FEDME PROFESSIONALS

FEDME (Spanish Mountaineering Federation):

Incompetence? Ignorance? Or bad faith?

Foreword to all my non-Catalan or Spanish speaking friends:

This will be an English resume of my blog texts. Please by kind with me about my grammar skills, and never doubt in suggesting any correction for the mistakes you may find.

 

 FEDME (the Spanish Mountaineering Federation) just published in his website a call to cover “video and photo services in sports events co-organized by FEDME”.

What is interesting to us, image professionals, is what FEDME offers and what gives in return. Just because professionals (people who make their living with this, who invest in their job skills and who pay taxes to be allowed to work) are tired of being insulted in a world were almost nothing can be done without images.

What FEDME offers? They offer a fare, to cover an event, of 800€ VAT included, which makes 661,16€ as a real fare.

What FEDME is asking for? They ask the professional to assume the cost of staying in place (food, bed and highway tolls if any), to be in place the day before, to propose improving ideas to FEDME (¿), to assist to FEDME meetings whenever they consider, to design and audiovisual plan about the event, to record and edit a ¡12 minutes video! In no more than 48h after the event, and to get minimum 70 good quality pictures in what they call “high quality and low quality”. To send in real time video and photo images and, of course, to have all necessary stuff to do so … All of this in a weekend (call the plumber in  a weekend…) and working where you are risking your gear.

It’s obvious for any real professional that this can’t be dons for just one person. Being optimistic, we are going to need two.

Some fast calculations: previous day means travel and preparation, race day, following day trip back home, after that, a day to edit and prepare images. FEDME themselves, consider in the very same document (section 15 point 18) that sleeping and food (a cost for the professional, do not forget that) means 100€ day/person. Two people, three days in place:: 600€.

Wu must add the fourth day work, taxes (IRPF y Social Security in Spain) material and vehicles wear, image storage …

FEMDE doesn’t look for slaves, It is worst, they look for people willing to finance their communication needs while thinking that they are earning 800€.

We are noy going to talk about work conditions, thought by someone with no idea of what working in an outdoor sports event is. It’s just evil? It’s just ignorance? Who knows?

FEDME sirs:

  • Probably that’s legal (slavery was it in other times),but is absolutely indecent.
  • I’m sure you will find someone to do that: world is plenty of people with cameras and other jobs willing to “play photographer” until they discover how much does that cost.
  • It’s obvious that people in charge don’t know anything about images (¿“resolution” in Mb? For God’s sake) and don’t know anything about what represents what they are asking for.
  • If you don’t have money, forget about images. And, as it appears, images are so important, look for the money in your budget.
  • Don’t forget that “You pay peanuts, you get monkeys”, but maybe that’s the real problem.

If any doubt, you can contact me.