What would you say the toughtest thing about making your first movie is?
 

I'm in the process and I'm looking for what hiccups I should look out for. Thanks.

I cannot say from a movie side. My biggest pain in production is synchronization rights and master use licensing for any of the music tracks. It just takes time and I have had to call back a few times. I am having to spend at least $500 for a buyout of only 250 copies (6 songs, twice) on a drum corps DVD. That was only for sync rights, as the corps has given permission (it raises funds for them already ;) )

I can understand how much of a pain it can be to get music rights. I wanted to use some music from the band Weezer, but I haven't been able to get in contact with them. Why is it so hard :(

Suggestion for anyone looking for music to use.

I've found that most record labels/distributors have sections of the company or better yet websites for licensing information.

Granted I've only quickly researched this as music is the least of my worries right now, but do a search through google for licensing contacts or rights for the specific record label you should be able to turn up some info.

I wish I knew the prices that they charge but as I mentioned I haven't fully researched it as of yet.

-Hal

Plan as much as you can. Make sure your locations are TRULY
secured and you have everything you need. You can read up
on some of my issues/troubles on my first movie in my article:

http://www.dvinfo.net/articles/production/lohman1.php

<<<-- Originally posted by George Ellis : I cannot say from a movie side. My biggest pain in production is synchronization rights and master use licensing for any of the music tracks. It just takes time and I have had to call back a few times. I am having to spend at least $500 for a buyout of only 250 copies (6 songs, twice) on a drum corps DVD. That was only for sync rights, as the corps has given permission (it raises funds for them already ;) ) -->>>

Hey!

What corp / DCI? are you working with? I helped produce some DCI / Crossmen vids a couple years ago while my brother was in the corp (euphonium lead). Video diaries during the season, warmsup, pre season, some of the lesser tournaments, etc. Pretty much anything and everything up to the actual championships themselves. Fun stuff!

Finishing it. :)

Rule number one:
Everything is harder than you think and takes longer than you expect.

Rule number two:
Everything will be harder than you think and will take longer than you expect, even when you take rule number one into account.

I started my first personal movie project over three years ago. I thought I was being very conservative, a simple 20 minute, fast paced plot with lots of action. That project is now mostly shot, but post production is at a crawl.

What I LEARNED from the experience has been far more valuable than anything that could have (can/will?) come from actually finishing that project. Since starting that first project, I've produced several other shorts and DVDs as well done post work and visual effects on several indie productions. None of THAT would have happened had I not started out on that first attempt.

Plan as much as humanly possible.
Visuallize every shot.
Write them down.
Work backwards through the pipeline writing down every element you expect to need for each shot. Then work forward again to figure just how to acquire/produce those elements and how long you expect each step to take.
The rules above will still apply, but at least you'll have a good roadmap check to see just how far you've come and where you still need to go.

Good luck.
Have fun.

Rehearse with the actors a lot - both before shooting, and on set. That includes what your camera move is going to be Staging can be a tricky thing and often getting it to look in real life as it does in your head is difficult to say the least. Prepare, prepare, prepare - if you try and wing it on the day, you will find yourself in a lot of trouble. For complex scenes, shoot as much coverage as you can make time for.

Schedule the whole shoot down to every shot you want. You don't have to stick to it religously, but it will make sure you get everything done.

I tend to shoot at a scheduled pace of 3 pages/day more or less. If I shoot more, great, I get ahead, and if things get difficult or I have a difficult bit of business, I usually have some time to figure it out. It also allows for a small amount of time on set for reflection, to see if you've missed anything you're going to want later.

On our shoots, we typically find it works out to about one page an hour, but we have a small crew so we can work fast. Lighting will slow you down a lot, so plan your shots and shoot as much as you can before moving the camera to another angle. Nothing ticks me off more than being asked to set up a new shot that could have taken advantage of a lighting scheme that we had shot earlier in the day.

