Film Center discusses the recent unionization of VFX artists at Walt Disney Pictures, highlighting the challenges they face including long hours, tight deadlines, low benefits, and lack of job security. It mentions that Disney has contracts preventing employees from unionizing and the lack of attention given to the post-production industry. Check out this new episode of Film Center!

This is Film Center, your number one show for real entertainment industry news.

No fluff, all facts.

Now, here are your anchors, Derek Johnson II and Nicholas Killian.

Hello and welcome to Film Center.

My name is Derek Johnson II.

I'm Nicholas Killian.

And what are we talking about today, Nicholas?

Today we are talking about the fact that the Disney VFX artists have unionized.

Yeah, they unionize under IATSE.

IATSE.

This Local 839.

Yeah, Local 839.

And where is 839?

Local 839 is the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees.

Yes.

That's what IATSE stands for.

And 839 is gonna be here in Los Angeles.

Right here in Los Angeles.

And the number of artists that are eligible to join the union, thanks to this

recent development, is over a thousand.

Now let's talk a little bit about why these people haven't been

in the union in the first place.

I myself have been a previous Disney employee.

And I know that Disney and some of their contracts...

Now I was not a VFX artist, but working under Disney, I do know

that in some of their contracts, they prevent you from unionizing

when you sign up to work for them.

This is possibly one of the reasons why they were not unionized previously.

Plus, one thing that a lot of people do not pay attention to is post.

There's not a lot of shine brought on the post world.

For some reason, a lot of people don't even know some of the post awards that

have happened that are pretty big.

I myself have gone to the HPA awards.

My words, if you don't know what that is, that's the Hollywood

Professional Association.

And a lot of times their awards are more geared towards best colorist.

They're geared towards best editing and things like that.

And of course, visual effects.

VFX, it does come up in the Oscars, but there's not really,

there's not really distinctions.

No, and then, one of the things is that the way that this came

about is obviously with the SAG Afterstrike and the WGA strike.

Yeah, it's been a huge years for, huge year for strikes when it comes

to the entertainment industry.

And we had previously talked in a previous episode about why IAOTC wouldn't

strike, but they are, but there's also...

Possibly those reasons we talked about previously and if those of you listening

here to film center You can go check out those previous episodes at filmcenternews.

com We're also on all streaming platforms such as spotify apple

and things like that, right?

But then we also have to talk about the long hours and the tight deadlines.

So well, obviously In the entertainment industry you're going

to get taken advantage of right?

That's just a given.

Yeah, it does happen And like it says vfx they often work, 60 to 80 hours per

week and are often given tight deadlines to meet low benefits And pay lack of

job security unfair especially with the especially with these the dischange in

technology they've been more directly affected than the I would say the writers

or the actors by AI, because other people are like, Oh, it's visual effects.

How could it be different?

They've been competing against technology for a while now, plugins that do texts,

plugins that do fire and things like that.

Those were used to have to be done by VFX guys.

And now are things that you would just assume that most people could

just do was just basic Adobe plugins.

It used to be VFX people's job.

Not saying that.

They're now not now tools because VFX people have a lot

of tools that they can use.

But there are a lot of AI.

Environment generators, right?

And so what happens is that you, some of these studios will say, okay,

you have access to this technology.

Now I'm going to even tighten your deadline, making it even more unrealistic.

And then they complain why it doesn't look realistic.

And then a lot of these VFX jobs are being shipped overseas where

there is sometimes even worse labor practices than here in America.

And then the thing is this hasn't been happening for.

just a couple of months.

They started doing this in 2022, right?

So the VFX artists at Disney began organizing with IOTSE in 2022.

And then also in 2022, a survey of VFX artists at Disney finds that 90 percent of

respondents were interested in unionizing.

They then Disney then sends a letter to the VFX artists, urging

them to vote against unionization.

And then in, of course, in 2023 they then unionized to vote.

Because there have been some high profile cases of VFX artists speaking out.

Yes.

So there are...

Four cases, four high profile cases that come to mind, right?

