The Paying To Work For Free VFX Business Model
polycounter lvl 12
An article on how Digital Domain CEO John Textor would like to have 30% of his workforce be students... who pay to "have the privilege" to work for them.
I could very well see this happen in the game industry as well
http://vfxsoldier.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/the-paying-to-work-for-free-vfx-business-model/
I could very well see this happen in the game industry as well
http://vfxsoldier.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/the-paying-to-work-for-free-vfx-business-model/
Replies
I'd imagine they can't make a lot of profit if their pros spend all their time teaching though.
Wire removal and rotoscoping
No thanks, not for free.
If their work is good enough to be used in your product that you are making money off of, then they're good enough to get paid.
The "motivation" for the students here is supposed to be that they come out of school with a couple feature films on their resume, which would be great for the whole "needing experience to get your first job" aspect of the industry.
But because they are inexperienced students they're going to get stuck on wire removal and rotoscoping.
So at the end of their schooling they still can't get a job because they only know how to rotoscope.
Is that about the size of it?
looks like it...
http://www.walletpop.ca/blog/2011/07/20/unpaid-internships-outed-as-illegal/
http://www.learn4good.com/jobs/creative_arts_and_media/e/137055/search/toronto/
From the Jan 20, 2012 job ad:
Minimum Education Level required - College
Minimum Years of Experience required: 1 to 2 Years
This is an unpaid position.
Qualifications Required: Must be eager, excited and willing to learn.
That said, this is a business model that I've seen abused a lot in the Australian games industry - studios bringing in naive students to work free/cheaply for ridiculous hours for the reward of some nebulous "experience".
Seems absolutely mental. I remember at the time Vince Cable wanted to make this illegal. Dunno what happened since then though...
Screw that guy. If he tried that here in the States, the IRS would be up his ass nine ways to Sunday.
EDIT: Wait, they're still in LA, right? How the hell are they getting away with this?
gee, you really think outsourcing is cheap because people are paid crap?! outsourcing is cheap because it happens in countries where the loans are lower IN GENERAL or because the studios work with just less overhead (show me one outsourcer that has a gym or a tiki bar or the luxury of even getting on the game credits).
Now this has absolutely nothing to do with outsourcing at all. This is just tricking students into doing work for free. And yes, this is unfortunately working in many many industries - just look at journalism for example.
French and German people may remember the protests from a few years ago about unpaid internships and unpaid practice years after graduation where people were exploited in a similar fashion.
My hunch is that this runs afoul of all kinds of labor laws AND tax laws. I think Mr. Wishes It Was Still 1890 With Company Towns And Company Scrip is about to get a very not-fun visit from some IRS and Dept. of Labor federales.
There's the free market, and then there's... this. This is neither legal nor ethical.
I only made my opinion open to state that. Actions like these taken in cheap measures only lead to a lower presence for healthy and quality development because there are obviously more stubborn people out there who are more greedy, and selfish for big bucks. While increasing the lowest work standards to treat talented individuals like garbage and doing this makes it increasingly OK for big heads to continue onward w/o any regard on how it affects people like myself, those on polycount, and around the general 3D community who deserve better work and treatment for their dedication and their passions. It doesn't need a technical minded person to figure that out when you take the time to step back and see the positives from all the negatives.
Whether you can see it or not. This doesn't just relate to low practices for students. This is a reflection upon people of all trades whether professional or entry/interns. Its an increasingly bad set of ethics that are not working. Yet all I am saying here is I am obviously not for it.
I know this has nothing to do with outsourcing but I have to address this: pay is less for game development in China, you've even said in the past that westerners have to cut back their lifestyle because the wages are lower in proportion of the cost of living. The fancy studio with a Tiki bar in the US is the rare exception - if you're going to compare, you can't compare the EA Redwood campus to a small outsourcing studio in China, you have to compare it to one of the equally large publishers in China like Tencent.
idk this shit makes me really angry and not have the best outlook for the future of 3d art
Unfortunately, this is being done in the worst way possible right now.
I think you confuse this with something someone else said
Our studio, close to 1000 employees is run very conservatively I would say. There's much less waste on luxuries than I have seen in some Western studios - e.g. not a single Cintiq, mostly wacom bamboos, no Gym (we do have a sculpting room with lots of clay though
Sure there's also the sweatshop outsourcers, but a sweatshop place building AAA content is just as unrealistic as a sweatshop place designing a commercial jet liner. Quality work requires quality pay and quality premises. People who worked on an AAA title and haven't been crunched to death probably know this.
Then again I've always wondered how much use students who don't get paid actually are probably none unless you give them monkey jobs. Let's hope their teachers warn them of the dullness that awaits them (mine certainly did when it came to rotoscope cleanup). The only benefit I see is making contacts and passing around your reel while you're there (kinda like many Runners do)
I see your point, but I don't agree with your choice of example to illustrate it.
I work for an AAA outsourcer and it just doesn't fit. I also don't see how US based outsourcers like Liquid Development would fit into your example.
Sorry if my comment sounds harsh - I just come across too many people who think outsourcing consists of 10 half naked people sitting in a damp basement in a 3rd world country making crates and barrels in front of old CRT monitors working 16 hour shifts. I hope you're not one of them and if you are - you think EA, THQ, Activision, NCSoft, Disney, Square Enix, Naughty Dog, Ubi would pay for assets made that way?
Jokes aside, It's quite worrisome to see these kind of paths companies take,
Haven't seen that level of shittyness in the game industry but many companies
take in more free interns then they can handle in hope of free workers.
