Filming on a Microbudget E-Book

Paul Hardy

• Herausgeber: Pocket Essentials
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 388

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

So you want to make a film? It's the only way to get into the film industry. No one's going to let you play with the kind of money it takes to make a feature film until you've already proven yourself by making a great short film. You can do that at film school - if you can afford to go to film school. If you can't, then you're going to have to make your films without money. You're going to have to film on a microbudget - like Shane Meadows, who made Where's The Money, Ronnie? before TwentyFourSeven, and Guy Ritchie, who made The Hard Case before Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels. With the technology available today, it's easier than ever to make a short film without the benefits of funding, but digital cameras and editing systems are only part of the story. The most important thing is you, the film-maker. This Pocket Essential gives you all the information you need to put together a short film production - from first idea to script to planning to casting to locations to shooting to editing to distribution.

Leseprobe

NOTE: Tables are easier to view on a computer (clearer)

Filming on a Microbudget

So you want to make a film? It’s the only way to get into the film industry. No one’s going to let you play with the kind of money it takes to make a feature film until you’ve already proven yourself by making a great short film. You can do that at film school - if you can afford to go to film school. If you can’t, then you’re going to have to make your films without money. You’re going to have to film on a microbudget - like Shane Meadows, who made Where’s The Money, Ronnie? before TwentyFourSeven, and Guy Ritchie, who made The Hard Case before Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels.

With the technology available today, it’s easier than ever to make a short film without the benefits of funding, but digital cameras and editing systems are only part of the story. The most important thing is you, the film-maker. This Pocket Essential gives you all the information you need to put together a short film production - from first idea to script to planning to casting to locations to shooting to editing to distribution.

Paul Hardy has made eighteen short films with not nearly enough money. Despite this, he’s had work screened on FilmFour, shown at international festivals and was chosen to make a short film during the Brief Encounters short film festival.He recently co-wrote and co-produced an independent feature film. Paul currently runs courses on how to make short films.

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Acknowledgements

Thanks to everyone involved in Blood Actually: Amelia Tyler, Al Convy, Natalie Gardner, Chris Pinches, Paul Ullah, Charlie Falagan, JJ Bates, Charlie Morton, James Lawton, Sophie Hancock, Harry Webb, Simran Panesar, Huw Bowen, Tim Robottom, Bo Davies, Abigail Tarttelin, Damian Hayes, Nino Marsala. Also thanks to Warwick District Council, Heartbreak Productions, everyone at Spencer Yard, and The White Horse Pub in Leamington Spa.

Contents

Introduction

Development

The Idea

Script & Structure

Storyboarding & Shotlisting

Preproduction

Scheduling

Locations

Casting

Crewing

Props, Costumes & Make-Up

Budgeting

Precautions

Production

Organisation

Performers

Camera

Lighting

Sound Recording

Postproduction

Editing

Sound Editing & Mixing

Music

Mastering

Distribution

Case Study:Blood Actually

Afterword: The Twelve Most Common Microbudget Mistakes

References

Media Centres/Workshops

Regional/National Screen Agencies

Other Organisations

Websites

Periodicals

Books

Glossary

Index

Introduction

This book will tell you almost everything you need to know to make a short film on as little money as possible. A ‘microbudget’ for short films is a cash spend of around £500 ($1,000) or less, but that shouldn’t put chains on the quality you can aspire to; a fundamental trait of every microbudget filmmaker I’ve ever met is that they exploited whatever resources they had as ruthlessly as possible and never acknowledged the word ‘impossible’ if they could come up with an original way of doing something. With the right mix of ingenuity, contacts and tenacity, it’s possible to make a film that looks like tens of thousands of pounds, on a budget within the reach of even the most modest wage. And technology is on your side. First the Mini-DV format and now the emerging HD formats have brought reasonable picture quality within easy reach, video editing is now possible with quite ordinary PCs, and better equipment can be found at subsidised rates from media centres and workshops across the country.

But there’s one thing that can’t be improved by technology: you, the filmmaker. To begin with, you need the ability to imagine a series of images that tell a story. After that, the only thing that can improve you is experience. You should watch as many films and as much television as possible (especially the ads, since they’re effectively short films), and with a critical eye. And you must make films, even if you’re just going out and grabbing some footage to use for an editing exercise. You’re the one that’s got to make the films, and you’ll still make mistakes, but hopefully the way will be a little smoother.

