VFX Artist Explains What It's Like Working for Marvel (Vulture)

[Username taken]

Watch the Disney+ show about ILM and get back to me.

Hollowsage is spot on.

The MCU list of directors is large so let’s just look at phase 4.

Cate Shortland: Somersault, Lore, Berlin Syndrome, Black Widow

Destin Daniel Cretton: Short Term 12, The Glass Castle, Just Mercy, Shang-Chi

Jon Watts: Clown, Cop Car, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Far From Home, No Way Home

Chloe Zhao: The Atlas Mountains, Daughters, Songs My Brothers Taught Me, The Rider, Nomadland, Eternals

Sam Raimi: (too many to do them all) The Evil Dead, Darkman, Spider-Man, Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Taika Waititi: Eagle vs Shark, Boy, What We Do in the Shadows, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Thor Ragnarok, Jojo Rabbit, Thor Love and Thunder

Ryan Coogler: Fruitvale Station, Creed, Black Panther, Black Panther Wakanda Forever

Seems like a good mix of directors with different backgrounds. Some have directed a lot while others have only directed a few. Does quantity matter more than quality?

I really don’t think the directors are the real issue here anyway. The real issue brought up by this thread is simple mismanagement. An effects house promises they can deliver work for an agreed upon price knowing that the price they agreed to is too low. This leads to understaffing to keep costs down which leads to overwork or what’s commonly known in the video game industry as crunch.

Hiring more experienced directors won’t solve crunch. It has been a problem in the video game industry for decades and only recently have some workers started to unionize. That’s the only real solution. VFX artists in the movie industry should learn from their video game counterparts and start the unionization process now and not wait because this isn’t just an issue with Marvel, they are simply the biggest player.

This in an industry wide problem that only continues to get worse as more and more movies rely heavily on cgi. That means more work and job security for vfx artists but without a union they are at the mercy of badly managed effects houses who will work them to the bone and replace them if they complain about it.

The problem is bigger than one studio so the solution must be as well.

Exactly this.

[Immortal Weapon]

You work your way up. Take Christopher Nolan for example. His first movie was Following made for 6,000 dollars. That movie made a profit, so he moves on to direct Memento with a budget of 9 million dollars. Memento was a success, so Nolan's next film is the medium budget Insomnia. After three exponentially successful films, Nolan is chosen as the director of Batman Begins. Most well known Hollywood directors from the past 50 years follow this trajectory, small budget-medium budget-big budget.

I can understand why Marvel Studios is reluctant to work with big name directors nowadays. They cost more and are more likely to butt heads with producers. However, the other extreme, hiring indy movie directors with no experience with action or cgi has it's obvious downsides as well.

I think there is an obvious middle ground to be had here. Hire directors who don't really have much of a following, but who specialize in action or science fiction movies. There are tons of journeyman directors working in those genres who Marvel can probably pay the same amount.

I don't think directing action will be an issue. I remember an interview with the director of Black Widow saying that the stunt coordinators directed the movies action scenes

[James Cameron]

The MCU list of directors is large so let’s just look at phase 4.

Cate Shortland: Somersault, Lore, Berlin Syndrome, Black Widow

Destin Daniel Cretton: Short Term 12, The Glass Castle, Just Mercy, Shang-Chi

Jon Watts: Clown, Cop Car, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Far From Home, No Way Home

Chloe Zhao: The Atlas Mountains, Daughters, Songs My Brothers Taught Me, The Rider, Nomadland, Eternals

Sam Raimi: (too many to do them all) The Evil Dead, Darkman, Spider-Man, Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Taika Waititi: Eagle vs Shark, Boy, What We Do in the Shadows, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Thor Ragnarok, Jojo Rabbit, Thor Love and Thunder

Ryan Coogler: Fruitvale Station, Creed, Black Panther, Black Panther Wakanda Forever

Seems like a good mix of directors with different backgrounds. Some have directed a lot while others have only directed a few. Does quantity matter more than quality?

I really don’t think the directors are the real issue here anyway. The real issue brought up by this thread is simple mismanagement. An effects house promises they can deliver work for an agreed upon price knowing that the price they agreed to is too low. This leads to understaffing to keep costs down which leads to overwork or what’s commonly known in the video game industry as crunch.

Hiring more experienced directors won’t solve crunch. It has been a problem in the video game industry for decades and only recently have some workers started to unionize. That’s the only real solution. VFX artists in the movie industry should learn from their video game counterparts and start the unionization process now and not wait because this isn’t just an issue with Marvel, they are simply the biggest player.

This in an industry wide problem that only continues to get worse as more and more movies rely heavily on cgi. That means more work and job security for vfx artists but without a union they are at the mercy of badly managed effects houses who will work them to the bone and replace them if they complain about it.

