Welcome to the Open Forum for Motion Design Standards of Practice!
This open, collaborative site aims at establishing standards of practice for employers and employees in the motion design industry, including freelance animators, designers, art directors, and visual effects artists.
The site's goals include:
- creating an organized repository of best practices for motion design employers and employees.
- providing practical tips for freelancers and contract artists.
- establishing and discussing ethical and professional standards for the motion design industry.
This site's success depends on focused, mature contributions that raise the level of professionalism for the entire motion design industry. Any content that is not in accord with these goals will be respectfully removed.
At the moment, the site is focused on standards of practice in the United States, but we hope that with your input it can be expanded to include markets around the world.
Adding and Editing Content
As the site evolves, new pages and areas will be added. For now, most of the content is contained on this single page. The initial content was adapted from this document.
To learn how to write and format text, see this page.
Best Practices for Freelancers (United States)
Booking Confirmation
A booking comfirmation is a legally binding document that aims to protect individuals as well as companies by alleviating any confusion during the temporary hiring process. By confirming this document verbally or by text, both parties agree to the terms stated within.
Here is an example booking confirmation email:
Please confirm this agreement by replying “CONFIRMED”
EMPLOYER INFO: Name: Address:
DURATION:
HOURLY RATE: [Rate per hour up to 8 working hours in a day excluding lunch.]
DAILY RATE: [Rate per day defined at XX total hours.]
OVERTIME RATE: All rates based on an 8hr day with 1 hour lunch included. All rates based on an 10am-7pm day with 1 hour lunch included.
OVERTIME = regular hourly rate * X for up to 8 hours excluding lunch
OVERTIME*2 = regular hourly rate *XX for any additional hours past 12 hours in a day or after 4 hours of work on the 7th consecutive day (in accordance with California law).
EXAMPLE #2 (This was modified with California State Laws in mind, but you can easily swap out CA for your State and / or Country):
Please confirm this agreement by replying “CONFIRMED”
• NAME OF FREELANCER: • COMPANY NAME (IF applicable): • DATE:
EMPLOYER INFO: Name: Address: DURATION:
WORK TO BE PERFORMED:
HOURLY RATE: $XX.XX [Rate per hour up to eight (8) working hours in a day excluding lunch.]
DAILY RATE: $XXX.XX [Rate per day defined at eight (8) total hours.] Guaranteed minimum.
OVERTIME RATE: All rates based on an eight (8) hour day with one (1) hour lunch included. All rates based on a 10am-7pm day with one (1) hour lunch included.
OVERTIME(1) = regular hourly rate of $XX.XX x 1.5, for a total of $XX.XX per hour. Overtime (1) rate is “time and half” for the first four (4) hours after eight (8), based on the hourly rate of $XX.XX of an eight (8) hour day including lunch.
OVERTIME(2) = regular hourly rate of $XX.XX x 2 for a total of $XXX.XX per hour. Overtime (2) rate is “double time” for any additional hours past twelve (12) hours in a day or after four (4) hours of work on the seventh (7th) consecutive day (in accordance with California law); based on the hourly rate of $XX.XX of an eight (8) hour day including lunch.
Cancellations, Unscheduled Down Time, Kill Fee, Pay or Play: Booked time that is cancelled is subject to a minimum cancel / kill fee of 50% of remaining booked hours. Booked time that is used to prevent a challenge cannot be cancelled. It will be billed for the entire booking. Kill Fee: 50-100% of remaining booked hours.
Payroll, Invoicing and Payment: *If work is to be conducted on-site under employer's supervision with employer's equipment, between specific times, then compensation is to be paid under W-2 / I-9 in accordance with Federal and State laws regarding employee / temporary employee / contractor classification. Invoice to paycheck under W-2 / I-9 shall be no more than two weeks in accordance with CA State timely payment laws.* Otherwise all invoices for work that truly falls under independent contractor classification will be billed weekly, due upon receipt, with thirty (30) days to pay in full under California State Law. Invoices not paid within thirty (30) days shall accrue an interest of 5% per week. Compensation shall not be processed through a third party Employer of Record Service where the freelance employee must pay a service fee and / or employer tax contributions.