So in 2019, a group of VFX artists who worked on the film The Lion King

alleged that they had been worked extremely long hours and tight deadlines.

And we're underpaid for it.

Now, what I love, so specifically some of our viewers out there might not

understand what this exactly means.

Oh, long hours.

Let me work long hours, but these people are giving deadlines that are basically

almost impossible or it's their job because there is the entertainment

industry is so sought after that everyone is just very replaceable.

And it's also a 24 hour cycle.

There is no rest.

The lawsuit was settled for 20 million.

So it's not it's not like they were lying or it was something small.

No, the government was like, Disney, you have to pay and you'd be surprised

how often it happens that these larger studios like Disney have to pay out

because of basically working abuse.

And then in 2020, they had the same thing happen on the Avengers end game.

And then in 2021, a survey of the VFX artists found that 85 percent

of them said they had experienced a burnout at some point in their careers.

And the survey also found that 75 percent of respondents said they had

been forced to work overtime without pay.

Now, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Mark Patch says the aim would be to have members of such a local local work under

a local basic agreement contract already used by the entertainment workers and

13 locals, including the international cinematographers Guild, local 600 motion

pictures, editors Guild, local 700, and the art directors Guild, the local 800.

I personally.

Have met a lot of really great people in the Art Directors Guild.

They were also at the San Diego Comic Con.

Yeah.

And if you guys don't remember, Film Center went to the San Diego

Comic Con earlier this year.

And I had a really great time speaking with some of the members of the Art

Directors Guild that were there.

You, I was shocked to see them.

Why?

Because...

They were out there like almost like promoting if that makes any sense,

which a lot of Unions and gills it's not something that you typically see them

doing go around promoting Oh, they'll promote to people there I guess who

are already in the industry who are already working like you're working

inside Oh, you want to join side because you're already working actor not to

random people not at Comic Con, right?

One of the things I talked to them about was that they were like, a lot of

these visual effects artists are getting picked straight out of like college

or sometimes they're being picked.

It's hard to, I say picked, I mean that very lightly, it's

still very difficult to get into.

I'm, CalArts is the best.

But basically if you're coming out of CalArts, something like

they want to get you as soon as possible before you're able to.

Basically properly represent yourself and get you into one of these longer contracts

for a while and a lot of times the you'll get into a contract that might be for A

show that you might be in love with but like you said these working conditions

aren't what you expect once you sign that contract Especially someone who

needs to pay rent you gotta do it, right?

Exactly.

It's almost like the whole college situation where it's you know You're

18 and you take out how many tens of thousands of dollars and it's hey, by

the way This is with you until you die.

And when you die, we're gonna pass this off to another family member.

But, so we sit there and we say, Okay what are the good things

about the fact that the VFX artists are now unionized under IOTC?

Everything goes up, right?

There's potential increase for actually, let's do this.

We'll talk about the benefits, right?

Collective bargaining for better wages, benefits, and working conditions.

Protection from exactly what we were talking about as far

as unfair labor practice.

Access to training and development.

And then the other studios that have also unionized With the Disney V

F X artists are wet Digital frame store, industrial light and magic,

and Sony Pictures image works.

This also remember that earlier this year, Marvel visual effects also unionized.

Really?

Yeah.

So the Marvel lot, the Marvel V F X.

Unionized as well.

And so I assume that, this is just a year of unis everyone's just, everyone's really

fighting for their rights this year.

I personally think that a part of this reason really does come down

to the inflation that's happening with the rest of the country.

People forget these are regular jobs, not regular quote unquote, but like

when I say regular, They pay their bills with these jobs, they pay their rent

with these jobs, they pay their car note, whatever sort of student loan debt

they may have, those certain things.

Now, it used to be that, yeah, they're getting abused, but they are

being paid a lot more for it, right?

And now that studios are more penny pinching, this, nah, it's

flying, and they need these rights.

It's funny that you talk about pay because, according to Glassdoor, the

median salary for a VFX artist at Walt Disney Pictures is about a hundred

and one thousand dollars per year.

However, salary is based on experience, seniority, and the specific roles.

