FEATURE: DEUCE OF SPADES - How I made a period full feature film all by myself on ZERO budget

[Deuceofspades]

Faith:

Have to ask, you are a filmmaker, hot rodder and have amazing drive and tenacity. What is your day job? Just curious.

Dan

The first job I ever had was reading the news in French at a major AM station in Lebanon (I grew up there - my dad worked for the french Ambassy "the French Cultural Institute" to be precise). I then was offered to launch an FM station in partnership with a young guy who loved radio broadcasting. So we did. Our Station, "Radio One IFM" in Lebanon, played strictly US music with the occasional 1 hour French program and in less than 2 years we went from being a Pirate FM Station to being the #1 FM station in that country. After I left that country I no longer had any involvement with that station but last I hear it was still ranking #1. My ex partner now has several more radio stations and I think also launched a TV station LOL.

When I arrived in the US I was out of a job. It's not like anyone needs a French radio broadcaster here and the radio field was completely saturated with people trying to get into it. I needed money fast and I needed it now, since I lost everything I had in Lebanon during the war I arrived in US with $400 in my pocket and a one way ticket.

I bumped into some nice people who gave me a job at their company, which made custom accounting software packages for small businesses. I learned how to do accounting (well, more like full charge bookeeping) and found that it was easy to find work in that funciton and coud always find part time work with smaller companies and then have extra time to devote to pursuing my music career (rehearsals, live shows, writing more music and recording it)

So I stayed in that field and although boring as hell comparing to running an FM station LOL, fronting a rock band or making film , it has served me good. It is stable, uneventful and allows me free time at work during non tax season to work on other things.

Other things being for exemple my small business I accidentaly started 10 years ago. I started raising tropical fish (bettas) for fun. I then had the idea of starting a website, just for fun to educate people about bettas. It became popular. People started ordering my fish and next thing I know I am selling fish to private collector across the US. Then Animal Planet comes and films my fish and I ("World Most Extreme" series - "Most Extreme Fighters" episode - yes for those of you who saw it, I was the platinum blond with the rock outfit LOL) and next thing I know Baboom, my business takes off. It is a Microscopic home based DIY one person does it all (sounds familiar? LOL) business but it made good extra cash until I started the film. I no longer can sell fish cause I dont have the time. Breeding and selling bettas is very very time consuming. So now I am broke (... But I hope to go back to it when I am done with production / post production, to try to get back on my feet financially. Emphasis on "TRY"... LOL

You can see my website about the Betta Splendens (by far the LARGEST website on that topic worldwide - it is over 500 pages of information) here:

www.bettatalk.com

If you google the word "betta" I am the third link that comes up (this is non paid - based entirely on traffic) :thumbup:


well I hope that answers your question

Currently, as far as bookeeping go, I have been working at the same company for 12 years, nice people, very small family run multi million $ company that sells undevelopped land. I work there mon-fri from 9 to 3PM.


Busy life LOL.

 

[DjfunkmasterG]

Nice work. Really nice work, but it could not have been done on a zero budget.

:thumbup::thumbup::thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:


What about gas for the cars, food to feed the crew and actors?

 

[puredrifting]

Wow, Faith, I should make a documentary about you, you have had an amazingly varied and diverse life.

I knew that someone with your drive, stubbornness in the face of adversity and intelligence about how you went about this couldn't have come from a conservative, boring background. You obviously are highly adaptable, driven and tenacious, qualities that will serve you well as you develop your film career.

I admire you and what you have accomplished so far. Keep on plugging away and you will make it, I see big things in your future as a filmmaker.

Best,

Dan

 

[Deuceofspades]

Wow, Faith, I should make a documentary about you, you have had an amazingly varied and diverse life.

I knew that someone with your drive, stubbornness in the face of adversity and intelligence about how you went about this couldn't have come from a conservative, boring background. You obviously are highly adaptable, driven and tenacious, qualities that will serve you well as you develop your film career.

I admire you and what you have accomplished so far. Keep on plugging away and you will make it, I see big things in your future as a filmmaker.

Best,

Dan

"highly adaptable" - You bet! I learned this from growing up as a kid in a country torn by war. Many times we had to run away from home to save our lives and ended up refugees with nothing.

one interesting story comes to mind to illustrate that point; Imagine having 5 minutes to pack your **** and leave, cause the military just knocked at yoru door and said: Evacuate NOW ! I grabbed my two most priced possessions:
My accoustic guitar and my motorcycle. Rode behind my parent's car to an abandonned monastary in the back mountains. It was a refugee camp. We slept on improvised foam matresses (1 inch thick) on the floor, about 10 people to a small room. We had no electricity, no water, no shower and barely a toilet. We had very little canned food and no bread. We had to live there for 2 months or so.

Oh and that was NOT a movie. It was REAL LIFE.

You learn to become adaptable and survive FAST.

:thumbup:

 

[Deuceofspades]

Nice work. Really nice work, but it could not have been done on a zero budget.

:thumbup::thumbup::thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:


What about gas for the cars, food to feed the crew and actors?

