Music Videos on 35mm under $10,000

El Gato Negro

El Gato Negro

Well-known member
Hey crew. Just wanted to get some opinions on wither you could shot a typical music video 3-5 minutes on 35mm and keep the budget under $10,000.00. This would of course include film stock, development, grip/lighting truck, art department, production insurance and camera rental.

I have worked on numerous HD music videos ranging from $3,000.00 to $10,000.00 and my background is 1st AD and gripping. The majority of productions I have worked on that have shot film were with out of town DP's. So the pool of DP's that shot on film here are next to none. So consultations are hard to come by.

Another thing would be how to convince a client to shot on 35mm. The pros and cons. Would love some feedback and opinions.
 
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Hmm, well it's probably done, but I don't see the purpose of it. It's a stupid decision to spend your tiny budget shooting on 35mm when you can rent a RED for a lot cheaper and have it actually look better anyway. Or you rent something like an HVX200 and you can still make it look great, and a lot of music videos are shot that way. I filmed about a $10,000 music video with two HVX200s, it was slightly cheaper but I own a lot of equipment so if you factored in the fair rental price for my equipment you're looking at well over $10,000. So imagining trying to film a music video with 35mm, wow, I mean that'd be tough to do for under that budget amount.

I'm sure it's possible, anything is possible, it's just if I were directing I'd much rather have that money to spend on something we'll actually see in front of the camera. If you shoot on film but you have a lousy production what does it matter? I mean the whole point of shooting on a high resolution format is being able to have it look better, but that doesn't matter if you can't afford to put much in front of the camera.
 
JonathanLB said:
Hmm, well it's probably done, but I don't see the purpose of it. It's a stupid decision to spend your tiny budget shooting on 35mm when you can rent a RED for a lot cheaper and have it actually look better anyway. Or you rent something like an HVX200 and you can still make it look great, and a lot of music videos are shot that way. I filmed about a $10,000 music video with two HVX200s, it was slightly cheaper but I own a lot of equipment so if you factored in the fair rental price for my equipment you're looking at well over $10,000. So imagining trying to film a music video with 35mm, wow, I mean that'd be tough to do for under that budget amount.

I'm sure it's possible, anything is possible, it's just if I were directing I'd much rather have that money to spend on something we'll actually see in front of the camera. If you shoot on film but you have a lousy production what does it matter? I mean the whole point of shooting on a high resolution format is being able to have it look better, but that doesn't matter if you can't afford to put much in front of the camera.
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Well I am obviously not doing it for the profit. I've worked on productions that have shot on the HVX200, RED, Varicam, etc. It's just a personal goal. I might completely change my mind after my first experience and forever just shot on HD. I do want that under my belt thou.

I have a gaffer colleague who owes a solid 3 ton truck. It's all MOS so no need for sound. Key Skeleton Crew paid. The thing that is killing me is production insurance. Short term insurance is hard to come by here in Texas.

Thanks for the input.
 
Yes, it can be done. I shot a short film on 35mm for $5000.00 Four day shoot. $1000 of that was for food and a U Haul rental. Granted, I didn't pay anyone, but still, it can be done.

30 minutes of short ends, processing and an HD transfer at Cinelicious comes out to $1600 plus, lets say $200 in FedEx charges. Round up to $2,000 for good measure.

So now, it is just a matter of how many people you are hiring, for how much and how many days, etc, etc.

Oh, those short end prices are actually for medium ends (at .16 a foot) which run between 250 and 400 ft.
 
baquajim said:
Yes, it can be done. I shot a short film on 35mm for $5000.00 Four day shoot. $1000 of that was for food and a U Haul rental. Granted, I didn't pay anyone, but still, it can be done.

30 minutes of short ends, processing and an HD transfer at Cinelicious comes out to $1600 plus, lets say $200 in FedEx charges. Round up to $2,000 for good measure.

So now, it is just a matter of how many people you are hiring, for how much and how many days, etc, etc.

