How I became a NYC based Jib Operator

Lots of people ask me how I got into this weird niche. Most people I knew growing up went to college, got a degree, possibly a grad degree, and work some kind regular well paying job. You just say to yourself, well that figures! He or she studied HR, they do HR. They have a business degree….and now they do some ethereal job involving paper and $$ deep inside a computer. What’s my story? How did I manage to get into this??

Well, many might be surprised to know this was entirely an accident. I actually graduated from Mason Gross School of the Arts (Rutgers) with a bachelors in jazz performance. I was a drummer, a pretty good one too! I played professionally for several years in a variety of bands, taught private lessons, and even taught high school marching band for a few years. It was during this time that I got more and more into production work. It started with learning audio skills to record my own bands. That turned into me teaching less and working with sound more. One day I got the opportunity to do audio for video with a production company that specialized in streaming MMA/Boxing. We hit it off and eventually they had a job with no budget for audio, but asked me if I wanted to learn camera. I jumped at it! From there I just kept learning more and more, more and more, more and more.

A year or two later I wound up in a situation where the production company’s jib operator had to bail very last minute and we couldn’t find an op. I figured out how to put the jib together and got promoted! Funny enough, this NYC JIb Operator’s jibbing debut was actually in Lancaster, PA! After that, I took the jib home with me to practice. I just kept getting better and better. Eventually, I just wasn’t a drummer anymore but wound up with the wonderful business and career I have today.

You never know where life will take you!

What is the right size jib for the job?

As a rule of thumb, in a stage environment you want to avoid a jib arm crossing more than 1/3rd the length of the stage. This helps keep the jib out of other camera angles but also lets the widest point of a shot still look very wide. If the arm is going any further along the stage, your wide can result in a cameo appearances of the jib rig and operator! But what about jobs where there isn’t a stage and it’s just an open space? Being a NYC based jib operator, you see venues and spaces of all kinds. A good rule of thumb is to make sure your arm isn’t built so big that you don’t have room to boom around. If the space is 40 wide, then a 30’ reach jib would have a 90’ degree boom radius. An 18’ jib reach would have considerably more boom radius and be a lot more appropriate. With camera crane/jib operator gigs in and around New York City/Philadelphia, ceiling height and what’s around you also is a big factor. Let’s say there is a chandalier close by to where your footprint is. You need to make a judgement call if it’s easy to avoid OR if it’s better to build 3’ shorter so you don’t have to even think about dodging it. No one likes having to use a shorter arm for safety, but if the camera can boom right up to a cool lighting fixture or grid, then you’re in for setting up some amazing shots! Lastly, how high or low the camera needs to go is something to consider. When using the larger Triangle Jib sizes, you have 6 and 9’ ballast arms. To get extra lens height, you set up the tripod legs to be higher. The flip side is that it gets very difficult to boom close to the ground. It’s important to get a feel for the zone you need to be swinging in before you build a rig.

30’ Jimmy Jib Triangle at Parx Casino outside of Philadelphia. Jibbing around lights needs to be done carefully, but there’s a lot of cool perspectives to be had!