Be careful what you wish for.
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Medicine seems to have figured it out. For example, when my foot hurts, I may see a Podiatrist. When my brain hurts, I see a Psychiatrist. When my skin hurts, I see a Dermatologist. They are all doctors. They are all someone Iād prefer to be stuck in an elevator with or seated next to at a baseball game when I choke on my hot dog. But, alas, each one is a specialist and can therefore specialize and become really really good at somethingā¦like, comping cg, or making something from nothing, or making different sized rectangles and squares from other kinds of rectangles.
Someone that didnāt fall asleep in Intro to Latin should help us come up with some ridiculous flame specialty titles.
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Horrifying.
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After a handful of rather evenly spaced financial booms and busts, the collective knowledge of our clients in terms of what we do has dropped in equal points to their average age. Thatās to say that as soon as theyāre experienced enough to understand fully what we bring to the table they get fired because theyāre too expensive to keep around.
Itās the āComputer Graphics Guyā to āVisual Effects Supervisorā cycle. Rinse and repeat.
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Iāve started crediting myself as a Finishing Editor. I did consider Finishing Artist but that is a glorified photoshop operator for print media.
Iām actually not comfortable referring to myself as an artist. What we do has to be fit for a purpose so designer would be more fitting as art doesnāt need to fit a purpose. But I donāt feel that is correct either as we are sometimes compositing elements together that we personally havenāt designed. Compositor would work if you are only doing VFX, but we often have to do more than that. Operator sounds more like a button pusher without taking into account all the thought and creativity that goes behind what we do. Assemblagist could work but then could come across as just being an assembly editor trying to pass themselves off with a more fancy name. Finishing Editor works for me because I get a whole lot of components that I place together and finish off whether it be compositing, mastering, graphics, whateverā¦
Iāve always thought there should be a more specific name for what we do these days but even amongst us Flame folk there are differences in what our roles encompass.
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i have done almost everything in tv post, but always find myself coming back to Editor. Its what i doā¦whether its video editor, audio editor, graphic editorā¦its all variations on a theme.
I donāt feel right calling myself an artist. I come up with creative solutions but for me an artist is someone like my wife - a sculptor, a painter, someone who can draw. That aināt me.
Having said that - iām happy being recognised for what i can do, but i detest with a passion the job title i was lumped with when creating our in-house post facilty, by those who know nothing about tvā¦studio manager! I hate it. I donāt manage a studio, I edit and finish commercials. I audio mix, I create graphics and 3d animations.
To me, the word manager is about the biggest insult on the planet.
I donāt manageā¦i excell.
To manage sounds like getting through an onerous task with the barest of effort or resultā¦hmmmā¦maybe they did understand the tasks?
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Most of what I do is the last stage of the post process. Iāve always seen myself as an online editor but the title is a little outdated so I changed it to finishing artist
I do like @AdamArcher title though and fits for me too. Ok to use it Adam?
This kind of thing is probably what led to startup bros calling themselves things like ārockstarā and āninja.ā
Itās hard to quantify what we do, and a literal description always sounds bland at best, and incomplete at worst. Like, I get to be called VFX Supervisor sometimes, but am I just standing with a clipboard, arms folded, watching over others as they work? Hopefully not.
And not to be cheesy, but one of the great things about flame is how many homes it can find in various post environments. Beauty AND finishing AND CG comping AND longform. Itās no wonder we canāt agree on a title for ourselves, most of us donāt even have the same job!
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Oh my god I love this. What a fabulous read. Thank you for sharing - I agree with ALL of this! 
āI think youāre all fucking mad. Deranged. So disengaged from reality itās not even funny. Itās a fucking TV commercial. Nobody gives a shit.ā
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āCognoscenteā 
Fuuuuuuuccccccck
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Thank You for sharing this!
Oh thatās good. Thanks John.
Thereās a director I work with occasionally that will come bounding in to the flame room during tense moments, often late at night, and say, "Guys, great news, I just found out this is just a tv commercial."
Always helps us to take a deep breath and chill out a bit. Until the revisions came through.
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Semantics aside and with generalization as a goalā¦
An Artist does it for the divine inspiration.
A Craftsperson does it to hone skills every day.
A Salesperson sells ice to eskimos.
Operator push button fast.
The illusion of artistry is intoxicating when you first get started but itās actually the fulfillment from honing your craft that you realize later drives the ego behind this identification of self as an artist. I have always contended that flame is 50% sales. Youāre all full of shit on a good day! Many are so good at the facade they believe themselves to be artists when theyāre really operators who can sell anything to anyone.
Art
When asked to interpret a surreal and nuanced visual idea without reference to match to, I attack the opportunity until the morning hours.
Craft
Iāve learned how to mould, shape and manipulate motion, light, color and pixels to create beautiful images effortlessly.
Sales
I am adept at listening to director, art director, and executive and identifying the common thread that ties all three together and then concisely presenting that as my original and inspired solution.
Operator
When I sleep my hand races over a keyboard to hit that hotkey like a dog chasing a squirrel.
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I like the term Storyteller, god I want punch people when they say that.
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Oh, thereās an āinnovation strategyā company in NYC that has trademarked storydoing as if itās a real thing. I think thereās even a book. Monsters.
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I just barfed a little when you said that, god, just remind people its a commercial and they are supposed to sell shit. I might make business cards that say Story Telling Artist Op, too bad I havenāt handed out a card in about 15 years.
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Me and my dad work together and we have an inside joke where whenever thereās a shot that is just going to be so difficult and time consuming and frustrating, but itās something that no viewer whatsoever wouldāve cared about, you just say something to the tune āWellll, visual effects IS about storytelling, and the story Iām telling now is āthis a street in which traffic cones arenāt reflecting in the bottom right corner of a characters sunglasses.āā Add on a āThe Emmy for the television show or miniseries with the least traffic cones reflected in sunglasses goes tooā¦ā and youāre fully jaded.
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