Having made many of these mistakes myself, I wouldn’t want you to repeat them without being warned…

This edition has been updated to reflect the changes in technology that have come about since the last version, mainly the advent of High Definition video into the microbudget arena. There’s also a new case study film, Blood Actually, which I shot and edited during the writing of this book and which you’ll be able to watch online at www.pocketessentials.co.uk/bloodactually.

NOTES FOR INTERNATIONAL (NON-UK) READERS

The basic procedures for making a film are pretty much the same throughout the world, which means that the vast majority of this book will be relevant to you. But nevertheless, it was written with a British audience in mind, and there are some points where you will need to exercise your own judgment:

– Currency The prices quoted in this book are all in pounds sterling, a currency that only applies to the UK. You should check exchange rates in your part of the world to get a rough translation. For example, the US Dollar is trading at a rate of £1=$2 at the time of writing. This will doubtless change as time goes by – I’ve seen it dip to nearly £1=$1 in my lifetime and while that’s unlikely, it’s far from impossible.

– Prices The prices given in this book are rough estimates of UK prices for certain goods and services. However, translating these numbers to your currency may well prove inaccurate, as things will likely cost more or less in your country. For example, the suggested UK mileage rate of 40p/mile will not translate to US prices as gasoline has always been much cheaper in the US than the UK.

– Sales Taxes In the UK, we have ‘Value Added Tax’, currently at 17.5% and applied to most (but not all) goods and services. This of course does not apply outside the UK, but other sales taxes at different rates and with different rules may well be of relevance.

– Video Formats Standard Definition video formats come in three flavours: NTSC, PAL and SECAM, and which one you use depends on where in the world you live. This book mainly covers PAL, and if you’re filming in NTSC, you’ll need to look up the relevant differences. It gets more difficult when you have to send a film to a foreign festival and have to translate between the two, which may require a visit to a specialist video company. High Definition formats don’t differ so much, but NTSC countries will generally film at 30fps and PAL/SECAM countries will generally film at 25fps.

– Power Electricity is delivered in different voltages in different countries. In the UK and the rest of the EU it comes at 230V; in the US it’s 120V. Most of the time this is just annoying if you go abroad, but for filmmakers plugging in lots of lights onto a domestic ring main, it alters the amperage that the lights draw; an 800W light in the UK will draw 3.48 amps, while in the US it will draw 6.66 amps – pushing you much closer to the point at which the circuit breaker cuts in (or if you’re less lucky, the point at which the house burns down).

– Units of Measurement The UK is unusual in that it has two parallel systems of measurement – both the Metric and the Imperial Systems. The Metric system (e.g. metres and centimetres) is familiar to most people in the world (unless they’re Americans), while the Imperial system (e.g. feet and inches) will sound very familiar to Americans. They should, however, be careful as some Imperial units (mostly to do with weight and volume) are different in the UK, even if they have the same names. This is because the US didn’t reform their system of weights and measures in the nineteenth century as the UK did. The systems used in this book reflect the most likely measurements to be used in any given situation, and are therefore a bit of a mixture. Consult the internet for translations.

– Emergency Services If you get in trouble while filming in the UK, you may need to dial 999 for Police, Fire, Ambulance, Coastguard or Mountain Rescue. In the US you call 911. In the EU you call 112 (which also works in the UK, and on GSM mobile phones almost everywhere). Consult your local phone directory if you live elsewhere.

– Local Laws… will vary from country to country, state to state, city to city, town to town. Some cities will require you to pay for a permit to do any filming outdoors. Some won’t care in the slightest as long as you don’t block the road. Health and Safety regulations will vary. Requirements for insurance will be different. Contractual laws will be different. There’s no way to really summarise all the possible differences, so consult your local screen commission or other local sources to get accurate information.

– Copyright is treated differently in different countries. In the UK, copyright is inherent in any completed work, such as a script, film, or piece of music; elsewhere you may need to register the work in order to get copyright protection. Differences in copyright law may also mean that a piece of music which it is legal to use in one jurisdiction may be illegal in another, possibly because the composer’s rights last for longer after their death.

