Reply To: Backhoe Contribution – adrian2301 – Chassis/Stabilizer/Fenders and the Engine. And the hydraulics for the swing frame.

but people talk about the work as god sent, oh my god I love this! my dream job! you have to work work work 24/7, I give my soul to the studio, here studio! take my life!, I’m sooo passionate, I’m not being exploited because I love it.

This is a major misconception within CG imo. For so long it’s been seen as a “how lucky am I to do CG for a living” – by the artists themselves as well as studios / clients imo – which has led to an imbalanced industry, underpaid artists for amazing work that’s in extremely high demand. That just doesn’t makes sense.

There’s many facets to the discussion but specifically about being lucky to do CG is true but can be, and is, dangerously misunderstood. I certainly feel lucky to have made this my profession. But that gratitude is not compensation and thus NOT a reason to accept low rates or accept long hours, unpaid overtime, or ridiculous deadlines. But we see those things happen all the time in the industry. Personally I think the artists are to blame as much as clients / studios. We’re the ones who started accepting the bad deals our of misguided gratitude for doing what we love professionally. As far as I can tell artists in the industry need to unify (unionize probably), stnad their ground and set things right or the industry will always have these problems.

Apart from that is the personal attitude each artists feel toward professional CG work. I’ve always said that my main motivation to join CGC and teach Blender full time was that it allows me to create what I want. This remains 90% true but I’ve also had to teach topics I wasn’t interested in. And despite it being CG-related, it might as well have been bagging groceries or busing tables at a restaurant. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that!” -Seinfeld

Meaning that the tedious monotony of every job every performed by human being is very possible to CG jobs. In fact you can count on it as an absolute. If people on social media make it sound like it’s 100% euphoric to turn their passion into their career, understand that’s just how they feel in the moment. Every pro has those moments where a model turned out just right or their project earned top row on artstation or the TV show they worked on won an emmy. So many jobs don’t have the potential for such moments of deep personal reward – THAT’s what makes me grateful CG is my career despite tons of unsatisfying just-a-job moments. Even when I think “in another life I would have pursued [insert hobby] as a career” I inevitably step back and remember the rewarding moments.

That said I don’t doubt that people try CG and don’t feel the same reward. Of course it’s not for everyone. But @dostovel for as long as I’ve watched your CG journey couple with the quality of your skills…I can’t imagine you being one of those people. You have what it takes to be a pro and have rewarding moments that outweigh the monotonous ones. So personally I’m not convinced of this:

I’ve often wonder if maybe is it that I don’t like this work,

Honestly I sense that you’re believing a myth: It’s possible to 100% love your job day after day. This cannot be true and thus comes down to “which job can I have more rewarding moments than disappointing moments?” CG is that for me and I truly think it could – will – be that for you.