For low budget features - Do you pay your *entire* cast/crew or only some of them?

Have you done a bunch of shorts with people working for free?

I have. It's a nightmare. I don't even want to do it anymore. Key people don't show up. They don't take it seriously. They are far more likely to have something better to do.

Maybe in an eager, hungry, desperate town like LA or NY things are different. In bumblefruck, where I'm deposited, it just sucks.
 
It depends on your need. If your DP is cool with not getting paid than don't turn it down. Try to pay the least amount of people as possible. If you are doing it for profit, I would say off back end payment. Give people percentage of whatever the movie makes.

Or look to see what other benefits beyond financial you can offer in return
 
To the OP, you sound like EVERY beginning filmmaker on this forum (probably like i used to sound like too). You basically will blow through your $10k. There is a hundred of filmakers on this forum that need $10K to complete their budget. Why not connect with them and have a shot at a real film? (see what i said - even with tens of thousands you still only have a shot - not a sure shot - at making a viable film)
 
Ted Spencer said:
I will be including union actors among my cast if they are the best for their roles (auditions thus far suggests this will be the case for some), and have made arrangements with SAG to fulfill all of their specifications. As it turns out, the SAG terms are *very* lenient for projects of this kind (under 30 minutes, under $50K budget). Only $100 + $16 pension and health contribution per actor as a minimum, and even that can be 'deferred' (until money is earned from a sale). I had planned to pay at least that amount from the outset; I've done too many non-paying films as an actor myself, and won't do that to these kind folks, union or non. If I have to jump through a few paperwork, pre-funding other other SAG hoops to get the finest actors I can find/afford then I will. Compromising on actor performances to save a little sweat-equity is not a good tradeoff in my humble opinion.

Hopefully all of this will result in a quality film, which is ultimately the *only* thing that matters. If not it will be a fine learning experience. Enough people seem to sincerely like the story/script that I'm reasonably encouraged...

To the OP I would say: pay your actors and crew whatever you can. So many work for nothing so often that even a little will feel like a lot. I can't believe the props I'm getting from folks as I tell them I plan to do it this way, even though the actual numbers are very low. I know that as an actor I would have really appreciated it too...

My $.02
Click to expand...

Right. My stricture against SAG is limited to features - it's not about money cost, it's about problems with distribution even on ultra-low budget (look at the small print). When it comes to shorts, then yes, the rules change, and I'd employ SAG actors. In general, it surely comes as no surprise that the vast majority of talent is SAG - you must get very, very lucky to get good actors who are not SAG, and usually those are young or talented ingenues; once you need an older actor - past about mid 30 or so, your odds of finding a talented actor who is not SAG drop dramatically... because if they're any good, how come that after the age of 35 they still have not managed to have enough of a career to become at least SAG? Exceptions always exist, and hey, sometimes buying a lottery ticket can fund your movie budget, but the odds are not good. So yes, whenever possible, I'd say: go SAG - actors and script are the most important elements for your film, so get the best you can. But sadly, for features it's not possible for reasons mentioned above. However, in Ted's situation, I too would use SAG - he's not shooting a feature. It is my dream that one day SAG will revise their agreements for ULB features to the same conditions as for shorts, then I'd use SAG actors... basically, I should not be contractually obliged to pay imaginary profits from distribution, but only actual ones.

And yes, my feature too will take place in my apartment for 90% of the action - the always available set can't be beat.
 
Gary Huff said:
And all of those apartment-based movies do so well!
Click to expand...

Pretty irrelevant. I don't expect to make a thin dime - I expect to spend every red cent and not make anything back. The function of the feature is as follows:

1)Learning experience - that's 95% right there.

2)Meeting people of like mind - about 4%.

3)If the film happens to be worthwhile, it might be a small factor in opening some doors - about 1%, in other words, "a moonshot".

For all values of "Do well" involving money or winning prizes - 0%. In other words: irrelevant.

Going through the entire process from conception to attempted distribution is the goal. There was a documentary about a couple of guys who wanted to understand how the economics of corn production work - and the best way to understand the entire process was to go through it from A to Z - they rented an acre of land, planted the corn, harvested, sold. No moron came along to say "gee, 1 acre of corn, boy are you guys gonna get rich, hyuk, hyuk, hyuk, lol, you guyz are dum!". Regardless of outcome, the process is the point.
 