Development

THE IDEA

Getting an idea for a film is tough. It helps to read widely, as many newspapers as possible, watch a broad range of television and see as many films as you can; the more knowledge you have of the world, the more resources you have to draw upon. Extrapolating further events from something that really happened to you is often a good source, but many stories are stranger flights of fantasy that come from something in your unconscious; they might start from a grain of reality but something else must be added. In my (highly subjective) experience, the key has always been daydreaming; the willingness to let your mind wander without restraint. Taking long walks always helps this to happen, and I personally find public transport to be enormously helpful. But try not to be anxious about getting an idea, as that gets in the way – just relax your mind and it’ll often wander off down some interesting paths. If you’re not working alone, brainstorming is also a very good technique; get together with friends and a whiteboard/flipchart/whatever and knock out some ideas. Let ideas pile up without judgement and then see what among them sparks your interest.

Another way to get ideas is to work backwards. Make a list of all the things, people or places that you could use to make a film, and see if that sparks your imagination to come up with an idea. Robert Rodriguez (El Mariachi, Desperado, The Faculty) made a short film called Bedhead with his brothers and sisters as performers, the family house as a location, and only what was already available in the house for props. It went on to win multiple awards.

Once you’ve got an idea, you need to subject it to a few very tough questions before you turn it into a film:

– Is this actually a story? Not every idea will be useful. It’s necessary to learn about story structure and what actually makes stories work before you allow your idea to progress beyond idle imagination. Skip forward to the Script & Structure section for more information but it’s a good idea to read some books on screenwriting as well.

– What’s my audience? Not every idea will be of interest to anyone besides yourself. It’s important to be aware of the needs of the audience right from the very start, whether that audience is very small (your immediate family) or massive (the world), or anything inbetween (women, men, OAPs, under-fives, religious groups, national groups, people who watch BBC4 rather than BBC3 etc.). What does a given audience expect? What can they cope with? Will they even understand? Even if you only have a vague notion of who your audience are, you must remember that they’re the people you’re doing this for (unless you only ever intend to screen the film to yourself).

– Is it the right length? Short films can be anything from a few seconds to 40 minutes or so. The longer the film, the more difficult it’s going to be to make; if your story is running long, it may be worth considering using it to build an idea for a feature film. Longer fictional shorts are very difficult to find distribution for, and ten minutes is often considered an appropriate length in the UK. Many short film schemes require this, and cinema distributors of short films tend to stipulate this as the maximum. Ten minutes will allow you to go into some depth with an idea, and is a good benchmark to set yourself. There is also something to be said for making a very short film of 60–90 seconds; while this may not seem like much, bear in mind that television commercials are often shorter and yet capable of telling a perfectly good story. It’s an excellent way to learn a very efficient approach to storytelling which will pay off when you make longer films.

– Do I have the resources to do this? If your idea concerns space aliens battling Roman soldiers upon the bloody fields of the Somme, then the answer is probably no. If it involves the titanic struggles of your child to throw a ball through a hoop, then the answer is probably yes. Take a look at the idea and work out if you can do it – what props does it need? What equipment? Are there large travel expenses? How many people are in the crew? Are there large crowd scenes that will be difficult? Time is also a resource – are you completely free? Do you have holiday time coming up? Can you only shoot on weekends? There are lots of things that are surprisingly difficult, and you often won’t appreciate these until you’ve made a few films, so it’s best to keep your first project small, and build from there.

SCRIPT & STRUCTURE

Story Structure

Writers sometimes like to give the impression that ideas strike in a burst of genius, needing only to be typed out and delivered to set; films collude in this, often showing the process of screenwriting as a matter of banging away at the keyboard until all the pages are filled.

This is a lie, but an understandable one. The actual process of writing isn’t very photogenic, as it involves a lot of hard work, dead ends, rewriting, and staring at a blank screen wondering where to go next. Even if you do have a burst of genius, it won’t be enough, because you need to find a way of structuring your idea into a story.

Story structure is nothing to be frightened of; it hides beneath the surface of every story you’ve ever heard or seen and normally goes unnoticed, unless you know what you’re looking for. There are two main story structures you’ll be familiar with:

– Two Part Structure has, as the name implies, two parts: Setup and Resolution. Example: A woman goes through a theft detection gate in a shop, which beeps. She protests to staff that she’s stolen nothing (Setup). Which is when a charity collector next to the gate reveals the remote control that’s causing the beeps. She reluctantly pays up (Resolution). This basic system of reversals of expectation is at the heart of all storytelling, but is most often seen only in short films or within scenes of longer films, because it’s a little inflexible by itself.

