Found In Time

Lessons Learned During Post

2011-09-21T23:56:00.005-04:00

Anthony (Eric Martin Brown) and Two Chrises (MacLeod Andrews) have a stare-down

Quick Self-Promotion: I will be teaching a three-part course on Visual Storytelling at Brooklyn Brainery! The course looks at the tension between showing and telling in films. The first session will focus on existing films. During the second and third sessions, students will bring in works-in-progress (films, scripts, poems, novels, etc.) and discuss ways in which they can show their stories.

Where: The Brooklyn Brainery, 515 Court St., Brooklyn, NY
When: Thursdays, 6:30-8pm, October 6th, 13th, and 20th
Cost: $45
Register on the official site

Post

I'm just starting the promotion/marketing journey, but I wanted to step back for a minute and talk about the lessons I learned during post. What follows is a brief look at what I learned during post.

Make Time For VFX in Production

After Dan Loewenthal and I had scanned through the film a few times, and discussed/vetoed/decided on a few tweaks, we figured it was time to lock the picture. Up to that point, I'd put together some very rough visual effects shots, just so we had something to look at, and to give me some idea of what I wanted. I figured that few, if any, of these attempts would survive through the end of post (though a couple did). The VFX shots came in three basic flavors:

Hiding/Erasing booms, boom shadows, lights, and other gakk
Compositing plates together (there are a few shots where we extended sets and doubled characters)
Creative work - adding tazer effects, glows, blood, and other things that weren't there during the shoot

What I've learned is that I have to pay more attention during production when setting up VFX shots. Ben Wolf, my DP, is really good at setting up and executing low-budget VFX. But I rushed through the process a bit, creating more work for Vickie later. A good example is of a composite shot called "Two Chrises". In the foreground plate, we had Anthony (left) and Chris (right) arguing, then turning around as a second Chris enters the room.

There are several problems with this shot. First, foreground Chris moves into the area that the background Chris occupies. If you're going to shoot a shot like this without using a greenscreen, then keeping the layers separate is pretty important. Second, the lighting from outside changed slightly between shooting the foreground and background plates, so Vickie and Verne Mattson, our colorist, had to spend more time in post evening up the shots.

Ben did a superb job framing and executing the shot. And the actors' performances were great - MacLeod Andrews (Chris) and Eric Martin Brown (Anthony) are, after all, reacting to someone who literally isn't there, and they sell it. The problem is that I didn't schedule enough time to proceed just a little more slowly and make some minute adjustments, so we had to rush through the shots.

On the other hand, this shows you what you can do even without a lot of money or a greenscreen. We could have tried setting up a portable greenscreen, but placing it far enough away from the actors and lighting it properly may have been very difficult in that location (it was a small office).

Regardless of these oversights, Ben, Vickie and Verne were able to put together a wonderful shot. Dan Loewenthal, the editor, broke it up into two pieces and put a reaction shot by foreground Chris in between, to heighten the impact of the shot.

DropBox!

I am not affiliated in any way, shape or form with DropBox. However, I totally swear by it. It is worth it to upgrade to the Pro Version ($10 a month). With Vickie in Queens, Quentin in Brooklyn, and Verne in New Jersey, it would have been very inefficienct for me to shuttle files back and forth. YouSendIt is a great option for sound files (Quentin and I used it a few times) but for video files, DropBox is key. It works like a virtual hard drive that synchronizes a directory on your hard drive with its online counterpart. Stick a file in your local Dropbox directory, and it will be uploaded. If you give other people permission to see your account, they can download it. No more shlepping drives and DVDs back and forth.

Amend the Script

After the picture edit is done, you should go back to your script and amend it to reflect the locked cut. You'd be surprised how many differences there are between what you wrote and what was said on set, and between that and how it was cut together. I found little chunks of dialog had been added, others taken away, and some bits rearranged within the same scene. Presenting an amended, as-edited script to your sound designer will help him/her out immensely.

You Can Never Have Enough Drives

I started out with a 2TB internal drive and a 500Gig Camera/Sound Master drive. Since then I bought three 2TB external e-SATA/FW drive - one serves as a backup of the internal drive, a second is for Vickie (and contains everything) and the third is for Verne. I also purchased a second 500Gig "shuttle drive" which went back and forth with me on those occasions when I was meeting with someone had to grab a file from them or give one to them. I will need another 2TB drive pretty soon, to back up all the behind-the-scenes footage, the various QuickTime exports I've made, and the VFX final files. Since space constantly gets cheaper, I only bought new drives as a I needed them.

Life After Post

Okay, that's it for now. There's a lot going on at the moment - we're in the process of building a new website for the film, and creating publicity/promo materials. I'll have more to say about that next time.

Breathing Out During Post

2011-08-18T08:13:00.004-04:00

Ayana (Mina Vesper Gokal) and Chris (MacLeod Andrews) share a rare laugh in the field.

Next week I'll be working with Quentin Chiappetta (sound designer) on the mix for the film. He'll be mixing, I'll be gulping ice coffee and requesting minor changes. Bring this up, take this down, that sort of thing. With luck and hard work on the part of the team, the mix will be done by next Saturday, and then I'll be sitting down with Vickie Lazos (VFX) and Verne Mattson (color/conform) to match up the locked sound with the corrected picture. Then I'll be making festival screeners!

The End Of The Beginning

My role at this point is somewhat more managerial - I'm working with a group of very talented professionals who have good taste, so I'm there to help each of them with whatever they need, and lend a critical eye to the results of their efforts. At this point, it's not really possible to fundamentally change the nature of the film, so I feel like my job is to reinforce the strengths. On a more practical level, I'm making sure that:

The sound and video stay in sync during the mix, color correction and VFX creation
Shooting an insert shot that we've needed, inserting it into the locked picture, without changing the total picture length
Finishing and outputting the end credits
Coordinating between Vickie and Verne
Creating new Quicktimes for Quentin that include the insert shot and the end credits, so he can score and sound design them
Approving the VFX shots as Vickie finishes them up
Grabbing Quicktimes of the color-corrected reels from Verne so we can check sync before we go into the mix
Getting the festival applications ready
Preparing a bare-bones DVD

While that may sound like a fair amount of work, it's not really - especially since it's spread over several weeks. And with a little help from a post schedule I created in Excel, Dropbox.com, and frequent emails, it's actually pretty painless.

Next Steps

The current strategy is to submit Found In Time to a couple of top-tier festivals, and send one or two screeners to producers and agents as a calling card for my next project. While waiting to hear back from all these sources, the next step is to build up the promotion machine. While social media is an important component of that, it's not the whole story. A good, well-placed "how-to" article (either in print or online) is sometimes worth more than upping the Facebook friend count.

I'm currently putting together a revamped website for the film. Found In Time currently lives in two places on the web (three if you count the Facebook page): here on Blogger, and as a section on the ChaoticSequence.com site. I set it up this way so I could focus on the more pressing job of getting the film together, but now I have to figure out how to retain the domain but migrate the content to another platform. On the coding side, I'm looking at Joomla, WordPress, Drupal, and my own PHP code (which I've used with minor modifications on about a half-dozen sites so far). For design guidance I'm looking at tons of film websites.

Most film sites have the same structure (story/about/cast/crew/buy it here/press/images/trailer/contacts), but employ a wide variety of approaches. Some use Flash and Quicktime extensively; others are fairly bell-and-whistle free. Some are super-slick, while others stick to the familiar blog format. The biggest challenge in web design, as I see it, is how to communicate information effectively. Generally, people hit up websites to find out things, rather than to engage in a 'rich, multimedia experience.' Look at the design of Craigslist, Google, Gmail, Mandy, Wikipedia... even Facebook. Words are primary; pictures support the text.

Having said that, there is a way to make a film's site more attractive, without relying too heavily on Flash. After developing with Flash for two years, I was very happy to leave it behind and go back to more traditional tools (though I still use it for animation, logo design, and video). Also, for the first time in a while, I'm thinking about smaller screens - designing pages for phones and tablets.

In the next series of entries, I'll start talking about the marketing process. This is critical to a film's success, but is often a bit of a challenge for filmmakers. You almost have to start from the beginning again.

Day To Day

2011-07-25T07:15:00.004-04:00

Boom operator Shawn Allen and PA Denzil Thomas on set in the Bronx.

Reading over the last few posts, I realized I've been focusing almost exclusively on how-to's and haven't included too many updates on the film itself. So here's a brief post on the progress of the film itself.

If preproduction is training, and production is a sprint, then postproduction is best described as a marathon. You're exerting a constant, slow effort, but you can't overexert yourself. Rushing through post is nearly always a mistake.

Right now we're about a little more than a month away from finishing. The Visual Effects Artist, Vickie Lazos, is doing a great job with a mix of shots - some very challenging boom removal shots, composites that were shot without greenscreen, and a few nifty touches that hopefully people won't even realize are effects.

Verne Mattson, our colorist/conformist, is nearly done; he just has to grade the effects and titles. Quentin Chiappetta and his team at Media Noise are nearly done with the sound design - our mix date is mid-to-late August. For my part, I'm revising the titles and working on a last, stubborn insert shot.

I spend a good deal of time trying to think about the next steps - what festivals to apply to, who to potentially approach for distribution, what the poster should look like, etc. I confess that the social media explosion of the past few years baffles me. I know that I need to take greater advantage of it; however, I'm not sure if there's a payoff at the end. Do Facebook fans turn into ticket buyers, DVD renters - or just bit torrent streamers? Does it prove to a distributor that you have an audience, or does it just mean you're really good at marketing your film?

I've "liked" a bunch of films and do follow their posts, but it's a very passive experience. When these films are finally done, will I go out and see them? I don't know. I'd like to think so.

So I throw out this question: does social media campaigning have a good ROI (return on investment), or is it just one more thing you "have to have," like a press kit or website?

When Sh*t Happens

2011-06-22T00:50:00.005-04:00

Despite your best-laid plans, at some point during the prep, shoot or post, a monster fuck-up (or a few small ones) are going to come along and take a dump on said plans. Apart from the obvious (try to stay calm, get your plan B ready) what do you do?

Shoot Something

For some reason (that's still not clear), we lost our NYPD TCD (Traffic Control Division, who are also responsible for police presence on set) on a particular day we needed them. In New York City, you are not allowed to shoot scenes with "film cops" without real ones being around. Otherwise, some other real cops might wonder what the hell is going on.
Since we had a full day of shooting scheduled with Morton and Jess, our 'Psychcops,' I was in real trouble. My DP (Ben Wolf), sound mixer (Anthony Viera), and I sat down for a few minutes and figured out what angles/parts of the scenes we had scheduled that we could shoot without Morton and Jess. Meanwhile my crack PAs called Curt and Mollie (who played Morton and Jess) and told them they weren't needed that day. According to SAG regulations, I had to pay them for the day, which sucked, but it was better than trying to pull a fast one on the police. If we had been caught in violation of our permit they could revoke it and then we'd be really screwed.
As it turned out, we were able to shoot about 80 percent of what we had scheduled, and we added a scene that we'd originally scheduled for the next day. So despite not having a plan B, we were able to salvage the day. The lesson here is to keep shooting despite the obstacles. Come up with something - anything. You can't afford to be down for more than a couple of hours on a low budget shoot.

Replace

Sooner or later, someone will become an obstacle in your path. It could be a crew member with an attitude, a cast member with a schedule conflict that can't be worked around, an agent who's putting the hammer to your balls on 'behalf' of his client, an investor who insists on a LOT of special treatment before signing that check, a location owner or vendor that keeps changing the deal on you. These people may be your friends. They may be acting from completely benign motives - anxiety, loyalty to their client/organization, a misunderstanding, or because they've been burned by producers in the past. In any case, you have to make a decision: is this aggravation worth it? It may not be. Start looking for a replacement.

The horrible thing about being the boss is that you may have to replace someone for the good of the project. You will have to put your loyalties to the person to one side.

Chances are, the replacement person will be better than you'd hope for. The knot in your stomach will go away surprisingly fast.

Consult

Chances are, your crew has been through whatever fire you're going through. In fact, they've probably encountered it a lot more often than you - a DP can work on many features in a year, whereas you can probably only direct or produce one every two to three. It's not weakness to ask for advice - it's common sense. It also invites people into the creative process, which is a good thing.

On Found In Time, we were shooting in a narrow corridor, and I couldn't figure out how to make the script blocking match the location. I knew going in that it was a tough location but didn't have much choice - I'd run out of time to investigate alternatives and the price was right. On the day, I was still figuring out how to position my leading man between the two leading ladies, even though it clearly wouldn't work with the geography of the place. Ben came up with a solution instantly - just change the door that one of the characters was coming out of - and then everything snapped into place. Instead of me staring into space for an hour trying to figure it all out we were shooting in about fifteen minutes.

Punt

On Found In Time, we had a monster 15-hour day on our soundstage (as a result of poor scheduling on my part) on day 11, so everyone was pretty tired by the end of day 12. The shoot was dragging and I wasn't getting what I wanted from anyone, including myself. My brain was the consistency of cottage cheese. I realized that if I pushed us up to the 12th hour, that we were still not going to wrap out of the scenes we needed to shoot, and the work was going to suffer. By pushing the scenes to the next day - our last day of shooting - I was taking a chance. We already had about 8 pages to shoot, and a hard out on the location and some of our cast members. Adding another 2 pages seemed insane.

But on the other hand, we WERE coming back to the location the next day. After looking at the existing 8 pages we had to shoot, we realized that we could tuck the owed scenes into the end of the day without screwing anything else up. This proved to be the correct decision - people got some sleep, we were able to start a little earlier, and we got better work done.

Consolidate, or Break Apart

Sometimes consolidating your setups is a good idea - unless it results in a complicated pretzel-twist setup or creates other problems that you'll never get out of.

On Windows, a film I lined produced, one ten minute scene was supposed to be shot in one take. On paper it looked easy enough - two characters in a room, talking, then arguing, then fighting. But the location turned out to be full of mirrors, and the blocking got very complicated. So there was no way that the DP WASN'T going to see himself in one of the mirrors at some point.

After trying to shoot it all in one take, Ben and Shoja Azari (the director) talked it over and decided to shoot 'sort-of' coverage. This meant shooting moving masters from different angles, trying to avoid the mirrors as much as possible, and emphasizing different elements from take to take. By shooting the scene this way, the editor had enough material to cut with, without sacrificing the 'feeling' of the single take. Some people who've watched the film aren't aware that it's actually several shots stitched together.

On the other hand, on Caleb's Door (my first film), I had the opposite problem. I was three hours behind and we were shooting a four-page dialog scene between the two lead characters, Liz and Caleb. Liz and Caleb were sitting side by side at a bar, looking at each other. This would normally call for four-to-six setups. A master shot looking down the bar at Liz, a reverse looking at Caleb, then CUs of both of them, then cutaways, then a double (if possible) from behind the bar. There was no way to accomplish this and make the rest of the day.

Then something wonderful happened. Ben put the camera on the bar for the master on Liz, which would normally just get the back of Caleb's head. But Carl, the actor playing Caleb, ended up playing the scene looking AWAY from Liz and at the bar. In other words, he was in profile for nearly the entire scene - so we were able to get both actors' faces in one master shot. Plus, since he was closer to the camera, it worked as his CU except for three lines, when he finally does turn to Liz. So we shot the three lines as a separate CU, then shot a CU of Liz. This gave us enough material to cut with, and saved us three setups. I wish could take credit for it, but the main point is that it got us out of a major jam. and it worked really well.

