What is a Grip?
Grips are the extra hands & feet on a video production set. Grips provide general mechanical assistance on the set, mostly to the gaffer and DOP helping to set up and tear down equipment before and after the shoot.
On bigger jobs and on tight production schedules, having a grip on the team improves the efficiency of the crew, allowing the videographer, audio technician, and lighting technician to focus on their particular responsibilities.
Grips also handle mechanical rigging needs on the set, including various camera arms, dolleys, and other vehicles for camera-mounting.
Who should play the Role of Grip?
In smaller video productions, the grips responsibilities are handled by anyone on the video production team. On larger video productions, having a dedicated grip improves the efficiency of the entire video production team, and so the Grip pays for himself or herself.