Infamous: a web-series production blog

Definitely. With a web series, how do people get paid? I mean, do you pay your crew and actors, or do some kind of back-end deal?
 
aaronz said:
Definitely. With a web series, how do people get paid? I mean, do you pay your crew and actors, or do some kind of back-end deal?
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As a filmmaker and an actor, I really value the work of a quality actor. Good actors are worth money. And while everyone would work for free, or the hope of dividends, you are respecting the actors by paying them something. We actually went through SAG, made sure we were hitting their minimums, and went forward with that in place. In my opinion, if you pay the DP something, and the director, your actors should be paid. It makes it harder on the producer to balance the budget, but Pharaba is a great producer, and managed to find a way.

By no means did we pay people what they were worth, because unfortunately our budget didn't allow any of us to make what we were worth. But everyone was paid a similar scale, crew, and cast.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Infamoustheseries
 
Good stuff... I've been aware of Infamous from elsewhere but didn't realize you were also on this site. Congrats on wrapping, and let's hope it all works out now that it's out of your hands!

One question: are you at all concerned about working with 60Frames, given how short-lived Get Ripped was? Do you have any idea of what it will take for you to get picked up for more episodes?
 
When we considered our deal with 60 Frames, the #1 reason for going with them is that we retain the rights to the show. We had to think long term, since our goal is television/film. Quite honestly, at the budget we were given, we couldn't reproduce this web series. Our goal was to put up the best looking web series we could, and make others fall short on quality and content. To get picked up for more episodes, I would say the main thing would be 60 Frames covering their investment in us. But our goal is to get as many views as possible, to show the tv studios that we have a fan base.

I think that if a show is good, it doesn't matter who the studio is-people will watch what they like. But in all of our dealings with 60 Frames, they are very excited about Infamous, and are planning on doing a lot of marketing for it, which of course helps. They also treat us like the show is one of their flagship shows, and I think it could be.

It's cool to hear that you had heard about Infamous from somewhere else! I have heard that a few times, and that definitely makes me happy...
 
Yeah, I think I heard it from Tubefilter or NewTeeVee or something. I've got friends at those places.

Thanks for the answers! After pitching a couple different shows to some of the better-funded web studios, I ran into that exact same problem: most of them want to own your IP at the end of the day. And after the in-the-meeting excitement of "hey, our show would get made!" faded, it became obvious that it simply wasn't worth it. So that's at least good to hear about 60Frames.

Anyway, congrats, and good luck!
 
Yeah, I think we are still at a point where even the well-funded web studios are still spending very little money, as far as production goes, so you really have to protect your idea. Quite honestly, there isn't a roadmap yet for moneymaking with a webseries, so it's still the wild west. I would say that keeping your intellectual property in whole or in large part is most important, since you are really most likely not going to make enough money to live on by producing your web series! In that respect, and many others, 60 Frames is a great company to do business with.
 
Uh, yep. Here I am!

So how did you end up with John Asher at the helm? Was he someone you knew already, or was he brought in by the agency/60Frames? Was there anything interesting about becoming acquainted with him?

I'm also interested in his decision to shoot one episode per day. That makes sense from a continuity and character standpoint, and it's the kind of thing I'd probably say as a director – but did you find it required you to make any company moves that otherwise wouldn't have been necessary? Did any other problems result?
 
Asher was put on by 60 Frames. They wanted to have an experienced director come in, and he just so happened to be interested in Infamous after seeing some early footage we had shot. He's a funny dude, to say the least.

We did have a company move for one episode, and then for another episode we actually had to shoot a scene later on with a different director. John had gone to the east coast to direct One Tree Hill, and the studio decided they wanted the opening scene, so we had to get it done asap. It was directed by Jeff Ketcham, one of our producers. He did an excellent job, and I think it really matches the feel of the rest of the series, since we used the same DP, and Jeff was around for the entire shoot as well.

I would say the decision to shoot an episode a day was a lot harder from a low-budget standpoint, but our producers made it happen. I am used to slamming things together wherever we can get the best deal, and letting the chips fall where they may. I think John is used to a larger budget where he has that luxury, so it was good to be able to give him that, since we were lacking in many other ways, as far as available locations, equipment, etc.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Infamoustheseries
 
In the trailer, it looks like you have a lot of low-light footage, at night, like the car stuff. How did you light that? The redrock sucks up a lot of light, doesn't it?
 
The redrock does take in some light, but we have shot with it many times and are used to it. I think that our DP covered some of this in his interview, but basically he knew going in that he would have to overlight by about a stop/stop-and a half. I am so used to shooting with it, I don't look at it as a negative, it just is what it is. I love the look that the redrock gives, so it's worth having to create a little extra light.

One thing that I use as a standby is setting the lighting that I like, and then taking a 1k and banging it at a beadboard on the dark side of the shot. It just brings up the general light level by a stop, which will correct the stop loss of the M2.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Infamoustheseries
 
is that one guy from the star wars Force Unleashed game? I see a couple of clips of him in your trailer...is he the main character in Force Unleashed?
 
NEW RELEASE DATE!!!!!

Infarmous, the web series will premiere on Thursday Sept. 18th. A new episode will start every thursday for 6 weeks! Very exciting!

youtube.com/user/Infamoustheseries
 
Awesome! Can't wait. Tell me there will be high quality HD releases on Vimeo. As much as I like YouTube, Vimeo is where it's at. :)
 
I have spoken to 60 Frames about Vimeo...But the show will also release on Veo, Joost, Myspace, and several other outlets. I am going to focus people to the youtube page because they will have both high and low quality versions, plus, we need to try and rack up a lot of hits so we can sell this to tv, or get our feature going...I think Joost will have an HD version though....

youtube.com/user/Infamoustheseries
 
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