A senior VFX artist at Disney may Earn upwards of 150, 000 per year.

Now it's difficult to say how much more they're going to get

paid now that they're unionized.

And I would also like to state that because he's just said

the medium and the high number.

You also need to remember that a lot of people are not getting these

high or medium numbers, right?

So when we talk about mediums and high numbers in, here, one thing you

memorize is that it's not consistent.

This is a contract, right?

They could just get this money and then not work for another year, which means

really for over the, for two years, they're actually only getting 50k.

And also you do have some people who are only getting about 50, 000 a year.

I know some personal, I personally know some VFX artists.

They're only getting paid around that much.

And part of the issue is that, people will look at the mediums

and they'll, or they'll.

Say they oh i'm paying this one person all this much all this money, but

you're not really Paying the rest of the people on the back end of the

team that much then that's the whole point of the union unionization is

Job security, job length, right?

Everybody in the entertainment industry knows you're only as good as your last

job, and it's job scarcity, right?

So let's say you did get paid a hundred thousand dollars or a hundred

fifty thousand dollars, right?

Yes.

You might, like you said, you might now work for another two years, right?

It's totally possible.

That's what the unionization is for, right?

So with that it's estimated by Glassdoor that salaries for VFX

artists could go up as much as 20%.

Which is really great.

And then also, some of these people are taxed very high too.

They have very high taxes, and then it was crazy that we also

was living in Los Angeles.

It's like one of the most expensive places.

Now, once again, I have said this in the past.

It's not like these are jobs that are only paying 20k, you know what I'm saying?

But because a lot of these people...

You should still get paid with your worth.

This is not at all.

And the thing is, it's also worth noting that the unionization of Disney

FX artists could set a precedent for other studios to unionize like they

already have and could lead to more standardized set of wages and benefits

for VFX artists, across the industry.

The surprising part is that it hasn't happened already.

It's 2023, right?

And unions have been around since a very long time, but the entertainment

industry has such a huge history of abusing their workers that it's

like, Oh this is just not the time.

I don't know.

I feel like this should have happened a while ago.

It's just supply and demand.

Everybody wants to do it.

Like I'll give you an example, right?

So right now, a lot of jobs, you negotiate your pay.

It's not a standard set.

You do have SAG AFTRA that has standards for pay scale, and you

have all that kind of stuff, but I'll give you an example, right?

My teacher who teaches me how to do the facial hair pieces, right?

He told me, when he was coming up, that he would go from studio to

studio negotiating his own pay.

And then when he would...

He would work here for a year or two, and then, or maybe a year, he would

negotiate this pay, and then build up his portfolio, build up his experience, go to

the next studio, and then be like, okay Now you're going to pay me this amount

and negotiate that amount instead of them being a set standard pay increases.

It's just what you're going to negotiate.

So this person get could be getting paid 40 an hour and this

person get paid 24 an hour, right?

So it's just really what you can come down to negotiate, which is why for a long time

many workers have relied on their agents.

And the managers to come up with these numbers.

Be personally, I use an entertainment lawyer to negotiate all my stuff, but

they're also not cheap, but I need to make sure that my negotiations are done well.

But, and like I said, it's just gonna, with the local.

839, it's just going to come down to better job security, fair scheduling,

transparency, voice, training and development, networking opportunities,

professional development, just overall being treated like a human person.

That's not, there just to finish the project.

I'm going to tell you what might result from this is that because there are so

many, especially in VFX, there are a lot of jobs that are being pushed overseas.

Unions, when places unionize, the first thing corporate wants to do is

move the job somewhere else, move them overseas, move them somewhere else.

However, I truly believe that of enough VFX artists unionized in their

own groups that eventually, we're in America, you'd be under Iazi, right?

But eventually I believe they might do this in other countries too.

So they can never get away with it.

We, there was a famous case of Disney working way around China and their they

had some sort of camps, some sort of slave camps around there to shoot Mulan, right?

And so it's okay, that was a huge controversy, very large controversy.

So it's if people start unionizing in other parts of the world, maybe we

can finally put an end to all this.