– Three Part Structure is necessary to tell longer stories, and does so by adding another section: we now have Setup, Conflict, and then a Resolution. An example is: A man and a woman spot each other across a crowded room, make eye contact and like what they see (Setup). But they are each joined by another woman, and it looks like these new women are their girlfriends, dashing their hopes (Conflict). But the two new women turn out to be merely friends of the original couple; and the new women suddenly see each other across the crowded room, make eye contact and like what they see (Resolution).

Satisfy the Audience in an Unexpected Way

The trick is to give the audience what they want, but not in the way they were expecting. In the Three Part Structure example above, we expect to see a pattern of Boy Meets Girl (Setup), Boy Loses Girl (Conflict), Boy Gets Girl Back (Resolution). But instead, what we get for the third part of the structure is Completely Different Girl Gets Girl. It fulfils our expectations because someone’s got someone – just not the people we were originally expecting.

The audience will have expectations of a story – expectations that you have given them and which you cannot ignore. If they see a romantic story happening, then you need to give them the resolution to the romantic story – but you’ll only be doing it well if you do it in a way they didn’t expect.

Subtext

Another way to keep things interesting is by using subtext. Subtext is a layer of meaning hidden beneath the obvious meaning you’ll find in the script – but hidden in a way that makes it possible for the audience to figure it out, thus creating that little spark of involuntary participation that draws them into the experience.

You can find examples in almost every seduction scene in cinema history. In The Thomas Crown Affair, the mastermind of a robbery (played by Steve McQueen) is being chased by an insurance investigator (Faye Dunaway), but she’s only acting on a hunch. They play chess, but the game is only what’s happening on the surface (the text); the way they play the game, with lots of little looks and nibbling the end of pawns (the subtext), reveals that she’s pursuing him in a romantic as well as an investigative sense. In this instance, subtext is revealed through performance in a fairly blatant way, but it’s still more interesting to watch than if the seduction had been put into straightforward dialogue. Showing how people feel is always more interesting than having them explain it.

Subtext in dialogue scenes can turn them from dull exposition to electrifying turning points in the story. A classic example is the line ‘round up the usual suspects’ delivered by Captain Renault (Claude Rains) at the end of Casablanca. In this one line, he simultaneously orders his men to conduct a routine series of arrests following the murder of Major Strasser, protects the man who actually shot Major Strasser, and reveals an abrupt and complete change of loyalty from the Nazis to the French Resistance. If all of this had been put into dialogue, it would have taken half a page and bored the hell out of the audience. Instead, it’s a single line that’s gone down in cinematic history.

Show, Don’t Tell

The best principle for storytelling is: show, don’t tell. We usually speak of ‘telling a story,’ which makes sense when your story is written in text or spoken out loud, but in film, what you should really be doing is ‘showing a story.’ The basic process of filmmaking is to string together a sequence of images that tells a story – NOT a sequence of speeches. Changes and revelations should be, as far as possible, transmitted to the audience in a visual manner. Consider the examples I gave above: is it necessary for the man and the woman locking eyes across a crowded room to have to explain to someone else that they really fancy each other? No. If an audience see something for themselves, they become more involved than if they had simply been told the same information. Of course, it’s not always possible to make a film without having people speak to each other, but if the dialogue has subtext, the principle still works; if two people are talking about something innocuous but there’s a deeper meaning, then the audience has to make that little bit of deduction which gets them more interested in what’s happening.

Keep it Simple, Stupid

One common mistake is to overestimate the audience’s ability to make connections. Filmmakers tend to do this because they’re very familiar with the story and the characters and already know what things mean – so surely it should be obvious to everyone else, right? Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Try to look back over the story and see it from the eye of a first-time audience: what do they know about the scene and the characters? Small details that might seem to speak volumes might not even be noticed. Knowing how much they can be expected to understand while not boring them with too much information and detail is a fine art but one you’re going to have to learn. If in doubt, the venerable KISS principle applies – Keep it Simple, Stupid.