OldCorpse said:
Pretty irrelevant. I don't expect to make a thin dime - I expect to spend every red cent and not make anything back. The function of the feature is as follows:

1)Learning experience - that's 95% right there.

2)Meeting people of like mind - about 4%.

3)If the film happens to be worthwhile, it might be a small factor in opening some doors - about 1%, in other words, "a moonshot".

For all values of "Do well" involving money or winning prizes - 0%. In other words: irrelevant.

Going through the entire process from conception to attempted distribution is the goal. There was a documentary about a couple of guys who wanted to understand how the economics of corn production work - and the best way to understand the entire process was to go through it from A to Z - they rented an acre of land, planted the corn, harvested, sold. No moron came along to say "gee, 1 acre of corn, boy are you guys gonna get rich, hyuk, hyuk, hyuk, lol, you guyz are dum!". Regardless of outcome, the process is the point.
Click to expand...

Unlike most in your position, I really do admire your realistic expectations going into a film. Most have wildly unrealistic expectations of their low budget film, to the point of expecting great success.

-ryan
 
OldCorpse said:
Going through the entire process from conception to attempted distribution is the goal. There was a documentary about a couple of guys who wanted to understand how the economics of corn production work - and the best way to understand the entire process was to go through it from A to Z - they rented an acre of land, planted the corn, harvested, sold. No moron came along to say "gee, 1 acre of corn, boy are you guys gonna get rich, hyuk, hyuk, hyuk, lol, you guyz are dum!". Regardless of outcome, the process is the point.
Click to expand...

Exactly, which is why a short film will help you meet all three goals without wasting the time and effort needed to do an 80-minute-plus project that takes place in a single location.
 
Gary Huff said:
Exactly, which is why a short film will help you meet all three goals without wasting the time and effort needed to do an 80-minute-plus project that takes place in a single location.
Click to expand...

Well, no. Shooting a feature is not like shooting a long short. It's a different process artistically, logistically and as a learning experience. Shooting shorts is valuable, and you are well advised to do that before attempting a feature. But it is not the same. And 90% of it happening in one location can be as much a plus as a minus, just as a smaller budget can sometimes oblige you to be more creative. The challenge of limitations. Some of the greatest achievements came in the context of overcoming limitations. You might set the goal too high, or be too ambitious, but it beats not attempting to rise to the challenge at all. I will lose every penny, but my dirty secret is that I cannot help but succeed in at least one respect - the most important one to me - learning.

We live in amazing times. Today, we can do what others could only dream of in bygone days. We can shoot an entire feature on very little money. Sure, most such experiments will have little inherent value, but to quote Brian Eno about experimenting in the studio: "the great thing about digital technology is that we can experiment without crashing airplanes" (paraphrasing). There is no reason not to take advantage of that.
 
I'm not asking the following question to challenge your point, but can you list the ways a feature exercise is different than a short exercise? Again, not asking to infer that there aren't differences, I do think there are. It's something I've not thought into terribly much and would be fascinated to explore/discuss.
 
Boy, has this thread been hijacked :(

Re: shorts vs features. Starting with effect on the audience - short forms have different impact from long forms; this is true whether you compare short stories vs novels, a 2 minute instrumental vs symphony, short vs feature. On the creator's side, a different skill set is involved in the creation of short forms and long forms - which is how you can have some writers be great at short stories, but falter with novels, musicians, filmmakers etc. - many are skilled in both, of course, but if it was exactly the same skill-set involved you'd never have a writer be great at one and poor at the other. You bring different strategies and training to both - like in a sport analogy, a great 5 mile racer is not necessarily equipped to run a marathon and vice versa. Finally, the artwork itself has a different structure with different rules.

Time available in the form, gives different opportunities. For example, you can go deeper into a character, his background and arc in a feature vs a short. You need to speed your effects and payoff in a short compared to a feature. Take development - whether in plot, or character, or simply psychological effect: when you are doing a feature, you must be able to graduate your effects over a much longer span; you might be able to sustain tension and interest over 10 minutes in a short, but you must use different techniques for a feature. This is actually a frequent problem for directors - some things would work much better in a short than in a feature; a longer conversation that works in a feature might not work in a short, ceteris paribus. How do you use an actor so that we don't get tired of him over 90 minutes? That's a completely different challenge than doing it over 10 minutes. People can sustain a level of emotional pitch of involvement over a span of time, which is why you will notice how whether horror, or drama, or comedy, you need periods of higher involvement and then a climb-down to re-charge before the next climb (like breathing). It takes a different skill-set to do that over 90 minutes vs 10.

