Hey everybody. My name is Allison Powell and I'm an actor and filmmaker. And I am
going to walk you through the five steps to get your project from script-to-screen.
and I'm mainly going to be talking about shorter projects (short films or
webseries). There's a lot of information about how to get independent features
made and while it's essentially the same steps there are a lot more in depth and
you have a lot more variables that you're dealing with but there's not a
ton of information about how to make a short project or a small budget project
and there's a lot of people that'll just say go make your movie like get friends
together go shoot it on your iPhone which is great and totally doable but
sometimes it's like I don't know what to do what are the steps how do I make it
happen and that's certainly where I was coming from when I started making
shorter projects and so I am gonna explain to you everything that you need
to know first step when you're making a short project is to determine what your
budget is I always tell people your budget is the money that you have
whether that's the money that you have in your savings account the money that
you can put aside from your check every week or the money that you crowd fund
and raise with the help of friends it's always gonna be the money that you have
anything is possible on any budget some things are just easier with more money
or easier to achieve with less money your budget is determined by what you
want to do with the project at the end so think about that if you just want to
make a project to learn how to get a project together what it means to be on
set test out producing something test out if you like directing see if you
want to get some her footage for your real or dramatic footage for your real I
highly recommend spending less money you are going to learn the same lessons if
you spend two hundred and fifty dollars or if you spend twenty five hundred
dollars and it's way better to learn the lessons on the two hundred and fifty
dollar project than on the twenty-five hundred dollar project so think about
what you want to do with your end goal if you want to submit it to festivals if
you want it to be sort of a proof of concept for a feature or pitching a
pilot then you probably want to spend a little bit more money you're just gonna
get a slightly higher quality project you're gonna be able to rent better
equipment and locations and make it look really
really nice if you just want to make a project to learn how to do it
you can spend 60 bucks I made five projects for $60 to a hundred and fifty
dollars and I learned almost everything I need to know about producing doing
those projects so it's totally possible when you're thinking about your project
think about the end goal and that's going to determine what your budget is
and again your budget is the money that you have anything's possible for any
amount it just might take more work your budget when you're putting it together I
put all my budgets together in Google sheets just as a spreadsheet so
basically an Excel document that way you can also put in all of the formulas so I
can say it's gonna be a two-day shoot I'm paying my director two hundred
dollars a day so two hundred two days and then I can put in a formula here and
to multiply those days or add the column so then I have a running charlie going
as well and it should look something kind of like this
if you're only spending money for food you might not even need to put together
a budget but it's always a good practice to try and do it one of the first bigger
projects that I made I never made a formal budget and now when people ask me
how much money I spent on it I don't have an answer and it would have been
great to know and a great way to track what I was spending and what I was
spending it on so even if it's a tiny project go ahead and put together a
little spreadsheet again you might as well learn on a smaller
project where you're spending less money than on something where you're spending
between eight and ten thousand dollars the second thing to do for your project
is to hire crew you only have to hire crew people one person at a time when I
was first starting out I feel like I got overwhelmed because it's like you need a
sound person and a camera person and the lighting person and a makeup artist and
do you need somebody to do costumes and who's gonna handle props and what's
production design and it's so overwhelming when I did pretty much all
of my first projects I hired just one person at a time that's all it takes and
usually if you get that one person on board and they're really excited and
excited to be involved in the project they're gonna start making suggestions
of other crew people that they know that they can bring on board so you really
only need to know one person or reach out to one person when I made a black
widow fan film I reached out to someone initially to be the first assistant
director cuz I knew he was a big comic book fan and I knew he'd be excited
about the project and I said here's my idea here's the script you want to meet
up and talk about it and he's the one who actually said hey I really want to
direct something and if I get to direct it then my friend who's a director of
photography wants to work with me so I'll bring him on and he's got
connections to lights and he has connections to camera and he's gonna
hire everybody in the genie department so again one person it's very very
simple you also want to hire kind of from the top down so you want to hire
your director first if that's not going to be you you are the producer no matter