Still quality costs, and I'm sure it still will in the future.
yup. I totally agree - it's just bad practice.
Globalisation and open markets are just a fact (heck people move their entire production Montreal to save a buck!) but not paying for good work is quite different.
Getting some real industry experience, contacts with professionals, learning from the best and possibly a job afterwards if you work hard enough is more than any art school can offer.
If you think about it, if 30% of the workload is from their "student", it means that the remaining workforce would be even more skilled/talented people due to this "filtering". So between veteran and free student, where do you get your entry point with your " not so much experienced but not free" position?
But when you apply class to who gets jobs its not sustainable and causes a brain drain.
Thats just insulting and disrespectful...not just to those students but to people in our profession as a whole.
only true if you're from one of the "horror story" art schools. A good art school should give you more than roto cleanup skills
On the other hand, is it really worth getting into the industry to do roto cleanup? Sure some people start as runners. But heck, if you wanna be a modeller, stay at home, work on modeling and then look for a real modeler position rather than wasting time with cheap crappy "foot in the door" jobs where, yes, you are IN the industry but you have no time left to work on what counts - your folio (unless you want to advance in the cleanup hierarchy).
Its the same hassle as starting out in QA - is that really the right route to become, let's say, a concept artist??
We however do this - there's just not enough skilled people here in China, so we partnered with a local university and offer hands on training to make them ready to produce game art and then hire the best people. It's kinda self serving but there's just no other way to find people that are good enough to eventually put them on AAA titles.
Seriously, if you run a studio in the UK, try and find a decent graduate who you can recruit straight into a junior position...
My studio has just been given a massive grant to take on gifted and talented undergrads and have them work within a real studio environment in order to better prepare them for the games sector. They work everyday in the studio and the work that they produce as well as how they manage their CPD is assess against a degree program.
We're actually creating a new dedicated resource just for them, plus a royalty based pay scheme so that they can reap the rewards of any projects that they work on. But ultimately, yes they are paying to come and work for us.
What do we get out of it?
Young talented people who work the way that we do
Cheap Labour (I'm not going to deny that fact)
Great new innovative IP
One of the largest development teams in the UK
What do they get out of it?
3 years industry experience
Industry standard 'on the job' training and CPD
A degree that means something
The opportunity to pitch their own IP for development in the studio
More chance of getting a job
Upto 30% royalty based on individual contributions to a studio IP
What does the sector get out of it?
Young talent with 3 years industry experience
Personnel that can be recruited straight into junior and mid level positions
A consistent stream of new high skilled graduates
Found this while googling around. Disgraceful is what it is.
My problem comes from their attitude. They don't give two shits about the students. They just want the labor force. What's their incentive to hiring on some of those kids? It's really low since they have another batch just waiting in the wings year after year. It's also quite expensive for these families who have to dump tons of money into the education or grab student loans. Also, the comments some of you made about this somehow being illegal are probably right.
In conclusion, I think I like short term internships better.
Unpaid internship, seems borderline illegal.
Pay for the honor of working, seems beyond ridiculous...
... but then again if it is part of school as if the student instead of paying 5-20k for the last year pays $1,000 for a "work in lieu of school program" it would make sense and even save the student money? The company is taking a major risk that the student could preform at the level they need but then again if that level isn't very high then there isn't much risk and the company would cherry pick students so there wouldn't be any surprises.
Yep. Still sounds pretty slummy even when I try to rationalize it.
I don't see why an experienced worker won't have to pay for the privilege of learning to become a lead. A lead could pay to become a supervisor, etc.
This could also apply to cross-training between disciplines.
Or could it just be that people don't just want to take the first best job that comes along with crappy pay and rather stay home and work on their folio while they can to enter the industry having a proper job and proper pay? Even though it's anecdotal evidence, I still know more people who did that than people who grabbed the first job that came along.
I know very few colleges that produce people who can get a job right away - and yes, the industry would love that for obvious reasons (cheap well trained people? hell yeah!). But I came to see college more as a long term investment. The knowledge you gain, the connections, you benefit of it over the years, not right away. The returns are little drips, not a single instant shot. And this also makes it hard for the employer to see what college gives (or doesn't give) a recruit when they're hiring.
And I also know many people who instead of taking the first job that comes along, work on their folio. Sit at home 6 more months and bust their ass so they could enter the industry doing what they wanted to do and getting paid properly.
Personally I would rather hire someone with little experience and little CG Knowledge as long as I know the guy had a wide exposure to topics like life drawing, color theory, art theory and history, cinematography, sculpting over someone who got 3 years of low level production experience. But I guess it all depends on the sort of production you're doing and the student's short and long term goals.
I don't buy that it would be useful work experience on the CV either. If I was an employer and I asked a student about the work experience and found out it was pay to work scheme, I would just think their a bit of a mug and kind of bribing their way into the industry rather than on merit.
After 3 years of pot noodles, vesta curries and hard work, I will pass on paying to work for free. When your portfolio is ready and up to standard there is no reason why you can't get a paid job anyway.
I was recently checking how my linkedin contacts are doing and saw that one has finally graduated from vfs and now works in the film industry as...a jr. roto artist.
When I saw that I recalled immediately this Digital Domain school. On the surface the difference between vfs, also an expensive school, and DD is you only start doing "real" work after graduation (from vfs) IF you get lucky and get hired. Whereas in DD you pay for training but you also start working on real production (so the CEO in the article says) during your student status.
I'm not recommending one school over another since software and online training is dirt cheap these days. And networking with pros is as simple as following and conversing with a few guys active on twitter. But just sharing this to people thinking of going the traditional college route.