There is NO SUCH THING as a NO BUDGET. Everything costs something.

i think everyone understands that these days "small budget" = a few hundred thousand dollars (ex: American Graffitti was a small budget - back in the early seventies i think they had line $250,000.00 to film it? Or something like that)

A "no budget" to me would be anything that ends up costing less than $100,000 and anything that you start without having money aside to do it.

As in: you spend the money you made that month or put it on your own credit card.

Spending monthly pocket money for 3 years will probably mean that the film will end up costing me anywhere from $40K to $60K in the end if I add EVERYTHING up. (but not my labor)

I am pretty sure it would have cost a normal studio over 1 million to film the exact same scenes, more than likely (figure $500 per car per day and there alone you have several hundred thousands dollars...).

No budget also means that when I started doing teh film I had no funds or funding. I had no investors, no money to speak of, I went for it anyways and figured that "God will provide" and provide He has :thumbup:. It was a HUGE leap of Faith (pun intended hehe). 90% of everything in the film was DONATED.

 

[visugeek]

I've just started reading the thread, and checked out the teasers on your site. Very impressive! Good luck, proof that the only way to get anywhere in this business is to bust your ass. Well done!

 

[Deuceofspades]

Edited ALL DAY today. Still massaging my race scene and struggled with my ambulance scene. Boy oh Boy.

Me the writer had this BRILLIANT idea to write the most important scenes as a NIGHT scenes and consequently me the producer had to struggle to gather what was needed to pull it off and me the director had to SUFFER to pull it off and film it without decent lights nor a real cinema generator and consequently, me the editor is now in deep doodoo...

I am going to fire all myselves now. :huh:

Oye...

What an uphill climb!

 

[Deuceofspades]

I've just started reading the thread, and checked out the teasers on your site. Very impressive! Good luck, proof that the only way to get anywhere in this business is to bust your ass. Well done!

That is probably very true, but here is the interesting thing: It aws nevermy goal to get anywhere in this business. To me, making teh film is a pure cretive endeabor and a labor of love. I never did it for the hoe of making money or getting fame or even because of wanting to become part of the film industry. I am going to become part of it because I made a film, but it was not the other way around (i didn't make teh film to become part of it).


I live in LA and have seen the industry (both music and film) and frankly there are not very many people in those industries that I would look up to. i think they are dominated by a large percentage of A.Holes on ego trips.

but the part abotu BUSTING YOUR ASS? Oh yeah, busting it I have for two straight years now...

I look forward to meeting you tomorrow.

 

[Martay]

Good suggestion! See? I learn something EVERY DAY. Yeah, we did deviate from the script more than once LOL, usually I update the script after the shoot but I slacked here and there...

So I will work on a Dialogue Script and then what?

How do you guys go about getting subtitles? And about doing it yourself?

thank God I have fans across the world, all hotrodders are wanting to help, so getting script translated not a big cost issue, but how good wil the translation be? I dunno LOL and will not be possible for me to double check...

:huh:

Unfortunately I have no information about how to dub or subtitle yourself. I had to deliver to a distributor the tools that each territory would need to distribute the film.

I assume the Greek rightsholders would subtitle and dub it if they felt the need to do so. Likewise for other territories, etc.

I don't know that it would be cost-effective or time-effective for you to take this on yourself. How many dub sessions or sets of subtitles are you planning?

If you're able to secure distribution, those issues are likely to be solved by the individual territory rightsholders.

But, you will need the Dialogue script no matter which route your distribution takes.

-M

 

[Deuceofspades]

SCREENGRABS FLASHBACK 8B


Thsi scnene was shot on location over two days. The stock merc was trailered from OC all the way up to Santa Paula. It was very hot that day but I had a huge crew (go figure) a bunch of new volunteers. I never saw many of them again LOL - they were men enough to take it. LOL

On day one the merc died a gruesome death. All the transmission oil leaked out of it when it overheated from running for a mere 15 minutes

I needed the last shot to close the first half of the scene; shot of teh merc leaving. It woud not run ... After waiting for a couple hours for the flathead to cool all the way down, the owner gave it a LAST go. IT STARTED!! He was able to drive it for about 40 feet, which is all I needed to get my ONE shot of the merc leaving.

It then died PERMANENTLY. We all had to push that car (super heavy - led sled) UP the trailer. We ALL pushed, actors, crew, me everybody.

When the owner got home he said that when he openede the gutts of the car he noticed there was ZERO oil left in it and it was a miracle he was able to shift to get it to run the last 40 feet.

I feel lucky I got that shot. Providence was once again there to save my pathetic fannies .

Anotehr cool story: I shot Johnny speeding straight at the camera, then instructed actor to "hit the brakes" and do a skid forward on eh dirt road. I never realized I was BEHIND the camera he was now SPEEDING straight at.
::

He stopped 3 feet away from me.

mentail note: Let's not do another take of that shot LOL.

DAY TWO - heat was excrutiating and I filmed for the second day now under full sun, and was fried to a crisp. It aws hard to see anything in the monitor. we workd on a dirt road and I twisted my ankle on a night shoot a week ealier so it was painful to walk or stand on it - but I did walk and stand on it for two full days about 14 hours a day.