what so you're hiring everybody you may want to hire another producer if you
want a little more help and assistance and going through this step-by-step but
you certainly don't have to but hire your director your director may have an
opinion or then want to choose their director or photography the director of
photography I have a gaffer that they want to work
with or a first AC so it's better to hire kind of from the top down so that
then you're not saying to a director well I've already hired this DP so you
have to work with them or I've already hired this gaffer so you're gonna just
have to make it work ideally that way everybody knows who everybody is how I
work well together and all of those things you want your crew and your set
to be a really cohesive structure and I really like my sets to be a fun place to
come and work because especially when you're not spending that much money
you're maybe not paying people anything or you're paying them a very reduced
rate it's a huge help to at least make it somewhere fun to hang out for the day
since you've already put together your budget what you're able to spend and
what you're willing to spend you'll know what you'll be able to pay crew people
when you're hiring them and it is very key to be just upfront and honest with
what the rate is if it's free if it's nothing if it's just gas money if it's
50 bucks when you're hiring someone just always be honest there's no point in
going around and saying do you want to work for me like yeah it's paying but
it's really only paying $50 just say it's paying it's a very low rate it's X
amount that way everybody knows what they're getting upfront and if somebody
can't work for that rate ideally they'd tell you right away and you don't get
offended you don't get upset you don't tell them why it's a terrible mistake
and your movies gonna be amazing and then we're gonna regret not working for
you you just say thank you so much hopefully we find something to work on
together in the future and let them go you can always find
somebody that is able to work with your budget it might not be the first person
that you ask but since you have that budget together and you know what you're
able to spend you can say that upfront when you're hiring crew people if you
have any sort of flexibility in your budget or the director of photography is
saying oh I need X amount and you really want to work with them then that's kind
of up to you and that's on a project a project basis but be upfront about the
rate they are offering people the third thing that you're gonna need to do is
find a place to film this is hugely determined by you and the script and the
reason that I say by you is because you as a filmmaker have personal
connections that I might not know about your director might not know about
another producer might not know about and if you have those connections and
you're able to use them to get a place to film perfect you might be able to
film in a mansion for free or a bar for free or in a swimming pool for free it
all depends on who you know and where they live and what they have access to
so if you know that you have a friend who has a backyard with a trampoline in
it and that is the specific thing that you need for your script then you have
to reach out to that friend and see if they're willing to let you go and film
there and it could be a totally reasonable location if you don't have a
ton of connections and you're wanting to make something just for practice or for
a lower budget then ideally you write it somewhere that you do have access to
that you know about so maybe that's just in your apartment in your house you know
get creative maybe it's not the dining room table maybe it's the bathroom maybe
it's the kitchen maybe it's the backyard maybe it's up on
the roof or on the porch on the balcony but you're going to need to find
somewhere to film it the other thing to keep in mind is that a lot of people who
don't work in the film industry don't know that our days are 12 to 12 and a
half hours long because you should never ever go over 12 and a half hours if you
can it all help it do not go over time if you remember nothing else remember
that so if you're reaching out to your mom's old college roommate who has a
trampoline in her backyard that has a giant sprinkler and a fountain and
that's everything that you need for your script make sure that she knows you
might need to be there from 7 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. and make sure that they are ok
with that if you don't have a friend who has a castle or a swimming pool or owns
a mini golf course or whatever you need you can look at places like Pierce base
and Rat pal they're really good location resources and also just Yelp calling up
local restaurants local cafes local shops is a great way to get a location
for filming anywhere that's independently owned is going to be a lot
easier to deal with then somewhere that's a chain the fourth thing that
you're going to need to do is rent equipment sometimes when you're
hiring crew you might ask the GP or the sound person or the production designer
whoever what gear they already have and what are they willing to bring sometimes
a DP is willing to bring their camera onto the project and reduce the rental
fee or maybe even bring it on for free if they really like the project but
you're gonna want to ask them that you know do you have a camera do you want to
film this project on your camera do you have lenses are you willing to
use those lenses on the project if they're not totally fine they might say
