Ideally, I begin working in audio post-production as an independent contractor, working on individual projects rather than for a single organization. I believe this would allow for diverse work environments, contexts, and project management exercising both my practice, technical ability and exposure to various working environments. Working as a freelance editor demands strong networking skills which I believe I have exercised through the last few years, working in live engineering environments, hospitality environments, and working on contract based artworks, including composing music for short films and design shows.
Forming community alongside pursuing consistent freelance work is part of the reason why I am focusing on working in New York while I can. I have a large network of friends from Los Angeles that I grew up with who have moved to New York, and from July I will be living with three of my close friends from high school who have all just graduated from art university as well, focusing on design and fashion. I believe having direct access to driven artists who also want to engage with communities, performance, and fabrication using new materials will provide a sort of symbiotic environment where we can create together and push each other in our personal and professional practices, allowing for constant criticism and support. This is one key factor that I want to use to support my freelance practice in sound editing. I believe the constant escape to be able to have access to a creative environment that isn’t relying on your personal time allocation is very important when trying to balance work and art practices, which is something that I have lacked discipline in for the last few years.
Circling back to working as a contractor in sound in New York, one of the most important factors that lies outside of the demand of networking and maintaining relationships for employability and growing your career, jobs in sound editing that are freelance require a fairly intensive amount of financial planing, budgeting, and saving – not to mention applying for unions in the United States to help with health care access and additional financial support. In preparation for this I began to grow my savings over the past year in conjunction with my university work and artist practice. Having a nest egg that assumes I could potentially be unemployed for up to six months is helping ease the financial and personal pressures of moving countries again. This perspective was built on working with contractors and crew from the sum of live sound gigs I have done over the past year with JB Sound company, setting up PA systems and doing assistant engineering work for various bands and DJs.