To take the example of the challenges in my own project. I wanted to do a horror feature with my apartment as the set for 90% of the duration. Just from a visual point of view, this presents challenges that a short would not - how do you prevent visual fatigue? It's not just a question of "make the action interesting" - note the many films which are single/few locations and how often the directors dwell on how to pull off the visual challenge - see for example the BTS interview with the director on the DVD of Compliance, he went to great lengths with the DP to solve that issue, or take a look at an article recently posted on DVX about the same challenge, "The Kitchen - keeping a one-location indie visually interesting" , etc. - you don't have the same challenge with a short.

Take the horror aspect. I'm relying on psychological effects. Merely setting up the effects take time, and must take time. You don't have that time in a short, so I couldn't simply condense my feature into a short, it could only be done on a feature. At the other end, I faced a challenge that I wouldn't have to worry on a short - how do I keep escalating the psychological effects over the entire span of the movie... it's not easy, I had to wrack my brain for new ways to take the tension to another level repeatedly - in a short, you'd use three or four effects over a span of 20 minutes, and you're done... not so for a feature.

The practical side. You can shoot a short and not worry as much about an actor being at all times in the correct character development stage - over a span of a feature, that can become a serious problem in guiding the performance - and the problem is two-fold, one is that the actor cannot get into a character state a week later, and sometimes the director has forgotten too ("remember, you are grief stricken here, you just got the news" etc.). This is easier with experienced actors - sometimes directors resort to shooting sequentially to avoid the development stage issue for the actor, but that is not always practical.

There are of course just plain everyday issues of being able to organize a production and coordinate schedules of crew and cast over long periods of time in a feature vs a day or few days on a short, and experienced people develop systems that make it easier to handle. Someone who has only done shorts, is not going to be equipped with that experience, which can have a bad effect on the production.

Finally, marketing and distribution of shorts and features is different, so it is useful to gain the experience of going through the process that's appropriate to what you are going to shoot.

This is of course just a thumbnail sketch - if we want to explore such things we should make another thread instead of hijacking the poor OP's question :)
 
I think the issue is not how different features and shorts are - they indeed are - but rather what one is trying to accomplish here. It's as if i proclaimed that i want to build a house and then state that i want to learn how to nail two pieces of wood together. Well, you don't need to attempt to build a house to learn that. As a matter of fact if you start with realistic budget and expectations then you might not only learn how to nail wood but actually do something. Thus Ryan proposes to start with a short film - in my example a wooden shack in your backyard. Sure it won't sell for $300k when it's finished but it will help you learn the basics - how to manage your supplies, how to hire the subcontractors - how to choose them, how to plan the time and limited resources. I mean i really don't have to say all the specifics because almost everyone here knows it. Ryan, as many others here (me including) have seen countless of times people with budget for a shack trying to build a house. Sometimes they even managed to bring great carpenters, or electricians, or architects or what-not but somehow no real houses ever got built. We've witnessed it over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over, so when yet another cat comes in with the pipe dream (and Ryan was much more tactful not to name things by its name) we hope that this one time they will listen to experienced people. In essence: build a number of shacks. In the process learn the politics of the business. Find a financier willing to put up the money for your dream house (or recognize that it will take much more money than you predict - MUCH more) and then with that experience, money and what-else go for it!
 
OldCorpse said:
Boy, has this thread been hijacked :(

Re: shorts vs features. Starting with effect on the audience - short forms have different impact from long forms; this is true whether you compare short stories vs novels, a 2 minute instrumental vs symphony, short vs feature. On the creator's side, a different skill set is involved in the creation of short forms and long forms - which is how you can have some writers be great at short stories, but falter with novels, musicians, filmmakers etc. - many are skilled in both, of course, but if it was exactly the same skill-set involved you'd never have a writer be great at one and poor at the other. You bring different strategies and training to both - like in a sport analogy, a great 5 mile racer is not necessarily equipped to run a marathon and vice versa. Finally, the artwork itself has a different structure with different rules.

