When There’s No Work, Everything Feels Like Zero—How Do You Cope?

[Harsh_3cine]

hello everyone

harsh here,i am from India, i have done diploma in cinematography. And working as Focus puller since 6 years , meanwhile  and I’ve also shot several independent projects as a DP. I’ve put together a decent  showreel and have been emailing production houses but most of them either continue working with their existing DPs or don’t respond at all. , sometimes i send DM to directors but some reply with “currently i don’t have anything lined up right now but will contact later ”

I’ve tried reaching out to a few DPs to assist them so I can stay on set, but they already have their teams. Is there any way to network or any platforms where I can find indie work as a DP? or maybe join any good DOP’s team?

Sometimes I feel like everything goes back to zero when there’s no work and I face a lot of rejection. How do you deal with this? Does this happen to everyone, or is it just me?

For those of you who have made this transition, could you share a brief story of how you landed your first feature film as a DP? Any advice on how to pitch yourself effectively would be really helpful.

 

tell me any platform where i get genuine work opportunity.

 

Thanks!

Topic

[LucaM]

I can’t help you with finding jobs because my day job has nothing to do with cinema (i’m a school teacher) , but i’ve been in a similar situation in the past in other contexts and perhaps i can understand you.

A couple of things you may consider:

– your job is not you, it’s what you do for living, support family, pay the bills, buy nice things that make you feel better, etc. You are yourself even when there’s not work. There’s zero work at the moment, you are not zero. They are different things.

– when your job is what you like to do in life and make you happy, congratulations! But it’s not so common. So: if you dream of a career in cinema but the moment is a bit complicated, you may consider finding a new job while waiting for new opportunities in cinema. You can use this time to deal after some personal project, shot your own things in the spare time, learn and study.

– from what i’ve been reading for at least a couple of years, jobs in creative industries (cinema, vfx, games, illustrations, music, etc) are fewer and fewer. I am afraid this is the first immediate effect of AI. Why hiring a [insert human artist category here] when you have AI? I used to do some illustrations jobs time ago, before having kids (i worked at school at morning and spent hours drawing at night) : the same small editors i worked with are publishing their things with AI generated images. It’s happening everywhere and the better the AI the worst for the humans.

Be realistic but don’t give up. Quoting Calvin & Hobbes : “when life gives you lemons throw them back to it and add some other lemons by your own.”

[Author]

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