Adobe Sneaks Highlights, Freelance Rates, and Financial Apps

I stumbled upon a fantastic article that I just had to share with you. It’s the elephant in the room when it comes to freelancing! In the article, they delve into the importance of open conversations about pay rates in the industry.

Let’s take a look at some key takeaways and why this conversation is crucial for all of us:

Equal Pay for Equal Work: The entertainment industry, like many others, has faced issues of wage disparity. By talking about rates, we can work towards closing the gender and diversity pay gaps, ensuring that everyone is paid fairly for their contributions.

Support and Solidarity: Discussing rates fosters a sense of community and support within the industry, as well as identifying and addressing cases of exploitation. When we share our experiences and information, we can help each other negotiate better deals and avoid getting shortchanged.

Guidance for the Next Generation: As veterans in the field, we have a responsibility to guide newcomers. By sharing our rate information and experiences, we can help aspiring professionals navigate the industry more effectively.

So, what can you do to help empower yourself and others through these conversations about industry rates?

Start the Conversation: Don’t be afraid to talk about rates with your colleagues, peers, and mentors. It might seem uncomfortable at first, but it’s a necessary step towards transparency and equality.

Share Your Experiences: Your personal experiences can be incredibly valuable to others. Share your stories, both the successes and the challenges, to help guide those who are just starting out.

Advocate for Fairness: When you see instances of inequality, speak up and advocate for fair pay. Collectively, we can work towards making the industry a more equitable place for everyone.
Remember, the more we talk about industry rates, the more we empower ourselves and others. Let’s continue the conversation and work together to make our industry a better place for all. 💪🎬

Last month, Adobe unveiled several innovations that are under development in their “Adobe Sneaks” event. This year’s innovations are building on how generative AI can help in many of their projects. For this newsletter, I thought I’d pull out the ones that are most applicable to video editors.

Project Fast Fill brings the power of Firefly generative AI to video for the first time. Leveraging Generative Fill technology (which already is used in Photoshop) Project Fast Fill shows what human-prompted generative AI could enable inside Adobe video editing tools — including Premiere Pro and After Effects- by using prompts to add, remove, or expand content in images.

Project Dub Dub Dub automates the video dubbing process. It translates audio tracks to multiple languages while preserving the original speaker’s voice. How cool is that?? Maybe I WILL actually be speaking Spanish one day!

Project Scene Change simplifies compositing subjects and scenes from separate videos captured with different camera trajectories, creating synchronized motion.

Project Res Up allows editors to finally up level the video from a lower resolution camera to look like it was shot on a higher resolution camera. So maybe we don’t always need to buy the highest resolution camera as soon as it comes out. I’ll hold on to my camera a bit longer.
These are really exciting innovations that aren’t taking away jobs, they’re simply reducing the amount of time a project can take, and in some cases, they are doing things that were never possible before. What a great time to be alive!

Managing money is part of being a freelancer, and it’s more than just making sure it’s coming in! Taxes, invoicing, and expenses are all part of the business. Here’s three great apps you may want to explore for your business.

Melio is an app that I use personally for getting paid, and paying others. It integrates with Quickbooks and your checking account, and it’s free if you do ACH bank transfer. You can also use it to pay international clients in more than 70 countries for a small fee. There’s no subscription fee, and it’s easy to use. We’re living in an age where checks and mail are getting stolen. Don’t let someone take your money!

SoFi offers banking and wealth management with no fees or minimums. They offer financial planning, community events, personalized career advice and a Unemployment Protection Program. Currently, SoFi is offering 4.6% APY on their checking and savings accounts. That’s hard to beat!

Hello Alice is a business mastercard that rewards you points that you can use for cash back, gift cards, or virtual workshops on business topics. And I’m pretty sure this is also the only business credit card that gives you access to one-on-one busienss coaching! There’s no fee. They offer small business loans, as well as grant opportunities, too!