for those on 4way teams right now

[superstu 0]

i'm getting into 4 way team stuff right now and was wondering how much money do you guys spend a month for training jumps, video,packers, everything? also how many training jumps a month does your team do?

Slip Stream Air Sports
Do not go softly, do not go quietly, never back down

[ladyskydiver 0]

We pay for our video guy. Each person packs their own rigs. We try to do 2 training jumps on a Wednesday and 3 training jumps on a Saturday twice a month. (This is excluding our regular jumps.)

So....

video guy - $18/jump X 5 = $90 / 4 team members = $22.50 (each team member kicks in for Sam)

packer = $0 (we are discussing using a packer for our competition days)

training jumps = $18/jump X 5 = $90 / week / person

Rough total = $112.50 / per person every other week for training

Sometimes we do not have video at our home DZ, because our video guys is, also, on staff at the DZ. We, also, will pay for Sam's lunch, etc. while at the competitions.

ARG!! Maybe I shouldn't have calculated that. I think I was much better off not knowing.

Life is short! Break the rules! Forgive quickly! Kiss slowly! Love truly, Laugh uncontrollably. And never regret anything that made you smile.

[Watcher 0]

48 jumps no packers ~$3000-3600 per team. Everyone Team deals will vary.
2 weekends a month (24 and 24). 2 Rigs also.
Add in packers ~$1200
Our Video is part of the team so they do not charge us.
DV tapes are cheap (relatively)

So thats roughly $1200 per person per month. to have packers and 48 team jumps

--

Jonathan Bartlett
D-24876
AFF-I

[Ron 7]

You need to figure out what YOUR team will cost.

Take 5 X the cost at your DZ.
Add in the cost of your camera guy (10-15 bucks)
Divide by 4.

Pack jobs are the individuals responsability.
We don't get them, we pack for ourselves during training.
We are on 20's all day

Some DZ's give deals to any team....Some give just the top team a deal.

For us we have a tunnel plan as well, so thats more money.

We plan 40-50 jumps a mth, 2 hrs tunnel time.

I budget around 800.00 a mth.
Or 5,000.00 for this year, not including hotels, nationals fees, FSL's, ect.

Ron

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

[quade 3]

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Our Video is part of the team so they do not charge us.

Jonathan -- with all due respect, that is pure BS.

If video is part of your team, then where is the camera flyer's name, bio and photo on your team web site?

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[rehmwa 2]

There's some hard core practice people posting here.

We're more casual (not my choice).

video - we pay his slot
no packers - we pack our own
jumps - We're looking at 10 per weekend every weekend weather permits - average 25/month

Tunnel time later.

The point is not making as many jumps as possible, but coming to an agreement/commitment on what everyone wants - and sticking to that agreement. Even a couple organized jumps a weekend is better than pick up dives. It just takes longer.

You probably already know about the articles posted on this site. Read them all and search within the articles for all of them.

Good luck - a committed 4-way team is the best thing you can do for skills

...
Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[Rdutch 0]

Quote

Quote

Our Video is part of the team so they do not charge us.

Jonathan -- with all due respect, that is pure BS.

If video is part of your team, then where is the camera flyer's name, bio and photo on your team web site?

GO QUADE, your making me proud!

Ray
Small and fast what every girl dreams of!

[weid14 0]

Quote

i'm getting into 4 way team stuff right now and was wondering how much money do you guys spend a month for training jumps, video,packers, everything? also how many training jumps a month does your team do?

how much do you earn? sign the check over.....

I was 8,000 in debt at the end of last year. (was worth every penny, well all except the bad parts)

[fudd 0]

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Our Video is part of the team so they do not charge us.

Jonathan -- with all due respect, that is pure BS.

If video is part of your team, then where is the camera flyer's name, bio and photo on your team web site?

Depends, I don't see anything wrong in that. If someone want's to fly video without getting paid, thay should be allowed that.
Someone starting out to be a camera guy/girl need a lot of practise. We use some fresh guys, and pay their slots if the videos ok. However, the quality of the video is often not good enough to fully see all that happens in the exit or all grips.

There are only 10 types of people in the world. Those who understand binary, and those who don't.

[darkwing 4]

We don't pay for video, unless we are jumping where we get a team deal that includes the video slot. At meets we pay the video jumps and packs.

The more you invest in training, the better you will be. Generally speaking I'd say that teams pay what they can, which is almost always less than what they would like to do. If they had more money they would spend it on jumping. For most jumpers the constraint is the money, not the time or the desire.

-- Jeff
My Skydiving History

[RozeAY 0]

Quote

Quote

Quote

Our Video is part of the team so they do not charge us.

Jonathan -- with all due respect, that is pure BS.

If video is part of your team, then where is the camera flyer's name, bio and photo on your team web site?

GO QUADE, your making me proud!

Our camera man is paid. Slots (and pack jobs when necessary) are covered by the team. Our camera man was learning last year so other than covering slot he was not paid per jump. However, we did buy him a canopy as a thank you at the end of the year.

[curtismelaniej 0]

Depends on the team.... I'm on a player-coach team, so we also have to pay the coaching fee, his slot, on top of all the other stuff-- jumps, video, packers, team room, Nationals, tunnel, etc. etc. It will add up very quickly-- I definitely choose not to keep close track of how much I spend on 4-way, because it's not like I won't spend it anyway. I make sure I have enough for my rent and bills-- and the rest is just 4-way gravy. Now, I don't budget very specifically, but I do budget such that I can't remember the last time I bought new clothes retail-- not counting my latest jumpsuit. I call myself a priority spender-- I'm cheap in many aspects of my whuffo life, so that I can be very frivolous in my skydiving life. Choose what you want, then just make it happen.