Failure Is Just Another Opportunity To Learn

It may be that nothing works, that the shoot falls apart anyway, and you don't get everything you need. It sucks, and it's the worst feeling in the world. But it's not the end. There isn't a single great painter, sculptor, writer, business owner, scientist, parent, cook - a single great anything - that doesn't have a failure in their past. A script that didn't come together, a restaurant that never opened or failed, an experiment that blew up, a novel that bombed. Sometimes what separates the wheat from the chaff in the film business is what you do after you fail. Do you pack it up and do something else, or do you learn what you can, file it away, then get up (after a good night or two of drinking) and get back in the saddle? I've had my share of failures, and it's taken me years in some cases to see them in anything but a negative light, but now I recognize them for what they are: learning experiences.

When One Head Is Better Than Two

2011-05-25T02:15:00.014-04:00

A candid moment for actress Kelly Sullivan (Jina)

I'm usually very scared when I'm approached by a hyphenate to work on their film - the producer/director. I wonder how they're going to handle it when I need to have them sign a check while they're on set trying to direct, or when I have to get their signoff or opinion on something that will not add value to the screen, but will definitely fuck us if we don't take care of it. Often the experience isn't pretty. I've had arguments over the cost of bagels.

But I recently found myself in a similar situation, and, probably due to hubris, I figured I could handle it. I could walk the producer/director tightrope. I'm still not sure I've pulled it off - I often worry that I've been too worried about producing to be as effective a director as I could have been. But it is possible, and with some sweat and initiative, it can even be enjoyable, to wear two hats.

Trading Space For Time

In military tactics, there's a maneuver called trading space for time. You send a fast, light force up against the enemy, then retreat ahead of them as they advance, harassing them then running out of their reach. By the time they hit your main forces, they've been demoralized and depleted.

Independent filmmaking works in a similar (though hopefully less bloody) way. Without a huge budget to depend on, you need to spend a lot of time in prep, chipping away at the problems of getting locations, signing up vendors, raising money, finding cast and crew, etc. If you wait until just before you start, or count on being able to hire your buddies at the rate they promised you six months ago, you will inevitably burn through more cash than you want to and probably achieve suboptimal results.

So if you're the producer and director, start early. Do your line producer's script breakdown, and director's script analysis, as early as possible. You may have to do some of this work over again if you do a rewrite down the road, but that's okay. You'll be able to answer the 'big picture' questions:

What are my characters' arcs in each scene, each sequence, in the whole script?
How many locations?
How many script days?
How many characters?
Special props/action/effects?
How many shooting days does it look like I'll need?
How are my characters' choices reflected in dialog vs. nonverbal (image/action/sound/wardrobe/makeup/hair/editing)?
What can go wrong?

You will never know the complete answers to these questions. But getting some initial answers now will enable you to write up a shooting schedule, a budget, a scene-by-scene 'beat sheet,' and some creative notes to pass on to your department heads.

Leaning On Others

I had to lean on the people around me more than I would have if I'd had a full-on partner, especially during preproduction. My attorney, casting director, DP, and production sound mixer heard me bitch a lot. Since most of them had known me for a long time I think they were okay with it. (At least I hope so). On the other hand, I believe it gave them an opportunity to contribute more to the film creatively than they might otherwise have had. This is a very good thing. Your crew will almost always know more than you about their specific area. They've probably solved the problem you're facing before, and can find their way to the solution faster than you can.

Staying Organized

There's no real secret organization sauce. But if you're constantly looking for things, forgetting appointments, and leaning on other people to keep your life together, you had better find a system that you can work with. Nothing erodes people's confidence in their leader faster than seeing that the boss can't find the map, never mind the road. And since much of your job consists of communicating with others, it's also critical that your system be understandable by more than just you. That's the real basis for the seemingly endless paperwork that accompanies filmmaking - production reports, callsheets, sound reports, camera reports, lined scripts, location directions, crew and cast contracts, and even the script format itself.

Recognize and Contain Your Obsession

It happens to every director: you get fixated on something that you think is critical. My obsession was over some smaller props (paperwork, crayons, some other odds and ends) that had to look absolutely 100 percent right. Other directors I've worked for had a specific shot they insisted on (and which completely screwed up the schedule to shoot). Maybe you wanted a location to look just like the one you grew up in. Or you have a line you think is so important you'll shoot 50 takes until your actor gets it right (or he bites his tongue and chokes on it). As a director, you are completely convinced that the audience will not get your film if this ONE thing isn't right, and you will drag the entire budget and schedule (and your precious prep time) down to get it onscreen.

Guess what: in all likelihood, the audience isn't even going to register this ONE thing - assuming it even makes it into the final cut. Audiences overlook gaps and fill in details all the time. Use that to your advantage as a producer - push your director-self past your detail obsession (I realized I had to stop when I kept going on ebay to buy more crayons).

Be In the Moment AND The Moment After That

As a director, your focus should be on what's unfolding in front of you on set, in the rehearsal space, or in the editing room. As a producer, you should be thinking at least one step ahead, and preferably several.

To deal with this I did my producer's prep in the morning when I woke up, and when I first arrived on set. Then I tried to stay in director mode until lunch. I leaned a LOT on my PAs, giving them petty cash and problems to solve. They were awesome.

At lunch I tried to think about the schedule, reshuffle the day a bit, then I got back into director mode until wrap. Often I dropped off my DP, Ben Wolf, on the way home, so we both had a chance to talk over the ups and downs of the day. I often got some ideas from talking with him about the next day. At night I tried to slip back into director's mode by reading the sides and my scene analysis notes just before going to bed.

The main idea here is to not try to do both jobs at once, but do each one fully, when it makes the most sense.

Give It Up

At a certain point, despite your best efforts, your director and producer selves will clash in a big way, and you'll have to make a decision that could cost you big bucks but save the film. My personal opinion is that the director should be allowed to win in this scenario. You can often find more money in the budget, or cut back on something else, or (worst case) raise more money. But having 3/4 of a movie that's on budget doesn't benefit anyone.

The trick is that you can only play this card once. On Found In Time I scheduled a over-ambitious day - combining soundstage work with a big chase scene. Stunts, set building and dressing, extras. Needless to say we went into OT. But there came a point where I just had to let it go, or we wouldn't have gotten the material we needed to make those scenes work. I ended up cutting back on a few other things for the rest of the shoot, and recouped some money through prop returns.

Okay, next time I'll get back to post production. But to sum all of the above up, the key things to being a director-producer are: do your prep ahead of time, stay organized, and get good people to work with you.

Breathing In During Post

2011-05-01T17:33:00.004-04:00

Many thanks to the folks at the recent New York City Film and Finance event 'Eyes on the Film Festival' for providing valuable insight into the festival programmer side of this discussion.

There's always a lull in the post-production process, and it usually appears somewhere between picture editing and sound post. Typically the end of picture editing is marked by somewhat arduous, anticlimactic chores, to get the OMF and Quicktime files ready for your sound designer and composer. You might also be getting various comps and elements ready for the visual effects artist, and, depending on what you shot on, going back to your camera masters to conform for your colorist.

And then... there's very little to do. All the people that you're working with will need time and space. After thinking mechanically and technically for a few weeks, it's time to start looking a couple of moves ahead again. Which is where I'm at now.

How Do You Know You're Locked

Before you deal with any of what I've just described, ask yourself: are we really picture locked? It's worth taking some time before answering that question. There's really no magic formula. Dan and I watched the film several times, all the way through, then made minor changes after each viewing. I could tell we were close because the changes kept shrinking in scope. Sometimes a small change can make a big difference - a few frames left in can let a moment breathe, a few frames cut can trim the dead space out of a scene.

One way to gauge whether a film is locked is to look at your dissatisfaction with the film. Is it based on things that you can change in picture, is it because you don't like something that you can still fiddle with (like an audio or music cue), or is it due to factors absolutely beyond your control/budget? If you keep coming back to a performance or a moment you never got in production that you can't synthesize in the edit, then you're probably ready to move on to sound post (or you're headed towards further reshoots).

Another way is to look at the flow of the film - the moments within the scene, and the transitions between scenes. If you can allow yourself to relax a little, and not hang on every cut or word of dialog, are you still entertained by the film? Do you feel unsettled by a cut, or does it all seem to flow by smoothly? If you feel that it's all pretty smooth, then you're probably done.

Getting Back To The Big Picture

At a certain point, you have to throw your post schedule out the window. Not that you shouldn't be striving to finish the film in a timely way, but the film becomes the boss. And in a larger sense, the budget is as well. I've been lucky enough to snag really excellent people to work on Found In Time for very modest rates, in part because we understand that if a better paying gig comes along they'll have to take it for a little while. As long as the film isn't moldering on a hard drive for months on end, I think it's a fair way to work.

So while the film winds it's way through post, you should start thinking about what you need to move the film forward once it's 'done.'

Press Kit: This should include a PDF with cast and crew bios, a synopsis of the film, photos (see below) some happy production stories, and ANY reasonably positive press you may have gotten during production.
Photos: If you didn't grab stills on set, get the best-quality frame grabs you can. You'll need a set of 300dpi TIFF files for print, and a set of 72dpi JPGs (high quality) for the web.

Short Teaser: This should be about a minute long and can contain rough audio and temp score elements (as long as the audio isn't completely awful). The idea is to deliver some sizzle, but not much steak - give the audience a taste of the film.
Full-Length Trailer: Somewhere between two and four minutes long. You'll want to hold off on creating this until the sound post and color correction are further along. Uncorrected audio and picture can make a trailer unwatchable or at the very least unprofessional looking.
Key Artwork You should at least be thinking about this at this stage. It's okay to send out sharpie-inscribed DVDs in sleeves for festival submissions (some will argue that even here better packaging helps). But for handing out to press, industry, producers reps, and even (who knows) selling a few units directly, you'll want to put together a central, iconic set of artwork - title logo, poster shot, and tagline that you can base a campaign around. Mock up a poster, one-sheet, DVD face and wraparound sleeve cover in Word or (better yet) InDesign or Photoshop. Print a few out at home to see if they're pleasing to the eye, before dropping money on a print run.
Pitch: You probably developed this during the developing and financing stages, but revise it to reflect the film you actually made. Can you explain the film in one minute/three sentences or less?
EPK: This can (and usually does) include all of the above, plus behind-the-scenes footage and/or interviews with key crew and cast members.
Get on the Web - Build Your Site, IMDB, and Withoutabox Goes without saying. Also start getting people on your emailing list, or weed out the deadwood from your existing one.

As you can see, this is a lot of work to tackle. But now is the perfect time to do it, while the film doesn't require as much of your attention.

The Bigger Picture

When you're doing all of the above things, it's important to figure out what the story of your film - as a product - is about. It's difficult to think in these terms, especially if you're the creator. It's like trying to justify your child to a bunch of strangers. But it's essential in order to create publicity materials that are enticing and organic to the story. Think of it this way: people have a LOT of choices - perhaps too many - and limited time and attention spans. Why should they choose to plunk down their hard-earned dollars on your film, rather than another (or watch tv or a webisode, or play a video game, for that matter)? What is special about your film?

The easiest way to tackle this is to ask yourself some questions: Who is your film good for? What films is it like? What films is it not like? Do you have niche appeal - for example, do you have a film that tackles a specific issue or fits a specific genre?

Look at the ad campaigns for films that are similar to yours. Is there a common graphical element, something that separates them from other films? It could be a typeface (I remember in the 80s horror films often had red, dripping titles), how the photo elements are arranged, or the tagline ("this time it's personal" or "the girl is out there"). Perhaps the trailers had similar music.

The trick is to stand out from the crowd, without pushing producer's reps, festival programmers, and sales agents out of their comfort zones. So while you're looking OUTWARD at other films, you need to also look INWARD at your own project. Is there an iconic image, scene, or even line of dialog that captures what you're trying to say? This will (hopefully) supply you with the inspiration to craft a publicity campaign that highlights the uniqueness of your work, while retaining the conventions of the genre your film is in.

While you probably did a version of this work early on during the financing stage (so you could put it in your business plan), the film that's in your hands now is doubtless very different from the one you set out to make. So you'll need to reappraise and readjust your artwork.

Graphic Language

Part of how you get people to respond positively to your DVD cover or poster rests on your ability to command the language of graphic design. It's similar to, but not the same as, the language of film. It's too big of a discussion to get into here, but if you don't have a good print/web design sense, or if you don't really know the difference between CMYK and RGB, work with someone who does to create your media.

Last point: for DVDs that are going out to reps, agents, and festivals, you're better off eschewing graphics for readable text. Whether you handwrite on your DVD or have them printed, make sure you include the title, your name, phone number, email address, total running time, language, sound type (stereo, 5.1), the DVD type (region code), the video type (NTSC/PAL), year completed, and whether it's in color or black and white. This may seem like common sense, but I've gotten a LOT of screeners over the years that lacked this information, which forced me to have to hunt down the missing information from the press kit or email. So I'm already in a bad mood by the time I start watching the film. And I'm not even a festival programmer - they watch thousands of Da YEAR generally.

Working With Your Editor, Part 2

2011-03-28T14:45:00.006-04:00

Because pictures of cats are always good to post

In the last entry (wow, that month went by too fast) I talked a bit about the alchemy of editing and the director/editor relationship, and got as far as the rough cut. This time around I'd like to talk a bit about how to get from the rough to the final cut.

The Dead Spots

As I mentioned before, I have a hard time going back to the big picture after a screening. I get caught up in the atomic structure of the film, especially the dead spots. I'm always afraid of boring the audience, or myself. My first instinct was to cut cut cut. Dan never lost his sense of the big picture. He warned me about cutting too much too soon, because we ran the risk of losing the moments that were buried in the middle of the dead spots.

He was correct. The first thing he did after the rough cut was to simply go through the film and trim out small bits from many of the shots. This meant cutting a few frames from the head and tail of a series of shots in a scene, to keep the tension from flagging. Sometimes it meant getting out of a scene a little sooner (again, just a few frames). Sometimes it meant starting a scene a little later, so that the actors were already warmed up or in the frame. These small changes can make big improvements, without requiring you to rethink the work as a whole.

Just by making these kinds of cuts, Dan trimmed about six minutes out of the film. The result was much, much tighter. During this time I made suggestions but mostly stayed out of Dan's way (at least, that's what I recall). I started working on putting rough F/X composites and titles together, and thinking about music.

When To Bring the Music In

On Caleb's Door, I started working with a temp score only towards the very end of the picture edit. Dan suggested bringing music much earlier into the process. This made a lot more sense, particularly given the somewhat extreme state of the character's realities, and the pacing of the chase/action scenes in the film. Also, as Dan said, a shot that seems overly long without music can sometimes seem fine with it.

Fortunately, we both found common musical ground. Dan's a big fan of Egyptian music, and I'd been thinking about a scoring around a particular instrument - the oud. The oud is a stringed instrument that produces a very bluesy sound, and in some musical forms plays a role similar to that of a guitar in rock music. So we started dropping in temp tracks from an Egyptian composer he's worked with, and I looked at a bunch of different sources, including artists like Stellamarra, Rabih Abou-Khalil, and others. The initial idea was to use a Middle Eastern theme to underscore the idea that that this film was taking place in an altered version of New York.

I should tell you now, DO NOT GET TOO ATTACHED TO YOUR TEMP SCORE. Chances are that unless your composer has specifically written it for you, that you're not going to be able to afford it. I've seen it happen more times than I care to recount. The record labels and publishers are only too happy to give you a great deal on a festival license, because they know that you'll be back once a deal is on the table. At that point they're counting on you being in a terrible bargaining position - you'll cave into the time pressure to deliver the film to a distributor (before you see any money) so you'll ransom your cats or your unborn grandkids to pay for the score, rather than lose both money AND time to on a sound remix.