Time available in the form, gives different opportunities. For example, you can go deeper into a character, his background and arc in a feature vs a short. You need to speed your effects and payoff in a short compared to a feature. Take development - whether in plot, or character, or simply psychological effect: when you are doing a feature, you must be able to graduate your effects over a much longer span; you might be able to sustain tension and interest over 10 minutes in a short, but you must use different techniques for a feature. This is actually a frequent problem for directors - some things would work much better in a short than in a feature; a longer conversation that works in a feature might not work in a short, ceteris paribus. How do you use an actor so that we don't get tired of him over 90 minutes? That's a completely different challenge than doing it over 10 minutes. People can sustain a level of emotional pitch of involvement over a span of time, which is why you will notice how whether horror, or drama, or comedy, you need periods of higher involvement and then a climb-down to re-charge before the next climb (like breathing). It takes a different skill-set to do that over 90 minutes vs 10.

To take the example of the challenges in my own project. I wanted to do a horror feature with my apartment as the set for 90% of the duration. Just from a visual point of view, this presents challenges that a short would not - how do you prevent visual fatigue? It's not just a question of "make the action interesting" - note the many films which are single/few locations and how often the directors dwell on how to pull off the visual challenge - see for example the BTS interview with the director on the DVD of Compliance, he went to great lengths with the DP to solve that issue, or take a look at an article recently posted on DVX about the same challenge, "The Kitchen - keeping a one-location indie visually interesting" , etc. - you don't have the same challenge with a short.

Take the horror aspect. I'm relying on psychological effects. Merely setting up the effects take time, and must take time. You don't have that time in a short, so I couldn't simply condense my feature into a short, it could only be done on a feature. At the other end, I faced a challenge that I wouldn't have to worry on a short - how do I keep escalating the psychological effects over the entire span of the movie... it's not easy, I had to wrack my brain for new ways to take the tension to another level repeatedly - in a short, you'd use three or four effects over a span of 20 minutes, and you're done... not so for a feature.

The practical side. You can shoot a short and not worry as much about an actor being at all times in the correct character development stage - over a span of a feature, that can become a serious problem in guiding the performance - and the problem is two-fold, one is that the actor cannot get into a character state a week later, and sometimes the director has forgotten too ("remember, you are grief stricken here, you just got the news" etc.). This is easier with experienced actors - sometimes directors resort to shooting sequentially to avoid the development stage issue for the actor, but that is not always practical.

There are of course just plain everyday issues of being able to organize a production and coordinate schedules of crew and cast over long periods of time in a feature vs a day or few days on a short, and experienced people develop systems that make it easier to handle. Someone who has only done shorts, is not going to be equipped with that experience, which can have a bad effect on the production.

Finally, marketing and distribution of shorts and features is different, so it is useful to gain the experience of going through the process that's appropriate to what you are going to shoot.

This is of course just a thumbnail sketch - if we want to explore such things we should make another thread instead of hijacking the poor OP's question :)
Click to expand...

You have made some very good points regarding features vs. shorts. I understand your point of the Hijack, but I felt it was a good side tour to take, plus I think the OP has been answered pretty well, and this is actually going in a very good direction regarding a friendly debate/conversation.

That said, it is my learned experience and opinion that when budget is low, you would learn more making a short than a feature for the reasons of money.

$10,000 on a feature, everything will be bare bones. You'll likely skip hiring a script supervisor, make the 1st AC also be the 2nd AC/DIT, you'll have makeup maybe, actors bring their own wardrobe, and crafty is pizza. There will likely be little to no art direction except a few extra picture frames and rearranging furniture that is already there. Sound will be a one man team with a s*%tty boom mic and a zoom. You'll do ZERO post audio work, mixing, foley and etc. The list goes on and on.

$10,000 on a short, you give yourself and the film the benefit of a decent and appropriately sized crew with tools professional filmmakers use. You will learn what it is to work on a real schedule, (not shooting 15 pages a day), you'll learn how to direct and work with the different departments all doing their jobs. You'll have wonderful sound (a mixer and a boom op? what? haha) the story will benefit from better production design, wardrobe design and more! You will be able to practice and learn how to work with everyone (directing, huh?) to all come together and collaborate with you, and that vision will have more resources to be successfully birthed into the world.

