Walt Disney Pictures VFX Workers Move to Unionize | Hacker News Reader

Walt Disney Pictures VFX Workers Move to Unionize

variety.com

Am I reading this properly, Disney only has 18 in-house VFX employees?

This is "Walt Disney Pictures" not Walt Disney Studios as a whole. Walt Disney Pictures is just one of a bunch of their production companies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Disney_Studios_(division)

There are a lot of subsidiaries:

Walt Disney Pictures

Disneynature

Marvel Studios

Marvel Animation

Marvel Studios Animation

Lucasfilm

Industrial Light & Magic

Skywalker Sound

20th Century Studios

20th Century Family

Searchlight Pictures

Walt Disney Animation Studios

Pixar

20th Century Animation

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

Buena Vista International

Star Distribution

Walt Disney Records

Hollywood Records

Disney Music Publishing

Disney Concerts

Buena Vista Records

RMI Recordings

Disney Theatrical Productions

Buena Vista Theatrical

Disney Theatrical Licensing

Disney Live Family Entertainment (DLFE)

Disney on Ice

Disney Live!

Walt Disney Special Events Group

Disney Studio Production Services

Walt Disney Studios

Golden Oak Ranch

The Prospect Studios

Disney Studios Australia

KABC7 Studio B

Disney Digital Studio Services

Great for them, but out of curiosity, what's stopping Disney to let them all go and farm out VFX work to other non-unionized shops outside their studio? Disney already work with so many third party houses anyway for most of their movies.

What could possibly go wrong? These artists are surely fungible.

The National Labor Relations Act. That would be pretty clear retaliation against employees for Unionizing.

Also, if Disney attempts to union bust, they are now forced to immediately recognize the union and begin to bargain with them.

https://prospect.org/labor/2023-08-28-bidens-nlrb-brings-wor...

https://www.nlrb.gov/news-outreach/news-story/board-issues-d...

Then how can Starbucks, Chipotle etc. blatantly shut down stores in response to unionization?

I believe they tend to take action before a formal vote is held, which gives them plausible deniability.

Then it seems really easy to avoid?

The regulatory authority has changed it's interpretation of the rules recently.

But nothing forces Disney to continue to fund this studio, or for other companies to give them VFX work to do. The reason for poor conditions in the VFX industry is always identified as the fact that, put bluntly, they are willing to take it to work on movies. No different to video games or other artistic endeavours. Until the field stops being fashionable enough for people to compete so aggressively, conditions won't improve and unions can't fix that.

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