All bookings and terms will be “confirmed” by employer before work commences. No other agreement shall make or hold these terms invalid.
Employment Status
For more info, see "Independent Contractor (Self-Employed) or Employee?" on the IRS website.
If you are incorporated with associated Federal ID you can legally accept a W-9 as an outside contractor as opposed to a W-2.
Holds and Booking
Holds
If requesting my services for specific dates you can request to have dates set aside or put “On-Hold”. Alternatively, you can simply Book (aka “Firm” or “Buy”) the dates to assure the service/dates are reserved with no challenge.
First Holds
A ‘First Hold’ is considered a tentative booking. A tentative booking will be put on first hold at your request. When you’ve decided to confirm or release your date(s) please contact me immediately.
Second Holds
If there is a first hold and you are interested in those dates you can place a second hold. If first hold cancels I’ll contact you and offer you the date(s), which must be confirmed or released.
Challenge to the Hold (Buying Out)
If you want to Book/buy date(s) that another Client has on a First Hold, you can “Challenge” that First Hold Client upon confirmation that you will Book the date(s) immediately if the first hold releases the date(s). The First-Hold Client now has the option to either Book or Release the First-Hold. I will make every effort to contact the First-Hold Client regarding the dates challenged by 2nd Client seeking to Buy Time. However, if there is no response by First-Hold Client after 24 hours of my initial attempt of contact, I can sell any dates they have on On Hold.
Confirmed Booking (Bought Time)
Booked Time may not be Re-scheduled without penalty fee. The fee varies depending on project and should be agreed to in advance.
On Call Time
If agreed upon by the freelancer, he/she will be within range of the designated workplace for a day, but until called in will be free to do as he/she wishes. If called in, the freelancer should be able to work within a reasonable amount of time and is entitled to his/her full day rate. However if the freelancer is not called in, he/she is entitled to half his/her day rate.
Cancelations (Unscheduled Down Time, Kill Fee, Pay or Play)
Booked Time that is canceled is subject to cancel/kill fee. The cancel fee varies depending on project.
Booked time that is used to prevent a challenge can not be canceled. It should pay amount for entire booking.
Invoicing and Payment
Payroll
Unless otherwise agreed upon, the standard time from invoice to paycheck for W-2 workers/Employees should be consistent with state mandated timely payment laws. In most states this means not less than bi-weekly.
Depending on company Account Payable procedures W-9/Corporations should agree upon payment schedule upon hire date.
Invoice Paid Upon Receipt
Invoice shall accrue an interest of 5% per week if not paid within 30 days.
Proposed Topics for Further Development
Discussion
as cool as this is it's a bit one sided. what happens if your the boss and you hire a new guy that sucks. i've had freelancers hrs late because they had a hangover. this was in the middle of the week. i generally won't agree to a kill fee. but i try to treat them fairly. my 2 cents GT
@Greg, If you have an artist that was late, that hour should be deducted from his salary, period. You should have qualified people that always ask for references and reel breakdowns. If the artist is late and it is a repeated offense you are within your right to let that artist go, granted you have informed him and warned him. A kill fee is hard since, jobs get awarded from one day to another. However, I think this opens up the conversation for the producers. Producers should be able to handle clients properly so they can plan their schedules accordingly. A kill fee should be required only in an extreme case where a long booking comes to an end early, since that puts the freelancer at a disadvantage.
Exactly. A kill fee is not to be confused with a “firing fee.”
Kill fees should be enforced on 'bought' time, when a freelancer has already turned down other work in order to take the job which now ends earlier than expected. This is not the same as a producer deciding to let someone go because they are unprofessional, come in late or can't do the work which they've been assigned in a timely manner.
I will have several comments on this topic in the near future. As an artist in this industry for close to 15 years, I've seen its many ups and downs. However the last few years it seems like the industry has become less artist friendly. I've watched wages come down to what they were 3 years ago and it is not all due to the economy. Most of us attribute it to the start up of so many small studios all fishing for the same jobs from the client. In order to be awarded the job, they undercut other studios with promises of shorter turn around time and lower budgets. This unfortunately trickles down to the artist. And a lot of studios would rather hire three rookie artists at a rock bottom rate as opposed to a veteran artist at a higher rate.