And then the biggest thing to, one of the things, not biggest, but the thing

that I think is very interesting is Disney has not yet publicly commented

On the fact that they have unionized yet Yeah, I mean that I actually did really

already released a statement saying breaking walt disney's Visual effects

workers and this is from their twitter.

I guess they're x since elon musk changes to x but It's from X, even though it's

still a tweet saying breaking Walt Disney pictures, VFX workers voted unanimously

to unionize in a labor board election.

The vote was 13 to zero.

These workers become the second dedicated VFX union unit to unionize with us.

With the other being the unanimous election of Marvel studios,

VFX workers just last month.

And then, so you sit there and think, okay, did Disney do anything to try and

interrupt the VFX artists from organizing?

Could they even have done anything?

Apparently, according to many media outlets like the Hollywood

Reporter, Variety, Deadline, and The Wrap people were threatened.

People were incentivized by saying, hey, don't worry.

I'll give you a pay raise if you don't unionize the typical things

that happen when an industry or a group of people union try to

unionize And then the overarching people are like, hey, don't do this.

It's the Typical corporate, you know show around oh, hey, i'll pay you more which

is not guaranteed and especially when Once again, these are contract jobs, right?

This is not W 2 jobs, right?

There are a couple people who get W 2s, but they're like senior Somebody

they're getting paid like I guarantee you that 150, 000 is not the peak So

someone out here they're getting 200k and that person might be W 2 However

a lot of these are and then they are usually the ones that don't do anything.

They don't create anything, right?

They're just managing, right?

A lot of these Union jobs are just creative contracts.

So when I say they'll pay you more It's I'm paying you more once for this limited

time not in general because they know once you unionize you'll have a lot more

power you'll get everything that you want compared to they've just trying

to negotiate a deal with you and for This is, 2023 has been a huge year in

which a lot of people have not scabbed.

It was very shocking.

We thought a lot more people would scab.

We had Cass on recently on the podcast, a SAG actor, and he was talking a lot

about how some actors wanted to scab, but a lot of them took on regular jobs.

Like Cas was gonna, was a P.

E.

teacher.

Cas right now is not only a professional actor who's working on

Grown ish, and like a whole bunch of other shows, shows on Freeform,

shows on HBO and stuff like that.

He's oh, I'll be a P.

E.

teacher to not cross over the picket line.

He's talking about how one of his friends was who was also an accomplished actor.

Is an Amazon driver to not do a big like I can't like it's crazy.

That's the state of the industry right now Imagine watching

someone on tv and be like man.

I love these actor this actor.

He's so great.

He's so awesome and then He delivers your What's up, actually?

Hey, man Imagine watching new girl and then nick shows up to your door

like hey, I got your domino's pizza and you're like Yo, yeah That's

how you know times are difficult.

That's how you know times are difficult.

So the next question is this right?

So how is this going to affect disney's bottom line?

How is the vfx artist?

going to affect Disney's bottom line?

How much money is it going to add to Disney's bottom line?

And Michael Patcher, an analyst from Wedbush Securities two other people,

are saying that it's going to add between 50 million and 100 million

to Disney's bottom line each year.

Not like they can't afford it.

Not like they can't afford it.

Doug Cruz at an analyst from Cohen and Company said Pretty much the same thing.

It could be 50.

It could be a hundred million dollars And again, it's not like Disney can't afford

50 to a hundred million dollars, right?

This is one of the studios that was Allowing themselves to lose hundreds of

million dollars every week by allowing the writer's strike to go on and the SAG

strike is still happening And they're probably fine with losing all that money

just despite them And then you sit here and you say, Okay how is this, how is the

fact that the VFX artists have unionized themselves, how is that now going to,

how do you think this is now going to affect the support staff in other areas?

For and forms of production assistants, costume designers, and editors.

There are a whole bunch of unions out there okay, so you have IOTC and you

have SAG, WGA, DGA, the producer's guild, the producers don't really need a union

really, but there is one we've talked about that in extensive but there's also

hair and makeup unions, things like that.

