ASK & DISCUSS INDEX

8 years, 6 months ago - Mark Wiggins

I know a Focus Puller who was a photographer until his early 30s, then decided to do a career change and became a Camera Trainee. He's now just moving up to Operator.

8 years, 6 months ago - Lee 'Wozy' Warren

My first thought was to hear what you would want to do. Do you want a job that means you have to work on set? Or maybe work in a production office? Or if you'd like to be a writer you could simply do it from home.

So what do you fancy doing? I would be able to tailor my thoughts or advice from that.

Best

Wozy

8 years, 6 months ago - Jamie Hough

Hi both, thanks for responses so far. I guess my main interest lies in editing, however I do naturally dabble in some camerawork. My main issue there is I suspect physically running around a set is something that is for the able bodied? And yeah working in an office isn't alien to me - Ive been doing it for the last 10 years lol - so that's an option, but again I've asked a few places and it's always the same 'can you work for free' conversation.

8 years, 6 months ago - John Lubran

As 66 year old 31 seems young to me. People have widely differing life paths, there is no generality and no one ought take their own to be one. Even amongst some of the old hands here, whose great experience is profound, their paths are not entrenched in empirical natural physics. I've seen many a meteoric career evolve rapidly, even amongst within those craft skills often declared to require years of stepping stones beginning with being assistant to assistants assistants before being deemed competent enough to be allowed to operate a camera, edit or structure a project. Clearly physical handicaps effect how or if one can do things. Security of home and bread is often a matter of chosing that or risking discomfort, much easier for the young. Aptitude and skill is as often born as it is taught. For those who have it the odds of success are good. The other things that helps with rapid progress include enterprise combined with sufficient worldly conciousness and grace as to give enterprise legs. It's as much a matter of spirit and character as it is about learning by rote. Having great networks and relationships goes a long way too.

Finally I'd also suggest that the technical advances since a decade ago, far from daunting ones abilities, have actually made things far more accessible and a lot easier to master in terms of being able match, and indeed better, the technical benchmarks that only the very wealthy could achieve back then. The challenge today is not so much the mechanics of production but the rising above the cliché'd and banal if one wants ones work to sufficiently enough to be appreciated to the degree of being viable in an increasingly fragmented and over crowded market.