Somehow the studios try to convince themselves that this is a way to get more work done for cheap, which means they can meet their timeline/budget. But time and time again, myself and other more veteran artists get the call in the last week of the project to come in and fix/problem solve the project. And the fixes are almost always things that should have been dealt with in pre-production (which tends to be non-existent with these shorter production schedules).
Anyway, I could go on for quite a while on this topic (artist/studio relationship). 15 years you see the good/great studios doing it 100% right, and you also see the bad/horrible studios doing it so far beyond wrong that it can make you sick.
I'll end this short novel (part 1) with a comment to greg. It is completely unacceptable for an artist to show up not ready to give a 100%. And there is no reason to even consider a kill fee for that.
However the “being late” opens up a can of worms for many studios. Because a high percentage of studios hire artists as independent contractors. And legally an independent contractor is actually considered an 'employee' if he/she is told a specific time to arrive and leave work.
There is a list of things that a lot of studios tend to overlook in order to pay artists as independent contractors so that they can save on paying all those extras (social security, 15% of the artists taxes). Fees which the artist has to pick up.
In any business, whether it's the guy who was hired to build a deck on your house or an artist hired to create 3d elements for a movie/commercial, they are legally considered an independent contractor when the person/studio hiring them has given them a definition of what they need to do to consider the job complete and a timeline as to when the job needs to be complete.
How that deck builder or artist goes about doing that job is his choice as an independent contractor. If he has 3 weeks to get the job done, he can choose to not work for the first week and then bust his butt for the next two weeks. As long as the job gets done he is good.
However, if that deck builder/artist is told he has to work every day for the next three weeks and he/she has to show up between specific times and has to go to an office/site and use tools other then his own, well then this turns that independent contractor into an employee.
I bring this up because some of the bad studios pay artist as independent contractors while treating them like employees (trying to get the best of both worlds). And as an artist this becomes a problem when the studios take 60-90 days to pay, or refuse to pay at all, or argue with an artist who bills the studio for overtime pay for working 10 15/hour days in a row. There are some studios that feel even though you agreed on a day rate (for a 10 hour day) that the 5 hours each day beyond that agreed upon day rate should somehow not have to be compensated for because it's just comes with the territory.
I think this is all a touchy subject and needs to be discussed among the masses so that it's not such a mysterious/taboo topic. CG work is one of the few jobs within this industry (tv/film) that does not have any kind of set standard or union affiliation. And sometimes it works just fine the way it is. But unfortunately with so many studios opening up trying to undercut one another just to get the jobs, it's more often that any and all 'unspoken' rules just don't get followed and turn what should be a fun/creative experience into something quite the opposite.
I can assume most of us … artist or studio owners … got into this industry because we wanted to create amazing eyecandy and work in cool environments surrounded by fun and creative people. And there are still a handful of studios that still live up to this. But the hundreds of other studios that are just treading water, and fighting to survive seem only to care about making enough money to stay in business for another month. And in that situation it hardly tends to be what could be considered a creative/enjoyable experience.
Sorry for the rant. But I look forward to seeing more educated and informed discussion on this topic. I hope this doesn't turn into an artist vs. studio discussion. And in the end I hope this helps lead artists and studios to some kind of common ground that is fair for all. One in which the artist is respected for his years of continuous training and the studio is appreciated for its reputation for quality work and its creative work environment.
I would really like it if the end result of this venture was an organized, step-by-step document (pdf or pre-printed), that takes you through each point in the booking, project, billing and payment cycle process.
Great idea, Arlan! Let's write that up …
So, here's the question, literally, how do we assemble such a document? Ideally it would correspond to a site (this site, perhaps) with all the relevant documents (deal memos, contracts, collection letters, etc.) as editable text or Word templates.
I might also suggest, a la AICP, some kind of graphics budget templates as well. Lately I've been on a quest to eliminate producer costs, and thus, I've been doing all my budgets as well as my scheduling, contracts and all the rest. I must say, it's been pretty liberating. It would be good if we could give everyone the same set of tools that we've been building for the last few years.
