salaries

[zerocool41]

Anyone know the average salaries for people in the film industry...obviously there are some who make 20+ mil a year...but what about everyone else?  

sound people

editors

cinematographers

1st & 2nd AD

Line producers

Assoc. Producers,  etc...what kind of life can a film school grad hope for if he doesn't make it big?

[cowboykurtis]

it compeltely depends how often you are working. if you're a director of photography you may only shoot a film every other year. obviously if youre dante spinotti your plate is going to be more full. the biggest factor is whether or not you're working on union or non union pictures. union is going to pay more. lets assume you're in IATSE union....its going to depend whether or not its a union STUDIO picture  or a union INDEPENDENT picture. if you're doing most indie union gigs, they'll have a low budget agreement, and everyone will be taking pay cuts. there are different tiers for rates on union workers depending on the size of the budget. lets say you're a UPM, which is the highest union position on the production side, working on a indie, with a low budget union agreement. youll get paid 1,300 a week, plus pension and vacation. if its a 4 weeks shoot, with 4 week s pre-pro and 2 weeks post -- youll be getting paid for 10 weeks at 1,300 a week. thats roughly 13000 before benefits. obviously a portion of that has to go to IATSE to pay union dues. now if you're lucky you can be working consitantly. however some UPM's only get on a feature of two a year. Obviously with a big budget studio picture the rates are going to be higher and the shoot will have a longer shooting period. as far as union grips, camera assistants,etc -- they make roughly 30 dollars and hour, with time and a half after 8 hours and double time after 10, triple time after 12 hrs, etc...

[ReelHotGames]

Yeah, as cowboy curtis states it will depend completely on the production and its budget, and its agreement with the Unions.  

If its a non-union production you will most likely be working for copy and credit with a defered payment that will be based upon the lowest pay allowed under union standards.

Basically what most indie filmmakers do is act as if they are under the lowest contract available with SAG and IATSE when they set out to do their contracts, that way if the film under some miracle is picked up and people can get paid they will get paid to some union standard.

You can find out these rates by going to SAG and IATSE directly.

But also remember in the Indie world there is NO RULES of payment, so you have to be willing to stand up for yourself. If you want to be paid $1000 a week for your work, even if it's going to be defered make sure it's in your contract.

And ALWAYS have a contract, as a perfoemer, crew worker or as the filmmaker. You can find sample contracts in the back of the GREAT book "Feature Filmmaking at Used Car Prices" - a great resource tool for all.

The film at my website www.fof-films.com had about 50 actors and half a dozen crew, small shoot and all and the ACTUAL production budget was under $1500.00 for the ENTIRE FILM, but the budget on the film itself under all the cintracts was easliy about $40,000 with payment to talent, and crew and such.... Since we have yet to make money off the film, no payments have been made, but that's the way it goes.

[cowboykurtis]

it seems the real question he's asking, which i dont think i answered the first time, am i going to starve,  if you dont "make it".

as far as commerce from a crew standpoint,  it all comes down to: STUDIO  = money, INDIES= dog shit.  lets say you're in the DGA. Even if you get on only one studio picture a year, you can live pretty damn good. lets say you're the 2nd unit director on a film like daredevil. you'll be making around 13,000 dollars a week. lets say its a 4 month shoot: thats 208,000 for working 4 monts out of the year. not bad, you could do a lot worse. plus all DGA members get back end points of the net. you can make an extra 100,000 dollars as a DGA member on the back-end of a film like daredevil.