I think you'll get a better and more realistic learning experience, as well as a more successful product, if you concentrate your budget to a short versus a feature. But then again, if the script you have is one-in-a-million good, and simple enough to shoot in one place, I'd regret telling you to throw away a brilliant script for my advice. But if your script is anything short of brilliance, do the short. At least that is my $.02.
 
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If your team doesn't care about your film, they won't ever care, no matter how much money you throw at them. If you are making a $10,000 feature film, then you have no money to pay anybody. Your film will manifest purely from your courage and dedication.

There are experiences in life that are truly priceless. Make working on your film one of these experiences. Give your crew that fulfillment.

We say "story is the most important" and things like that, but I don't think many of us understand the depth of what a story is. A story is your dream. If you aren't prepared to live or die for your dreams, nobody else will be. No-budget filmmaking is pure passion.

Fake passion isn't going to work. Fake courage is worse than no courage. Your crew and your actors will see through it. It's also a disservice to the entire filmmaking community, because when you say "this is a labor of love," you weaken those words for everybody else.

So work on your script. Why do you want to make this film? Is the story filling you with a burning energy? If not, don't bother. Please don't make your movie. Humanity doesn't need any more bullsh*t.
 
@patryk - no issue starting with shorts; but when you've done that, what's wrong with trying for a feature? Do you keep telling someone: "shorts"? That's nonsense. "Sure it won't sell for $300k when it's finished" - I didn't think it would sell for even $1, so I don't know what you're talking about; "so when yet another cat comes in with the pipe dream" maybe you should learn to read - nowhere have I projected great expectations for the film, I simply want to be able to finish it, that would be accomplishment enough for me - if you think that's a pipe dream, you are confused as to the meaning of the phrase. If you want to do features, there comes a time when you have to make a feature - because that is a different learning experience than shooting shorts. For me, that time is now. "Find a financier willing to put up the money for your dream house" - that is one way, but I wonder if you have thought of reasons why you may not wish to do so; I have; my reason: if I finance my movie 100% myself, I am beholden to no one - not formally, and not psychologically... there is nothing in the back of my mind, or subconscious feeling of having to do this taking into account an outside financier. That is incredibly freeing - you can truly do your best (or worst!)... it is a rare opportunity, you probably will never have otherwise in a career... there is not much in the way of perks to a no-budget film, and almost all is disadvantage - but freedom to do whatever you wish (for good or ill) is one of the few real perks of doing it 100% yourself. I have set aside the money - it is mine to burn or "waste" 100%... I could throw it into the sea, set it on fire, or shoot a feature - the last option will be more fun for me.

@Ryan - I appreciate your honest reaction, and I am grateful you took the time to write this. I am not one to brag, so I am not going to make a big deal about what a brilliant script I wrote, and what an amazing production it is going to be etc.. Actions count and the results counts - promises and projections and plans are not worth anything - so I can't at this stage say to you: "gee, I am on top of this"... absent showing the finished film, it would be empty claims. That said, allow me to modestly claim that I in fact am aware of many of the issues you mentioned, and I have therefore thought of solutions - or possible solutions... I may be completely wrong, and off my rocker and insane and stupid - but I guess we won't know until I have the finished product. A few examples.

"actors bring their own wardrobe" - no, that would be stupid. I don't have many actors. It is very cheap to buy wardrobe ($2 a garment if you know where to go in LA). Furthermore, you must buy the wardrobe and keep it with you throughout the shoot, because an actor might lose it or destroy it accidentally.

"crafty is pizza." - no, that would be stupid. I don't have many actors and crew, so it won't be super expensive, but food for the production is very important, so I'm willing to spend a bit here; however, my wife will prepare good quality home-made food with vegetarian options, fresh fruit, snacks in addition etc. An army marches on its stomach (Napoleon).

You'll do ZERO post audio work, mixing, foley and etc. - no, that would be stupid. If I were to economize, I'd sooner do it on the picture than the sound. But post-sound does not have to be expensive - good, fast, cheap - pick two. I pick good and cheap. I pay with "slow" - none of this has to cost money - I have some experience doing post audio work, and I can do it myself on my computer, it'll just take time - I can mix, lay effects, do foley etc..