That day went well, it was just me, Raphael (crew volunteer to boom and carry shi*) and the two actors. Light was very harsh.

Screengrabs:

THE MERC:

THE SKID:

 

[Deuceofspades]

THE FIGHT

THE MIRACLE SHOT:

 

[Deuceofspades]

Remember this is a 50's flashback. Things were a lot more innocent and romantic back then... So Ihave both of the spectrum in my film: Scenes that are very soft, sweet and romantic and scenes where Johnny is beat to crap and thrown naked, bleeding and handcuffed in a dark hole. The gammut.

:thumbup:


THE ROMANCE

Bettie finds out about the death of Johnny's father

THE FIRST "MOMENT"

 

[Deuceofspades]

PS: My lead man is so devastatingly HANDSOME...

Oye.

 

[visugeek]

Faith,

I'm not going to disagree with you there. I've dealt with my fair share of those same ego manical A-holes. I do everything I can to avoid them and work with people who are in it because of their love for film making and the craftsmanship involved in making films.

I look forward to meeting you too!

That is probably very true, but here is the interesting thing: It aws nevermy goal to get anywhere in this business. To me, making teh film is a pure cretive endeabor and a labor of love. I never did it for the hoe of making money or getting fame or even because of wanting to become part of the film industry. I am going to become part of it because I made a film, but it was not the other way around (i didn't make teh film to become part of it).


I live in LA and have seen the industry (both music and film) and frankly there are not very many people in those industries that I would look up to. i think they are dominated by a large percentage of A.Holes on ego trips.

but the part abotu BUSTING YOUR ASS? Oh yeah, busting it I have for two straight years now...

I look forward to meeting you tomorrow.

 

[doubler83]

This looks absolutely glorious!

 

[Deuceofspades]

This looks absolutely glorious!

thank you thank you :dankk2:

We try, we try...

Edited in the middle of the night last night. I've been doing this. Go to bed early (7PM) sleep until midnight then get up and edit for 2 to 3 hours. It works good for me cause I have this incredible ability to go from deep sleep to wide awake in 2.5 seconds (it's the hotrod in me LOL)

Edited my train station scene. That leaves me with only 4 scenes to still edit, and about 10 to go back over and reedit (a faster process)... I think I will be done in 10 days. THEn I'll have a total runtime of all he flashbacks. It was 1 hour and 55 minutes when I first laid the scenes down on timeline. Now down to 1 hour and 45 minutes. by the tie I am done I hope to be down at 1 hour and 30 minutes - but not sure i can go that low withotu having to delete some scenes...

Goal? 1.5 hours of flashbacks and 40 minutes of modern day scenes.

Oye. This is going to be ROUGH.

 

[mentatDUKE]

Faith. I love your grabs. Especially the longer lens stuff (since they're sharper). The colors are also really great. I wonder what the footage will look like after a nice grade since they look so good raw already.

Your shadows and edged lighting are great! I love the hair lighting too. How are you doing all this without butterflies or silks? I always hear stories of outdoor shooting being difficult, and when I watch BTS on DVDs I always see butterflies, silks, and nets everywhere. Not to mention bounce boards and reflectors. How are you taming God's light so well? Are you just waiting til the right time? Clouds passing overhead? Magic hour?

Great job. Can't wait til you finish so I can watch the whole film.

 

[Ozhair]

I agree with mentatDUKE after seeing the latest batch of grabs. Somehow Faith is managing to make almost every hour look like magic hour ;-)

Some beautiful stuff there

 

[Deuceofspades]

It's weird, it's true when I look at the grabs, the lighting looks really good on almost all of them... but I remember what it was like that day. BLARING sunlight - 110F temps, not a cloud in sight as far as the eyes could see... No silks (boohoohoo), all we had was one small flag and one bounce.

And a lot of FAITH (which always saves the day) LOLOL

Pun intended

How I did it was by careful (very careful) positioning of my actors at all time. I am extremely meticulous about this. Have their face turned just the right way in just the right spot... Used the tree shade, used magic hour, used everything I could think of. The most romantic moment (the end of the scene) I waited for magic hour to film, hence the side light and good 50/50 lighting on their faces.

But I ran into a big problem. I was unable to do reverse shots on Johnny because that road is only period corect on one side, and turning the camera the other direction resulted in seeing modernism everywhere. So I had to use the same side for both actors, have them trade places basically and flip the car around to fake it. You can't notice it BUT the light does not match since now BOTH actors close ups have the sunlight on the SAME side... :crybaby:

Look carefully at the OTS two-shot compared to the reverse C.U OTS shot and you will notice this anomaly... (sigh)

But what do you gotta do? Filmmaking on zero budget is not a precise science

:huh:

 

[vic777]

Goal? 1.5 hours of flashbacks and 40 minutes of modern day scenes.

Some say, "Less is more". I would humbly suggest 90 minutes max. As long as it qualifies as a "feature", your original goal will have been realized.