Sumit used to have long days, not anymore though

Deepkamal Kaur

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, October 30

As marriage season has set in, video editor Sumit (31), based at Islam Ganj here, has a ray of hope lighting his face again. For nearly four months, he was out of work as there were no social functions.

Being used to a busy life, Sumit had the habit of sitting in front of his system for 12-14 hours a day and going about the computer mouse swiftly to edit the videos of marriage, ring ceremony, birthday, baby shower and mundan (head tonsuring) functions. Using a set of five or more editing softwares, including converters and DVD writers, he and his team of four experts often worked from 10:30 am till midnight; sometimes at 2 am when the days called for wrapping up of the work in time.

However, none of that is likely to happen again. “Thank god, the Navratri came at a time when Covid cases had fallen. There were quite a few marriages in these auspicious days. I have a tie-up with the photo, video studios of the city which shoot the social functions and get video editing done from us. As of date, I have four-five assignments in hand to work on,” he said.

Thank god, the Navratri came at a time when Covid cases had fallen. There were quite a few marriages in these auspicious days. I have a tie-up with the photo, video studios of the city which shoot the social functions and get video editing done from us. As of date, I have four-five assignments in hand to work on. —Sumit

He is hopeful that the coming wedding season will bring in more work for him. But he is not much enthused, “It is only the big, fat Punjabi NRI weddings that we look forward to in each season. One such big budget photo-video shoot package of about Rs10 lakh or so helps us earn Rs30,000 as well. But I do not think it is happening. Marriage functions may not be as big and the budgets, too, could be low. Low budget packages would imply more effort and less income for us.”

Sumit, who did a course in animations after his schooling, says, “The course did not come of any use to me. I spent two years with a video editor in his shop where I learnt all the nuances and got adept in the work. Now running my own business, I charge from customers on per hour basis. The lengthier the data of the shoot, higher are the charges.”

The youngster shared that amid the Covid days, he would work on any assignment that came his way. “Some people laid their hands on old video tapes, some of them dating to times as old as 1950s. I enjoyed working on all such videos. I enhanced their sound and image quality to the best possible levels.”

He even got his hands on Punjabi video song mixing works that he managed to get through his sources. “The lockdown days were not easy for us. Even though, I got a lot of time to spend with my wife and my son, it was not easy paying my staff the salary for four months when there was absolutely no work. Fortunately, we had work till April as there were weddings till mid-March. So, we kept doing all those video jobs that came to us. But after April, it was a complete lull,” said Sumit, hoping for better days ahead.