How Often To Meet

On Found In Time Dan and I generally met a couple of times a week. My 'homework' in between meetings was to put together rough F/X composites and titles, and pick out temp tracks. Having things to do in between meetings helped keep me from getting too obsessed. During the actual sessions we'd drop in my temp material, look at cuts that Dan had made, and run the film through (usually from start to finish). We focused a lot on the first half-hour, since that was the most problematic part of the film.

We generally worked for three or four hours during the week, and then a longer session on the weekend. Working this way, we averaged about one cut of the film per week. With each cut we got closer to the target running time - about ninety minutes. We stopped and talked a lot during the process. Not just about the film, but about life, love and film. Far from distracting us, these chats strengthened our working relationship, and helped me get over my anxiety and deal with the film in smaller chunks.

The Feedback Screening

After about nine weeks, we had a feedback screening. It's an important part of the process, but the feedback should not be taken too literally. There are two important factors: inviting the right people, and taking the right attitude.

You want to invite people who will give you honest, direct feedback, and are willing to get specific. A mix of film and non-film people is good. A small group is better than a bigger one.

The right attitude to take is to be open to everything, to withhold your defensiveness and feedback until after everyone's gone. The best response to criticism is 'can you elaborate on that' or 'that's really interesting. What else?' No matter how ridiculous the suggestion or feedback, look at the person and try to take it seriously. You may know out of the gate that what they're asking for is impossible - you can't afford reshoots, you don't have the material, it would create too many problems in the third act. But what they're responding to is a real problem that may have a solution that IS within your reach. Plus, these people are spending their precious time with you, so do them the courtesy of being polite and encouraging.

What you're looking for are patterns. If one or two people have problems with something, then they may be more perceptive than everyone else, or they may have differing tastes than you. But if everyone has issues with the same scenes or characters, then you have an actual problem that needs to be addressed. Often good sound design and music can get people more involved in the story - watching a fine cut without corrected sound is a lot like looking at a really great sketch for a painting. Adjusting the pacing can solve a lot of problems.

What became apparent to me was that the first act was too slow. It took too long to get into the story, and Chris's problems were over-commented on. So this is where Dan and I concentrated our efforts over the next two weeks.

In the next blog entry, I'll talk about the transition from picture to sound editing, and how best to think about your score.

Working With Your Editor

2011-02-21T20:22:00.007-05:00

Probably one of the knottiest relationships you'll ever have is with your editor. Who did what? Who's idea was this cut? After a few cuts it's nearly impossible to tell. This is not a bad thing. It's like having a very close older sibling. He always knows what you're doing, where you've been, and what you're trying to hide.

I've edited (a little bit) for other people, and tried to edit my first film (with the predictable result that I had to hire an editor to get myself out of the hole I'd managed to dig). For Found In Time I didn't want to go through that again, and so began my journey with Dan Loewenthal.

Finding The Fit

I interviewed several editors, and all of them were quite good. I liked their reels, enjoyed their company (that's a biggie), and felt they all had good insights into the film. So what stood out? What was the deciding factor?

Well, there wasn't one single factor. But experience was part of it. Dan has edited features, docs, infomercials, music videos, shorts, television shows - pretty much everything. He's also worked in a lot of different genres, beginning with action and horror, but including drama, documentaries, comedies. I felt that Found In Time needed someone who had eclectic tastes and wouldn't be scared of challenging material (we often shot under very intense time pressures, resulting in less coverage).

Another factor, harder to define, was the sensibility. I prize working with people for whom the work comes before the ego. Don't get me wrong - a healthy ego is a very good thing. But it's also good to know when the story is right and your ego is wrong. That's a challenge for me (as I suspect it is for most writer/directors). My hope is that by working with people who are better at listening to the story rather than their idea of it, I'll rise to the occasion.

Trust

Trusting your editor is key. A lot of directors don't like to give up their precious moments, the ones that cost a lot of money or time or effort, even if they don't translate. Or you have a favorite line that just never came out right or didn't mean what you think it meant two years ago when you wrote it. The editor is in the room to lend a fresh perspective to your story. Let him or her do that.

Getting Ready For Editing

The best thing you can do is get organized. I've covered this in detail in the past (see (http://www.foundintimefilm.com/2010/11/art-of-slogging.html)), but here's a very brief overview: have the footage synched, logged, and labelled. Make sure the script supervisor notes, shooting script, camera and sound reports (if any of those were done on set) are in a binder, along with callsheets, production reports, and any inspirational/technical/writing notes you want to write up. Any wild sound, stills, miscellaneous/second unit footage, should also be included. Basically, your editor should be able to just edit, without wondering where the hell the footage is.

That First Cut

If you're the director and/or producer, the best thing you can do once the editor has all the material is go away for a few weeks. You're tired, you have no perspective on the footage, and you probably have obligations (your rent, family, friends, squeezes, pets, your next project) that you've been neglecting for far too long. Call or email if you must, but unless the editor wants you in the room, you're better off not being there.

After a few weeks (less if the editor was starting during the shoot), you'll have the most horrible experience related to the film (at least until you see it in a crappy theater with an out-of-focus projector and blown speakers), the rough cut screening. It's best NOT to have too many people in the room for this - no cast, crew or friends/family, the minimal number of producers, the editor, and the director. You'll see the difference between what you thought you shot and what you actually shot.

Here's how to survive and prosper in the rough cut screening:

Watch and take notes. Interrupt as little as possible.

Look for dead spots, where nothing is going on and there's no point in continuing the shot or scene.
What's completely out of place? It could be that a scene has to be excised or moved because it interrupts the narrative flow rather than helps it along; or that a performance that seemed fine on set doesn't work as well as you'd hoped.
What's surprising - in a good way? The footage can sometimes reveal something wonderful that you weren't expecting or didn't notice on set.

What's the obvious next move? Sometimes, the best way to tackle the second cut is to start with the easy stuff.

I find it almost impossible (most of the time) to work out the "big picture" after seeing a screening. I have to go back to looking at the film atomically, one shot after another. Dan is a lot better than I am at keeping the larger narrative structure in his head. I think this combination is also key - if you and your editor can compliment each other's sense of scope.

Moving Past The First Cut

In the next entry I'll talk about how we moved past the rough cut and went through the rest of picture editing.

2010: The Year In Movies

2011-02-02T14:23:00.004-05:00

I realize that it's nearly February 2011, and we should be looking forward. In fact, I'm working on another entry about the editing process. But in the meantime, I figured this would be my last chance to talk about movies I saw in 2010. Rather than do a "best of" article I figured I'd just talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly, and maybe even dig out some general themes.

(NOTE that I said MOVIES I SAW, not necessarily movies that CAME OUT in 2010. This gives me quite a bit of latitude. Hey, it's my blog.)

SHREDDING BODIES

It seems like 2009 was the year of the armored body. From Avatar to Surrogates to Terminator: Salvation to District 9, our heroes found themselves inside of various tougher, more agile bodies. By contrast, regular bodies began to look weaker, more fragile, like big bags of blood just waiting to be microwaved, ripped and riddled full of bullets. The year just past continues that trend: Repo Men Jude Law and Forest Whittaker hack, slash, and cut their way through flesh to repo the artificial organs that their clients have defaulted on payments for. In Daybreakers vampires are variously burnt, decapitated, exploded, and torn apart as they turn human. Centurion takes the sword-and-sandals genre to new heights of gore. Kick Ass features some very disturbing violence. And so on.

What is going on? I don't know, but I'll take a stab at it. Images of ourselves in media have always oscillated between all-powerful (see the cave paintings in Lescaux) to fragile (much of DaVinci's work). The current emphasis on the fragility of the body may reflect our own aging (at least in the U.S.), our anxiety over the fate of the species, and the feeling of helplessness many of us have in the face of political, economic and social disasters.

It's no coincidence that three of the movies I just cited are very political. In Repo Men, the dominant force is The Union, who are like an insurance company, hospital, bank, and drug co. rolled into one. Can't afford an organ transplant? No problem, just sign up for a payment plan - with 20 percent interest. Can't make the payments? Don't worry. One of our repo men will take it back. You might die in the process, but that's life, right? In Daybreakers (a really, really good film, by the way), vampires are the dominant species - except that in their greed, they've pretty much wiped out their food supply, and so are now tottering on the brink of starvation. Starve a vampire and he turns into a cannibal bat. Over-dependence on scarce resources coupled with short-term greed... sound familiar? Centurion (perhaps the oddest of the three) is set against the backdrop of a long, drawn-out war between the Picts and Romans in Britain, with backstabbing and extremism on both sides.

RESIST ADULTHOOD AT ALL COSTS

Many of the men I saw onscreen had opted out of growing up. Greenberg, Cyrus, Enter the Void, Due Date, Kick-Ass, Blue Valentine, Splice, Iron Man 2 feature men acting like petulant children or refusing to grow up. Even Inception and Shutter Island, it could be argued, are centered around adult men who are still, on some level, playing games rather than facing up to painful loss. I'm not sure what this means either. It's possible that Gen X men are finally growing up, or that we see that growing up doesn't mean the same thing it used to. It could be that maturity, as defined by our parents and grandparents, is a rather defeatist and ultimately fruitless way to look at life. Growing up often means giving up.

OVER-COOKED AND UNDERRATED

So here's a quick look at the most overrated and underrated films of the year (IMHO). This doesn't mean that the films were good or bad; in some cases, the overrated films were excellent. It's simply that they don't live up to their hype or aren't nearly as clever as they'd like to think they are.

OVERRATED

The King's Speech: I liked this film a LOT. I thought it was a humane, engaging portrait about someone who I normally could care less about (the royal family has problems? boo hoo). The performances were wonderful, the chemistry between Colin Firth, Helena Bonham Carter and Geoffrey Rush was great, and the struggle it represents is one we can all relate to. But in humanizing the King, it fails to politicize him. Apart from the obvious class differences between Rush and Firth (played for laughs, mostly), an opportunity to investigate the deeper complexities is left on the table.

Enter The Void: this is a case of brilliant technique married to a juvenile sensibility. Gaspard Noe is the kid in class who can draw amazing, life-like penises. The craft of the film is amazing - the overhead travelling shots, the mix of sophisticated effects and handheld camerawork, the removal of the subject from the screen altogether in the last third of the film. But it's empty of ideas, save for a rather junior and over-literal understanding of karma and reincarnation that, in turns, masks a very traditional, conservative mindset. It revels in its juvenile qualities - ooh, look, full-on sex! Drug use! Gore! A microscope-level view of a penis! It's also misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic, and, worst of all, boring. But the camerawork, editing, soundwork, and effects deserve some real study and appreciation - the mechanism of how the story is told is something that opens new doors.

Inception: This is a wonderful heist film, that just happens to take place in someone's head. It has a solid cast, some wonderful (and very organic) effects, it doesn't waste a second of time, and it builds the tension in a way that should be studied by filmmakers everywhere. But, it's not as complex as everyone's making it out to be. It's overly structured, with thin characterizations, and the dream world is in some ways exceptionally dull. Its conception of gender is rather old-fashioned (the dark heart of the main character is a woman). I really enjoyed this film and feel it deserves more attention at the Oscars than it will get, but in some ways it's a big-budget b-movie.

Shutter Island: I found this film gripping, and the performances, setting, and use of dream imagery really, really well done. But again, where is the ambiguity? Where is the breakdown of structure? In Goodfellas, Mean Streets, Kundun and even Bring Out the Dead, Scorcese made me care about distant, unsavory or otherwise normally unreachable characters. In Shutter Island, I failed to connect with DiCaprio's character, even after spending much of the film in his head.

Black Swan: As with Enter The Void, you have great technique married to a juvenile sensibility. If you want a meditation on the intersection between dance, identity, and madness, see the remastered The Red Shoes, which Swan cribs liberally from. If you want to see the disintegration of identity in the face of sexuality, see Fight Club. If you want to go beyond duality altogether, see Paprika. It was a fun film to watch, and had some great touches, a fantastic sound design, and featured a really good use of effects.

UNDERRATED

Daybreakers: A vampire film that manages to cram about three movies'-worth of ideas into a crisp, lean 90-minute ride. Good performances, some sly political commentary, and complex characterizations (no one in the film is completely good or bad). What's not to like?

Cyrus: I'm NOT a mumblecore fan. I applaud their DIY attitude, their willingness to experiment and just 'shoot their damn movie,' but I could never relate to the results of their efforts. But perhaps because of the cast, or the story, I rather liked Cyrus. It also has something to say about gender roles, and about men of all ages who are still negotiating the process of growing up.

Splice: A gene-splicing film that's really about the horrors of parenting, a monster movie where the monsters aren't the obvious ones, and a creepy movie where the creepiness is psychological rather than physical. An examination of gender roles, parental responsibility, and the commodification of the flesh are all on the table here, but not in any kind of boring, polemical way. It falls short in many ways (some of the characters are a little too stock) and it could have been longer, but it's definitely worth looking at.

Broken Embraces: At first glance, these film seems like a bit of a mess; part memoir, part mystery, part director-drag statement (the main character is a blind director). But on another level, it's about much more - the blind spots we all have in our hearts, the things we hide from each other, the small things we only notice later. The theme of watching, hiding, touch, and how what we don't see shapes our identity as much as what we do, make this a more interesting film on second viewing.

Kick-Ass: I'm not really sure why I like this film. Perhaps because it never does exactly what I expect it to do. I often found myself laughing and recoiling at the same time. It rather confronts us with superhero fantasy in a way that's refreshing, exciting, and somewhat revolting. And it features some winning performances and well-shot and well-edited action scenes.

It's a Wonderful Life: I saw this at its annual screening at the IFC Film Center, just a few days after seeing Enter the Void. Capra touches on many of the same themes - the imagined life, karma, the web of interconnection between people - but does so in a much more sophisticated and involving way. It doesn't flinch away from showing the cost of heroism, nor does it short-shrift the miracles that are possible in everyday life (something it shares with both Ikiru and The Bicycle Thief). It's a more adult, and less-square, work than it's generally thought of.

Old Films

In Understanding Comics, Scott Mcloud talks a lot about the process of making art. Often the 'new kid on the block' is just putting a new spin or glossy coat over deeper, older territories and structures that were explored by the previous 'masters.' I have to agree. Many of this past years' films were clearly built upon (and in good cases, expand) the territory mapped out by Hitchcock, Ozu, Kurosawa, Hawks, Capra, Carpenter, Sturges, Tarkovsky... the list goes on and on. If the old studio system had flaws (and it certainly did), it also had its virtues, and it established within a very short span of time most of the major genres, syntactic elements, and styles that we still work with today. So in 2011, go see some old films! Many can be streamed on Netflix, so now you have no excuse. :)

Musing on Filmmaking in 2011 And Beyond

2011-01-03T14:40:00.007-05:00

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE! In many ways, the first year of the 10s was a marked improvement on what I've earlier called the decade of the suck that preceded it. Really? How is that possible? The economic recovery everyone seems to be talking about is more of a mirage than a reality. My older friends - who would be happy to work - are being forced into early retirement. My younger friends are climbing deeper into debt to stay afloat. Friends my age are spending their hard-earned savings (if they have any) taking care of aging parents and grandparents, thanks to the hospitals, nursing homes, drug companies, and insurers whose sole mission seems to be to gouge the elderly and their families at every opportunity. The ripple effects of all this will be felt for the next twenty years, here and across the world.

There is hope, however. While the half-measures put in place by our government are just that, they're better than nothing. For every step backward, we seem to take 1.5 forward.

Similarly mixed news pervades the film industry. DVDs and box office revenues are not being replaced dollar-for-dollar with streaming/online (and probably won't be in the future). But the DSLR came into its own as a viable production camera this year. In fact, technologically we're at the point where you can pick up just about any piece of gear or software and create something worthwhile - provided you have good skills to begin with. The tools are our friends, not our obstacles.

