Petition To Redact New Extracurricular Production Policies

Dear Dean Gansberg,

We, representing the student body of Columbia College Hollywood, feel that the new policies surrounding extracurricular productions are both unfair to the student body as a whole, and serve against the very principles of the college itself. Below we have outlined some of our grievances; we respectfully ask that you evaluate each of them from our perspective and give serious consideration towards either removing the policy in its entirety, or to adopting a new set of policies offering a solution more balanced to the needs of both the college and its student body.

A. Restricted Equipment:

We do not feel that access to the school’s equipment should be limited or restricted for extracurricular shoots. Restricting our resources restricts our ability to create art and refine our craft; with every piece of equipment banned from EC shoots comes more shots, more stories, and ultimately more films which we are unable to create. The designated equipment list gives us neither the freedom to express ourselves creatively or the resources to demonstrate our skill – even some basic equipment required on all shoots, such as bounce boards, are not currently provided. If the college is having any conflicts with equipment reservations, we suggest enforcing the current rule that PW projects have priority; all Production Workshop and class projects should have their equipment lists turned in at least 2-3 weeks before their scheduled shoots, affording EC shoots time to move production to a different date if necessary.

B. Cameras

The SONY F3 Camera is a terrific camera, however no one camera is ever the right camera for every feasible production. We ask that you revoke the policy that EC shoots may not film on the Alexa or Red cameras - enforcing if necessary a suggestion such as the one listed in Grievance A. There will be shoots where the F3 is the appropriate camera to use, however there will also be shoots where we are required to use either the RED MX1 or the ARRI ALEXA; both of which have very different capabilities with regard to Frame Rate, Color Space,Tonal Latitude, Resolution, and Shutter Speed. Our school has long bragged that students may come and begin shooting with these cameras right away, whereas with the new rules we may get to do so until students begin production workshop in their senior year.

C. Production Limits

The philosophy of the school has long been stated that we encourage students to film as much as possible, limiting the number of EC productions a year which a student can be a part of directly conflicts with that statement. Many of us chose to come to CCH BECAUSE it offered unlimited access to the equipment; for us to refine our skills and craft to the degree necessary to obtain production based work after graduation will require far more experience than our classroom projects alone can offer. Our professors all warn us that we have to be the best in our field, that we have to be experts by the time we graduate, if we cannot earn the experience necessary to reach to that point we will not be set up for success upon graduation.

D. Intellectual Property Rights / Rights of Sale

CCH also likes to brag about how students maintain complete ownership of all their intellectual property rights, however the requirement to sign a contract stating we may not sell our work voids that claim and leaves us with only partial rights. Not being able to sell our work leaves robs us of many career advancement opportunities, not to mention that most of the students here could greatly benefit from the sale of their work to assist in paying their tuition – especially with the recent increases. One of our events this year actually brought in a guest speaker who was eager to purchase students films for her satellite channel, this is one example of the many of opportunities now closed to us. We understand the college wanting to ensure all productions are student productions, but we should not be stopped from selling our work and possibly advancing our careers.