This would be marvelous, Arian. It seems that any way towards building a standardized document is bound to be imperfect for the community as a whole, but it's a start. Could you post what you use as a Google Doc and let us edit it and make versions until we can Frankenstein something together that works for most of us. Really, it doesn't have to be you who posts it, anyone could. Really, everyone should. Then we could collectively cut and paste until we build something solid. It would be a great starting point.
I'd be happy to start, but all I have is my invoice form. So I am obviously one of the individuals who would benefit from this.
So, I'm sharing (you'll have to copy and paste) a set of Google Docs with the group.
Standard Service Contract:
http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AfqZzYp63aW7ZGZnc3N2ZmpfMGdwajl3dmZu&hl=en
Collection Letter - Initial Attempt
http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AfqZzYp63aW7ZGZnc3N2ZmpfMTBmZ3FrZm1jdw&hl=en
Collection Letter - Second Attempt
http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AfqZzYp63aW7ZGZnc3N2ZmpfMjhnMnc2MzYy&hl=en
Collection Letter - Third Attempt
http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AfqZzYp63aW7ZGZnc3N2ZmpfNmQ2dHJtamZr&hl=en
If people find this stuff valuable, I can post my budget template and deal memo stuff as well.
Arian, thank you very much. And thank you for explaining some of the clauses as well - it makes it read a bit more like english and a little less like stereo instructions.
Does anyone else have anything to compare/contrast to this?
Adrian, That's a great list of documents. I think we all should gather up the whole enchilada of docs that freelancers/small studio owners need.
A few that I can think of off the top of my head would be: - Example of proposal and/or SOW - Examples of invoices (a proper/good looking invoice has value in my opinion)
What else do we have in our arsenal of documents that would be helpful to share and learn from?
I added a topic in the “Proposed Topics for Further Development” area called “Booking Through Payment and Collections Overview”. It's sort of a broad outline for whatever our final document and supporting material could be.
Finally we people that work with computer graphics in general are tending to be more organised. I think there's a myth about “I am just an artists and i hate bureaucracy / paperwork ”. I've seen many people from 20's to 60's complaining “ohh this or that studio is really bad, “artist unfriendly”, unfair, doesn't pay , I been very unlucky…Well of course there's always people with bad intentions but… As soon as we realise that we are running a business like every other one, and we should be well structured legally we will be treated with more respect. If you come up with some sort of paper just before the job starts it shows that 1. You are not for jokes or for time wasting. 2 You are really confident in your work and in your business. 3 You are probably a responsible person that cares and respects your profession. We have to be artists and business people at the same time, this is the key for a successful career I reckon.If you don't know how to do it just get inspiration from simple business around the corner. A good example could be restaurants. You got the menu at the door.They put clear their conditions beforehand.If you didn't like the food for a good reason you got the right to refuse it or change it. But if you ate almost everything , drunk all the wine and don`t agree with prices…you probably will spend a night in prison if you don't want to pay in full the bill. The same with mobile phones companies, cable tv, banks…and endless examples. Make sense?
This is a great resource and I'm lovin' the wiki style. I've started a page on 'showing work', I'd be interested in some folks to flesh it out a bit more.
Great idea indeed. But… I've been working in this industry for a VERY long time and have experienced studios that have been great to work with, and some not so great. But as many of you have said, this is a touchy topic. In California, where I am, this is state law (someone telling you what to do with their equipment classifies you as an actual employee). I've been on both sides from running a small motion graphics company to getting back into freelance recently, so I've kind of seen both sides. 'Union' you say? Maybe, if need be. But I guess that depends on where you've worked and what nightmares you've had. If you've been chained to a desk working until 2am every night for 2 weeks then.. “YES, UNION!” Overtime rocks! Ka-Ching! But, if you've worked in a studio that has their sh*t together and maybe between your renders you are playing Wii, or surfing the net, or what ever, then.. “NO, UNION!” I fortunately have been in the later environment, so my perspective may be out of whack for the rest of you. I have found a couple studios that I can work my butt off at, find that time between renders to mingle or what ever, and get out at a 'reasonable hour'. It's the sweat shops that give the bad rap. You know who you are! I'm a bit older than my respectable freelance colleagues, so you may not find me chatting, Facebooking, or Twittering during the day! Ugh! But if I was back running a studio again and it was now UNION, all the computers in the studio would have all that social networking apps DELETED. I'd be cracking the whips harder then ever. “Go have your half hour lunch, but I'm watching the clock!” My 2 1/2 cents.