On the other hand, I feel that 2010 will be seen as the beginning of the end for the studio system as we presently know it. Bad debt, an unsustainable business model, and top-heavy management are leading them all to the brink. This is not necessarily a bad thing. Taking the broad view, this is only the latest of a series of shakeups that have both threatened and energized the industry since its inception. Edison nearly choked the industry with his draconian demands for a piece of the pie (since he had the patent on most of the film equipment made up to that point). His attempt at monopolizing the industry backfired, with the best and brightest American producers relocating beyond his long arm - to Hollywood. Television and the breakup of the studio system in the 50s led to the "new" explosion of good filmmaking in the '60s and '70s.

The consolidation of the industry over the last twenty-odd years, and its takeover by companies not necessarily interested in media production at all, was responsible in part for the rise in independent filmmaking (since it's easier for them to buy a film than make it on an indie budget). But it's also led to the weakening of the labor guilds and unions, the near-disappearance of the "b-movie", and the development of an unfair business model - everyone's a freelancer, and profits rarely go back to the media creators. The pursuit of the "tentpole/high concept/four quadrant" Holy Grail has also meant the watering down or outright abandonment of intellectually stimulating films or filmmakers.

But that brings up an important question: will film as a medium survive the contraction of film as an industry? The short answer is yes. Consider it in light of other media:

Like jazz, film as a medium has adapted to new forms and paradigms, and embraced change as its modus operandi. Once films were only seen on really large screens; now they're seen on everything from IMAX theaters to iPhones. Filmmakers have incorporated sound, color, and new styles of editing, storytelling, acting, lighting; new technologies for production and post; new methods of distribution, promotion, advertising; new sources of funding, education, and training... this indicates a medium that's still growing and finding new ground to cover.

The upside of the low cost of production is that you don't have to go out and raise a fortune to make a movie. It's possible (though not easy) to make a film for not much more than it costs to put on a play or write a novel. You can take bigger creative risks. There's no guarantee that anyone will see your masterpiece, but then again, there's no guarantee anyone's going to read that novel on your hard drive either. If the profit margins for film fall in line with book and magazine publishing, the big economic powerhouses may sell off their film distribution companies or shut them down. They'll take their football and go find another industry to make them gobs of money. But the distributors that stay in the game will be doing so because they genuinely like making and promoting films.

Okay, so filmmaking will continue. And distribution will continue. But can we make any money at it? (Are we condemned to day jobs for the rest of our lives?) Will it become a fine art, essentially something done for its own sake? Will it become regionalized like theater (Broadway, off-Broadway, community, touring, etc.)? Or will it fold into television and webisodic forms - will a new medium emerge that combines film, tv and web formats? This last seems less likely in the short-term, given how the internet and television have staked out their domains. But written epics, poems, and bardic news/storytelling were once separate mediums. They have all contributed to the rise of the modern play and novel forms.

Perhaps in the future we'll have features that are short, webisodes that run long, episodic television that can be of varying/irregular lengths. Novels don't have a page-count limit; albums are no longer bound by LP limitations; fine art is contained by whatever canvas size the artist deems necessary. Removing some of the economic pressure and incentive for filmmakers may actually open up the medium for more interesting forms. If you can make it cheaply enough, and do it well, you can find an audience. Writers, fine artists, poets, playwrights, and sculptors are used to dealing with small audience numbers. These forms show no sign of dying out. Perhaps film is headed in the same direction.

Personally I find this both very hopeful and rather depressing. Hopeful because I feel that there are a lot of stories that deserve to be made into movies, and now maybe at least a few of them will get made. But one of the reasons I chose film over writing was because it seemed easier (relatively speaking) to make a living at it (no day job). The idea that I'm going to continue to have to work multiple jobs for the rest of my life so I can pursue my "work" is not a very heartening one. And what about the poor private equity investors and producers out there, the unsung heroes (and often close friends/family members) who've invested time/energy/money/love into these projects that will no longer have any hope of coming close to recouping? And do we really want to make $50K movies once every ten years for the rest of our lives? Is that a sustainable model?

I suppose what you're getting from this screed is that I have no idea what the hell is going to happen next in the world of film production and distribution. Well, you're right - I don't. But I'm hopeful. Which is more than I could say a year ago. So that's something, right?

What I Learned On My Summer Vacation

2010-12-09T09:04:00.006-05:00

... or, some details on what went right and what went wrong during production. This will necessarily be a short blog entry; in the future I'll go into more details on some of these points.

What Went Right

The Small Crew Size: I've worked with crews of 30 people, each of whom were getting paid very little money, and consequently tended to be less experienced. This necessitated adding more shooting days to the schedule. I decided to go the opposite route, hire more experienced people, pay them a little better, and have a smaller group overall and fewer shooting days. It should be noted that I did hire a number of interns, all whom did excellent work. But because we had experienced keys, I didn't need the same level of infrastructure to manage them.

The Five Day Week: I think that shooting a sixth day is basically a waste of time, unless it's absolutely necessary. Since most people are getting paid a day rate, and you're probably not paying full retail for gear and locations anyway, why put yourself through a sixth day of shooting when you can use that time to organize the following week, or maybe, I don't know, get some sleep?

Starting With the Hard Stuff: During our first week, we shot about 36 pages. Nearly our entire cast worked the first week. We shot a number of long scenes with some very tricky stuff going on (five people talking and moving around). We had very little control over the environment, and had some bouts of inclement weather (though it wasn't as bad as it could have been). But by the end of the first week, we had a tightly knit cast and crew, and shot an incredible 36 pages in only five days. Also, by putting the crew through their paces, I also got a sense of how they worked and what the pattern of the day would be.

Scheduling Actresses Later: Whenever possible, we tried to schedule scenes with actresses for later in the day, so that we wouldn't be waiting on hair/makeup and wardrobe. This put a little less pressure on Ghislaine and Janis, and let us get our first shot off a little faster.

Block Shooting Some Scenes: There were several points where we decided to shoot out an angle for all the scenes, then turn around, rather than cover a single scene at a time. This works best, obviously, when you only have a few angles you can shoot a given set of scenes from, or where there's supposed to be a visual similarity between scenes. This saved us a lot of time relighting and repositioning.

Staying In One Place The First Week: Our first week's work was in one location - the vendor street, which happened to be (in real life) the corner of Davidson and Burnside Ave in the Bronx. We had a wonderful holding space, the Davidson Community Center. Being able to stay in one place and get organized, while also shooting a lot of challenging material, was crucial.

Starting Prep Early: Everyone says that production is determined by preproduction, but it's very true. We started location scouting in April and May; locking down locations, vendors, and crew in June; casting in July and August; analyzing and breaking down the script in March and April... the truth is that if you don't have a lot of money, you HAVE to take the time to figure out the shoot before you get on set.

Switching Caterers a Lot: We switched our caterer several times during the course of the shoot, which worked well because it meant not getting bored with one cuisine or another.

WHAT WENT WRONG:

Trying to Bite Off More Than I Could Chew on the Stunt Days:
We went into overtime on both days that we had stunts, and ended up owing some footage on one of the days that we didn't make up until the last day of the shoot. When tallied together, the OT overages (on the crew, cast, and locations), combined with the additional day that I had to hire one of the cast for, nearly equaled another day of shooting. Lesson learned!

No Key PA: This was a painful position to eliminate during the budgeting process, but I couldn't figure out how to squeeze it in, especially as other costs started to rack up. The problem is that without someone a little more experienced to kind of run the other PAs, a good chunk of the job fell on me. That's not a bad thing - sometimes I think directors could use to be a little more in touch with everyone in the crew - it was sometimes very distracting.

This is not to take anything away from the PAs; they worked their butts off and took a lot of initiative.

Not Enough Good Vegan Options: I should have worked out better vegan options with each of the caterers. Some delivered good options, others didn't get it. The vegans in the cast and crew were very easy-going but they didn't have to be. Next time I'll get it right, guys!

That's it for now. I will try to post one more piece before the end of the year. If I don't, then have a great new year and a happy holiday season!

The Art of (S)logging

2010-11-08T13:50:00.011-05:00

I promise, there will be a blog entry - soon - on production. But I wanted to delve into more detail on something that's very important, and I think underreported: preparing your film for the editor.

In the previous entry I focused on the big post picture. Today I'm going to stick to the first three steps I outlined: transcoding, synching, and logging the footage. The goal is to get acquainted with the film you've shot (as opposed to the one in your head), save your editor unnecessary headaches (and you unnecessary time and money) hunting for footage, and get your brain thinking about sound, visual effects, titles, music, and other post elements.

Workflow: When To Do This

On a big enough film, your script supervisor would make the continuity book, the 2nd AC and the mixer would write reports, and your assistant editor would transcode, log, and synch, all while you're shooting. The advantages are fairly obvious: you'll find out about coverage or technical problems while you're shooting, and you'll get to a rough cut that much sooner. However, on micro-budget films, this is a comparative luxury.

On Found In Time, we had no script supervisor, the sound mixer was doing about three other jobs - though he did take very good notes - and we didn't have an editor in place during the shoot. I'm assuming that many of you are in a similar situation.

Transcoding

The Canon 5D records to an H.264 Quicktime-playable file. H.264 is a highly compressed format that somehow retains a lot of detail despite throwing out an enormous amount of picture information. Part of how it does this is by storing frame data in a long-GOP format. GOP = Group Of Pictures. Essentially, what the codec does is analyze a group of frames (in most cases, 6 or 15). It stores the first frame, then stores the DIFFERENCES ONLY between the first frame and all subsequent frames within the group.

There's a LOT more involved than this, but here's the main point: editing H.264 footage can be difficult. Your cuts are probably NOT going to be on the first frame in a group, which means the computer will have to analyze and rebuild frames every time you cut picture. The result can tax your system, leading to dropped playback frames and a lot of rendering time. It's also more difficult to do a final conform, render effects, etc. In other words, H.264 is a great origination and online distribution format, but you don't want to edit with it.

Transcoding the footage from the original H.264 files to an I-frame format (which compresses and stores each frame individually) is thus an easy decision. But there are several software programs to do the trick:

MPEG Streamclip is preferred by many, and with good reason: it's fast, user-friendly, free, and can batch-process clips very easily. But the quality of the resulting clips is not quite as good as we were hoping for. It also strips out the original timecode from the file, substituting its own.

Rarevision's 5DtoRGB on the other hand, is supposed to do the best overall job in terms of image quality, but lacks a batch feature (at this time; it's still under development). It also takes the longest to transcode.

We considered Compressor, but have had problems with batch transcodes in Compressor and haven't been super happy with the results. After going on Creative Cow and talking to a few folks, we decided on Canon's own Final Cut Pro plug-in, the EOS Plugin-E1. It produces decent results, processes batches of clips at a time without any hiccups, didn't take too long, and retained the original clip timecode.

The next decision: what to transcode TO. The obvious choice for editing in Final Cut was Apple ProRes, but ProRes comes in several flavors, ranging from Proxy (small file size/lower quality) to HQ (huge file size, better quality). After thinking about it, trolling the forums, and consulting with some experts, we decided on ProRes LT, which is somewhere between the two ends of the spectrum. The data rate is approximately 100Mpbs, roughly the same as DVCProHD, and nearly 3x the 5D files' 40Mbps. This means in practical terms that we were getting something very, very good - that we could put together into rough cut shape if we needed more investors or to assembly a festival screener out of - but we wouldn't kill our hard drive.

The long term plan, once the film has been picture-locked, is to note the selects (the clips that make it into the locked picture), and re-transcode the camera originals to QuickTime HQ using the 5DtoRGB utility.

Setting Up Final Cut For Transcoding

At this point, we set up a new Final Cut project with a sequence default of 1920x1080 23.976p, with 48KHz 16-bit stereo sound. During the shoot the DP created folders by day, running to lettered bins if he had to copy more than one card per day (so we have Day1, Day1b, Day2, etc. folders on the hard drive). We started out by creating camera reel bins to mirror the originals. Within each bin, I created three sub-bins: Scraps (for NG or goofing-off material), Video (for source video clips), and Audio (for source audio clips).

We also created a database in FileMaker (which is cross-platform, by the way), to capture information on each clip. Initially, we just dumped a directory listing of all the clips into a text file then imported that into FileMaker, so we'd have a list of the 840 video clips and 735 sound files (we had a good number of MOS takes).

During the transcoding process itself, we renamed each clip to "sceneshot-take" format, then also filled in the scene, shot/take, reel (camera reel), angle, and loggingNotes fields. We went in shoot (as opposed to scene order), and limited the batches to one-or-two scenes worth of material depending on the number of individual clips. The entire process took about four days, and was highly automated. A good tutorial on it is on Canon's own site. TWO THINGS TO NOTE:: when you name the clip (scene-shot-take), the utility actually renames the transcoded Quicktime file. So if you ever want to go back to your camera masters for retranscoding, make sure to keep a list of the original filename and the new one.

Also, the utility REQUIRES that all the clips be inside of a folder called DCIM off the root of the hard drive. That's because the plug-in is expecting to be reading from an SD card (which uses DCIM as the main folder to put all saved video and still files in). Note that you CAN nest folders inside of the DCIM folder.

Once each batch was done, I moved the transcoded clips into matching day folders on the edit drive. This way instead of having over 800 clips in one folder to sift through, I would only have to look through a few dozen at a time.

Synchronizing

This was probably the most boring part. Anthony, our sound mixer, had wisely named nearly every sound file in the scene-shot-take format. So figuring out which sound take went with which video file was relatively trivial.

This is where Pluraleyes, from Singular Software, saved my butt. It's a standalone program which works with Final Cut sequences and synchs video-to-video (in the case of multi-camera shoots) and video-to-audio footage. It creates a new sequence for each synched clip. So instead of going clip-by-clip, I was able to drag a dozen or so clips at a time to a sequence in my Final Cut file, line them up very roughly to their matching audio sequences, and click "Sync" in Pluraleyes. A few minutes later I had a dozen sequences with synched sound. Since we used a slate and had the original camera audio as a reference, Pluraleyes rarely had difficulty finding the right sync point. (BTW: the software is free to try for 30 days).

NOW, there was one surprise. For whatever reason, the audio in the original camera file was exactly one or two frames AHEAD from the video - you could tell because the slate was ahead. However, there was no drift. So I had to manually check the sync on each new sequence and adjust by one/two frames - but again, because we had the slates, this was a no-brainer. Other people on Creative Cow have complained of the same problem. There doesn't seem to be a clear-cut solution, nor does it seem to be universal.

After moving the sound one/two frames, I muted the original camera audio, clipped the trailing and leading audio so the sequence would start on the first frame of video, and changed the sequence timecode to match the video timecode (so instead of starting at 01:00:00:00 the TC would start at 18:31:15:00, for example).

Last (but not least), we took the synched clips, along with the source video and audio files, and the scrap clips, and put them into scene bins. The scene bins ultimately replaced the day bins we had established, and had the same structure (Audio, Video, and Scrap sub-bins). Synched sequences went into a new sub-bin called Sync.

This process was also fairly mechanical, and took about two weeks (working part time).

Logging

Now I was ready to log the footage. This consisted of two parts: makes notes about each clip in my database, and lining the script. Lining the script is a BIG topic, and I'm no script supervisor, but the gist of it is that you want to visually indicate where each individual camera setup begins and ends within each scene, what lines and blocking have changed from script to shoot, what scenes have been omitted or added, and what gaps in coverage you might have. As you can imagine, this is a fairly time-consuming process.

In my database I had the following information already:
* individual clip name
* the scene, shot and take number
* the timing (media start, end, and duration)
* The angle (Master, CU John, OTS Jane on Jack, ECU pill bottle, etc.)
* Logging Note
* The original (camera source) filename
* The sound take file name

Most of this information I was able to get by exporting a file list from Final Cut, importing it into the database, then going through it quickly to make sure I didn't miss anything.