The problem is bigger than one studio so the solution must be as well.

The issue is not the inexperienced directors or that it's occurring industry-wide. Marvel is deliberately cutting costs for when the effects houses bid on their projects. This leads to understaffed projects and artists working overtime, which could be avoided if Marvel simply offered more money on their projects or had a larger minimum staff. Or stopped being so overly reliant on CG for basic things like helmets and costumes which they could pay designers to actually make, but that costs money and those people are unionizedx The staffing issues and the problems with artists being overworked and stretched thin is something Marvel specifically is doing. And regardless of how experienced a director is or not, expecting artists to have high quality output in just a few weeks is ridiculous.

And a solution doesn't need to be the final definitive solution -- this is about making these artists' lives better. People shouldn't put pressure on Disney/Marvel to stop these despicable practices because it wouldn't affect the whole industry? Bogus. Marvel needs to respond to these allegetions from the past several months and do more for the artists crafting their films.

[HollowSage]

The issue is not the inexperienced directors or that it's occurring industry-wide. Marvel is deliberately cutting costs for when the effects houses bid on their projects. This leads to understaffed projects and artists working overtime, which could be avoided if Marvel simply offered more money on their projects or had a larger minimum staff. Or stopped being so overly reliant on CG for basic things like helmets and costumes which they could pay designers to actually make, but that costs money and those people are unionizedx The staffing issues and the problems with artists being overworked and stretched thin is something Marvel specifically is doing. And regardless of how experienced a director is or not, expecting artists to have high quality output in just a few weeks is ridiculous.

And a solution doesn't need to be the final definitive solution -- this is about making these artists' lives better. People shouldn't put pressure on Disney/Marvel to stop these despicable practices because it wouldn't affect the whole industry? Bogus. Marvel needs to respond to these allegetions from the past several months and do more for the artists crafting their films.

A little research will show that this is not a problem specific to Marvel. Disney/Marvel offers work on their projects. It’s up to different effects houses to bid on those projects and like most companies they go with the bid that offers the best work at the lowest price.

This is how it works across the industry. Once a deal is reached on price it’s up to the effects house that won the bid to figure out how to deliver the work they agreed to do. If they don’t have enough people to do the work without crunch then they should not have bid at all or they should have asked for more money upfront.

Expecting a corporation to just “do the right thing” is naive. A publicly traded company has a legal responsibility to shareholders to make the most money possible. They will never pay more than they have to. Especially since most people don’t care how the sausage is made.

Take the first Sonic movie for instance. When that trailer was released there was outcry from fans about how bad Sonic looked. So much that the studio had to delay the movie and some poor vfx artists had to redo every scene in the movie where Sonic appears. Did those fans care about the overworked vfx artists who had to fix it? No. They just wanted a game/cartoon accurate Sonic.

This is why unionization is so important. If vfx artists want a better work/life balance they are the only ones who can make it happen. The Corporations won’t pay more than they have to. The effects houses are seemingly to busy undercutting each other’s bids. The majority of moviegoers don’t care as long as they get a good looking movie.

If you care about improving the lives of vfx artists then unions are the only way to really make that happen.

[James Cameron]

A little research will show that this is not a problem specific to Marvel. Disney/Marvel offers work on their projects. It’s up to different effects houses to bid on those projects and like most companies they go with the bid that offers the best work at the lowest price.

This is how it works across the industry. Once a deal is reached on price it’s up to the effects house that won the bid to figure out how to deliver the work they agreed to do. If they don’t have enough people to do the work without crunch then they should not have bid at all or they should have asked for more money upfront.

Expecting a corporation to just “do the right thing” is naive. A publicly traded company has a legal responsibility to shareholders to make the most money possible. They will never pay more than they have to. Especially since most people donÂ’t care how the sausage is made.

Take the first Sonic movie for instance. When that trailer was released there was outcry from fans about how bad Sonic looked. So much that the studio had to delay the movie and some poor vfx artists had to redo every scene in the movie where Sonic appears. Did those fans care about the overworked vfx artists who had to fix it? No. They just wanted a game/cartoon accurate Sonic.

This is why unionization is so important. If vfx artists want a better work/life balance they are the only ones who can make it happen. The Corporations won’t pay more than they have to. The effects houses are seemingly to busy undercutting each other’s bids. The majority of moviegoers don’t care as long as they get a good looking movie.

If you care about improving the lives of vfx artists then unions are the only way to really make that happen.

I mean I agree with everything you're saying - unionization is the solution. I'm just saying Marvel is not making things any easier and are clearly one of the worst culprits of these practices.