I think that this is just a long time coming, but I don't really see it.

The only thing I see this affecting, cause it's been a whole coming it's

been a whole like congregation of the entire working force behind Hollywood.

That's been like, Hey, you guys got to start treating us with some respect.

Yeah.

You got to do something.

You have to start treating us with some respect.

And so I think that.

When more negotiations come up next year, when more negotiations are due for

other unions, they're gonna demand more.

There are way more, they're probably gonna go on strike.

I guarantee this, what's going on this year is going to happen again next year,

but with the other unions that are due.

I honestly avoided a strike, but next time they'll be like, hey, you know

what, now that we're bigger and better, With so many vfx artists behind us now,

we decide that we're probably going to strike if we don't give us more now

We said they weren't going to do that.

But When people get a little bit larger get a little bit bigger, that's

something they might want to do Right, and then they had a study by the

economic policy institute found that union workers in the united States

as a whole earn an average of 11.

2 percent more than non union workers.

And then also an example would be the unionization rate for production

assistance is around 20, is around 10%.

However, in some industries such as television and film, the unionization rate

for production assistance is much higher.

For example, the unionization rate for production assistance

in Hollywood is around 40%.

Yeah.

Which it's crazy that's higher, right?

It's crazy how in Hollywood it's 30% higher.

So I think overall the benefits and job security could.

ripple effect into other areas and again It's not like these studios

can't afford it Like we just said the unions were spending on the unions.

I'm sorry the studios were spending how much?

Hundreds of millions of dollars?

Hundreds of millions of dollars to not allow these people to unionize.

And they're perfectly fine with that.

But to spend the little 47 million to the WGA or, the other under 100 million

to any of the other unions, they were struggling to wrap their minds around.

I think the reason why they were willing to do that is because of the domino

effect, of the precedent that it sets.

If one union, that's, this is also, I have, this is a little hot take here.

But I don't think the WGA should have gone with, I don't think the

WGA should have gone with such a quick tentative deal as they did.

I know why the WGA did it, but they should have waited till SAG also had one.

I don't believe that they should have done that.

And I know we're supposed to be talking more about the VFX artists here, but

we're talking about the domino effect.

You're everyone's stronger together.

They should have been like, okay, we're going to stay with our, with SAG.

But I took a tentative deal in the same aspect.

The VFX artists have realized, okay, we all have to join.

First of all, I actually, once again, we have said how powerful they are.

They're immensely powerful.

Not only is it the right match for them, but they're immensely powerful.

It's hard to say that this year isn't going to ripple into other

years and to other unions for them to say they want to demand more.

We already talked about that's how, what they want, when they get more

powerful, but What happens when each union starts looking out for itself and the

unions aren't quote unquote unionized?

And that's personally what I am afraid of.

I think that the VFX artists should be a part of IOTC.

I think they should have been unionized a long time ago.

I think they should, they deserved rights for how, for so long.

But I also believe that IOTC is powerful enough to say Oh, like with WGA and SAG,

if one, if IOTC goes on strike, right?

And let's say SAG, for some reason, is on strike the same year.

Okay?

If IANCE goes on strike, then SAG goes on strike.

IANCE could say, oh, we're not with them.

They are.

They'll, look, here's the thing.

Everyone stands in line.

They all picket with each other, walking out front of studios.

Because they're all, doing that, right?

They're all fighting, cheering together.

But what happens when one union says, oh, we're good?

For example, the DGA.

The DGA has said, Oh, we're being supportive, but they're not

supportive enough to help them.

That's the same thing that happened in 2007, right?

It was just the opposite.

It was the opposite.

It was what was the studio?

One of the studios caved and was like, ah I'm actually good.

I'll actually give you guys a deal.

And the producer the producer's union, but all the studios didn't stay combined.

One broke off to say hey guys.

I support this.

This has got a affair.

Yeah.

I support this, right?

But, I'm a, I'm gonna go ahead and give 'em a deal and that's, obviously it's a

lot more nuanced than that, but that's essentially how the 2007 strike ended.