you know I do have a camera but this is gonna look way better on red and I only
have a black magic or it's gonna look better on this camera or that camera
there's a whole bunch about equipment that they might throw at you and the
thing to know is you don't need to know all the answers and everything about
equipment you just need to get a list from them of what they need rented and
again this is a place where you should be really upfront with your budget with
them so I have $600 for camera and lenses what do you need and what can we
get for about that budget once they send you over a list you can look at places
like share grid and kit split because they are more affordable typically than
rental houses for getting equipment and you can just copy and paste the list
into the search bar one item at a time if you're not finding what you need or
it's turning into piecing a bunch of equipment from you know 20 places all
over town you can also Ford that list over to a rental house typically rental
houses are camera gear like camera lenses tripods items like that and then
a rental house for lights so c-stands lights sandbags things of that nature so
you may end up renting from two different rental houses totally normal
totally fine if you find a place where you can rent everything at once do that
that's amazing when I reach out to a rental house I usually just Ford or a
copy and paste the equipment list over to them from the email that I've gotten
from my crew the rental house will email me back and say here's the quote here's
you know all the equipment that we have and here's what
cost you it's very rarely the amount that I am able or willing to spend
so sometimes it's totally out of the ballpark and it's just not possible
sometimes it's pretty close and in that point you can absolutely email the
rental house back and say this is great I actually only have $600 to rent this
equipment are you able to go to 600 maybe they are maybe they aren't maybe
we can go to 650 and you think you can pull $50 from somewhere else in the
budget great if it's something that's totally out of the ballpark and that's
been out of the ballpark on share grade kit split with every rental house that
you reach out you at that point you might have to reach back out to your
crew and just say I don't think that we're gonna be able to afford all of
this equipment what can you live without what do we
absolutely need rental houses are great and they usually will work with you
again as long as you are upfront and honest the last thing that you need to
do and it's not always the last all of these steps are intermix is picking a
date to film for me there's two methods to picking a date to film one is just
sort of picking an arbitrary date that works for you and maybe the location but
definitely one that works for you and saying this is the day I'm gonna be
ready to film and I'm giving myself a deadline and we are filming June 4th
then when you're hiring crew you're hiring the location you're renting
equipment everything you want June 4th then when you're talking to crew members
if they're not available June 4th again you can say thank you so much maybe
we'll find another project to work on we're shooting June 4th the other way
you can pick a day to film is by your crew so maybe there's some crew members
that you really want to work with or a director or DP in that scenario you say
to everybody okay we're all on board we all want to make this project what days
are everyone available and ideally they give you a couple of different options
because maybe almost everyone is available June 4th but a couple people
aren't but everyone is available on June 6th so then you can go film on June 6 of
course you want to be confirming with your location that they're available
that day again for twelve to twelve and a half hours on that day if your friends
like yeah you can film here on June 6 but we have a party at 3 p.m.
you can't actually film there on June 6 then maybe you need to see if people can
film June 7th as I was saying all of these stages overlap they intermingle
you don't necessarily have to do them in order mostly in order is helpful you
know starting with your budget finding your crew finding your locations
your equipment picking a date of film really doesn't have to come last be
somewhere in the mix but all of these steps you want to do before you get on
set and start filming even if you're making a project for $60.00 that money
should go towards food you always want to have water coffee and really good
food on set that's just a great way to show your appreciation your taking care
of your crew everybody's hydrated eating they're happy they've got caffeine also
if you're not spending a ton of money it's a great idea to reach out to your
crew beforehand and ask if they have any snacks that they really like that
they've loved to have on set it's a great way again just to show your
appreciation hey I remember that you really like dried mango here's some
dried mango for you I am a hot tea drinker not a coffee drinker so I love
when sets have a hot water kettle and some tea bags
that's what how I keep my energy up so ask that too you know does everybody
here drink coffee or do we need to have a tea kettle on set is a huge help from
you and there's a tea kettle on set but don't skimp on sound that's gonna make
your project stand out even if you spend $100 on it and you have good sound on
your project it's gonna look like you spent a lot more money I'm Allyson
Powell thanks so much for watching and go make your movie now that you know how
to do it