You know the feeling. You've been shooting for a little while now and the weight of the Nagra, or the DAT machine, or the audio mixer with all its pouches stuffed with accessories, is bearing down on your neck like a millstone. You support the burden with your hands, straighten up, stretch and go: "Aaaah!" or, if you are less well-mannered, you say something a little stronger. 
Illustration courtesy of the Health & Safety Executive It has always been thus, since gear has been not quite heavy enough to rupture you. If it can be picked up by one man, then put a strap round it and hang it on your neck. It is a different story for production mixers with enough savvy to load their mixer carts with enough bits and pieces to make it patently obvious that even if they were to strap on a tray the size of a cinema ice cream girl's there wouldn't be enough room: but for those of us who have to follow a fleet-footed cameraman - who more often than not will dart off like a startled pheasant - the luxury of wheeled support is just not an option. As a result of many years of working like this especially that appalling period when the early years of ENG gave us the torment of carrying BVU 110s around - I am suffering annoying neck and back pains, and I bet that I am not the only one. | Very recently I was afflicted with a terrific pain that spread from my neck sideways to my arms and upwards to my head, and I thought that this must be a warning. A visit to the doctor got me referred to a chiropractor who told me that my neck posture was badly distorted and that my troubles would get worse and more frequent if I did not somehow take the weight off my neck during work. Fortunately, with exercise, the worst consequences of my occupational malady may well be avoided, but if I had left it much longer before consulting medical help I could have been facing a painful and disabled life. Even when the Union was powerful, before the 80's legislation took away our protection, it was impossible to get any form of acknowledgment from employers that the weight we had to carry was dangerous to our health. I can remember a Recordist working for an ITV company who was threatened with dismissal if he continued with hiscomplaints about the weight of ENG BVU50s and 110s. If the Union couldn't help then, in those dear, departed days of pre-Thatcherite strength, I rather think that a snowball stands more chance of surviving in Hell than any of us receiving support or effective compensation in the present climate. The answer must lie in our own hands. I, for one, have been making a rod for my own back....what an apt phrase! My audio mixer chiefly used for working with Betacams - is loaded with radio mics, spare cassettes, batteries, a picture monitor and all sorts of detritus: fully loaded it weighs in at about a stone and a half. Why do I do it? Because it is a short term fix. It is easier to carry the extra cassette or the spare battery than to trudge back to the car. It is easier to have the radio mic receivers wired in semi-permanently than to rig them each time they are needed, with cold fingers and a tutting director. So for a quiet life, I mortgage my health: yes, I reckon I'm pretty dumb, but I also reckon that I am not alone in this. There are harnesses available to spread the weight around the shoulders and back, and there are jackets with many and large pockets. These do alleviate the symptoms but I wonder if they are only shifting the problem elsewhere - the weight has to be borne by our bodies somehow, and if we shift it from the neck and back perhaps we will find that our legs and ankles will pay the price. I plan to go through my gear and see if I can do something to reduce the burden - perhaps put the stuff that I think I may need in a bag I can put down as often as possible, although I can see me leaving it behind or treading on it! I shall be taking the mixer off my neck and carrying it by hand whenever possible. Whatever it takes I must look after my neck and back - and I really do suggest that any of you who are in a similar position do the same. NICK FLOWERS AMPS | 