Start Late, Get Out Early

When’s the best place for your story to start? As late as possible. When’s the best place for it to finish? As soon as possible. If you can start in the middle of something already happening (a chase, for example), that’s a wonderful way to grab the attention of the audience – their minds will be racing to construct the events that happened before the film started. Don’t have anyone stop to explain what happened before, though – go for the visual explanation over the spoken one every time. Then at the end of the film, make sure you know when it’s finished. The moment after the epilogue is not the end of the story; the end of the story is the moment when whatever was at stake has been resolved (boy and girl get back together, hero kills the villain etc.). As soon as this final event has happened, try and finish the film as soon as humanly possible, at that very moment if logic allows. The same principle applies to individual scenes. Why show someone turning up at a doorstep when the moment it gets interesting is the conversation they have inside? Why show them leaving when the next interesting thing is what happens when they get home? Every single thing you show should have some relevance to the story; it may be permissible to show someone turning up on a doorstep if their appearance is a massive shock; it may be fine to show them leaving if the person they were visiting is staring daggers at their back. But if there’s no story reason to show something happening, don’t show it.

The Writing Process

When you start writing, the last thing you should be doing is jumping right into the script itself. First of all, you need to figure out what it is you’re going to write. Here’s a rough idea of how the process works…

– An Outline is a step-by-step, scene-by-scene layout of the story. Each scene gets a single line, a quick summary of what happens, rather than going into details about how it happens. The purpose of an outline like this is to help you figure out the story, the character arcs and the structure. It’s common to put each individual scene on an index card so they can be shuffled about while you’re designing the story; using individual entries in a spreadsheet program is another good way to do this.

– Tell the story to someone else, just to get an idea of whether or not it works. You’ll see it in their eyes if it does. If not, you’ll see a slight frown as they try and think of something polite to say. If you get the latter response, it’s probably time to do some more work on the outline.

– A Treatment is the next step – a detailed description of what happens in each scene that could easily be longer than the script itself, but is purely a working document you use to figure out the details of exactly what happens in each scene. Confusingly, a ‘treatment’ is also used to refer to a much shorter description of the main points of the story – one sheet of A4 for a short film – to be used as a selling document to interest producers and funders in getting the film made.

– Write the script. This should go pretty quickly if you have a detailed treatment, as you’ve already done all the hard work. The first draft is a document you will love and cherish and believe to be the greatest thing ever. Unfortunately, you’re wrong. Put it away for a week, and then look at it again. You’ll soon see flaws. So the next step is…

– Rewrite the script. If it’s really bad, you may have to go back to an even earlier stage, but this is all good, because at least you’re improving it and not rushing to production with a script that’s rubbish. A good technique here is to read it out loud, especially when working on the dialogue, as you’ll soon hear whether or not it’s actually possible to say this stuff. You’ll probably have to rewrite it more than once; you may well find that you don’t really figure out what the story’s about until you stumble over something while doing the fourth draft, which means you have to rewrite everything from scratch – but as long as the script keeps getting better, it’s worth it. Three to five drafts of a script are quite common.

– Get people to read it and let you know if they think it works. You’ll almost certainly still find problems, but as before, at least you get the chance to solve them.

Script Format

Do you need to write a properly formatted screenplay for your short film? No. What you need is a blueprint for your film which will enable you to get your ideas across to other people. A script is the default way to do this since most films will require a mixture of visual action and dialogue.

Properly formatted scripts (which are different to plays or TV) also have a very useful feature which will assist you in making the film: on average, a single page of formatted script equals one minute of screen time. Working out the length of your film is a matter of counting the pages, then allowing for a couple of minutes’ variation. It’s also a minimum standard of professionalism – if you send someone in the industry an unformatted script, they may file it in the bin because writers who can’t be bothered to learn script format usually haven’t bothered to learn anything else. Screenwriting programs are commonly available these days, but if you have no access to these and need to set up your word processor from scratch, these are the basic settings:

– Slugline/Scene Heading (e.g. INT. EVIL LAIR – NIGHT) All capitals. 1½" from the left edge of paper.

– Screen Description 1½" from the left edge of paper.

– Character Name All capitals. 3½" from left edge of paper.

– Dialogue 2½" from left edge of paper.

– Personal Direction/Parenthetical 3" from left edge of paper.

– Effects (e.g. Fade in) Right aligned. 1½" from right edge of paper.

– Top and bottom margin 1" .

– Font for everything 12pt Courier.

Some films can and should have a different blueprint. A film that is entirely visual and has no actors (particularly animations) is best designed with a storyboard. A film that is to be improvised by actors may require a list of scenes and information on the characters, rather than specific instructions on what to do and say. A film with no dialogue and no actors may simply require a shotlist. It’s up to you to decide what your production needs. There’s an example of script format here – a ‘Spec Script’ such as you would write for submission to a production company. There’s a ‘Shooting Script’ as part of the Case Study.