[thwhtGuardian]

I mean I agree with everything you're saying - unionization is the solution. I'm just saying Marvel is not making things any easier and are clearly one of the worst culprits of these practices.

How are they worse?

[James Cameron]

How are they worse?

The article literally outlines why Marvel in particular is worse than most studios and why VFX artists make a point to avoid Marvel work. The article from a couple months ago detailing testimonials from several artists on reddit mentioned similar stuff

[HollowSage]

How are they worse?

Apparently because they are the largest due to all the movies they put out so they get the most attention. You can’t “fix” one studio even if it’s the largest and expect change. It’s a system wide problem so you need to fix the system.

[HollowSage]

The article literally outlines why Marvel in particular is worse than most studios and why VFX artists make a point to avoid Marvel work. The article from a couple months ago detailing testimonials from several artists on reddit mentioned similar stuff

That’s one solution. Just don’t do work for Marvel. No one is forced to bid on their projects. That’s not a true solution though since they still need to work and crunch can still happen no matter who you are working for.

[James Cameron]

That’s one solution. Just don’t do work for Marvel. No one is forced to bid on their projects. That’s not a true solution though since they still need to work and crunch can still happen no matter who you are working for.

Solutions solutions. The best possible way to see any solution is to put a spotlight on the terrible practices, and since Marvel is one of the worst culprits, more and more people should be exposing this and sharing it so we can move closer to unionization across the board. Since Disney is one of the largest studios they are the ones who should be spotlighted and held accountable for this, regardless of whether or not other studios are also responsible

[HollowSage]

Solutions solutions. The best possible way to see any solution is to put a spotlight on the terrible practices, and since Marvel is one of the worst culprits, more and more people should be exposing this and sharing it so we can move closer to unionization across the board. Since Disney is one of the largest studios they are the ones who should be spotlighted and held accountable for this, regardless of whether or not other studios are also responsible

Why would you limit it to only Disney? Especially since the true problem lies with the mismanagement at the various effects houses? They are the ones who place the bids. If they bid low just to get the job are they not at fault? If they understaff projects is that Disney’s fault?

Disney doesn’t own these effects houses. They don’t run them. They just pick whoever puts in the lowest bid and expect them to do the job they were hired to do. Even if Disney paid them more than they asked for there is no guarantee that money would see it’s way down to the individual vfx artists. Because Disney doesn’t run these houses.

Disney offering to pay more won’t solve mismanagement at companies they don’t own or run. This problem is bigger than Disney which is why I keep saying that unions are the only real solution to help artists.

[James Cameron]

Why would you limit it to only Disney? Especially since the true problem lies with the mismanagement at the various effects houses? They are the ones who place the bids. If they bid low just to get the job are they not at fault? If they understaff projects is that Disney’s fault?

Disney doesn’t own these effects houses. They don’t run them. They just pick whoever puts in the lowest bid and expect them to do the job they were hired to do. Even if Disney paid them more than they asked for there is no guarantee that money would see it’s way down to the individual vfx artists. Because Disney doesn’t run these houses.

Disney offering to pay more won’t solve mismanagement at companies they don’t own or run. This problem is bigger than Disney which is why I keep saying that unions are the only real solution to help artists.

This thread is specifically about Marvel's terrible practices with VFX artists. It is telling that artists will deliberately avoid doing work for Marvel because of how they are treated. You can go on all day about how it's "not just Disney" but it's just deflection because the article is literally about why Disney/Marvel is among the worst. No one is arguing that unionization isn't the answer, but to keep going on about how it isn't just a Disney problem is distracting from the purpose of the thread.

[HollowSage]

This thread is specifically about Marvel's terrible practices with VFX artists. It is telling that artists will deliberately avoid doing work for Marvel because of how they are treated. You can go on all day about how it's "not just Disney" but it's just deflection because the article is literally about why Disney/Marvel is among the worst. No one is arguing that unionization isn't the answer, but to keep going on about how it isn't just a Disney problem is distracting from the purpose of the thread.

Well I apologize for wanting to discuss the real issue and a possible real solution. If you only want to complain about Disney then have fun grinding that axe.

[Rincewind]

Well I apologize for wanting to discuss the real issue and a possible real solution. If you only want to complain about Disney then have fun grinding that axe.

How dare you bring clarity and nuance to the subject.

[Tofali]

Since Marvel didn't directly hire these ppl I can hardly blame them when all these issues are all due to the VFX companies' incompetence. They're the ones who are underbidding and over promising what they can do for these film studios. With one stroke they can choose to solve their problems by demanding better contracts that would make them hire more ppl. If that isn't an option then all VFX artists in the film industry needs to strike, form a union or quit. They're barking up the wrong tree if they are blaming Marvel when it should be the company that directly hires them.