Film graduates , like many graduates , think that they ' ve spent their university time becoming masters of a subject , only to find the world doesn ' t think so and pays them accordingly . Film is actually incredibly vocational . When you swing a boom pole it makes zero difference how much you spent on study to do it . Very few people on set will really be interested in at uni they taught us to do it this way . , they just need it doing their way right away . Graduates rarely have the experience of working in larger crews of professionals , don ' t know the first thing of the basics , have to learn the pecking orders , have to learn to Walkie talkies , radio etiquette , how to read a call sheet , etc . And that ' s to start off on the bottom rung . Look at it like this , amortising shoot costs over the production window somewhat unfair , but useful , we ' ll be spending maybe $ 1020 khour on average . If we are held up by an hour , that ' s money that ' s never coming back . If we gave an HoD role to an inexperienced graduate , we would lose more than an hour for sure . How long does it take a focus puller to be any good ? A few student shorts , or years of practice measuring distances and knowing the kit ? How long for a sound recordist to get a good ear ? For a production coordinator to manage runners and a float ? For lighting department to get electrically qualified let alone learn the different lamps and their doubles and mending them ? For a 1 AD to be credible working with trades ? Location manager to scope and manage all aspects of a site ? None of these are skills you ' ll get in film school . In film school , everyone wants to be a director , and some will settle for camera department , but all the roles and trades are crucial . A unit needs carpenters and electricians , painters and handymen , lifters and carriers . Film school will pander to lofty ideals and beardstroking because they make $ 0 , 000 ' s a year from each student , but not get anyone qualified to tail in a lamp , work as a grip , manage a real budget , etc . And seeing as all those things are essential , the work of learning them falls on industry to teach . And that means vocational , bottomup learning . And even moving from shorts to features is a jump , the rules change . Everything changes . Shorts are not commercial , nobody buys them , and it ' s damn hard to get anyone to even watch them . Your local cinematheatre doesn ' t show shorts nights every week for a reason . Shorts are dead money , they are only a bit of experience for trainee crew , and a bit if showreel for director and maybe camera dept . I can ' t call students DoP ' s or Cinematographers TBH , they ' re just not at that level by the time they leave film school . They likely haven ' t loaded a magazine on a hillside with blue fingers at 4 am , tried to pull focus matching an earlier moving shot whilst avoiding the effect of the lens breathing , worked with many different bodies and bits of grip , have experience with HMI fresnels , open faces , fluorescents , LED etc as well as 18 kW lamps that take 4 strong sparks to even carry , and know at a glance how to manage reach of those against daylight . Damn , sidetracked again . Shorts are a bit of showreel and practice , 2 days of flitting around having fun . Features are weeks of 12 h days and it ' s different . It ' s draining . It ' s physically tough . It ' s some twat sitting on your kit box in a field eating a bacon sandwich and getting brown sauce on the handle . You ' re all exhausted , you ' re only halfway through , petty irritations become big . Production have to wade in and fire a few people who are frankly not cut out for the life and drop the ball . A runner is an hour late waking up , misread the call sheet , whatever , and is late picking up talent from the hotel . That puts the day back an hour , now we have grumpy talent and crew , and have to lose a shot or setup to recover . An innocent error is a big deal . You just don ' t learn this stuff at college making occasional shorts . If I had to commit $ 30 k in one or another direction and that ' s just tuition of course , I ' d get out there as a runnergofer and use it to get a modest car insured for business use , and get on set of any feature I could . Then repeat , and repeat . Soon enough I ' d actually see what department I really wanted to work in being a runner is the last time you work across departments , after that your specialise , and start working as a junior in that detainment maybe a camera trainee , sound trainee , or even a swinger on a smaller film . Maybe I find electrical department interesting , so spend $ 5 k getting a basic electricians qualification so I can grow through that department . Maybe I find I actually hate being on location and that I actually want to work in the production office as a coordinator or accounts assistant , and work up that route . You can subsidise the crappy entry level wages . When I ' m crewing up , I do not sort candidates by their film qualifications , I do so by their ability and experience . If someone is capable , present , pleasant , and priced right , they ' ve got a job . That degree doesn ' t even come into the equation . I ' m not saying don ' t go to film school , I ' m sure it ' ll teach you some fascinating theory and you ' ll make some great friends and some decidedly average shorts . There are many great reasons to study in higher education , but it ' s not massively vocational , and filmmaking is generally vocational . I ' m sure you ' ll get a range of opinions , that ' s just mine