Figure 1 Script Format Example

What Goes into the Script?

Not everything needs to be said in the script. If the script has such things as ‘The lead character closes her eyes. Camera TRACKS BACK to reveal a WIDE SHOT of everyone standing in a line, gaping in awe. ZOOM IN on main character as she opens her eyes and STARES down the lens…’ then the reader will not see the story in their mind’s eye, but be distracted by the camerawork – something that won’t be happening when they actually watch the film.

Remember that the script is not a technical blueprint for the finished film – you’ll be doing that with storyboards and shotlists later on. Scripts have many uses, and all of them are about communication; a funder is looking for an interesting story; an actor is looking for an interesting character; most people just want the script to make them feel enthusiastic about getting involved in the film. The purpose of a script is to give as close as possible an impression of the experience of watching the final film so that people know what it is they’re working towards. And since you can’t make a film on your own, being able to communicate this to your colleagues is vital.

One thing you don’t need to worry about while writing is scene numbers, as these only get in the way while you’re writing. Most screenwriting programmes will allow you to easily add them, so leave this stage until you start storyboarding – at which point you will need the numbers as a way to link the storyboards back to the script.

STORYBOARDING & SHOTLISTING

Storyboards: Starting to Direct

A storyboard is another, more detailed way of creating a blueprint for your movie, usually done once the script is completed. A storyboard looks like a comic, and that’s almost precisely what it is: the film in still images. You don’t need to draw a frame for every single moment, only for each of the shots you intend to shoot. And by doing so, you’re creating a rough edit of your film before you’ve even shot it. This is the stage in filmmaking when you make the fundamental decisions about what exactly you’re going to shoot – the stage where you start directing.

And since this is when you start directing, it’s time to consider the three main ways of constructing a scene:

– Single Shot – The simplest way is to cover the entire scene in one shot. This sounds like a nice easy way to do things, but means that if you make a mistake (and you probably will if you’re on your first film), you won’t be able to conceal it in the edit.

– Shot by Shot – the most obvious way to construct a scene is to think of each shot in turn, in the order that they’ll appear in the edit. This tends to work very well for sequences that contain actions of some sort, when we may never have to return to the same shot on a character or object in a scene.

Figure 2 Storyboard Strategies

– Coverage – However, many scenes are largely composed of people talking to each other, and these scenes are best shot with coverage. In this system, we film the entire scene from a variety of angles, creating a number of shots which can be cut into the scene at any point we wish, allowing us to decide the structure of the film in the edit – which we’ll need to be able to do since the cutting of dialogue scenes often depends on actors’ performances, which aren’t always very predictable.

The shots commonly used in Coverage are:

– A Master shot of the entire scene from beginning to end. You’ll normally only see this at the beginning of a scene, to establish the space in which the scene happens.

– Singles on each character, covering all their actions. Possibly several of these at different shot sizes.

– Cutaways Details on any physical action, like the pouring of a drink, fingers tapping etc. Sometimes you need these to tell the story; sometimes you need them to cover up problems in the edit.

Shooting coverage just by itself is, in the long run, quite a dull way to shoot a film, but it will get you started. In practice, you’ll often find yourself combining the Shot by Shot and Coverage styles within a scene, as there’s often action which needs to be filmed in a specific way even while characters are talking and requiring coverage on them. As you gain more experience, you’ll quickly see that you can mix in plenty of cool shots, as long as you always have enough coverage as well.

There’s an example of a full storyboard as part of the Case Study.

Figure 3 Shot Sizes

Shotlisting

Once you have a finished storyboard, you can work out how many shots you need to do. And once you have that information, you can work out how many lighting setups you need to do, and how many shots for each one. And once you know that, you can have a rough guess at how long it will take to shoot – and a full schedule is just round the corner.

The shotlist is a tool for planning, and planning is key to getting a film made. On set, you’ll probably use the shotlist as your guide to what needs to be done since the storyboard is a bit bulky. Put in as much information as you think necessary. Once you’ve made the list, put it into two orders: the editing order, and the likely shooting order. I find that spreadsheet programs are best for shotlisting, since they allow easier shuffling and sorting for this purpose. There’s a sample shotlist in the Case Study.