__________________________________________________________
http://www.skydiveelsinore.com/teams/EXCEL/basic_camp.html

[BikerBabe 0]

That's tough for me to answer, since our training plan is one weekend (20 jumps) some months, and 4 days (40 jumps) other months.

We do a long camp every three months, then one weekend each of the other months.

We pay for our camera flyer's slot, but since he's still learning along with us, he isn't paid extra yet.

We also pay for packers, especially this time of year. There is no way I personally could function well if I had to pack in the AZ heat AND do 10 jumps a day. Just a personal preference.

SDAZ gives us a $2 discount per jump, so that helps.

Sooo....a typical weekend for me is:
Roundtrip airfare from ABQ to Phoenix: ~$100 (cheaper to fly than anything else)
Jumps: $320-$400 depending on how many we do
Packing: $80-$100
Coaching: $137.50 - $150 depending on who we have and circumstances.

So not including food and unforseen circumstances (reserve rides, etc), a typical month for me (where we only train one weekend) would be:

$637.50 - $750

Pretty much double that for the longer camps. Of course if you stay at home and train, you won't need to add in airfare.

Never meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup!

[quade 3]

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Depends, I don't see anything wrong in that. If someone want's to fly video without getting paid, thay should be allowed that.
Someone starting out to be a camera guy/girl need a lot of practise. We use some fresh guys, and pay their slots if the videos ok. However, the quality of the video is often not good enough to fully see all that happens in the exit or all grips.

Fudd --

Everybody has to work out their own deal in order to learn. Even if that means the beginning camera flyer is paying his own slot, that's fine with me as long as everyone is clear as to what is actually happening.

What I was really objecting to was the concept that a team would try to justify not paying their camera flyer because he's a "part of the team".

Let's be serious here.

Using Jonathan's team as an example look at who they thank and look at their video page.

Is there even one word about who shot the video? No. Not even a freekin' copyright notice. Doesn't seem like they even had a camera flyer, let alone one that was "part of the team".

Well, if the camera flyer is not a part of the team, then he's obviously a hired gun. Hired guns should be paid and paid well. Any team approaching me without some sort of long term commitment better be prepared to pay my standard rates otherwise I just don't see the point in me jumping with them -- especially not for a competition jump!

I'm sorry but I just can't have any sympathy for a team that's willing to travel thousands of miles to fly hours and hours in the wind tunnel, pay coaches hundreds of dollars a day, go to a competition (or hell even a regular training day) and then try to cheap out when it comes to video? You can't be serious?

It's taken years of my time and thousands of my dollars to prepare myself and my equipment to work for your team and you want to squabble over a couple of bucks? Sorry pal, see ya.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[RozeAY 0]

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What I was really objecting to was the concept that a team would try to justify not paying their camera flyer because he's a "part of the team".

I agree with you on this point. This is not what our team does. Our camera man does not ask for compensation beyond slot and pack job. This was clear before the start of each season. We respect everybody who has helped us with video.

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Using Jonathan's team as an example look at who they thank and look at their video page.

Is there even one word about who shot the video? No. Not even a freekin' copyright notice. Doesn't seem like they even had a camera flyer, let alone one that was "part of the team".

Not that it is the main issue but as a side note, with the exception of the most recent video added to our page, the videographer is thanked on our thank you page. It does not, however, say "video by."

I'm sorry my teammate has given the impression that we do not respect or compensate our videographers. That is certainly not the case. We respect them, appreciate their help, and justly compensate them according to what they ask. We appreciate the camera flyers who have helped us out by not charging beyond slot and pack job and we also appreciate and respect those that we do pay.

[quade 3]

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Our camera man is paid. Slots (and pack jobs when necessary) are covered by the team. Our camera man was learning last year so other than covering slot he was not paid per jump. However, we did buy him a canopy as a thank you at the end of the year.

And that's not a bad deal as long as everyone on the team is clear as to what the deal is, then no issue as far as basic compensation goes.

As to recognition . . . I understand you're in the process of working on that, so, let me thank you for him and all the other camera flyers out there that have been overlooked by any one of a number of teams.

I'd also like to mention one other entire group of people that also tend to get overlooked in 4-way -- the packers.

One of the classiest things I think I've ever seen was Maubeauge bringing their packer up on the awards stage for photographs at various meets. It showed they understood that nobody gets to the top of anything without a lot of support people.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[Dumpster 0]

It's simple -

Jump as much as the four/five of you can afford to. be as competitive as you can be, and jump as hard as you can.

That's my philosophy as a a rookie, anyways-

Easy Does It

[JCoonce 0]

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i'm getting into 4 way team stuff right now and was wondering how much money do you guys spend a month for training jumps, video,packers, everything? also how many training jumps a month does your team do?

It's expensive, but worth every penny! My husband and I have both been hit hard by the 4-way bug -Our team (M4) jumps 3-4 days a month together, and we've spent a good amount of time in the tunnel, too. I don't want to look at the actual total, but according to the Microsoft Money pie chart - it's big! (But the experience is priceless).
We're lucky that Doug Glover took an interest in our Rookie team a couple of months ago when my husband and I had less than 100 jumps, and we didn't have a clue how to build a random formation. Doug has volunteered hours and hours since teaching us how to creep, fly, and "pass the rock."

We're also lucky that we get some free jumps for developing the new http://www.skydivemonroe.com website.


Stick with 4-way - it baffles me how much you can learn when you're jumping with the same people with a similar goal. The rewards are tremendous.


Janet