Picking up from yesterday –
I was unemployed for some months after my first assistant editor job. That was somewhat stressful.
“Will I be able to get another AE job?”
“Heck, will I be able to get another job?”
I ended up (yet again through Staff Me Up (…didn’t realize ’til writing these posts how many jobs I got through that service)) getting a job at Playboy in June.
I got a job as a media manager – which basically means I manage the media. Photos and videos would come in from shoots and I’d organize them by girl and date and such.
It was a pretty simple job. The people there yet again were quite nice. (It kind of sounding to me like I’m saying that a lot, but I guess I lucked out with a string of jobs populated with nice people, and in an industry where it can be easy to complain sometimes, it’s nice to remind myself of that.)
Working at Playboy is interesting (as you probably assume it would be). But as you also probably might imagine, working on sex stuff is not necessarily sexy. It’s a job like any other. For part of my time there, my desk was close to some editors’, and I’d hear them getting notes (un-sexy notes).
For instance, certain specific body parts or camera shots should only get a certain number of frames before you want to pull away. So, all kind of stuff like that. But hey, now I know how long you should focus on a [*self-bleeping, as it’s not totally appropriate for the blog*] to make porn sexy. I don’t know when that skill will ever come in handy. But it’s there!
The first week I worked at Playboy, I thought perhaps I’d be the only girl there, as practically all I saw were men. I think the show in the suite next to us had the week off, because once that office was repopulated, I saw way more women. Basically (as it is in too many offices), I met a lot of women doing admin roles. I’m the only one I knew of on the tech (editing) side.
Also, if you’re wondering if there’s a sexist culture there, I’d say just a little. There were small instances of that. For instance, if one of the bosses gave petty cash to a woman for a real errand, he hand it to her saying, “Go get yourself something pretty.” People also sometimes referred to the models as “the one with the forehead” or whatever instead their names.
So, there was stuff like that. But ultimately, I felt extremely respected and never harassed. It was a great company to work for.
Back when I worked there (and saw more footage of naked women than I thought I ever would), there was a message I posted on my old Facebook profile, because I thought it was important. And I will post it here tomorrow!