But one, one question that I would ask you is, what do you think is the reason why.

Workers wait till tech revolutionizes itself before they take or

ask for what's rightfully.

Oh, this is an easy question easy The answer is quite simple People don't change

until they're forced to Really, especially when you are working in this industry

people don't understand that, when you're been doing something for 10, 20 years,

you start to get real tunnel vision.

Humans are people of habit.

If I, especially people who are working 16, 18 hours a day, do you

think they're worrying about anything else besides eat, sleep, work, ain't

know how fast the days move in the mouth and the months move when you're

doing the same thing, that same thing.

When you're working at that high level, so often, so frequently.

Like, when do you have time to say, Hey, let me plan off,

let me plan this whole union.

You know what I'm saying?

Only this year when it has been so much disruption.

If you notice, they did not unionize and neither did Marvel VFX unionize last

month until there was time to do that.

Everything's down.

Yeah.

Everything's down.

Who's to say that if the WGA and SGA WGA and SAG did not

unionize and shut everything down that they would even do this?

I would think that the workers become more productive and more

valuable with the technology.

That's true, but I'm just saying because of this, because of the shutdown, they

would not have even, it's not a thing of it's not to say, oh, they're not smart

enough or not capable of doing it, right?

But they only do it when there's a change in technology because

if it's not broke, don't fix it.

And it's a lot easier to just keep on pushing through with the same thing.

It takes a lot to unionize.

It's not just Oh, Hey, what's up?

You want to unionize?

Yeah, sure.

Okay.

Guess what guys?

Now we're unionized.

No, it takes a lot of time out of your day, out of your nights.

There are.

A lot of ledgers and papers and memos that'll be written,

who are going to be my members?

Who's not going to be a member?

How do you define who's a member?

How do you define who can qualify to join, right?

How do you define who can't qualify to join?

Who am I going to say counts as VFX?

Even though VFX is a very broad term, right?

Do my assistants count?

Do my Meanwhile, somebody is now taking your job while you're trying to use it.

Do the people overseas count?

Because I could be working with I am producing a podcast show outside of this

one film centers really great and is, it's one of my main ones, obviously, but I'll

say this, I do produce another podcast.

We are working with a team in India right now for some of our technology, right?

For us to help us produce some of the episodes.

It's okay do they get de unionized because technically they do qualify.

So now I had to create regions, right?

Oh, you have to live here.

You have to live there, right?

Who knows?

It's a lot of work.

And you need time to do those things.

You don't have time for it when you're working 16, 18 hours a day.

And the days that you're not working, you're off contract

and you're not getting paid.

So you know what you're doing?

You're looking for your next one.

Because I remember when I was, whenever I was working in construction, They

have what's called per diem, right?

Everybody knows what per diem is.

Now, like they said, you have to be in a certain radius of

the plant to get the per diem.

And the way that they're also sneaky about it is we have a saying

called as the crow flies radius.

So as, what that means is it means if a plane or a crow were to fly,

say it was a 50 mile radius, right?

If a crow were to fly 50 miles that way, that's the radius.

Not 50 miles it takes to drive in your car.

It's a straight line.

It's a straight line 50 miles one way.

So it's a, it's the same thing.

It's a bit.

And now they're doing it.

A out of necessity because the change technology but for them I think it's

mainly because they finally have the breathing room to do it I think

that's what allows people to that's what allows the domino effect right

to strike after strike, but guys this has been film center once again,

you can follow us at filmcenternews.

com and we're all on all socials.

Nicholas What is your, what do you think is the future of this?

Do you think you're gonna see, we're gonna see more VFX people join Niazi?

Oh yeah, I think now that they've unionized, now there's protections,

now that there's a possibility for standardized wages, a possibility of just

overall better quality of life, it's going to attract more people to the VFX field.

Not that there wasn't already a lot of people.

But guys, my name is Derek Johnson II.

I'm Nicholas Killian.

And this has been Film Center.

See ya.

See ya.

This has been Film Center on Comic Con Radio.

Check out our previous episodes at FilmCenterNews.

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