It’s time to make our presence known and understood.
We are the engineering Local, a creative force in Hollywood. We stand shoulder to shoulder with the other creative contributors in the filmmaking community, at the ready to deliver under any conditions.
We are a proud union, committed to the principle of excellence and in this time of awards and recognition for the accomplishments within the entertainment world, it seems we should be stating clearly where we stand.
Each one of us is an ambassador for this group of professionals known as IATSE Local 695. Every day can present an opportunity for us to reinforce and enhance this message. What we bring to the workplace matters. We are needed as collaborators for the work to progress.
We need to communicate this in all of our work relationships and opportunities. Not with swagger or boastfulness, but with commitment, concern and contribution.
We are greater than the sum of our tools as our contribution is about the filmmaking, the storytelling and the project at hand. We’re here to serve like any “musician/ sideman” might be, intensely devoted to knowing our “instrument” fluent in the language of filmmaking, hungry to “play with good players.”
We have a system. Every day, we retrace our steps, practicing to reinforce what we’ve learned up till now, and build on that foundation by opening our minds to new ways of accomplishing this ancient task of storytelling, for that is our mission, telling the story.
We must be our own best voice to inform and remind those we work with that we are as indispensable to the process as any of our peer contributors. This is not conceit, but merely a statement of fact that is all too often missed in the flurry that is at the heart of making movies and television.
We can remind our colleagues that what we do is profoundly necessary for successful productions to take place. In fact, if we were unable to perform our contributing work on any given day, production could easily grind to a halt; something we, collectively, are absolutely committed to prevent. We do this by being perpetual students of the filmmaking. Soaking up the river of information and new technology constantly flowing toward us, creating training for our members, so we can say with confidence, “bring it.” Bring us these new hammers and nails, these constantly evolving tools of creativity that we are so interested in mastering. We must stay nimble and ready to perform in the orchestra.
We must express clearly that we are truly creative partners in the making of entertainment.
Happy New Year to our many friends.
Warm wishes to you all in the year 2016.
Fraternally,
Mark Ulano CAS AMPS
Local 695 President