How do you make a film?

[JetMonkey]

Ok, this is all good stuff, BUT. I need some logistical advise. I've done the script, storyboards, financing is an ongoing thing. I feel I don't want to cast yet until we're a few months out of filming. I decided to start with finding a director, then DP, then a editor. I already have: waredrobe, make up, location scouts, catering. Pretty much all the small stuff (if there is such a think when making a film). Still undecided with which director I'm going to go with. I still have a long way to go it seems. And I still need to find a really good production designer. But for me, the most important is the first three I listed, then find the talent.

So am I wrong with my train of thought? This is gonna be my first film I'm producing so I want it to go as smooth as it can.

Imput encouraged!!

 

[Rolf Silber]

Ok, this is all good stuff, BUT. I need some logistical advise. I've done the script, storyboards, financing is an ongoing thing. I feel I don't want to cast yet until we're a few months out of filming. I decided to start with finding a director, then DP, then a editor. I already have: waredrobe, make up, location scouts, catering. Pretty much all the small stuff (if there is such a think when making a film). Still undecided with which director I'm going to go with. I still have a long way to go it seems. And I still need to find a really good production designer. But for me, the most important is the first three I listed, then find the talent.

So am I wrong with my train of thought? This is gonna be my first film I'm producing so I want it to go as smooth as it can.

Imput encouraged!!

If you have written the script and already have most of the financing and know who will be in the "other" departments and want to cast it.... why don't you direct it then yourself? Just asking.

 

[JetMonkey]

Well tipota, the truth is I guess I'm not ready to take on that challenge myself. I don't want to risk that much and screw it up. Not that I wouldn't like to direct someday. I'd just would rather learn from experience working along side someone who knows a heck of a lot more than I do right now.

 

[Rolf Silber]

Well tipota, the truth is I guess I'm not ready to take on that challenge myself. I don't want to risk that much and screw it up. Not that I wouldn't like to direct someday. I'd just would rather learn from experience working along side someone who knows a heck of a lot more than I do right now.

Okay. That's a clear statement... and a good and prudent one. You should go for the director first as a director may feel crammed in if too many creative decisions already have been made. The point with finding a director is, especially in the beginning with the first projects, to find someone who does not kill the whole project or the producer because he thinks he is a bonsai-Michael-Cimino or needs a Kinski-wannabe as star.

That's the really hard part. And it's not only about talent - it will be very much about very old-fashioned trust and reliability between you and him or her. You have to trust the director that he will deliver within a given framework and that the director understands that it is his responsibility to do so. And he or she has to trust you, that the framework you give is not a fantasy but is resilient, workable, real.

Much more than what we think in such a decision may be based on "gut feeling" and our ability to read and decipher in the right way what that feeling tells us....

 

[keylight]

Just curious.

Anyone open to sharing there processes? Right now here is my flow:

Come up with idea and write it down.
Yap about it for weeks with friends with elation.
Make sketches of stuff from the film.
Bang out the script.
Make more sketches
Think about how I don't have the money to make it.

INSERT HERE: Film Budgeting

Do storyboards
Cast it.
Shoot it.
Edit it
Watch it 1000000000 times.
Try to get others to watch it 1000000000 times,
Depression
Repeat

 

[starcentral]

Ok, this is all good stuff, BUT. I need some logistical advise. I've done the script, storyboards, financing is an ongoing thing. I feel I don't want to cast yet until we're a few months out of filming. I decided to start with finding a director, then DP, then a editor. I already have: waredrobe, make up, location scouts, catering. Pretty much all the small stuff (if there is such a think when making a film). Still undecided with which director I'm going to go with. I still have a long way to go it seems. And I still need to find a really good production designer. But for me, the most important is the first three I listed, then find the talent.

So am I wrong with my train of thought? This is gonna be my first film I'm producing so I want it to go as smooth as it can.

Imput encouraged!!

So what are you planning to do with the film when you're finished?

 

[JetMonkey]

I'm setting up my own production company. Then hopefully get it into some festivals. If that doesn't work, I guess I'll just post it on Facebook and show it to some of my friends. lol

 

[Billy Pilgrim]

Here's how I made my first feature:

I thought about it for a couple hours, then wrote the first 37 pages in one sitting
Finished the rest of the script over the course of a few months
I wrote 8 more drafts over the course of about 2 years (10 total upon shooting)
Shot the movie, changing and cutting things as I went along, as well as re-writing some scenes the night before, also editing as I went along, for 6 weeks
I re-wrote and re-shot more scenes months later
Changed even more in editing for the next several months (maybe 7 months of total editing)
Then the score/sound design was done

The next feature, I hope to write only one draft (been thinking about it for a few weeks now), and shoot it in about a week, just to see if I can. It's a bit of an experiment for myself. I don't know how long it'll take to edit and complete, or if I'll re-shoot anything. I really want to see if I can do it all in one go.