Lance Parkin: Hi, I’m Lance Parkin, producer, director, co-writer and co-star
of Theo & The Professor. And this is Matt. Matt Schultz: Hi I'm the co-star and co-writer see the professor
and this is Jeff. Jeffrey Smee: Hey I'm the director of photography and the editor David
professor and also this is Ruthy. Ruthy Draper: I'm the producer and then after in Theo and
the professor and finally this is Dominique. Dominique Kirchell: Hi I'm Dominique the lead makeup artist and
creature designer on theater professor and this is our Film Courage video 5
things we learned making our low-budget webseries be our CEO and House cute
first what is the other professor guys it's our web series and what else about
it the professor is like a monster of the
week horror comedy it draws from a lot of like 1970s where I play a professor
at college and Lance plays a graduate student but the secret is that's just
the cover job they really hunt monsters and ghosts and fun stuff like that
squeaky stuff sometimes something's funny stuff that's the magic and now it
is available where we're gonna fight it guys he was on problem Amazon Prime yep
but we're here to talk about how we made it and challenges we had and to help you
guys not make the mistakes that we made along the way
yeah anyway that's point of the show let's get to the you know the but the
bones let's get down to breasts it's he's not a breast tax
first before you go into making anything you should take some time to build the
playground before you dive right in to playing it right guys
yes yeah I think what I understand we talked a lot of people were trying to
put together webseries I think they just think I'm just going to do it and then
it's gonna happen which is not how it works I think so like it's yeah it's
good to have that kind of drive but you have to have the pre-production planning
in place too or else it's going to crash and burn I think it's really important
especially if you're going to do really character driven kind of shows that you
want to have the characters really really drawn out and understood to the
point where even put them in any sort of situation and understand exactly how
they would have had and interact with which is where we really felt the
characters that we created had gotten to we didn't play the whole series out from
the start but we're definitely ready for we're going to do with once despair we
had a plan yeah I would say like every department has groundwork from the
pre-production you know perspective like from rehearsing to writing to I mean
what were some of the preparations you have to do donate for a makeup like
wooden stuff that has to be done weeks and weeks of shooting you have to our
life cast people taking the time to cover someone's face and like goop and
stuff and they don't ding like a prosthetic takes like a few weeks and
then you have to mold it and then you have to bake it and yeah I think we
didn't notify Dominic months in advance for a monster every time those important
isn't we stuck to our plan yeah and they premiered right on time even if it
almost killed us so yeah that's tip number one yeah build the playground
before you claim it what was - let's take it number two
money isn't everything we realized I would say part of the way through the
production because we were so amps that we had raised the money to be gotten
from the Kickstarter but when he started to film we realized how quickly that
money can go by quickly expended food for the crew food for the crew food for
the crew through the debris helping people with
gas money to travel mm-hmm makeup makeup I mean if we're like makeup stuff a lot
of our budget went so that just because makeup is expensive but I mean it's a
fine way to like cut costs on that like just using household items to like cut
costs and they actually look like I think they look good to make monster
gloves just use like rubber dishwashing gloves and cotton and latex necessity is
like the mother of invention and having those having the budgetary restraints
you know I think really forced us to like leverage a lot of that creativity
whether it was problem-solving on the set you know just using whatever we had
around us if you really got to reach back for favors because you make a lot
of friends I mean it's calling in favors from landlords they used to have you get
in those houses there in those houses and call my old school teachers from art
school ten years ago whatever your budget is whether it's a hundred dollars
or a hundred thousand stretch it in like consent when you say money isn't
everything it's true like you just need to make sure you can spending your money
wisely according to what the actual most expensive things you're going to need
are and I actually think that even though we did have you know a limited
budget and grand scheme of things I think that it you know we were able to
transform that really strengthen it doesn't that it doesn't look like a
$7,000 show I think yeah looks a little bit I think it's whatever that that was
because a lot of ingenuity wouldn't do it I think a little creativity goes a
long way mm-hmm yeah okay
alright number three is a fun positive environment creates a fun positive
product and this comes down to like balance I guess because if you're having
too much fun you're not going to get anything done but if you're in this
strict environment where nobody can have any fun
they're not gonna produce as good a product because they just aren't having
fun they don't want to do it they might leave you get nothing especially on
these low budgets where people aren't being paid they're getting paid in food
and credits not pay people and did not expect them to be part of the band and
have their own creative differences and their own creative input and yeah yeah
we made sure that everybody working on the show knew that their piece belonged
to them and they can look at it and make a watch the show and they know that like
that's my work that's a piece of me on there you know and I think that's what
actually made the show so good is that everybody was so committed to it because
they owned it you know everyone knew a little bit also candy candy is important
candy crunchy crunchy M&Ms are always good for my fruit snacks
yeah keep morale high with French M&Ms and fruit snacks that's that's the thing
we didn't mention it your team should be informed it should be empowered and they
should be fed if nothing else what they should be fed and fed well ask them what
they want to eat don't just you know you can just go along or you get a bunch of
stuff but it's nice if you dream every day not pizza every day
fourth and very importantly in my opinion as the producer is to remember