I understand what you are saying Charles, but most of us didn't get into this industry to play Wii and chat with friends online all day. We are here to make great work and inspire great work in others. There is inevitably going to be down-time during a job while waiting for renders or waiting for approvals - but I would happily break my back for 8 solid hours a day, knowing that I could go home at night - or get paid for extra time worked. I think the main argument here is about a lack of standards for pay, hours, and accountability. That is felt on all sides from the clients to the studios and then to the employees. Of course there are Studios who have good and bad reputations (Freelancers do as well), but we should all be held to fair standards of practice. It can't be one sided.
To know that there would be a fair and acceptable set of standards for the studios, employers and the freelancers would be a tremendous relief! I would trade checking email any day to know that.
Time should be taken to go through the Graphic Artist Guild Handbook for Pricing and Ethical Guidelines and applying those practices here in this forum as well. I'll plan to make time to do so for some of those proposed further topics for discussion.
My feeling is that this type of page has never been created nor taught formally by anyone in this industry before. If there are any issues with any of these practices by anyone in this industry this should be the place to work those out. I've already spoken to people who disagree with this page but who have not and possibly will not contribute to the dialogue by statign publicly here why they disagree. And for that reason I find issue with their claims and their inability to provide transparency in a public forum such as this. This page could be the start of a “revolution” of sorts. I don't see why we shouldn't be able to append this URL to any initial conversation with potential client leads for work. Send this URL along with a required agreed response as a preemptive contract deal. I don't see how this should be inappropriate as again nothing like this has been offered to us in the industry before.
I'm not sure what there is to disagree with, really. I guess my attitude has become, after getting burned time and time again, is that I'm not even going to have these conversations anymore. Basically, “these are my terms, if you don't like them, I don't have to take your project”. At the end of the day, if it's a choice between taking a job that's going to cause me stress because I'm being mistreated or not getting paid or I'm losing money, and not taking such a project, I'd rather just not take the project.
I can't speak for anyone else in the business, nor do I presume to. What I will say is that when you cross the line and start demanding that your clients treat you like a professional, guess what? They start treating you like a professional. Funny how that works.
Yes, there is a flip side to all this. It's contingent on you to conduct yourself in as professional a manner as you demand to be treated. So there's that.
I would love to see younger people coming into this industry armed with a set of standards like what we're proposing. The first benefit would be that they won't get taken advantage of the way we sometimes have been. The second, less tangible benefit might be that we can stabilize some of the economic slide we've been experiencing for the last few years.
Hey Cameron, I think if you feel the need to send the URL to this site along on any job related emails, then by all means go ahead, not that you need my permission or anyone else's for that matter.
However, you don't have to justify sending a booking confirmation and / or wanting and expecting to operate according to the law when it comes to over time compensation and employee classification.
In my opinion, trying to justify standards of practice such as these just infers that somehow you are wrong in utilizing these practices or that they are debatable. You are not wrong for wanting to utilize these standards of practice and thus operate in accordance with the law and they are not debatable for that same reason. For that matter, with regard to booking confirmations, over time and correct employee classification, no one utilizing these standards of practice is wrong or in the wrong, nor should anyone have to justify or debate such standards and practice with any potential employer.
I can think of more than a few people who I would (make an educated) guess have a problem(s) with this site too and the obvious reason they have a problem with it is because they don't want to pay people over time or employer taxes and they've been operating that way since day one.
Furthermore, they don't want new people or even not so new people in the industry to become aware of better business practices such as using booking confirmations and making over time and correct classification a part of those terms. Nor do they want them to become aware of the actual laws on the books regarding over time and employee classification.