Oh, those short end prices are actually for medium ends (at .16 a foot) which run between 250 and 400 ft.
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Thank you, Baquajim. How did you go about renting the camera? Did you have production insurance? What was your shooting ratio? 10:1? Most music videos run about 3-5 minutes. I could only afford a full day of shooting 12-16 hour . Baquajim, what camera did you go with? Thank you for leaving input.
 
Ah, there you are, El Gato! El Gato Negro!
Shoot film, El Gato, and you'll never be the same again. I'm tellin' ya, El Gato! Film is a pro format. Digital -- that's ok for student filmmakers and movie buffs. LOL

But seriously, El Gato, the Red camera isn't compatible with Bluray. They're having trouble outputting to Bluray. Avoid shooting with it until they have that problem ironed out.

Also, the Red camera has sensitivity toward infrared and it "sees" hot areas -- lips turn purple in certain light conditions.

The other digital cameras are ok. I've seen fantastic looking footage shot with 35mm adapters that put an Angenieux 25-250 zoom lens put to shame. They look like bazookas. Who needs them?

And you lose light with those adapters; therefore you need a ten ton truck worth of lights and another ten truck worth of grip equipment just to light the sucker.

A professional DP can whip out a small 35mm Arriflex and shoot on the fly without lights and capture the magic whether it is in Outer Space, under the ocean, in the swamps of Louisiana, on Mount Everest, the Sahara desert, the jungles in the Philippines or the Devil's Punch Bowl in Palmdale.LOL

Just kidding. Digital can imitate film too ... er, if you can afford the plugins, and if you know forty great digital technicians for recording sound and lighting the set.

I broke down the 35mm budget for a music video in another thread. It's less than $1,000. You want the film look? Shoot film. Want more info, read my book Filmmaking A to Z.

It's on amazon too:

http://www.amazon.com/Filmmaking-Z-...=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1236478779&sr=8-1
 
Ah filmman, here professing ancient idols and telling us to go back to yesterday's technology. *yawn* film is not for professionals, film is for people who are living in the past and cannot clearly see that you can get a much cleaner, crisper, better image from digital than you can ever get from film, and for a lot less money.

El Gato -- what are you looking at for insurance? I mean I wasn't aware that it would be that prohibitive. I pay about $8,000 per year, slightly less, for $300,000 in production insurance, I'm fully covered for automotive, rented equipment, owned equipment, props and wardrobe, theft, general liability, etc. I mean if you were here in L.A. we could just partner up and do a co-production and it wouldn't be too expensive, I'd be an associate producer, I'd come on the set and watch you for fun, lend you the insurance, no problems. I've never actually done that and would be reluctant (i.e. wouldn't do it) to do it with anyone who wasn't a true professional, because of course someone breaks something or doesn't have their s**t in order and then my insurance premiums go up. But I have considered doing it for people before, just because if I had nothing else to do it might be fun.

In any case I'm sure you can make it work, and the fact you have a grip truck to use like that is good, that saves some cash!
 
The answer to your question is to sit down, make phone calls, and do a budget. Not get our opinions.
 
JonathanLB said:
Ah filmman, here professing ancient idols and telling us to go back to yesterday's technology. *yawn* film is not for professionals, film is for people who are living in the past and cannot clearly see that you can get a much cleaner, crisper, better image from digital than you can ever get from film, and for a lot less money.

El Gato -- what are you looking at for insurance? I mean I wasn't aware that it would be that prohibitive. I pay about $8,000 per year, slightly less, for $300,000 in production insurance, I'm fully covered for automotive, rented equipment, owned equipment, props and wardrobe, theft, general liability, etc. I mean if you were here in L.A. we could just partner up and do a co-production and it wouldn't be too expensive, I'd be an associate producer, I'd come on the set and watch you for fun, lend you the insurance, no problems. I've never actually done that and would be reluctant (i.e. wouldn't do it) to do it with anyone who wasn't a true professional, because of course someone breaks something or doesn't have their s**t in order and then my insurance premiums go up. But I have considered doing it for people before, just because if I had nothing else to do it might be fun.