"There will likely be little to no art direction except a few extra picture frames and rearranging furniture that is already there." - no, that would be stupid. One advantage of shooting in your own apartment, is that you have control over your set, and can dress it carefully and consistently with your script - and part of that starts with the conception at the writing stage - write for the effects at a budget.

"shooting 15 pages a day" - no, that would be stupid. One of the advantages of controlling your own set forever is that you are not in a hurry. You do very comprehensive preparations in pre-production. You experiment with everything - light, camera, blocking etc. before you start shooting. You do a dry run with friends (not actors) of the entire movie. You solve your problems then. But before you even do that, your job starts at the writing stage - write a story that can be shot without having to resort to logistical heroics. You are the writer as well as the director - take advantage of that and write so that you can direct efficiently.

"Sound will be a one man team with a s*%tty boom mic and a zoom" - sound is more important than picture (even though the picture is certainly very important). As for equipment, I was thinking more along the lines of MixPre-D, and the new Tascam tascam dr-60D, decent mikes and boom - have not purchased any of it yet, but am aware of trying to get the best quality I can afford (and those examples indicate the level of equipment I'm thinking of... certainly no Zoom). But I have also paid attention to the issue at the writing stage - there is little dialogue in my film, and a lot of it can be done in stationary situations, where it is easier to get good mike placement and distances. Furthermore, this, just like with the camera, I intend to experiment with extensively before I start shooting. As with everything: carefully constructed, and then preparation, preparation, preparation.

I am by no means claiming that I can anticipate and control everything. I certainly can not. I think of shooting a film like a famous general said about fighting a battle "you make extremely detailed plans before the battle and prepare thoroughly. Then the battle starts and all the plans go out the window". But I still intend to prepare very thoroughly, and be ready for the unexpected... if there was nothing unexpected, it would not be a learning experience.

Look, I can't convince you (or Gary or Patryk etc.) that I am not a complete moron. I realize that talk is cheap, and my protestations have zero credibility - because as Patryk put it "we've witnessed it over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over, so when yet another cat comes[...]" - I mean, I cant' just talk, I must deliver, or else it's all BS. Let's see if I can - time will tell one way or another. Gary has his day today - he can sneer, jeer and laugh to his heart's content, as he's been doing with great gusto in this thread. He's welcome, and I won't say anything, but I won't forget. That's today - let's see what tomorrow brings - he laughs best, who laughs last.
 
Well good luck!

I never meant for my posts to be anything but helpful nor did I want to be discouraging.

Your angle of approach is different to what mine would be, but there's more than one way to skin a cat, yes?

I wish you luck and if anything I would love for you to document your process. From budgeting, to production to final product, you certainly have my interest and curiosity.


Also, if you ever need a hand, and I'm not busy I'd be happy to help.
 
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Ryan, I don't take umbrage at your posts - I quite understand, and in fact appreciate the spirit in which you posted. You were doing so to be helpful - which is a very nice thing. Furthermore, you may transpire to be completely correct in your first impressions, and I'll have to eat crow. Bottom line, I have zero issue with you (and as I said in my post - I thank you for your kind words). Patryk would benefit from knowing that one can't just broadcast without receiving - and so sadly his posts miss the mark for me, because he doesn't bother to acquaint himself with the particulars, instead he relies on reacting without the benefit of knowing what exactly he's reacting to... ends up spewing cliches, which everyone knows anyway... but at least his posts have some kind of tangential content, unlike Gary, whose only contribution seems to be to jeer. I mean, if the only thing Gary has to say is to jeer - not offer advice, or reasoned critique (like you did), but a one sentence jeer "it'll be so successful" what is the value of that? Even so, I answered him in good faith, and he returns with "Oh please". Zero content, only eye-rolling and sneering. There are always toxic people around any artistic endeavor - people who offer nothing, but jeering and sneering... that is sadly Gary. I appreciate criticism, no matter how harsh, and honest reactions, even if it's to discourage - or throw cold water on a lame idea - but content-free jeering is not that. Avoid toxic people. Again, Ryan, I do appreciate your posts, even if I may not concur with every word - discussion is healthy, including honest disagreements.
 
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