In short, the reason being is because they don't want the freelance pool to start to use these standards of practice in mass, because it will inhibit them from continuing to break the law to their advantage regarding over time and employer taxes.
All that said, the laws being what they are, there is nothing to debate as far as justification is concerned, on the part of those using the standards of practice here thus far.
Beyond the employment law issues, there's another aspect to all this that got thrown into pretty drastic relief for me during this recession.
Last year I took a long-term project from a client I'd normally had a really good relationship with. Unbeknownst to me, this client was having very serious cash-flow problems, like teetering on the brink of bankruptcy problems. Suffice it to say, while the client didn't go bankrupt and did eventually pay me, it took many months, and not without a lot of stress on my part. Also, unfortunately, a permanent souring of what had been a good working relationship resulted as well.
What this threw into stark relief for me was that without even rudimentary contractual protections, if a client goes belly-up, you are out of luck. And we all know, smaller studios especially, can be here-today, gone-tomorrow.
My main goal in adopting these types of practices has been to avoid a repeat of this occurrence. A deal memo, followed by a simple service contract, and then, if the client is being difficult about payment, a paper-trail proving repeated, formal attempts to collect the debt will give you a formal claim should the client actually go under and file for bankruptcy. If you follow these steps, you might actually see some of that money…someday.
I had an idea that identifying businesses and freelancers who, “value” these trade practices could be used as a great visual indicator. For example using a logo which could be downloaded here to be placed on ones website could be a great tool as such. I think other questions arise like how valid would it be and who should have access to it as such. I think if we go down that road in “legitimising” this organization as a proper one then the next logical step I'd think would be to put together a proper “board member roster” that could be elected to handle certain tasks such as certifiing businesses and freelancers as conforming to these trade practices. The whole point would be to function as a visual indicator, for me, anyway to see really quickly that a business values and conforms to these standards. If they don't then it's my choice to do business with them or not and vice versa.
Cameron: Good idea. I tried organizing something like this a year or so back, called the Motion Graphic Designers' Organization. It sort of fizzled, but could be revived, reinstated or expanded. A board and membership qualifications towards a professional organization (like AIGA) could help lots of the independent artists out quite a bit …
Bran: as you know, I've long been interested in something like this. But I think the key is that can't be three or four people trying to pull the whole thing together. I'm certainly willing to lend my experience and expertise to this, but we really need for other people to step up to the plate as well. You know?
I posted a bunch of stuff here a couple weeks ago, and I have a lot more I can throw into the mix, but since I put my stuff up, no one has added to it. The great thing about a Wiki is that anyone can contribute. If everyone on here threw an hour or two into this over the next couple weeks, we could make serious progress. So how do we get people motivated?
we should totally adopt that effort here. Use your logo, incorporate all that. It's a good thing that the over 975 views so far are attacting so many contributions to this site :) (sarcasm) I woulda thought some folks would've watched/listened to some of those vfx townhall meeting things and realised that there are many similar issues we face and maybe as with that industry, the real change starts with us as individuals, as freelancers. I think what the schools could teach the new crop is to stand up for you rights as a worker. Final Exams would include basic US Labour Laws and Industry Standards and Practice as listed here. Keyframes are cool but not being taken advantage of is kinda cooler I think anyway. Come on peoples lets act like we care about our long term. On a side note I was reviewing other similar industries trade organisations for inspiration and possible acting models for reference on how to better structure our own. I came across a really organised one in the UK that reps Illustrators, http://www.theaoi.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=25&Itemid=39 They have a tight mission statement as well as our US version http://societyillustrators.org/about/mission/index.cms those could be a place to start in constructing our own. We could begin by composing our own rough draft of such a mission statement using theirs as examples. The same could be done with any Union site.
I hear you Arlan. And yes, that's why MGDO fizzled as well. Too much extra work for me to take on on my own. I'll try to delve into your docs and add some more to the wiki as I can …
AOI is a great model I think, Cameron. I've looked at their site and mission a lot. Nice.
Bran, look specifically at this entry I started: http://www.motiondesignpractices.org/booking_through_payment_and_collections_overview
This, or something like it, gives us a good sort of organizing structure. Then we can fill in the various blanks as we go. I know a good deal about some of those topics I listed, but certainly not all, so those would good places for others to contribute.