To this laundry list of information I added:
* the first frame of action (usually after the DP calls "frame" or set but before you've called "action")
* A description of the shot
* Some kind of evaluation of the shot
* A list of visual problems in the shot (boom dips in at 23:04:10)
* Sound problems

On Found in Time, we shot 840 individual clips. Of these, about 75 or so were complete mistakes, goofing around shots, slates for MOS series, and otherwise unusable bits. These didn't take long to log.

I later figured out that I was able to log between 10 and 20 clips per hour, depending on how complex each clip was. I managed to log everything in just over two weeks.

Why Do This To Yourself

You can get interns to transcode and synch, and maybe even do some of the logging, so why do this yourself? In my case, it was a way of getting familiar with the film that we shot (as opposed to the one in my head). This way, I don't have to waste time having this discussion with the editor: "don't we have a shot of..." No, we don't.

It also got me thinking about how to solve certain coverage problems, what effects shots I will need, and what kind of sound design/music choices would work. The big thing is that the editor didn't have to do this work - he was able to just look at the footage and start cutting. That is a huge time and money saver on any shoot.

Okay, so this post has probably been about as fascinating as watching paint dry. I promise, more fun posts to come!

Post Production Workflow

2010-10-10T11:10:00.025-04:00

The shoot is over. I'm still figuring out all the things I learned, and at some point I'll integrate it and write a short blog entry on the topic. But at the moment my energy is going towards getting ready for the next step: cutting the film. What follows is a synopsis of the post workflow for Found In Time It's based on things I've learned while making this film, my experience as post supervisor on previous features, and a lot of consultation with other folks. Many thanks to Josh Apter, head of Manhattan Edit Workshop, Creative Cow Magazine, and as always Ben Wolf.

Don't Just Start Cutting
The temptation is probably just to dig in and start cutting scenes together, using the camera master footage. This is almost always a mistake. First off, if you're the director, you have no perspective on the footage. I know I don't. Secondly, you need to organize both the "physical" files on the drive, giving them a proper reel name and folder to live in; and the names of the clips in your NLE. Thirdly, you need to set up a schedule - what you want, when you want it, and what the end goal is. Hopefully you've done this before you shot anything, and now you're just revising it to match your remaining money/schedule/expectations. But if not, now's a good time to set it up.

The Schedule
Take a BIG step back. Forget about the footage burning a hole on your hard drive. Think carefully: when can I realistically finish this film? What are the steps I need to take to get there? Who's going to do those steps?
At this point, post breaks down into nine BIG steps, that generally (though not always) follow the order below:

1. Backup, Transcoding, Logging. In an ideal world, this is happening on a daily basis. Every night the Assistant Editor takes the day's work (either on cards or drives), backs it up to another drive, then transcodes the footage to the editing format, usually while also logging it into the NLE.

2. Picture Cutting. The film is put together, reel by reel, by the editor.

3. Reshoots/Inserts/Additional Photography. You need it, you didn't get it. Now go get it.

4. F/X and Titles. As the film nears completion, visual effects artists go to work on the more complex material. In an ideal world, sequences are finalized in time for the online. In many cases, the online has to be pushed back until after the sound mix is done, to give the effects artists more time. Titles are usually done at this point (end credit crawls are often finalized only at the final output phase).

5. Online. The film selects (from the final cut) are retranscoded at the highest possible resolution/setting. The footage is color corrected, basic transitions (dissolves, fades) and effects work (taking out booms, minor tweaks, etc.) are done. F/X and titles are married to the locked picture.

6. Sound Editing. The dialog levels are evened out, and the "sound world" of the film created - effects, foley, music, voice-over, are inserted and brought together.

7. Music. The composer scores the final cut of the film (sometimes this happens during the editing process). Existing music is licensed (don't do this at home, kids! You don't have the budget. Trust me.). The music is premixed (ideally).

8. Mix. The various sound elements (dialog, effects, foley, music, ambiance) are brought together and leveled, to conform to both artistic and broadcast standards. The mixer creates final "bounce files."

9. Final Output. The conformed film is married to the bounce tracks, and the whole thing (all the reels) are output to the "final" master medium (tape or film).

So with this outline in hand, you have to figure out: who's going to be doing what (personnel)? With what tools (gear)? For how long (timeframe)? And what are the things each step requires (inputs) and what are the results (outputs)?

After doing some research, and thinking about what's worked best on previous low-budget films, I came up with the following chart [NOTE: I know Blogger doesn't want to format this correctly. I'm working on it]:

Num.	Step	Inputs	Personnel	Gear	Outputs
1	Transcoding Organizing bins Logging clips with scene/shot/take/other info	H.264 Clips on drive Sound WAV files on drive	Myself	Final Cut Canon5D FCP Plugin	Final Cut Project File w/bins Named ProRes LT clips in folders on drive Logging notes of some kind (database, spreadsheet, something)
2	Syncing	ProRes LT clips Audio files Final Cut Project	Me	Final Cut PluralEyes	Final Cut Project File w/bins
3	Script Notes	Final Cut Project Script	Me	Final Cut Pro	Lined script books with notes Binder with notes, sound reports, production reports, etc.
4	Picture Edit	Final Cut Project Binder Hard Drive	Editor	Final Cut Pro	Sequences in reels
5	Feedback Screenings	Rough or 2nd Cut on DVD	Editor, Me, Trusted friends	DVD projector	Notes for next cut
6	Reshoots/Inserts	Wish list of shots	Skeleton crew and cast	Basic camera/sound unit Props, set dressing	Video/audio footage
7	F/X and Titles	Final Cut Project F/X footage (shot on location) Add'l computer-generated footage	Ben Wolf Me Visual F/X Artist Editor (possibly)	Final Cut Pro Photoshop Motion After Effects(?)	Locked VFX sequences and titles
8	Transcode for Online	FCP sequences (reels) Camera master files	Me	Final Cut Pro 5DtoRGB tool	ProRes HQ (422) or ProRes 444 versions of selects only (clips that made the final cut) Notes
9	Conform	ProRes HQ clips Offline Final Cut Pro sequences (reels) VFX and title sequences	Me	Final Cut Pro	Final Cut Pro sequences, linked to ProRes HQ clips
10	Color Correction/Basic Compositing	Final Cut Pro sequences (reels) Notes	Colorist Ben (DP) Myself	Final Cut Pro Color Motion After Effects	Color corrected reels with all titles and effects in place
11	Prep for Sound Edit	Audio files Final Cut Reels (preferably color corrected, but at least the final conforms	Me	Final Cut Pro	Quicktimes for each reel per the sound designer/composer specs Sound tracks grouped per spec OMF files per reel Sound Design Notes in binder
12	Sound Design	OMF files, etc. as above	Sound Designer Foley Artist? Dialog Editor?	ProTools or other sound software Final Cut Pro	Stereo LTRT session files Possibly 5.1 session files
13	Music	Quicktimes and sound notes	Composer	Instruments Music mixing software	Soundtrack, broken into reels, premixed
14	Mix	Session files Quicktimes Soundtrack files (if not already part of session files)	Sound Designer Mixer(?)	ProTools Mixing hardware	Bounce tracks
15	Final Output	Blank HDCAM and Digibeta stock Final Cut reels Bounce tracks	Me Post House Editor Mixer?	Online suite	Projection master SD tape master DVD master (Quicktimes)

Some specifics:
1. We picked ProRes LT because it offers the best compromise between file size and quality. H.264 can be difficult to edit with natively - it's a long-GOP format, which means that Final Cut has to do a lot of math to reconstruct the frames at your edit points. This can cause machines to chug and drop frames during playback, which is not good. The whole long-GOP vs. i-frame discussion is beyond the scope of this article; but I'll dig up some good resources for you or talk about it more in-depth at some point.

ProRes LT is an i-frame format (individual frames are stored instead of groups of frames), but the file size is manageable.

2. Pluraleyes is a stand-alone program that can take clips in a Final Cut Pro sequence and line them up. Assuming you have camera audio, Pluraleyes can line up your separate-source audio files with your video (with camera sound) files.

3. I'm glossing over a lot of the sound post process (which could have its own diagram); I'll save that for another blog entry.

So now you've got a basic idea of what we'll be doing over the next few months. Future blogs will focus on the individual steps, with more specifics and how-tos. I'd go into more detail but this entry is getting pretty long as it is. Until next time then!

The Film Is On The Hard Drive!

2010-09-30T02:23:00.006-04:00

After thirteen wonderful, challenging, action-packed days, Found In Time now sits on several hard drives. I've spent the past week dealing with equipment returns, catching up on expense receipts, and following up on the inevitable hangnails (missing batteries, damaged props, etc.)

It's hard to describe how I feel. Witnessing the cast and crew work incredibly hard to put the world of the story together, listening to the actors creating depth and texture, feeling part of a big electric circuit... it's an exhilarating experience, and one very good reason to go into production. The long hours, erratic sleep, physical hardship, mishaps, upset, and chaos are just checkpoints along the way.

By the end of the coming week, the production will be wrapped - all the paperwork filed away, receipts counted, everyone paid - and post will officially begin with the logging and organizing of the footage. By then, I'll have more perspective and a cooler head, and I'll be able to talk more about the production experience, including lessons learned for next time.

Simeon Moore, our gaffer, has posted some wonderful production stills on the Found In Time Fan Page. We'll be posting some behind-the-scenes clips at some point in the future as well. Stay tuned.

Casting, Props, Fun!

2010-08-24T09:55:00.008-04:00

This has been a hectic month+. We've been casting, building props, and locking down our locations - getting ready for the BIG DAY: September 10th! So this blog entry will be brief.

Firstly, we have our cast:
MacLeod Andrews | Chris
Mina Vesper Gokal | Ayana
Derek Morgan | RJ
Kelly Sullivan | Jina
Eric Martin Brown | Anthony
Mollie O'Mara | Jess
Curt Bouril | Morton
Stephen Bradbury | Ananasi
Glenn Thomas Cruz | Mark
Stuart Rudin | Isaac
Mary Monahan | Nadine
Avery Pearson | Matthew
Allison F. Phillips | Joan
Justin Myrick | Nicholas
Jaden Michael | Billy
Tony Wolf | Randall
Adam Feingold | Carl

We couldn't ask for a more talented group of people to be working with.

PROPS AND WARDROBE:
Just a quick selection of props and design elements:
This is the spinner that Ayana (one of the main characters) uses to weave her special braids.

This is a logo we made for the Psychcops, the special unit of the police force that keeps track of vendors.

That's it for now. Hopefully we will be able to get one more blog entry out there before we start shooting.

A Good Preproduction Checklist

2010-07-04T11:09:00.005-04:00

I realize I haven't been blogging very much lately. The truth is that the actual work of putting the film together swallowed me up for a bit, which left precious little time left over for reflecting and writing on what I was doing.

June was a very busy month. A few of the things on the to-do list:

Two Location Scouts

Filing the Tax Incentive applications with the City and State of NY

Filing the Screen Actors' Guild paperwork

Doing a new breakdown and schedule for the film

Calling locations and soundstages

Bidding on insurance

Prop shopping

Hiring the casting director and preparing for casting

Further script analysis

Setting up company credit cards, and the Quickbooks/filing system for the film

I've also been trying to study other low-budget fantasy films such as the recent Ink, The Science of Sleep, Cold Souls and Gabbeh (if you haven't seen these, I recommend them all highly). Gabbeh, in particular, fascinates me. Without any kind of special effects, it manages to utterly convince you of the authenticity of the magical world it creates.

Anyway, one of the overriding lessons of June is the importance of being organized. There are many preproduction checklists out there. But most assume a very idealized schedule and that you'll have a team of people working for you. Here I'm trying to condense it into a list that's manageable and more realistic for the folks who are producing films literally on their own or with one or two other people. As such it's organized more or less in priority order (of course, film preproduction is nonlinear and fluid).

CORPORATE STUFF:
Anything that involves should be taken care of as soon as you have a date set. This includes creating your production company, putting the legal paperwork together for your investors and partners, setting up your bank account and credit cards, getting a resale certificate, etc. This is time-consuming stuff and involves government entities, which move on a slow timetable. So don't put it off.

SCRIPT ANALYSIS:
You can never do too much of this. As a crew member, I used to hate it when the director seemed like the least prepared person on set. There's a difference between being "fresh" (not getting sick of the material before walking on set) and being unprepared. Properly analyzing your script will never make you sick of the material, only lead you to a deeper understanding of the story you're trying to tell. It will also give you the materials you'll need to help you communicate with the cast and crew.

In my mind, script analysis includes the following:

Preparing a character breakdown for the casting director

Taking general notes

Looking at the script from the characters'/actors' POV (see Judith Weston's books on this)

Storyboarding

Shotlisting

Preparing a "vision statement" that uses other films, stills, artworks, music... anything that someone can grab and watch/listen to/read to get a sense of what you want to accomplish

Figuring out what sides you want to use for auditions

Rewriting the script based on the above

This should be happening throughout the preproduction process. It becomes harder to do as preproduction goes on, since it demands stretches of uninterrupted time. So start this as soon as you have a draft that you think could be shot. I also recommend "saving" everyone (including yourself) huge headaches by refraining from publishing new drafts until you've "ganged up" a few significant changes. Publishing new pages every couple of days is not going to endear you to anyone. On a really low budget film, you are GUARANTEED to get out of sync (with actors, crew, director and producer all showing up on set with different drafts).

PRODUCTION ANALYSIS:
This broad category includes breaking down the script, scheduling it, and budgeting it. This should start as soon as you have a workable draft and will (for better or worse) be an ongoing process. You should try to generate a budget, a location breakdown, and a cast list as soon as possible. I've written about this before, so I won't go into too many details here.

LOCATIONS:
Try to nail your locations, or at least start exploring possibilities, as soon as possible. I've written extensively on location scouting considerations, so I won't go into it here. I want to add two things: be prepared to bribe people to turn off their radios, park somewhere else, etc. And have a backup plan. You don't want to lose a day of shooting if a location gets scotched.

Use the best aspects of a location - even if it means bending the story a little bit. I once worked on a film where we had to find a country house for a corporate law firm partner. We found a beautiful, "rich-looking" house with two giant floor-to-ceiling, two story windows. But the scene was set at night, and we were shooting during the day. The DP and director wouldn't budge, so we gelled the windows (which took forever), and shot away from them - blocking everything in front of an interesting but rather "non-opulent" wall. The issue of wealth (important to the characters and the film as a whole) was lost.

CASTING:
You should start thinking about this as soon as the script is done. Do you know a "name" actor (and I mean know in the sense of actually having met, talked, worked with, and NOT in the sense of having lots of posters of him/her in your room or that you've stalked them or followed them on "E")? Do you know good "non-name" actors? Do you know a casting director?

The casting process is in many ways the hinge that the rest of the film swings on. If you cast well then many of your headaches will disappear on set (to be replaced by others, of course). Cast badly and you'll be wasting a lot of money and time. Note that casting well doesn't necessarily mean casting a name, or even someone with a lot of experience. But:

Do they bring the role to life?

Do they think of things you haven't thought of?

Are they committed to the sometimes arduous nature of the process (they refuse to coast on indication and cliche)

Do they have chemistry with each other?

Will they show up on time?

Do they understand the hours and time commitment, or will you have to compete with their day jobs or significant others?

These last two sound funny, but they're not. I've worked (as a production manager) with musicians cast as actors. They tend to be very good, but many don't understand the concept of a seven-AM call time.

