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As mentioned previously we are making a few changes to the committee. The main change is we now have a Victorian representative, Doron Kipen. Doron is well known in Victoria, and can be found at M&E studios in South Yarra.
Doron is hoping to re-write the “Film Budget book” with the Guild’s support, here is an open letter from Doron to the Guild members.
Dear Sound Professional
At last years ASSG annual awards night there was some discussion about the fees paid to providers of audio services for the various production types.
The general consensus was that due to the nature of the media business over the last 5 years or so and the shortage of work, producers have been exploiting us by bidding one supplier of services off against another.
The ASSG seems the appropriate organization to represent us to the people who pay the bills.
As a result we are proposing to put a questionnaire to the audio industry to see if we can find some consensus on fee levels for various types of work. If we can agree on some ideals that would be great. More importantly we must agree on some absolute minimums that we ideally all hold to. This will ensure that the producer is paying a fee that will ensure that every job is profitable. Of course if you have a client that will pay a premium then you should continue with that arrangement. This is all about finding a stable base. If we could find out what categories you would like to see included in a questionnaire as soon as possible, with the committee, and perhaps some advice from a statistician or accountant, we would formulate a questionaire to put to our industry. We would then collate your responses, with a view to putting together a national rate card. The idea is that we would undertake this process throughout this year with a view to publishing the rate card at SPAA this year.
Now there are a couple of things to mention here. The first is that we seek to be as inclusive as possible. So put your ideas forward of things you would like to see on a rate card. Secondly privacy and commercial considerations must be taken into account. It has been proposed by a few key players that they would pay for an independent accounting firm to collate all of the material to then draw up the proposed rate card. The idea being that if we can all start being paid appropriately for our work then the cost of keeping your information confidential will be recouped by them very quickly.
I know that SPAA seems like a long way off but the sooner we get going on this the better.
So over to you all !! Another addition to the Guild is Sally Bennett as Treasurer. Sally has been doing the Guild’s books for five years now and has maintained our non-profit status intact.
So the new committee is:
President: Trevor Harrison.
Secretary: Tony Murtagh.
Treasurer: Sally Bennett.
Victorian representative: Doron Kipen.
Web site: Philip Purcell.
Email co-ordinator: David Glasser.
News co-ordinator: Tony Murtagh.
We would like to add a Queensland representative to the list and hopefully that might be possible soon. Something else we would like to do is expand the website. The AFI plan to improve their website to include links to all the Guild’s websites. They suggested maybe the ASSG’s website could include a video explaining what “sound” is all about.
We also thought we would like to have members profiles available on the website. This might involve a small fee and it goes without saying the member will have to be financial.
Well the next newsletter will come via the post, David Glasser is off on a well earned holiday this week to Alaska and Canada so no emails for at least six weeks, have a good trip David.
Well that about wraps it up for the moment, have a good month and look out for details for this year’s Awards, the eleventh, to be held on Friday 21st November, write that date in your diary.
cheers for now, Trevor Harrison President ASSG
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