I was thinking too of reaching out to the Freelancers Union, which I belive Bran you mentioned you might of already done? Maybe not? I wanted to consult their crew about the steps they took and what advice they can share in our journey to formalise this organisation. http://www.freelancersunion.org/ I might even consult my friend who is a member of the Steele Workers Union and ask him about his Union for suggestions and other info that might be helpful.
I've researched the history of Labour Movements http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_unions_in_the_United_States and came to the AFL-CIO http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AFL-CIO which overseas virtually all Unions in the US and internationally. http://www.aflcio.org/aboutus/oi/main.cfm I found that their office headquarters are down the street from where I'm freelancing. I approached their offices and am scheduling to meet with a “Organizing Director” who apparently can provide me (us) with step-by-step instructions on setting this up formally. If your interested in learning more call them up directly 202-637-6200. Hopefully I can meet with them by next week. I'll keep this post updated.
OK so after discovering that the main organisation who would help organize this union for Motion Graphics Artists/Designers would be the IATSE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Alliance_of_Theatrical_Stage_Employes http://www.iatse-intl.org The man I spoke with there, who was extremely nice and helpful, and who goes to visit workers in helping them get a union in place is Daniel Ditolla 212-730-1771 in NYC. http://www.iatse-intl.org/leader/bios/dditolla.html Their East Coast NYC office is: IATSE-PAC East Coast 1430 Broadway, 20th Floor New York, New York 10018
Their West Coast office is: IATSE-PAC West Coast 10045 Riverside Drive Toluca Lake, CA 91602 818-980-3499
As I understand it so far the way this will work is as follows.
1.) Get a shop/studio/network workers (mographers, editors, cameramen, and other studio employees) to agree to wanting to have union representation. (You need 60% of the staff to agree to this.) 2.) Call the NYC or LA office telling them you have 60% of the staff agreed to being represented. 3.) They send you a form/card to sign as a petition for a Union.
Once you have a shop/studio/network unionized then anytime a staff employee or freelance/independent contractor comes to work at that location they must join the union (pay fees) in order to work and be represented by such union.
Interestingly I saw this job posting on motionographer the other day and in it you'll see 'Local IATSE union members will be considered' as a requirement. http://motionographer.com/jobs/job/2340/freelance-graphic-designer-fox-broadcasting-company-at-fox-broadcasting-company/
Fox as I understand it is one of the big names that has already come into IATSE union representation.
With enough of these places represented then as a freelancer/independent contractor you could find out which studios were represented by the IATSE union and choose to either work with or not work with those studios.
The point of all this as I understand it is to have a union represent our industry and be able to negotiate through a bargaining agreement with the studio for better standards/conditions in the workplace. These standards/conditions and other terms would include the ones listed on this site and others that we (as union members) would deem worthwhile:
As listed above: Legal Representation; Copyright and Work-for-Hire; Job Titles; Better Insurance Options (United States); Overtime compensation; Common Pay Rates (formalised payscale?); Showing Work (Credits); Booking Through Payment and Collections Overview; Speculative Work Issue; Unpaid Pitching; Booking Confirmations; The HOld System; Invoicing and Payments; and other issues we'd want the Union to help resolve.
If you have questions please use the info above in this post or use the IATSE website.
On one hand it would be helpful to organise a site listing our names as individuals interested in Union Representation and the companies they work for as a means to proactively initiate the organising of the union as such. But on the otherhand It think the reason why Union organising remains secretive at first to avoid any blacklisting by the studios/networks of the individuals, in hopes to prevent unionising. The reason why many Studios and Networks avoid hiring employees on and labelling them as staff employees is to avoid unionisation. We need to combat this with our own proactivness. Daniel told me that you could still get union rep even if your an independent contractor as such. Imagine if we could organise everyone who freelances in the Viacom building we could potentially get IATSE representation there and find better conditions for those guys and for ourselves if we chose to work there later. If we could get VIACOM on board that would be a mega bonus start I think for our industry overall.