I've also worked with actors who told me on the day that they had to get to their catering jobs two hours before we were scheduled to wrap. My sympathy is limited - I've passed up day job money, sleep, sex, a few friendships, and a vacation or two to stay in this business. If you can't walk the walk, don't talk the talk.

On the other hand, if you're working with an actor who's got another ACTING commitment, then you have to respect that commitment and work around it. If you can't, don't cast that person, or wait until their commitment is over before you shoot.

Also, if your dates aren't solid (they won't slip by more than a few days), you can't expect any actor, no matter their level of experience, to wait around for you.

CREWING UP:
Crewing up is both difficult and easy at the same time. It isn't hard to find people who want to crew on films. The problem is finding people who are willing (see above) to stick with it during some tough times, and/or are also willing to take a pay cut to work on an indie film. Also, since everyone is a freelancer, you can't ask someone in May what they're schedule is going to be like in December. Unless the paycheck you're offering is awesome AND your dates are solid, you're going to have to settle for a "if nothing else comes up" commitment.

So start looking at reels and interviewing people, by all means, but don't count on hiring people for sure until a couple of months before the shoot starts.

PROPS, SET DRESSING, COSTUMES:
I like to create shopping lists of the props, set dressing, costumes, wigs, etc. that I'll need to obtain for the shoot. In creating this list, I focus on the following:

What's already at the location that I can use for free/cheap?

What do I own?

What can I borrow for free?

What can I rent for cheap?

What can I "buy and return?"

What do I have to fabricate or purchase?

This leads to a lot of dumpster-diving, making phone calls to friends, closet-raiding, and other activities. The good news is that you don't have to do all this work at once. The bad news is that, like everything else on this list, you should start it as early as possible.

One thing I would caution against is assuming that actors can bring their own wardrobe. Depending on their financial situation, day jobs, and/or taste, you may not be able to find a three-piece suit or formal evening gown in their closets that you can use. And if you do, keep in mind that it's your responsibility to make sure they show up with it on the day, that it's cleaned regularly, and that a second rented/purchased, if possible. Actors sweat a LOT - the lights are hot, the AC has to be off for sound, and the work itself is nerve-wracking and physical - so make sure they can get into a clean version of their clothes the next day.

Similarly, locations are seldom perfect and may change between the scout and the shoot. You may have to live with the location as is (not always the worst thing in the world), or spend some time before the shoot crew arrives rearranging things. The key on a low budget is to be flexible.

There's more to come, but I've got to get back to work here. Casting begins in a couple of weeks. I'll let you know how that goes!

Scouting For Fun And Profit

2010-06-05T11:10:00.014-04:00

So over the past few weekends, my director of photography Ben Wolf and I have been hitting the pavement. Starting in Astoria, jumping down to LIC and Greenpoint, and finally hitting some major paydirt in the Bronx, we've been taking in the sights and sounds of NYC.

We're looking for a side of New York that isn't often seen. Our everyday experience of New York, especially of Manhattan, is of a very close horizon with tall buildings and not much in the way of sky. This first image, shot in Astoria, is of the Hellgate Bridge. The vines growing up the supports help beautify the bridge, and the slight incline allows for a dramatic view. There's also a good contrast between the enormity of the bridge and the small (two-to-three story) houses next and under it.

The next couple of pictures, also taken in Astoria, show some nice diversity as well. The parking lot/alley, while generic in some respects, is broken up by the trees poking through the fence. And the park (Astoria Park) has several meandering paths and a nice incline. This allows for some good foreground/background blocking, creating depth in the frame.

The Bronx

The Bronx offers a "hilly" landscape, featuring a mix of residential and commercial buildings, lots of sky (a good lighting source, as well as a nice break from skyscrapers), and constant activity. The incline allows for some blocking opportunities that can create depth in the frame. The wide sidewalks are a big boon, since they will allow us to do profile shots without having to walk in the street. Many of the scenes take place on a "street vendor" corner, which means we need room for the camera, passersby, vendors with folding tables, and customers.

I'm also looking for a few other things in a good location:

Access to holding: Industrial landscapes and abandoned buildings are beautiful, except when you have to go to the bathroom or eat lunch, change wardrobe, or go somewhere to be quiet. I usually try to make a deal with the nearest church/synagogue/temple/mosque, community center, or hotel/motel.

Power: This is mostly for interiors. Gaffers usually love bringing along a generator and distribution, but on a low budget, it's impractical. Tie-ins or "plug-and-pray" are your better bet. Look out for tie-in-proof boxes (where they've sealed the distribution box cover so you can't get at the leads), old wiring, or 10 amp circuits (I still see some of these in old apartments).

Noise: The only downside of the part of the Bronx we saw was that we were only two or three blocks away from the elevated 4 train, and there was a tremendous amount of car and pedestrian traffic. We were there on Saturday, however; I'm going back during the week at some point to see how bad it is. The subway is on a somewhat predictable schedule and may be far enough away. Or we will have to decide to use it as part of the mix.

There's a lot of construction in Astoria, though not as much directly under the bridge. The Hellgate only sees the occasional freight or Amtrak train.

Goods: How far away are you from the nearest hardware store, supermarket, office supply place, and copy center. The last one is especially important at the end of the day when it's time to distribute callsheets.

Emergency: I worked on a film last year up in the Catskills that only had a part-time medical center in the nearest town. The closest full-on hospital was a good 30-to-45 minute drive. This was a little scary. On the other hand, the State Trooper barracks wasn't far away, and the volunteer fire department was fairly close by. The nearest snowplow and towing services were down the road.

If you're in the city, you can sometimes walk or drive faster to the nearest emergency ward than if you wait for the ambulance. So at least learn where the nearest fire/police/hospitals are.

Breakfast and Lunch: I usually try to find a variety of diners, restaurants, delis, etc. nearby so I can either send everyone away for walk-aways, or make deals for catering. It's almost always better to contract a local business for catering (they won't get lost, for one thing), but it's important that they understand the differences between Kosher/Halal, vegetarian and vegan cuisine. Astoria has a ton of restaurants. We spotted a number of good choices in East Burnside (the Bronx).

Public Transportation: Astoria is dependent on the N train and a couple of buses, while you have more options in Burnside.

Parking: No matter how hard you try, you'll end up with more vehicles than you'd like. If you have a shooting permit that gives you street parking (as opposed to "parking as available") AND you've coned out your parking the night before, you CAN technically ask for a tow service. But do you really want to piss off your temporary neighbors? Sometimes its better politics to find a cheap nearby garage.

Time To Location: A long commute will either be on the clock, or at least impact the turnaround, resulting in a "creeping call." It will also eat up gas and toll money (all non-production-value-enhancing costs). So shoot locally whenever possible.

Well, that's it for now - more scouting to do. Now that the rewrite of the script is done (finally), I have to break it down for the next draft of the schedule, and start thinking about interiors, props, and wardrobe concerns.

Being Smart About Money

2010-05-12T13:46:00.007-04:00

I've seen this happen. Genius starts a business. He's got a great product (or film), a lot of goodwill and interest from people, and a loyal team.

What's the first thing he does? Gets himself in hock buying or renting a LOT of stuff. Spending money (either his or his investors) on "publicity parties," glossy packages, and a really really impressive desk. He rents an office space.

Everything's going great, until the bottom falls out of the market, or Genius B comes out with the same product only cheaper, or your investor decides to shut the faucet off. Then Genius is left with a set of awful choices: close up shop, plow whatever's left into finishing the film/product, change horses and make something else, lay everyone off and try to go it alone, ask everyone to take pay cuts, and so on...

In the BEST-CASE scenario, the movie gets made, the software comes on the market, the appliance ships. It does reasonably well and the company skates by, but Genius has now burned pretty much everyone around him (usually including his spouse/significant other), is in personal debt up to his eyeballs, and may have to close up and go back to work for someone else for a few years before getting another chance at-bat.

I witnessed this behavior first as a computer consultant, then as a line producer. At this point I've been around long enough to watch small businesses in just about every sector fail. In trying to keep my own business afloat, I've had to learn (sometimes the really, really hard way) how to be smart about my (and my investors') money. This is a WAY-TOO-SHORT list of things to think about in this regard.

Limit Your Overhead
This should be obvious, but for some reason it's not. To start making a film you need (a) a cellphone, (b) a computer, (c) a printer, (d) your brains. [obviously you need more than that as time goes on] If you need to get away from the house because it's too distracting, find a cafe/bar/library/someplace, preferably free. Or make or buy a cheap desk and stick it in a corner of your room. Likewise, hiring people before you're ready to use them, buying lots of gadgets (more on that below), throwing launch parties, buying expensive desks... not good uses of money.

Get Good Tools
This seems to contradict to what I just said, but not really. You will need a smartphone, a computer, a printer, and probably some piece of furniture to put them on. Fortunately, good tools aren't always expensive. Almost any machine you buy from HP, Apple, or Dell will give you decent horsepower and all come with good warranty options. You'll need a laser printer (but not an expensive one) if you want to print bulk copies of scripts and business plans (it'll be cheaper than Staples or an inkjet). Most cellular plans come with decent promos for smartphones. A desk can be put together for about $50-60 in lumber or a trip to Ikea, or by salvaging a door and some filing cabinets (one of my favorite methods). A decent office chair (or better, a stool) can be gotten from Staples or Quill for cheap.

The price of buying bad tools that break or underperform is high - lost productivity due to tech support calls, cash spent on replacing items that are just out of warranty. Investors also take stock of your tools when you meet them (just as they do your clothes and hair). Appearing somewhat thrifty is good; appearing too cheap suggests that you don't have a good gauge on when to spend money.

Renting Gadgets vs. Buying Them
If you're a DP, a sound mixer, an editor or compositor, then your livelihood depends on having good tools (see above) and being able to use them when you want/need to. Purchasing a camera, lights, an editing system and/or DDR may make sense. But if you're a producer, buying gadgets usually doesn't make sense, and here's why:

* Unless your business model includes working for hire and bringing the gear along (for a fee), or renting the camera out to other people, then your gadget will never make back its cost. When I bought a Mac to edit my first film with, I also used it as my main computer for four years; between web programming gigs, line producing and the occasional editing spot, I'm sure I was able to pay back the cost of the machine. Can you say the same thing?

* If you rent something and it breaks down, you call the rental house and they replace it - on their dime. If you buy something and it breaks down, it's your responsibility to fix it. As a computer geek, buying a computer (vs. leasing) made sense because I could fix most problems myself. But if you're on set and your camera dies, you'd better have a backup unit or a good relationship with a rental house.

* Are you looking at the real cost of ownership, or just the basic model price? If you're buying a camera, did you include the tripod, carrying case, cables, spare batteries, and additional cards?

* Today's gadget is tomorrow's doorstop. Make sure you aren't buying something that's going to be outdated in a year when the next model comes along - then you won't even be able to rent it out as frequently.

It's often more cost-effective in the long run to rent gear when you need it. An important exception to this is documentaries, where you may have to pick up and go on a moment's notice, or if you're shooting somewhere way far away from a rental house for months on end (then you might as well buy, and just take really good care of your gear).

Take The Cost of Living Into Account
The cost of living - due to real or artificial inflation - goes up roughly 3% or more per year. It's hard to measure exactly, because some goods stay the same in price while others rise.

But most people don't take this into account. If you have a savings account that's earning below the cost of living increase, you're essentially losing money every year (less than if you put the money under your mattress, but still). Likewise if you go without a raise for a couple of years at your day job, you're effectively taking a pay cut. This is also why you can't use a budget from a film made more than a few years ago as the basis for your own (which you shouldn't be doing anyway). El Mariachi and Blair Witch would still cost more if made today, even if NOTHING in the way they were filmed changed.

Credit Card Debt Vs. Savings
Most of the time, saving is better than spending. HOWEVER, there are exceptions. Right now, CDs are offering less interest than the rate of inflation (see above). Credit card interest, on the other hand, has not come down as much, and credit card companies are constantly finding new ways to stick it to us - late fees, interest rate jumps, new ways of calculating interest, membership fees, "rewards program" or "fraud protection" fees, etc...

If you're putting money into a savings account (or IRA or 401K) but are also carrying credit card debt, STOP saving and pay down your debt first. Start with the highest-interest cards first, and "snowball" your payments (as you pay one card off, apply the payment to the next card).

Don't pay your taxes on your credit card. The IRS will take monthly payments, and the interest and penalties charged are usually far less than the credit card companies will charge you in interest.

Don't put staple goods on your credit card - food, gas, etc. - unless you can pay it off every month or you're using a debit card. If you can't pay for your food in cash, that's a sign that you're living above your means.

Don't buy into fraud protection insurance or any of the other crappy insurance programs offered by credit cards. They add very little value to the protection built into your account (and enforced by law). Likewise, be wary of rewards programs - they tend to encourage spending.

I'm all for having a little rainy-day fund in case you get laid off. But nothing will eat into that fund faster than debt, so I still think it's better to pay the debt off first and save later.

Get Organized
If your car ashtray or shoebox is your bookkeeping system, you need to upgrade to something better. If you have investors, they will sometimes ask you how things are going with their money, and you'd better be able to answer.

I recommend learning QuickBooks. It's hard to get a reliable, good bookkeeper for what you can probably afford to pay (which is usually next to nothing). It's not an easy program to learn, but once you do you'll be working with the industry standard. You can budget and track expenses, add credit cards as well as bank accounts, and generate statements and invoices.

Keep Your Money Separate...
... from your investors'. It's VERY tempting to use investor money for personal use. Maybe you think you deserved a dinner on the company's dime because you worked late. Or you think you should lease a car. Or have the company pay part of the rent on your apartment (since it's the production office anyway).

There is a legitimate case to be made for each situation. If you're in preproduction and you're saving money because you didn't have to hire a PA to collate all those scripts, then having dinner makes sense. If you're in production and your shitbox isn't big or reliable enough to transport your actors and crew, you should rent a vehicle. If your production office is your apartment, you may need to reimburse yourself a little (at least to cover bumps in utilities, furniture breakage, and/or spousal irritation).

But if you're in development or postproduction, these arguments don't really hold up as well. If you're in development you should be saving as much money as possible; if you're in post you're probably coming close to running out of it. Your investors may or may not scrutinize these expenses. If they think you're using their money as a "free ride" they may not be as generous the next time around. Or they might want some of it back.

Auto Pay Is The Way
Especially when you're in production, you really don't have time to keep track of your personal finances. Many of us (myself included) hate doing it in the first place. So I get the bank to some of it for me - I have my bank account automatically pay all my bills. I have an overdraft on the checking account so I'm not worried about a bounced check. Since doing this my late payment fees have dropped to about $15 per year; also, my interest rate increases (due to late payments) have disappeared. The few times I've had a shortfall - when a payment has come out of the overdraft because my paycheck hadn't cleared - the charge was nominal. At the very least, turn this option on during production.

Don't Let Out Of Pocket Expenses Accumulate
Your first instinct will probably be to let the crew pay for their expenses, then reimburse them after they submit receipts. After all, there's always the chance that if you hand them their money, they'll just walk away with it, right?

The truth is that most people won't do that. They want to work again. The short-term gain is too small. They have pride in their work.

The solutions are to give them floats, give them credit cards with specific limits, and/or pay for certain expenses directly. Review their spending on a weekly basis and stay on top of things (or hire a line producer to do it).

If you give your department heads piles of cash and say "that's all you're getting," they will spend that pile. If you tell them you'll reimburse them later, they'll spend more than that pile, and be upset if you say that you won't reimburse them for everything. This is not evil on their part - they're just trying to help you make your movie, and are often going above and beyond to do that. But people don't tend to keep as close track of their own spending, or they just assume that you'll cover it anyway, or maybe they're a little pissed because they're going out of pocket... for a variety of reasons, you'll end up spending more.