In any case I'm sure you can make it work, and the fact you have a grip truck to use like that is good, that saves some cash!
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The production insurance is mostly to cover 35mm camera rental. There are a few rental house in Texas that still offer 35mm cameras. Dallas/Houston/Austin. Of course no rental house will rent to you with out production insurance.

I did call a production insurance company in Dallas. Quote was $4,000 for a short term insurance policy. Being in Texas we don't have the luxury of competitive prices.

I will figure something out. Thanks for the offer JonathanLB.
 
El Gato Negro said:
The production insurance is mostly to cover 35mm camera rental. There are a few rental house in Texas that still offer 35mm cameras. Dallas/Houston/Austin. Of course no rental house will rent to you with out production insurance.

I did call a production insurance company in Dallas. Quote was $4,000 for a short term insurance policy. Being in Texas we don't have the luxury of competitive prices.

I will figure something out. Thanks for the offer JonathanLB.
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Dang that is not reasonable at all!!! I mean think about that, I pay something like $7,600 for an entire year's worth of production insurance and can do up to $300,000 of productions for that! If I ever hit that level, I can keep doing more of course I just have to pay an adjusted sum, which comes out to, what, about a few percent of the production budget? Not too bad.
 
El Gato Negro said:
Thank you, Baquajim. How did you go about renting the camera? Did you have production insurance? What was your shooting ratio? 10:1? Most music videos run about 3-5 minutes. I could only afford a full day of shooting 12-16 hour . Baquajim, what camera did you go with? Thank you for leaving input.
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I own my own Arri 35BL-2. Shooting ratio was 3:1. Adjust accordingly.
 
filmman said:
But seriously, El Gato, the Red camera isn't compatible with Bluray. They're having trouble outputting to Bluray. Avoid shooting with it until they have that problem ironed out.

Also, the Red camera has sensitivity toward infrared and it "sees" hot areas -- lips turn purple in certain light conditions.
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The incompatible part doesn't make sense. Red r3d footage can be transcoded to any format. If something ends up being wrong, it is the program doing the transcoding, not the original format. Unless you know something I don't.

Even if there is.... you can always transcode to another format that does work, edit and then output.

No matter what you use, there are often workarounds and compromises to be made.

The infrared problem has to do with ND filters. If you are use .9ND or less, you are okay, but if you use 1.2ND or more, you need to add a IR Cut filter.

Not that big of a deal.
 
El Gato Negro said:
I did call a production insurance company in Dallas. Quote was $4,000 for a short term insurance policy. Being in Texas we don't have the luxury of competitive prices.
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You don't need to get your insurance from Texas. Call Film Emporium and get a quote. Since you aren't going to be renting the latest and greatest, probably not even a sync sound camera, it shouldn't be that much.

Hell, I am in the process of selling my Konvas for $1500.00. You can find similiar deals around on non-sync 35mm cameras.
 
baquajim said:
You don't need to get your insurance from Texas. Call Film Emporium and get a quote. Since you aren't going to be renting the latest and greatest, probably not even a sync sound camera, it shouldn't be that much.

Hell, I am in the process of selling my Konvas for $1500.00. You can find similiar deals around on non-sync 35mm cameras.
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Thanks for the great info, Baquajim. Will definitely call and get a rate tomorrow. By the way I saw your short film last night on Vimeo. Wicked man. Exactly why I want to shot on 35.
 
I also want to add. When shooting with the Red under tungsten lighting, you should use an 80C filter as well to color correct the tungsten to daylight.

Or just use daylight flouros or HMIs.

The reason for doing this is to reduce noise that appears in the blue channel.

Also.... and this is a personal decision/preference, but for me personally, the best red footage I have seen has been stuff shot on really old lenses.

Like Cooke s2/s3 series or even Super Baltars.

To me, this is the most "filmic" looking. But once again, we are all different, you will have to investigate, test and make up your own mind.
 
Assuming you will shoot this in one day, it should be easy to get a one day producer's package for about $800.00. Also many rental houses will include rental insurance for an additional charge or at least they will in California, have not rented cameras in Texas.

Good luck,

Dan
 
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