Visual effects artists often make pretty good scratch working on some really fun projects, but they also log some obscenely long hours. Sure, $80,000 a year sounds great, but what if you had to work 80 hours a week? Oh, an 99% of the work is not glamorous at all. In fact the job is almost entirely about frame-by-frame (-by-tedious-frame) rotoscoping. Sure, you get fancy tools, expensive hardware and the latest plug-ins, but in the end, VFx can be a mind-numbing drudgery, with bursts of creative genius and maybe some  anonymous awards at the end of the year.

Still, without an army of VFx artists, where would the blockbuster Hollywood film be today? The answer is: nowhere. There would be no blockbusters as we know it. And that's just Lee Stranahan's point in his Open Letter to James Cameron. He wants more recognition and more of a cut of the money at the end of the day. It's easy to understand his grievances. As he notes, the top 30 highest grossing films of all time "...every single one...is a visual effects driven or animated film." On the otherhand, Avatar, for example, had something like 800 artists that worked on it. Do they deserve more credit? Maybe, but doesn't everyone feel that way? Are VFx artists an especially repressed class of movie drones? Sure, you need some skill, but much of the work is just a frame-by-frame grind. Do the Elite Artists and project managers deserve more credit and cash? That's a more interesting argument.

Oh, and just so you don't think I'm down on VFx artists, I'm not: I entirely agree that anyone that works 80 hours a week to hit a deadline deserves more money and accolades. And I also agree that visual effects artists should band together and form a union, like pretty much every other profession in Hollywood. This sort of managment/labor dichotomy really works, in my opinion: Managers try to get employees to work as hard and as long as they can for as little money as possible and Unions are supposed to fight back and get fair treatment, salaries and benefits.

References:
* Open Letter To James Cameron: Fairness For Visual Effects Artists