Think Opposite The Herd
When everyone sells, that's when it's time to buy. When everyone's buying, that's when it's time to sell. That's the best way to survive in the world of investing.

This principle applies to filmmaking in general, however. Make a film in the winter (when no one is working), shoot in a town where no one else goes, pick atypical locations, cast under-utilized actors... you get the idea. If everyone is shooting a romantic comedy, maybe you should put yours on the shelf and take down that horror film - otherwise, you'll end up with just one more low budget romantic comedy, aiming for the same jackpot your competitors are.

Student Loan Consolidation? Think Carefully...
Consolidating your student loans may lower your immediate overhead, but it will usually cost you more in the long run. The consolidated interest rate can often be higher than at least some of the individual loans. And of course you'll end up paying more in interest over the long haul (sometimes three times as much). Some of your loans (particularly certain types of Federal loans) aren't "consolidatable" in any case.

Hire Good Professionals
You'll need a good lawyer and a good tax accountant (unless you're skilled in either of these areas). Build their services into the film's budget. I've seen far too many people get into trouble because they wrote their own (badly worded) contract, or filed the wrong LLC forms at tax time or when forming the corporation.

Pay Yourself Last
Yes, everyone says "pay yourself first," but if you're making a low-budget film, your crew really aren't going to understand why they're working deferred or at a low rate if you're getting a better deal. If you want people to be loyal to you, it's better to forgo some perks (a fancier desk, a better salary, early-day Fridays) and work your ass off.

People Are Your Best Resource
You don't have to suck up or even be particularly nice to the people working for you, but you do have to publicly acknowledge that their contribution is valuable. This doesn't always mean spending a lot of money - sometimes a sincere "thank you" or a drink, or hiring them on your next better-paying job, are sufficient. You can't buy people's loyalty and trust, you have to earn it through your deeds.

Well, that's it - really truly. Time to get back to rewriting.

Thinking About Time

2010-04-28T14:03:00.009-04:00

Time is very much on my mind these days. What follows is a set of observations about it. It's a bit of a departure for me from the lecture/how-to format. Think of it as a window into my brain (aka "this is your brain on a rewrite").

Every day brings me closer to the start of production of the film. Every hour I spend working on other projects is one less that I can apply towards prep. Every minute that passes between my last film and this one my directing wheels get that much rustier. And so on.

Time is also a big theme in the script. Our hero keeps moving forwards and backwards in his experience of time. Much of this idea came out of watching films like Persona and Memento; reading books like Catch-22, Ubik, and Three Roads to Quantum Gravity; and looking at my own experience of time.

On the one hand, I feel I that talking about time is like being a fish trying to describe water. Water has properties, it can be measured, it can be understood chemically, but the very "wateriness" of the water, the experience of it, is impossible to separate from from a fishes' being. Fish are designed to swim in water; we are designed to exist in time. Whenever you try to get at the essence of time you end up talking about yourself.

The obsession with timekeeping and quantification of time is much-lamented, as is our apparent inability to keep focused on more than one thing for very long. Endless cliches are trotted out about how we're losing out on the beauty of life by endlessly trying to cram more stuff into the available time; how time-saving devices ultimately don't translate into more leisure, just more cramming; and how we've become slaves to an impersonal, mechanical version of time.

I suspect, however, that our time obsession is nothing new. While hunter-gatherers may appear to be more "relaxed" than us about when things happen, or farmers' lives a little "slower," their brains are wired just like ours are. I think they count the seconds just as much as we do. The main difference is in their expectation of what time will yield is probably different.

One day for a hunter-gatherer might mean preparing ones' tools, eating something; catching one big animal, or collecting a bundle of plantains; bringing the food back to the base camp; and cooking it. Counting is usually done by ratios, rather than absolute numbers; this is also how we tend to think (without training in number theory) and how our bodies themselves work.

This would suggest that time is indeed something akin to a volume or dimension. Physicists treat it as such. Non-physicists graph time along an axis (usually the x axis) of a chart.

But by and large, the equations of physics run equally well whether the flow of time is backwards or forwards, whereas a chart of the S&P 500 does not. So why does time only appear to run in one direction? Here physicists seem to be rather dumbfounded. Some philosophers (and physicists) have argued that time is a solid "block" like a volume of space. We move through it, it doesn't flow past us. This means that the moments past and future already exist, we just can't see them. Why not?

If I were to stand still in time, all my momentum would be transferred to space (this is what Einstein says; this is why less time passes for you when you travel at relativistic speeds). Does a photon, which travels at the speed of light, experience time? Would we, if we were to travel that fast? When we have gaps in our consciousness (from epilepsy, blackouts, drugs, etc.) some part of us is still in "record mode." Another part of us manages to edit our experience of time together so that there's no gap, no apparent discrepancy between what the different parts of us experienced (though it's obviously not a flawless system).

Does the universe perform a similar function at the quantum level? Some string and quantum loop gravity theorists feel that there's an atomic structure to space-time - a Planck-scale "smallest discrete unit" of space and time. If this is true, then events can't take less than a certain (VERY VERY VERY small) period of time to occur. The appearance of a seamless progression of events could really be the universe's equivalent of going through a flipbook - or projecting frames of film or video - at a high enough speed.

Perhaps time IS just an artifact, a feature like persistence of vision. Sadly, I don't find this comforting. I rather feel more as though I'm really just a big hunk of stuff that's being shuffled through a really, really fine deli slicer.

Perhaps I can show a little bit of this onscreen - by picking the right cut points, moving the story in just the right direction, I can make the audience aware of the water around them, without throwing it in their faces. Here's hoping.

Script Analysis/Acting Resources

2010-04-11T18:03:00.006-04:00

So in the last post, I promised that I'd tell you about some of the resources that have proven invaluable for me in the area of script analysis. So without further ado, here's a combination of techniques, books and films that will help you get to the heart of your script and be able to communicate it better to your cast and crew.

Breathe

There's a lot of pressure to get it all right on set. The clock is ticking and the money is leaking out of your pocket faster than you can think. So take time NOW, when things are relatively calm, and get down to it. And DON'T expect all the answers to come right away. It's taken me years for some of the things I've learned to really soak in, and the biggest thing I've learned about film making is how much more I have to learn.

Take Some Acting Classes

Go to Adrienne Weiss' Directing Actors website. She's a really good director, and taught me a hell of a lot about how to talk to actors. Adrienne is bi-coastal, but if you can't get to her, find an acting group, play, or something going on in your town.

Get some experience, however you can. Even just watching rehearsals helps.

Get Physical

No matter what an actor's training is, I think that the best way to boost a performance is to give them something to do. This doesn't have to be an "action" in the running-away-from-an-explosion sense. Look at Ozu's Tokyo Story (or frankly, almost any of his work). There's not a whole lot of action going on - no one's getting shot or stabbed, or thrown around. There's a lot of dialog. But the performances are incredibly dynamic, at least in part because the actors are always DOING something. They're packing to go on a trip, eating dinner, fanning themselves, cleaning up... I don't know what Ozu's directions to his actors were. But by getting your actors to move around, do things, play, walk, or anything aside from sitting down, you get their energy focused on something outside of their heads.

Reading

Judith Weston has written two really good books about directing actors. Of the two, I think Directing Actors is the most accessible.

I found The Film Director's Intuition very slow going. I'm not sure why - it may be because of the mood I was in when I read it. But once she gets into script analysis techniques - and illustrates them with three really good examples - the book takes off and all the material in the earlier chapters comes together.

William Ball's Sense of Direction is a nice, slim volume that really gets to the heart of directing actors pretty fast. There are some skippable chapters (it was written for stage directing), but it's worth picking up.

Cathy Haase's Acting For Film is geared towards actors more than directors - and for this reason it's actually a valuable resource for you. It's very practical, written very clearly, and is also very brief.

I'm still reading Tony Barr's Acting For the Camera, but so far it's a very clear guide to how to act for film; again, a very good book for you to read.

Finally, pick up a copy of Michael Shurtleff's Audition. It's aimed at actors who have to audition. They have to analyze a play based on a small scene and find a way to the heart of both the scene and their performance, all in a very short period of time. Sounds a lot like film acting, right? Yup. As a writer, I found the "12 guideposts" Shurtleff posits to be absolutely essential to figuring out why a scene works or doesn't work. Similarly, I use the same guideposts to help me figure out the subtext of the scene, or prepare some playable direction to give actors.

Watch Films

Watch films with an eye towards editing and performance. Look past cinematography and production value/design as much as possible. It's not that that those elements aren't important - they very much are - it's just that in many ways those decisions are made by you AND others (the director of photography, mixer, production designer, costume designer, etc.). The part that's really YOURS on set has to do with working with the actors. The results usually manifest themselves later in the editing room as the editor (with your input) tries to build the drama from the different takes.

Some people have said it's good to watch a film without the sound on - so you don't get too sucked into the story. Others have suggested watching films in black and white (either watching a movie shot in black and white or turning the saturation down so that the picture is effectively monochrome). I don't know if I buy either of those techniques whole-heartedly, but they're there, and maybe they'll work for you.

Floorplans, Shotlists, Storyboards, etc.

It wasn't until I was storyboarding Caleb's Door that I realized that I could cut big chunks of dialog out of certain scenes. The reaction shots would communicate plenty. Something about working with my hands, drawing my silly stick figures (I'm not a really good illustrator), made connections in my brain that I wouldn't have made otherwise. During the reshoots I adopted a looser style without storyboarding but my DP and I went over the script and I did make notes on it that resulted in a shotlist and a floorplan.

Some people will argue that a floorplan done while on the shooting location is more useful than a storyboard done months before. I say whatever works for you is good. Just don't skip this step. Anything you can do to pull the script out of two dimensions and into three in your head is a good thing. It will also help you figure out where the camera should be, what should be in front of it, and what's important to hear - all those things that your crew needs to know too.

Okay, that's it for now. Actual real news about the film is coming soon, I swear! In the meantime, I'm chugging away on a rewrite.

If you like this blog, visit the IndieGogo page, and express your thanks via a donation - every contribution, no matter what size, helps the film come to life.

Script Analysis Doesn't Have to Be Scary

2010-03-23T14:24:00.005-04:00

Some news: Anthony Viera, sound mixer extraordinaire, is coming aboard the film! I've worked with Anthony on about 8 or 9 projects, and it's always fun. Ben and Anthony have worked together on about a dozen projects as well. These guys understand the indie vibe and aren't scared by it.

Working with actors still scares me sometimes, however. I'm not sure whether it's because I haven't done a whole lot of it, or whether it's just endemic to the work. In a way, working on technical things is very easy for me. I understand the problem space and can nail a solution. Directing actors is about expanding on solutions, opening up more pathways - really going out on a limb.

I think this aspect of the craft turns off a lot of directors. I see their eyes glaze over as the actor asks them questions. Or I see them hit the actors with a ton of information when all they need is a sentence or two. So this past week I've been digging into my script analysis, hoping to get a jump on this type of situation.

The first thing I do is print out the script, dig out a pen, and go through each scene, looking for:
* Scene beats and transitions. These can be loosely defined as changes in subject. The transition is the space in between each beat. Sometimes it's an unspoken, unwritten thing; sometimes it's a bit of blocking or the entrance of a character; sometimes it's a line.

* Sensory data. This includes images and sounds; also possibly textures, smells and tastes that are implied (like people eating dinner, or dressing in a certain way). Sense data are a type of fact, and facts are good to work with.

* Ambiguous lines or actions. These give you and your actors something to work with - since they could mean more than one thing, they're like an opening into the character's inner life.

* Facts / Backstory. Facts are always good. They can't be judged. An actor can start with a fact and generate an emotional response more effectively than if s/he starts with judgments, opinions, gossip, etc.

* Tension/Stakes. Does the script fall flat in the middle? Does it ratchet up the tension? Does it need more or less "stuff" to get there? Since I'm working on my own script, I have the luxury of adding new stuff or taking it away at will.

From these things, I can glean the following info. This stuff I write down on a separate worksheet (I'll post it up on the IndieGogo site).

* Thru-Line of each character for each scene. This can roughly be defined as what the character wants FROM the other character. It has to be verb-based, and it's helpful if it includes an emotional response on the part of the other character. For example, Steve wants humiliate John can be too limiting. Steve wants John to feel humiliated opens up more possibilities for action.

* Moment Before. What happened just before the scene started. This is sometimes in the script, sometimes not. It's very important to establish since films are shot out of order. One of my biggest failures as a director was not reminding an actor of what had just happened before a small transitional scene. The scene, which would have gone unnoticed, was instead really flat, because the actors didn't carry the tension from the moment before into the scene with them.

* Questions. These are things I can ask the actors or myself. Sometimes a good question can open up a scene.

In the next blog I'll get into more detail on this stuff, and post some links to some good books on the subject. The key thing is to take this stuff seriously, and work on it as early as possible. When that rollercoaster goes over the first hill (see my last entry), you'll find yourself waist-deep or higher in production goo. Better to do your prep when things are calm.

Until next time...

The Long Ride Up the Rollercoaster

2010-03-09T22:33:00.005-05:00

It's been a few weeks since the last blog post. In part, this is because things are still in the early stages - I'm still gathering together resources that I can't talk about publicly until things are "official." I'm assembling some media (concept art, photo tests, and the like) that I'll be able to show off soon. And I'm talking to my regular gang of fellow filmmakers, getting the word out about the film.

A lot of what I've been doing (apart from the above) has been spectacularly unsexy - I've been taking notes. Lots of notes. Notes about color schemes, about the character's appearances and inner lives, about significant objects/images/facts in the scenes. I'm also reading and rereading film books, trying to get my head in the game again.

Once I've put some visual media for all of you to look at, the notes will make more sense. For now, I'm keeping them to myself, since most of these jottings and scribbles will never mature into executable ideas.

But that is in a way, what the point of the notes are. To prep myself for the real script analysis work that lies ahead. Right now I'm in the up stage of the rollercoaster. I know from experience that come May, when I start sending out casting notices, that things are really going to speed up rather drastically.

It's important, especially if you're a hyphenate writer/director/producer-type, to take time out every day to write some notes down about the script. The idea is to free your mind up a bit, let go of some of your preconceptions. Then when you start analyzing the script in more detail - finding out what the "core" ideas are - you've already shaken off a few prejudices.

The big thing for me is to find playable directions to give my cast. This is the Achilles heel of many an indie director. It's so easy to get caught up in the producing or visual aspects of the film, that you can lose sight of what (in many ways) is your most important function on set - to direct the actors. Many times I've felt that the crew could do without me completely, and maybe even work better. But the cast depends on me.

I generally don't look in the monitor for this reason, unless it's a very specific shot. I trust my DP to get what I'm looking for - I'll watch the blocking rehearsal through the monitor. I also don't sit much. Sitting and looking at the monitor together feels like watching television. My body relaxes, I lose my focus, and pretty soon I'm in passive mode. Maybe this is good for some folks, but I need to be up and walking around. It's probably insufferable for everyone else. But then most directors are insufferable on some level. The main thing is to communicate to the actors that I'm a participant, on some level, in their work. I watch them so they can focus on each other instead of themselves.

So that's what late February/early March has been about - preparation, dealmaking, scribbling. There will be more exciting posts to come, I promise. But since I told you back in the day that I'd be sharing the experience of making an independent film, you might as well get a taste of the less exciting stuff too.

Getting Your Production Company Together, Pt. 2

2010-02-16T23:40:00.005-05:00

First, a little bit of news: we've put some more goodies up on our IndieGogo page - our business plan, topsheet budget, and some more concept art are now online and available for download.

In our last post, we covered the first steps you'll want to take in starting up the production company for your film. Now we'll slow down a little and go over a few more steps, and then talk about some longer-term issues.