Video Storyboard

Now you have a rough idea of what you want to film, why not grab a camera, some friends and shoot a test version? You don’t need the real props although shooting in the real location can be a big help. Edit it together on whatever system is available and see what it looks like. These ‘video storyboards’ are a great way to discover problems with pacing, storytelling, whether or not you’ve put in enough coverage, shots that you ought to do that you didn’t think of before, and practical problems that might come up during the shoot.

Preproduction

SCHEDULING

Filmmaking is a problem-solving exercise, and the key to problem solving is planning. You cannot create a story with unrealistic requirements and then expect everything to end up exactly as you envisaged. There’s so much that can go wrong when you’re making a film that you need to be as certain as you possibly can of what’s supposed to happen. So you need to make a schedule. There are two aspects to scheduling: the overall production, from preproduction through to distribution; and the shoot itself.

The Overall Production

The first question is: When do you shoot? You set a date several weeks in the future, and how far in the future depends on how many things you already have available. The key thing is usually auditions, as they take a while to organise, and also locations, if you need to wait to get permission from a large organisation.

For the purposes of the following example, we’ll assume that you’ve picked dates six weeks ahead. Bear in mind that this isn’t a hard and fast schedule, and every film is different; it’s possible to throw something together in a few days if you already have most of what you need, but you may find this a useful framework to build on.

– Preproduction Week One is mostly about finding people. This is when you advertise for actors and make enquiries about your key crew. You may also want to be looking out for locations. You don’t want to be thinking about equipment or props unless there’s something unusual or difficult that you need to find.

– Preproduction Week Two is about selecting people – you’ll be selecting the actors you want to audition, and hopefully nailing down your key crewmembers. You may also want to be looking out for locations as well.

– Preproduction Week Three is the week of the audition, when you’ll make your decisions on the cast and book them for the shoot; you should also be finding most of the rest of your crew by now, although this process often goes on longer. You should have a pretty good idea of what locations you want to shoot in by now. This is also a good time to look for equipment.

– Preproduction Week Four is all about getting your locations sorted out. You should know where your locations are, and now you’ll be booking them. You’ll also be booking equipment for the shoot by now, and looking for props and costumes.

– Preproduction Week Five is mostly about sorting out props and costumes (and if you need to have . costumes fitted, now’s a good time), but also about the Recce – you may have visited locations before but now you need to take your key crew around so they know what they’ll be dealing with. On the casting front, you might well be looking for extras if you need them.

– Preproduction Week Six doesn’t have much specific stuff planned – just kit pick-ups and rehearsals, maybe make-up tests if necessary. The reason to keep this free is that some of the stuff you should have done earlier will inevitably take longer, and the final week is when you’ll be taking care of all these details.

A ten minute drama will generally take between three and five days to shoot. It’s best to have these in a row, and running over a weekend; shooting on consecutive weekends is fine, but bear in mind that it might incur things like extra travel costs.

The postproduction schedule can be more flexible, but it’s a good idea to move as quickly as possible – all too many people let postproduction slide on for months without getting the film made, when you could finish postproduction in four weeks. Again, these timings are only a guide and it’s possible to do things a lot faster.

– Postproduction Week One is mainly about taking equipment back, and capturing footage. You shouldn’t jump straight into the edit – give yourself this week to clear your head.

– Postproduction Week Two is when you do the first edit, known as the ‘Offline’ edit. This can take a good five days for a ten minute film. Once this is done, you lock the picture and stop making edits that change the length of the film.

– Postproduction Week Three is when you get to grips with visual effects (if you have any, and it’s probably not a good idea to do too much in your first film), and sound issues. You’ll be adding music at this stage (unless you’re working with a composer, in which case it’ll take longer to get the music ready), and looking for sound effects.

– Postproduction Week Four is when you complete the ‘Online’ edit – adding all elements and grading the picture quality. You’ll also mix the sound, and master the film to your chosen formats. You may also author a DVD for the film.

The Shoot

You should by now have numbered the scenes in your script, which you’ll need now in order to keep track of them. Make a list of all the locations named in the sluglines (or setups if there’s only one location), and arrange them in the most convenient order (see ‘Out of Sequence Shooting’, below), noting which scene numbers need to be completed for each one.

A shooting day is usually between ten and twelve hours; you’ll normally expect to complete roughly ten setups a day, but if you have to move to another location, that’ll usually take at least an hour, and remember that it takes time in the morning to get set up – usually about an hour but quite possibly much more if things are disorganised. You’ll find an example of a day’s schedule, along with an explanation of how it was arrived at as part of the Case Study.

