Film Industry Recovery

Howdy everyone. I hope you have all been enjoying the longer daylight hours. I will cut straight to the chase and tell it like I see it from our end at Filmcrews in Auckland. Post the announcement by the Government in December that filming incentives were to rise (to help NZ compete with the rest of the world), we definitely noticed a spike in crew being held for quotes and possible feature film positions. January was abuzz with work, but interestingly, it slowed down again in February in the commercial market, even though there have been many long term things in production such as Step Dave, When We Go to War, The Kick, Deadlands, and Project L in Wellington.

Last year we, as an industry, took an incredible hit with many crew leaving our shores or leaving the industry to find other employment. The flow-on effect has been big. We have found now that there is soon going to be a shortage of skilled crew in some areas of expertise, so I guess that is a silver lining for people who have managed to weather the storm, as they will pick up whatever work comes in from now on.

There is no better time than now to make sure you have a current showreel, portfolio, or CV, (easily accessible to producers via your chosen websites, agent, diary service, or IMDb etc) to encourage further business to come your way.

I predict the following months will be steady, and hope that once the incentives come into effect after April 1st the industry will be back to the way we like it, with work flowing steadily with the normal seasonal peaks and troughs throughout the rest of this year.

Sioux Macdonald, Guild vice president and executive committee member