Filmmaking is a life-long journey. Piece by piece, you will slowly acquire all possible filmmaking tools and become totally self-sufficient.You shut your eyes and dream of the possibilities that owning this new film gear “thing” will bring.
This is the year you make your dream project! And the gear you own will launch you there. Your mind made up, your mental justifications made, you smash that "BUY" button and hand over your credit card digits. Meanwhile, shopping induced endorphins pulse through your veins and join the caffeine already in circulation from late nights of video editing.
New gear is always rush to those of us with gear acquisition syndrome — and sometimes, we can’t help but just throw money at our own filmmaking challenges we’re trying to solve. But why do we do this? Can we show some restraint? Let’s explore this.
Bro, where’s my rentals?
If you’re one of the many owner-operator filmmakers working in a market outside of the coastal film hubs; out in the proverbial filmmaking backwaters (or new frontiers if you’re optimistic), you typically aren’t spoiled for choice with professional film gear rentals.
There often isn’t enough demand to sustain those businesses and owning your own kit becomes a requirement to tackle the production work in your local market. When you’re having to wait for a limited amount of gear in circulation to become “available” in a few weeks, it means losing the gig to someone else who has their own stuff and can shoot right away. Such is the nature of the type of production work available in these areas.
Now, there’s two perspectives to owning your own film gear. The good part is, it’s validation you’re doing something right because you’re able to afford it and re-invest in yourself. You aren’t beholden to the availability of equipment at your local rental house(s). It's much like finally owning your own vehicle after years of taking public transit, totally liberating. You swell from the pride of ownership!
The bad part is, you can make some colossally bad, lemon purchases along your filmmaking journey and feel like a fool with a collection of pricey paper weights.
We all know filmmaking is an expensive profession. It always has been. Yes, the costs are going down on gear, but it’s still well above and beyond what normal people would ever be willing to pay. Normies would rather pay for a family vacation than own a 600W RGB panel light. Never forget, these are professional, niche tools for a niche market, and priced as such.
Gear Acquisition Regret
You see this film gear thing, you feel like you need it, and you must have it. You notice its price is reduced and for a limited time only.
You buy it — and it sits in your film tickle trunk for 6+ months. Unloved. Unused. Dare I say, useless? Never brought to a job. Or, brought to only a handful of gigs before reality kicks in, you realize you don’t need it, and the gear is unceremoniously retired. Never generating a return on your investment.
The sting of realization-- that that is money you could have spent elsewhere, saved, or (like all the cool kids are doing) even put into crypto and generated a bafflingly high return-- burns a hole in your psyche.
Stay tuned for next week's blog in which Bourdon Creative talks more about "Post-purchase Clarity" in their two-part post "Step off the G.A.S. (Gear Acquisition Syndrome)."
__
Note From Tongal: This blog is part of a series of Tongal Community-written blog posts that were originally sourced in the Tongal Blog Open Call Project. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Tongal. Read more Tongal Community-written posts here!