that a finished product is better than a perfect product so you might as well get
started and get something out there that you can be proud of because you can
always reshoot it if it's not great the first time you do it we certainly had to
reshoot a few things oh yeah so many crews and just people in general
have these lofty ideas and they need to make it perfect they need to wait until
they have a better camera to shoot it because it's not going to be as good on
the camera they have or you know they need to get a big budget because they
need this special effect but then it what happens if you do that if you have
that mentality it just never gets done because there's always going to be a
nicer camera to get or a crazier special effect that you'll replace the other one
with or whatever just take the resources you have and make something no matter
how bad it might be get a finished product and then leave it there move on
to the next thing and you'll make the next one better and then people will be
watching that last thing and maybe you meet some people because they see that
or you know and they'll see you progressing and you'll get a bigger
budget or you know more resources for the next project and you can build up to
those lofty ideas you had for the first one but you'll never get there just
trying to make the leap yeah improvising and just dealing with what nature gives
you sometimes you know sometimes the world conspires to just give you a lot
of lemons and you got to find a way to make it work yeah we talked a lot about
how much you have to plant but there's a whole other half of that where you
should have a good plan but you should be ready to abandon that plan really
different at any moment let's notice our first episode the level 2 was a mess it
was our first shoot we ever tried to film makeup tests then we went out again
to try to shoot it it was a clear night 0% chance of rain and then a monsoon
showed up the last that was about 40 miles why we rescheduled a year later it
was another clear weekend then it rained the night before the
night before all day I seen her siphoning mud out of a pit with my mouth
yeah siphon dirty mud why it was supposed to it was a warm weekend the
weekend before it was like in the 70s but it got into the high 30s that even
it was the colder lower than that yeah well we were so we started freezing and
we were probably like a quarter of the way done with the shooting yeah probably
yeah this is a great case for improvising so uh quick-thinking
prevailed I thought long and hard I realized that you were got had a
warehouse we were near an additional area so I thought why don't we just have
a chaise wake up and chase us into a warehouse and we'll just shoot it six
months six months I'm going back to that first point about having you know a
fully built sandbox if you're creative enough and you have that world you can
rewrite your way out of any problem yeah deeper and that's where you need the
planning to be able to do the improvisation Hey enjoy this one okay
number five when you're done you're not done there's always more to do post
production marketing that kind of thing yeah all kinds of stuff shoot the show
is only half the battle I'd say yeah we don't name in half but the show is done
in a shot and you finished it you can pat yourself on the back I know I for
one took about two months of my entire life off because that was insane
whatever was done but you know you got to get back on the horse because there's
a lot more work to go if you want to make anything of that product you know
as we speak where were entered in a web series festival that we will hopefully
we'll be getting into we're going to a horror convention in Moritz couple Comic
Cons merchandise we're trying to promote the show and like we've been done
filming it since August 17 yeah premiered here at the Oaks in September
one thing you gotta be prepared for you're gonna you make this make this
product that you and much people close to you and your friends and your team
before their heart said to you all love it but not everyone's gonna love it and
you should prepare yourselves for the less than Pleasant reviews that are
gonna come your way and they came not no no like it's probably a it is a minority
of them yeah but they're there you know made for one it wins find it with the
show for nitwits Biden that's it which I think it's fantastic yeah that's one of
the best things you give us a community look good as a favor with that one
thanks pearl it's impossible to make something especially a piece of
entertainment there's a genre fiction like this it's not it's just not gonna
be for everyone so people are going to come across it who you know don't you
just don't like it it's not for them you know they have radically different
opinions than you do or actually gonna happen or that they just don't
appreciate how low-budget this was they see like they call the movies and we're
on Amazon like maybe not next to them but in the same arena as them
and we have less than 1% of the budget that those things have like they spend
they're like spent more yardage on the craft services on one day on that movie
or television show yeah yeah and people appreciate yeah I don't think they see
it's on Amazon I'm like well I should expect this is legit it is legit but
it's they don't run is that we put ourselves on it so that you will stay
the course if you have to love it or not to love it during the editing to love it
during the marketing to love it during the good and bad reviews like you got
it's got to be something that you want to really see into the future if you're
getting out to enough people that some of them hate it like it's not a bad
thing it means it surpassed your immediate circle of fresh your response
you know jokes on them cuz they watch it
and that's it so five things we learned for making our low-budget webseries
remember number one build the playground before you play in it
number two money isn't everything number three a fun positive environment makes
for a fun positive product number four don't be afraid to improvise because
none is better than perfect number five when you're done you're not done that's
it so yeah that's our video five things we learned while making a little budget
web series thanks film courage for letting us make this and post it on
their site and yeah I guess that's all we got right yeah and if you want to
check out this show that we've been talking so much about you can see me on
the professor on Amazon it can rent buy or if you mem is on prime you just watch
it for free and that's it everyone see you later thanks for joining us I
guess we're gonna have to get out of here thanks