IATSE Local 816 in LA was great back in Quantel Paintbox days. I highly recommend the organization. I think the industry is going towards getting work from freelance sites like Linkedin, Elance etc… and crowd sourcing such as PopTent. The idea of a logo that gives this wiki an identity along with a link to downloadable contracts and letters can be be very powerful.
I would like to learn the best way to be paid instantly for milestones. From my limited experience Paypal takes a 3% cut. There must be a better way.
Hi, I'm an Italian freelancer and I have a question about showing your work. I created some corporate videos and commercials for an advertising agency, providing them with everything from the concept to the final dvd. I was the director, writing the project, hiring the crew and delivering the video “turn-key”. They just had to forward some mail time by time. Of course I'm showing this videos as my studio creations in my on-line portfolio quoting the agency from the first day as my client. Since I'm not working with them anymore after having enough of payment troubles (!) now they're claiming I'm using “their portfolio” illegally. There was no copyright or confidentiality deal made in advance. How can I defend myself from that? Which are the author rights about a product purchased? Should I just send them to h**l or even don't reply? Thanks in advance for your help.
Nicola:
I don't know the legalities but here's some science to support reporting them to the Better Business Bureau or some European version.
“In a paper that was published in Nature a few years ago, in which Ernst Fehr and Simon Gachter had people play a commons dilemma. A game in which you give people money, and then on each round of the game, they can put money into a common pot, and then the experimenter doubles what’s in there, and then it’s all divided among the players. So it’s a really nice analog for all sorts of environmental issues where we’re asking people to make a sacrifice and they themselves don’t really benefit from their own sacrifice.
Fehr and Gachter said – on the seventh round they told people, “You know what? New rule. If you want to give some of your own money to punish people who aren’t contributing, you can do that.” And as soon as people heard about the punishment issue going on, cooperation shoots up. It shoots up and it keeps going up. There’s a lot of research showing that to solve cooperative problems, it really helps. It’s not enough to just appeal to people’s good motives, it really helps to have some sort of punishment. Even if it’s just shame or embarrassment or gossip, you need some sort of punishment to bring people, when they’re in large groups, to cooperate. There’s even some recent research suggesting that religion – priming God, making people think about God – often, in some situations leads to more cooperative, more pro-social behavior.”
Source: Jonathan Haidt on the moral roots of liberals and conservatives http://www.ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind.html
@ Nicola as you are the author of the art piece you have the copyright, as far as I know you could have sold a right of use only… But please double check with an italian lawyer
Some things I would like to add from my perspective to the whole discussion. In the first townhall meeting a couple of problems were mentioned that lead to our current situation. I have been working in this industry for only 3 years, so please forgive my harsh oppinion.
I think our work can be compared to a carpenters work. Sometimes it is more technical and repetitive, sometimes it is more artistical and creative. A carpenter estimates his work and comes up with a sum. We do the same. The carpenter starts to work and suddenly finds out the whole wooden support structure underneath is rotten and in order to do his work he has to replace it. His costs rise. The customer has to pay more for all the extra work. What happens in our business if we get badly lit green screens and almost unusable footage? Nothing. We just do the extra work for the same amount of money even if it doubled our working hours.
As almost everyone is working as a freelancer we can try to get compensations for the overtime, from the Visual Effects house we are working for. But the visual effects company has to charge the production company for extra work, in germany this is rarely happening. Usually all the budget for a production is gone when we start working. Then you can reject the work and try to gamble, but there are so many young artists willing to work their a** off and do the work for less money just to get a job.
So a union should prevent that from happening. in order to do so Visual effects houses and artists need to get in the union and define costs for our work. I think we depend on each other it is not the artist against the Visual Effect Companies, it is Artist and the VFX Houses together. We have to rethink our goals so many artist love their work and are willing to sacrifice their entire time to do visual effects. That is superb but the production companies are taking advantage of that passion.
We want to make money and have a family (at least that is my idea of a normal life) and our employer should make profits (that is normal too).
Therefore we have to rethink our whole price model and the way our contracts work. The VFX-houses should all together charge twice the money from tomorrow on….(absolutly unrealistic) but why not…. at least the production companies are making profits.