and aesthetically and most important get some content into those shows. What a dream team that would make.

[Hiding Under Here]

Nino, I have worked only very infrequently on shoots with the catering services that you desrcibe. But your point is true, the days of big-budget television are over.

Personally, I don't think my work is as good as it used to be. Why? Because the stories aren't as strong. Having a good story to shoot made me a better photographer because I worked hard to translate what I was seeing into pictures. The more connected I am to my work, the better I feel about doing it. If anything, I am more confident now than I was at the start or the middle of my career. I can solve just about any problem, shoot in virtually any style, satisfy my clients. I seek to do the best work I can day in and out. I never, ever, mail it in.

The big differences between today's production environment and yesteryear's are all the result of money (there's less of it) and choice (more of it). Also, the in past, there simply weren't as many people runnign around calling themselves television production crews. People didn't have ready access to high-end production equipment and the learning process was more difficult to access. Now a kid in college can shoot with a MiniDV camera and edit on Final Cut Pro and he/she knows far far more about video than I ever could have. There are college graduates who get out of school and want to start out as freelancers. How crazy is that? A freelancer used to be somebody with skills and experience. Not some green college kid.

Mike Rosenblum wouldn't be able to do what he does if there wasn't a market for it. His entrepreneurial experience is valuable to have. Unfortunately he seems to have assasinated his credibility by trying to explain why TV photographers will be extinct in the coming years. Those dual roles -- critic and participant -- limit his credibility here. My argument for him is that, to whatever extent he is correct, it's good for people to have access to someone who knows how to sell a finished product. Freelancers work for other people. You know "we don't make 'em up, we just make 'em". Well, Mike makes 'em up. That's a key component in the chain Anyone who is interested in persuing that aspect of the business can write to Mike and he'll respond. That makes him a resource in my book. The other stuff? The controversial stuff? Honnestly, I don't pay all that much attention to it. I argued with Mike as ardently as anyone at this board when he first came here. Then I let it go. I've got things to do and reading someone who says I'm doomed isn't one of them. Staying vital, remaining viable is important to me. That's why I stop in here -- to read what other people are thinking about, how they are approaching the challenges that face all of us. I'm very satisfied being a member of this community and I respect all points of view. I loved the back and forth you were engaging in with Mike. The high visitor count to this thread shows I am not alone.