Catering

Food can have a serious effect on the morale of a crew; if you feed people badly, you may find them grumbling behind your back and not giving their all. If you’re only using your friends, you might be able to get them to bring packed lunches or pay for their own meals, but if you’re using anyone with professional experience, you’re expected to provide a free breakfast and lunch. If you don’t have much money, the cast and crew might forgive you for some shortcomings; a trip to a high street baker to get sandwiches will probably be enough, or handmade rolls (even cheaper). You should have tea and coffee available at all times, or cold drinks and water if you’re expecting hot weather, along with a good supply of biscuits, chocolate and snacks. Ask everyone involved if they have any particular dietary requirements – there’s always a few vegetarians on any shoot, and more people than you’d think have special diets for health reasons. Lunch should be given an hour in the schedule. In the event of absolute disaster, people are sometimes willing to work through lunch and eat food ‘in the hand,’ but make sure everyone agrees to this before you spring it on them.

Call Times

Although everything depends upon when you can get into your locations, 08:00 (8am) is a basic starting point for a first crew call, with the cast called separately depending upon when they’re needed – those needed for the first scene will come in with everyone else and go straight into make-up if necessary. Others will have later call times, but always allow enough time to get them through costume and make-up; the schedule for this is a separate challenge all by itself.

Out of Sequence Shooting

Films are shot out of sequence to make your life bearable. Imagine you have a dialogue scene in a dark, moodily lit recording studio in which you want to cut back and forth between two people as they talk. But the lighting setup for each angle takes half an hour or more; do you really want to do that every time you need to make a cut? No. You shoot everything needed from one angle (also called a ‘setup’ – see below) first, and then from another angle, and so on until you’ve got everything on your shotlist. Shoot the widest angle first, then work your way in to the closer shots. A few repetitions of the action while it’s wide will act as rehearsal for the close-ups (when the actors absolutely have to get it right). Otherwise, scenes are shot in the order that it’s convenient to shoot them – many considerations will come into play, such as the availability of performers, locations, daylight, local requirements and so on. Get ready to juggle.

Lighting Setups

Lighting setups are the thing that will determine how long you need to stay in any one location; every time you put the camera in a substantially different place, you create a new setup and need to adjust the lighting. Only experience will give you a rough idea of how much, but you should go through your shotlist and decide which shots are to be done from which angle/setup, and then total up the number of angles/setups; indoor lighting setups will take longer (up to an hour or more sometimes), while daytime exterior setups may only require the placing of a reflector to bounce a little light onto someone’s face to even out the effect of the sun – the work of a few minutes.

Camera Movement

What sort of camera movement you use also makes a difference. Exterior handheld work is the fastest, since the camera doesn’t need to be ‘set up’ as such, just loaded onto the shoulder. The longest setups usually involve a track, when the camera is moving on wheels; these movements have to be rehearsed over and over to make sure that lighting is correct throughout (and it’s even worse when you throw in a jib as well). The same can apply if a handheld camera has to move about a lot in a scene; the hardest thing to do is create lighting that works in any direction no matter where the camera chooses to look.

Performers

People make mistakes, especially when it involves long, complicated dialogue scenes. If you have a shot where someone has to make a simple physical action, it will usually go a lot faster than a shot with dialogue. This is nothing to do with the professionalism of actors, but simply a measure of how much more difficult a dialogue scene is; you’ll want to get it right, so give them a little more time.

Using the Weekends

Bear in mind that Saturday, Sunday and public holidays present a variety of problems and opportunities separate from other days. Sunday is a good day to do a crowd scene if you’re relying on friends and family. Saturday on the sea front may be a difficult shoot because of the people; but Saturday in an office is great. Plan your shoots around weekends to get the most out of the peace and quiet while it’s there.

Night Shoots

Sometimes you need to shoot at night, but bear in mind what time of year it is and exactly how many hours of night you’ll have. Scheduling a ten-hour night shoot of exteriors in July is difficult; doing it in January is fine, but get prepared for the weather. Lunch breaks should be scheduled as normal, but it may be wise to provide (or pay for) a hot meal instead of just sandwiches. It’s best to put night shoots at the end of the schedule, since getting back to a daytime schedule requires a couple of days off. Or better still, shoot Day for Night if you can – see here for more details.

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