Relocating

[Julien Chichignoud]

Hi everyone,

I'm relatively new here, so first, hello!

I was wondering if anyone had experience to share about relocating themselves (and their businesses) and tips on how to handle it, approach new clients, etc...

My story in short, I'm originally from France, and moved to Australia over 6 years ago. I used to be a freelance editor and broadcast QC operator, and got my start as a freelance colourist in Sydney, Australia shortly after arriving. I'm now thinking of going back to France, and the idea of rebuilding a network is a bit daunting.

I'm at a point in my career in Australia where I'm very happy with the work I do and the people I work with. I work with people I've met shortly after arriving, and we've all progressed together, and I get new clients from word of mouth, personal recommendations, etc... I work from home 95% of the time, and clients don't even come in, just send me a drive or an upload probably for 80% of jobs. I get to spend more time with my son and work mostly the hours I want.

So my ideal plan if/when relocating is to quickly get to a similar point where I'm in control of all of this and am not chasing new clients around. Where am at right now in my career in Sydney probably took a good 3 years of heavy networking, doing a lot of favours to a lot of people, but I'm getting too old to do this again

I guess the main thing I need to figure out, is how to find and approach clients, since I'm just used to them coming to me, but won't have the luxury of waiting for them to come this time around. Australia has a (deserved) reputation of being of a very easy-going work culture, where things happen a lot more easily than in Europe, and I'm dreading the going back to the (also deserved) reputation of French administrative red-tape, setting up a business, etc...

Any insight welcome

[Emily Haine]

Many well established colorists in France, and lot of high-end work in all genres. Have you decided to move?

[Orash Rahnema]

Hi Julien,

I completely understand how you feel, that is something I'm struggling with as well, feeling the need to relocate but to start again as a freelance it's a daunting task and a shot in the dark.

The difference for me is that I still freelance going to post houses or with "clients" wanting to be presents.

So reading your story I'm asking, since most of the time you get the drives and do the job completely independent, would not be possible to do it from ovreseas keeping your clients, at least you will have a base while rebuilding the network in France.

What you need to do is to set up some kind of server storage to upload and download the footage.

I'm sure you thought about it as well, so I'd be interested to know your thoughts about it.

[Julien Chichignoud]

On 10/17/2017 at 6:30 AM, Emily Haine said:

Many well established colorists in France, and lot of high-end work in all genres. Have you decided to move?

I did end up moving earlier in the year, but to Melbourne, Australia, rather than France for now.

It's a good "first step" to see how the relocation on the other side of the world would go. I ended up keeping quite a few of my clients, which is good, and because I moved with the internet speed in mind (if you know anything about the state of the internet in Australia you'll know why I was careful) and I've been able to do a lot more remote work than before. The problem is that some of my clients still send me hard drives and I'd probably lose some of them by relocating to Europe, but I also have a few with whom I work fully remotely that wouldn't care about where I'm based.

I'm going to France in December/January so my plan is to start getting in touch with people, see what's around and if I could start working remotely for French clients.

 

On 10/17/2017 at 8:04 PM, Orash Rahnema said:

What you need to do is to set up some kind of server storage to upload and download the footage.

That would be fine on my end, but a lot of my Australian clients have terrible internet and I know they wouldn't be able to upload things to me. But as I mentioned just before, with the move to Melbourne I'm starting to see which clients I can keep and which I can't.

[Margus Voll]

I wonder if the France market would have outsider and non speaker as remote colorist?

I'm kind of looking to widen my clientele but as my baby is small now the have to work remote for now.
Estonia in that sense is good place as we can have either fibre or wireless fibre (400/400) in country side in the city full gig is doable.

[Julien Chichignoud]

1 hour ago, Margus Voll said:

I wonder if the France market would have outsider and non speaker as remote colorist?

I'm kind of looking to widen my clientele but as my baby is small now the have to work remote for now.
Estonia in that sense is good place as we can have either fibre or wireless fibre (400/400) in country side in the city full gig is doable.

We're not really famous for being good with English... You'd have more luck in Germany, the Netherlands, etc... but you never know!

[Orash Rahnema]

5 hours ago, Julien Chichignoud said:

 I moved with the internet speed in mind (if you know anything about the state of the internet in Australia you'll know why I was careful) 

I Iknow exactely what you mean!

I lived in Sydney for about 7 Years, i left in 2010, i hoped that things foto better in the main time.

Anyway, let us know how It goes, its a very interesting topic!

[Margus Voll]

1 hour ago, Julien Chichignoud said:

We're not really famous for being good with English... You'd have more luck in Germany, the Netherlands, etc... but you never know!

Thanks.

This is why i asked