Getting A Credit Card: It's important to get a credit card early on, and pay any initial expenses with it (while of course paying it off every month). This will help you establish a credit rating for the company, which may come in handy later, should you need to apply for a loan or a second card. I recommend getting three cards, actually:
-- an AMEX card that gives you cash back or miles (you may need the miles to fly actors in)
-- A regular business credit card
-- A debit card attached to your bank account

It's a pretty sure bet that the credit card companies will be looking at YOUR credit score when you apply, so now would be a good time to get a credit report via creditreport.com or one of the other services (your bank should also have a credit reporting service).

Figure Out How You're Going to Pay The SAG Bond and Any Deposits: Chances are, unless you're film is really, really tiny, you're going to be dealing with the Screen Actors Guild. And they're going to want a deposit equivalent to a percentage of the actors' salaries (there's a formula but it varies). They'll want this deposit in certified check or money order form. They will refund the bond once the film is shot and all the paperwork is complete. Of course, this process can drag on, especially if the SAG rep loses your paperwork (always make copies!)

If you're like most indie producers, this really sucks. You can lower it somewhat by agreeing to put the actors' salaries in an escrow account run by their agents, prior to the shoot. But this won't eliminate the bond altogether. So start thinking about how you're going to float the money (cash advance, loan, line of credit with your bank, etc.) Don't wait until the last minute to figure this out.

Likewise, you'll also want to figure out how to deal with any equipment deposits (which can sometimes be quite large) or credit card holds. Putting that stuff on your production account debit card is a bad idea, especially the holds. And some places don't take AMEX.

Separate Your Books: It's important to separate the day-to-day development expenses that are NOT associated with your movie, from the preproduction expenses that are. This is hard to do at first - at the beginning, you may be making a call that could serve as both a development call (hey, look at all my projects) or as a financing call for the current film (hey, look at this one script). But it's critical to separate as much as possible, for several reasons.

Firstly, it's honest. If you want your investors to come back again, it pays to make sure they're not inadvertently paying for calls to your spouse, or a new fancy desk or lamp that isn't needed on the shoot.

Secondly, it will give you a sense of how fast you're actually spending the money, whether you need to slow down or not (you don't want to spend out the budget before you start shooting), and (worst case) whether you should be raising more dough.

Find A Lawyer/Get Your Legal Documents Together: The film business is not known for its plethora of honest, easygoing people. A good entertainment attorney can help you cut through the chaff of wanna-be's and protect you from the predators. In fact, your attorney may be the most important member of your team. So choose your attorney wisely.

You want someone who's a clear communicator, has an enthusiasm for their work, and specializes in entertainment law - which encompasses securities, copyright, contracts, labor, intellectual property, and other domains. Look for someone who you can form a long-term relationship with. Ideally, your attorney will work with you all the way through the sale of this film and the next one as well.

Get Your Attorney Working on Offering Documents: This is very important. Anytime you have someone giving you money you can bet they'll want some kind of contract. For most films you'll need three documents:
-- The Private Placement Memorandum, which lays out the nature of the investment, summarizes the risks, and covers liability, company dissolution, and breach of contract.
-- The Operating Agreement, which lays out how the LLC actually... operates, the relationship between the investors and managers, and what rights each party has. You give these two documents to prospective investors. Hopefully they return them to you signed along with a nice big check (that clears).
-- A Joint Venture Agreement, which covers you and whoever else you're producing the film with (if you're the writer/director, this covers your relationship with the producer; if you and your partner are both producers, this covers both of you... you get the idea). Good contracts make good partners. I can't tell you how many films I've seen burn to the ground because two friends decided to make a movie together, broke up over something at some point during post, then - because there was no contract in place - couldn't agree on who "owned" the film.

Your investors will breathe easier, knowing that the people in charge have an agreement between them as well.

Okay, that's about as much business stuff as I can deal with for one blog. Next time we'll get to some more fun stuff, such as concept art, script analysis, or (hopefully) some big news about the film. Until then, have a good one!

Video Pitch Online

2010-02-01T01:18:00.004-05:00

We just finished and uploaded a video pitch for Found in Time. You can check it out on IndieGogo.com. In it I try to describe the story, what we're trying to do in making it, and how you can help us make it happen.

I want to take a moment and thank everyone for their donations of time, energy and money. The making of the video actually highlights another aspect of the DIWO (Do It With Others') ethos. My friend, writer/director Rick Mowat, donated his video and sound gear. Several other friends and colleagues watched various early versions of the pitch and offered excellent constructive criticism. Bob Seigel, another long-time friend and the legal counsel for the film, made sure all my i's were dotted and t's crossed. And Vimeo, Indiegogo, Facebook, Blogger, and Contactology have made it possible to tell people about the pitch for little to no dough.

If you had to add up the real cost of that advice, service, gear, and hosting, it would be quite a bit. So thank you to all who've taken time out to help us in our quest to bring the film to fruition.

Some More Business News

As I said in one of my previous posts, the temptation is to just shoot the damn thing. But while you definitely need to have that energy and enthusiasm, you also need to cover your butt and do a few business-type things first. You'll be happy you did in the long run, and while it will drain some of that enthusiasm away at first, later it will free you from various worries and let you make your film. So here's an all-too-brief overview of the steps you should take to get your film on the rails.

1. Copyright the script with the U.S. Copyright office:http://www.copyright.gov. For $35 you get your work protected (at least somewhat). Also, SAG will usually require a proof of registration of the script, so just do it.

2. Do a breakdown, schedule and budget for the script, so you know how much to ask for and about how long it will take to shoot. You can hire a line producer for this job (the cost will range from several hundred to a couple of thousand), or do it yourself.

There are definite pros to hiring a line producer. If they have any experience at all, they'll find and show you the expensive elements in your script, and give you at least an ideal schedule. They also have a good sense of what things cost in the particular place you're shooting (labor prices, as well as goods and services, vary from region to region).

But I recommend that you do it yourself instead and hire a line producer to check your work. Just don't kid yourself about how much time it takes - you'll need a month or more to do this step. But you'll be learning a valuable skill, and you'll get to know your script inside and out. It may even help you do a rewrite, both to make things cheaper and also better dramatically.

3. Decide if you're going to need investors, or if you can get by with your own money plus lots of favors (probably all of them you ever had coming to you) plus a credit card, loan, grant, second mortgage, etc.

I STRONGLY advise you to consider the POSSIBILITY of having investors. It affects many business decisions you'll make from this point on (see points 4 and 5). And yes, your mom or uncle or whoever who wants to give you money for the film - unless it's under $1000 or an outright gift - should be considered an investor. Even if you go it alone, any bank down the road will want to see some kind of corporate structure in place before they give you a loan. And psychologically, I think that having to think of other people and their money while you're making your film can be a good thing - it forces you to examine the film from an outsider's perspective.

4. If you need investors, put together a business plan. This is a 30-50 page document (or a PowerPoint slideshow) that explains, in as simple terms as possible: what your story is, why it's special, how it fits into the film marketplace, what your financial goals are with the film, and why anyone in their right minds would want to invest in it.

You can hire other people to do this for you (be prepared to pay a few grand) or learn how to do it yourself. The best book I've read on this subject is Louise Levison's Business Plans for Independents. Again, I recommend you at least try to do it yourself. You may find it a STEEP learning curve, but it will force you to consider your story from yet another perspective.

5. Decide on Incorporation. You'll need an entity separate from yourself to make the film, hold onto your investor(s)' money, and deal with all the vendors and crew and SAG. There are several types of business entities, but the most common are:

Subchapter S Corporations: these are designed for small businesses. They offer a "pass-through" mechanism so that income from the corporation is allowed to pass through the corporate "veil" to the owners. S Corps are easy and cheap to form, don't require a lot of maintenance from the IRS and state tax agency, and can have investors (they become shareholders). You can set up a mechanism whereby you will always own the majority of stock. This keeps you in the driver's seat while allowing other people to put money into your project.

So what is the problem? Well, because of the "pass-through" regulation, S Corps do offer somewhat less protection from lawsuits which would see to pierce the corporate veil (ie, go after your personal assets). In most states, there's an upper limit on the number of investors that one S corporation can have. And other corporations or entities can't become investors.

C Corporations (C corps) offer a solution to all these problems, but aren't really set up for small business owners. You have a MOUNTAIN more paperwork to file and track, and depending on your budget, you may have to file with the SEC. Trust me on this, you don't want to create a C Corp.

Limited Liability Partnerships (LLPs) used to be the entity of choice for filmmakers. You become the managing partner; investors become limited partners. The company is structured to give you most of the creative and strategic control, while protecting the investors' money and legal responsibility (the middle "L") in case you screw up. But these are relatively clunky, and are treated by the IRS as partnerships, not corporations.

Limited Liability Companies (LLCs) combine elements of corporations and partnerships. You become the Managing Member; investors just become Members. An operating agreement defines the different roles. You'll have to do a few things (the next few steps) to set up the company.

If you think you'll have more investors than, say, your uncle, you'll want to form an LLC. It offers the best combination of protection, paperwork hassle, and flexibility. It's also "the devil you know" - any investors who are NOT your friends or family will be expecting you to have an LLC.

You don't have to form an LLC right away, but should do it within the same year you go into production. You'll need a few weeks to set it (and all your other stuff) up, so you should schedule accordingly.

6. File the incorporation paperwork. Here's where I get lazy. You can file the paperwork with the state yourself, but I usually use Inc It Now's service for the initial filing. They charge a premium but can deliver the filing receipt and other paperwork faster than you'll get it back from the state otherwise. Expect to pay about $450 or so. Most of this goes to the state filing agency, with the rest paying for postage, your "black beauty" (the big thick book containing your corporate seal and all your corporate documents), and Inc It Now's service fee. For this you'll get a filing receipt with the state you incorporated in, a black book with stock certificates and other paperwork, your corporate seal, and your initial articles of organization (a brief contract explaining how the LLC works).

I recommend you incorporate in the same state you're doing business in. While you can incorporate in a different state, you'll have to file additional paperwork within your own state to be treated as a "foreign corporation." You may also have to pay some taxes. It's more of a pain. Some people maintain that it's worth it, however, because each state taxes corporations differently. That's why you'll see a lot of LLCs that were incorporated in Delaware but do business in New York.

A word of advice on Inc It Now's services: they have several "packages" available. The best value for your money, however, is to just let them do the initial filing, and for you to handle the following steps (below) yourself.

7. Get an EIN. Once you get the black beauty and the filing certificate, go to the IRS website and file for an EIN. An EIN is the corporate equivalent of a social security number, and you'll need it to do just about ANYTHING else. Their new online form is pretty good - it's actually written in English, as opposed to IRS-ese - and you'll get an EIN right away. Doing this yourself will save you some $$$ over letting Inc. It Now do it for you.

8. Get your filing receipt. A couple of days to a few weeks after you get your black beauty, you'll also receive a copy of the filing receipt from the state, with a state seal stamped on it. You'll need this later, so hold onto it.

9. Publish. Depending on what state you incorporated in, you may need to publish a notification of your company's existence. Two newspapers or circulars publish a daily classified listing stating that your company exists. This is possibly the biggest pain in the ass in this whole ordeal, and apart from a payola scheme, I don't really know what purpose it serves anymore. I recommend contacting Hudson Advertising if you live in New York (212-732-0337). They get paid by the publishers, so there's no surcharge to you above the advertising fees (which range from $600 to $1800, depending on the state and, believe it or not, the county of your company's address). The problem is that if you don't do this step, the state government can simply declare your corporation invalid. Then you'll have to start over again.

10. Open a bank account. Once you have your filing receipt and your black beauty, you should open up a checking account with a bank you can tolerate. If you have a budget big enough to justify an escrow account, you'll want to set up an escrow/production account. This is really two accounts bolted together: an escrow account (where the investor money goes into), and a production account (where you write checks from). You can't tap the escrow account until you've hit the break point (this is up to you to determine). The escrow account can be further set up to track individual investors' monies, so the bank can send statements back to each investor.

If you're doing a film for less than $100K, chances are you need whatever money comes in AS it comes in, so you'll probably want to just set up a simple corporate bank account. You'll need your EIN and usually the filing receipt or articles of organization (that'll be in your black beauty), as well as your personal ID.

One important consideration: how many ATMs does this bank operate in the city/town you'll be shooting in? During production, you'll often find yourself in need of cash, and you don't want to piss away money on ATM fees, do you?

11. Set up Your Online Merchant Account. Next (for now), you'll want to set up an Amazon.com merchant account, and possibly a Paypal account so you can take donations online. These accounts link back to your bank account. Most crowdfunding sites require one or the other (Indiegogo requires an Amazon account).

There are a few more steps to take but you're probably exhausted from reading this far, so we'll cover the rest in the next post (I promise). While it all seems like a lot, and it can be somewhat intimidating, if you leave yourself enough time, you'll be rewarded by (a) learning a lot of new things (which is never bad) and (b) preparing yourself to think like a business person, which you'll need to do at the other end when you're trying to sell your film. You'll also get more acquainted with your script, and may see some things that need changing (it's always cheaper to figure this out early).

We Have Crowdfunding Liftoff

2010-01-14T16:05:00.004-05:00

We're still working on the teaser video for the page, but our IndieGogo.com page is up, running and accepting donations.

I admit that I was extremely skeptical of the crowdfunding model. The basic idea is that instead of hunting down a few producers and/or investors with deep pockets and expendable cash, you build a community of supporters (and potential ticket/DVD buyers) by soliciting small donations. Those donations, combined with a few dollars from your pocket, some freebies, and maybe a kindly investor (or credit card), would be enough to make your movie.

About 15 years ago, a few producers tried similar strategies. The idea was to raise the budget "one movie ticket at a time." To my knowledge, none of those films got made. The idea seemed like a nice one. But given that people were shooting on film in the mid-90s and were trying to raise $500K for their first features, it seemed akin to saving up pennies to buy a house. Also, keeping track of potentially hundreds of donors seemed like a major nightmare.

But that was one generation of filmmaking and internet technology ago. The advent of cheap, tapeless HD makes it possible to shoot features for a lot less than before. The openness of distributors and fans to "mumblecore" movies - shot for peanuts with minimal crew, cast, and very tight, contained stories - has given us all hope that small movies with no stars can connect with an audience. And sites like IndieGogo.com, KickStarter (and the infrastructure created by PayPal and Amazon.com merchant accounts) make it a lot easier to accept and keep track of small donations.

The real revolution, though, is in the direction filmmakers and audiences are looking. We've all realized that we can't count on distributors. They've become too risk-averse and too penny-pinching to welcome members into their cadre. To some extent, this is a return to the way things have always been: a few controversial figures get into the club, but most of the filmmakers and their movies cater to a certain taste. This is not a bad thing - studios are very good at making and marketing a certain kind of movie - but it's only one slice of what film is truly capable of.

The '90s and early '00s were a brief moment when it seemed like the gates were open to a wider array of talented people; and that distributors who were interested in promoting these films, and their stars, crew, producers and directors would actually do things like cut trailers, arrange promotions, and market the film to an audience.

Sadly, I think those days are behind us, at least for now. The distributors are asking for filmmakers to do more of the heavy lifting: cut the trailer, produce the artwork, cross-promote the film, cough up all the deliverables - while promising less in return.

Compared to that, finding your audience on your own and working together with them to make your film sounds like a much better deal, even if it is more work. In some ways it's like going back to what motivated us to get into this business in the first place. I took photos and wrote stories as a kid because I wanted to share experiences with an audience (and get applause, let's face it). They helped me, I (hopefully) helped them.

In the long run, hopefully this will lead to a revitalization of distribution. Distributors will realize that the audience matters, that small movies can make people happy AND make money. And we'll all be better off. Here's hoping!