#careering

[jt1674]

Visit Original Link

[rastronomicals]

6:09 PM EST January 13, 2025:

Public Image Ltd. - "Careering" From the album Metal Box (November 23, 1979)

Last song scrobbled from iTunes at Last.fm

[spilladabalia]

Public Image Limited - Poptones, Careering Live The Old Grey Whistle Test 12.02.80

[therockerfromspace]

"You will meet people who promise everything, people who seem to flood you with love, who drown you with it and then kill you with contempt. You will meet people who claim they want someone to complete them, when they mean they are so frightened that they are missing something that they're too scared to give any of themselves away. You will meet people who are so fucked up and angry that they will make it their mission to tarnish your shine.

But if you're incredibly lucky, you'll meet someone who is kind and decent. They will want you to grow strong and sure. They will let you build your home with them, inside them. They will never make their own not-enoughness into an excuse to use you up. They will fill your life with joyful noise, the sound of their footsteps in the hall will become the beat of your heart. And all they will ever ask of you is that you love them and let them love you back. THAT is what matters. That is happiness. And nearly everything else you think you want is bullshit."

- Daisy Buchanan, "Careering"

[thedaveandkimmershow]

This is one of those professional experiences that, turns out, has implications for the personal. First things first, though:

When you really need the money, it’s excruciating to pass on a project. Potential cash, you know?

But. Especially as creatives, it’s important to recognize those times when the correct answer is

No.

Lemme back up first so we’re all on the same page.

The job of a creative is to accomplish at least one of the following...

to manifest the client’s objectives in the real world

to manifest the client’s vision in the real world

to manifest what’s in the client’s head in the real world

to manifest what the client themselves may not even know... in the real world

I’ve done all of these, by the way, so I’m not responding to degrees of difficulty. That difficulty, along with the constraints of the clock, is, quite honestly, what rocks my world about my career.

With me, so far?

Okay. Back to the present.

Recently, I was approached about a job. The client gave me a specific example of what they expected in the finished product... which was super helpful. The example totally made me want to do the project.

Except.

While the editing, graphics, and music were all very well done in that example, what really sold the experience was the experience itself. The experience of the people in the video was all visual. You could see it. Therefore, as a viewer, you felt what they were feeling. And they were super engaged, having a great time. The editing, graphics, and music were all icing on that particular cake. That work was masterfully done, but still... it was simply a masterful frame. The work did not constitute the picture itself nor the picture’s emotional impact.

The client, though, was most concerned with the technical aspects of the shoot and edit, which is normal. The more clients know about the tech, the more they want to discuss it.

Only one problem.

The client’s shoot came with restrictions making it impossible to capture any emotional experience. The restrictions made it impossible to capture human emotion, interaction, and engagement. They made it impossible to show people having a great time.

Those restrictions, for me, by the way, were the whole enchilada. The entire point of the video regardless of fancy framework.

Yet, the client was laser-focused on the editing, the graphics, the music.

So?

I could do a cut-for-cut version of the client’s example using the restricted footage and it wouldn’t work. I could replicate all the technical aspect in the example but, without being allowed to capture the same kind of experience... there was no way to replicate what that example accomplished. And, with the client’s attention so thoroughly focused on tech, I could only assume that sort of failure would be blamed on tech issues. Basically, on me. Which would result on tweaks and tweaks and new cuts and recuts until arriving at the inevitable unsatisfied client.

So I passed. 

I know my abilities and limitations. There was no way for me to succeed. This was a client for someone else. 

So I politely... passed.

This kind of experience has personal implications, the most important of which is this: being able to recognize the conditions for success.

One more time:

It’s important to be able to recognize the conditions for your success.

Why?

Because sometimes, sometimes, we’re asked to do things that cannot be done by us. These are not only questions of physical ability, they’re questions of mental ability, emotional ability, relational ability.

And so on.

We are, each of us, lives growing and changing in response to a world made from infinite moving parts. And we cannot do everything.

Much as we’d like to think we can.

Again, this isn’t a response to degrees of difficulty, it’s a crucial acknowledgment of those instances, rare though they may or may not be, when we’re asked to do something we can’t do.

Because rarely are those situations recognized as such. 

Those failures become blame... heaped onto our shoulders.

So yeah.

Let’s all... be careful out there.

[marcjacobs]

Please join us tonight (11/30) at Bookmarc Tokyo to celebrate Shota Matsuda and Taro Mizutani’s new book, “RING,” featuring Careering earrings and the work of top Tokyo hairstylists 📍 4-26-14 Jingumae, Shibuya-Ku, Tokyo ⏰ 20:00-21:30 💚 Hope to see you there!

[rastronomicals]

11:07 AM EDT March 19, 2024:

Public Image Ltd. - "Careering" From the album Metal Box (November 23, 1979)

Last song scrobbled from iTunes at Last.fm