Number one, BE CAREFUL WHO YOU HIRE. Anybody who shows an inclination to make problems early in the process (being late, personality conflicts, complaining, just being difficult, or even gossiping) should be fired immediately, but not in the presence of the rest of the cast and crew. I really mean that. One bad egg will poison the whole atmosphere. You need to surround yourself with positive energy.

Never promise something you can't deliver. If people lose confidence in you, the whole system shuts down, so always do what you say you are going to do.

Don't hold meetings unless absolutely necessary. This is contrary to most people's urge to hold endless production meetings that just suck all of the energy out of everybody. Instead have a few people in charge of key tasks and keep communication open with them. The phone is your friend.

Make sure you're on top of all technical aspects. Shooting is not the time to learn. This is especially true of sound, which is the one area that you can't skimp on at all. Bad sound equals bad movie.

Finally, don't wait for things to be perfect -- just shoot.

it's the SCRIPT ...

it's the actors ....

then comes the technicals

as a DP .. my beef with 1st time feature persons is they TALK about they want to go out to FILM ... they want the "film look" , they talk about what movie's ( 50-70 million $ budgets while ) they have no $$ for lights ) they like the lighting etc ..FILM look this - film look that !!post look this-that !!

they don't mention the script much !!!
IMO if they paid as much attention to the script as they do the film "look" -& post look questions they would have better scripts ...

get GOOD actors !!! viewers will live with a so so image if you have good actors BUT they will NOT live with great looking images with terrible actors !!!

NEVER put you girl/boy friend-spouse in your movie !!!

the toughest on last movie !!! was i had 50 lights rigged in the air and i needed 20 more lights... so the lighting crew had to keep taking lights off one set to move to another set then return the lights - took up too much time ... the set walls were only 8ft high !! so i had to put ceilings in on wide shots .... one of the actors DRANK too much ! was drunk on his last day !!! .....dailys were 2 days behind = 2 days of blue screen work the camera pull down was off so didn't see it till it was over .... was cheaper to use digital stabilzation in post ( flame) then to reshoot..some of the negative was scratched during film to tape transfer = production insurance paid to FIX it all in post ....

protect all your help ( paid & free ) = get workmans comp insurance !!!

<<<-- Don't hold meetings unless absolutely necessary. -->>>

Amen to that.

I'd add
- only hold meetings while standing up
- ban all food, drinks, and cell phones from meetings

<<<-- Originally posted by Nick Jushchyshyn : Finishing it. :)

Rule number one:
Everything is harder than you think and takes longer than you expect.

Rule number two:
Everything will be harder than you think and will take longer than you expect, even when you take rule number one into account.
-->>>

Reminds of the old woodworking project estimation rule. I'm guessing it pretty much applies to making a film: estimate the project then double the time and go to the next higher unit. E.g., a 3 day project will probably take 6 weeks. A 2 week project will usually take 4 months.


Good luck.

Dennis Vogel

The hardest thing?

Getting a good screenplay.

A good screenplay can become a bad film. A bad screenplay cannot become a good film.

Write a great screenplay, and your movie may have a fighting chance. Otherwise, it's a waste of your time.

Good luck!

<<<-- Otherwise, it's a waste of your time. -->>>

I have to slightly disagree here. Yes it is true that a (very) good
story is important and this will more likely get you noticed, but
that also depends on what you want to do in the business,
ofcourse.

But, a very good script will probably not help you in your first
couple of movies. Why? Because you will know nothing about
making movies. The experience of doing it is something completely
different then thinking about it. Especially with the more people
you are working (crew, actors).

Personally I would not put too much time into my first couple of
scripts, put it in learning the as much as you can about the entire
workflow which includes writing the script, other pre-production
work (planning for example), shooting, editing, effects, DVD
production etc. etc.

After you've done that a couple of times you will have a FAR
better understanding about what makes a not so good script
or a better (shooting) script. What kind of stuff you will cut that
doesn't advance a story, what kind of shooting material you need.

If you do all that on a couple of shorts (10 - 30 minutes or so),
which will take you an immense amount of time to make (which
is another thing you will learn) you will be way more ready to
do something longer and better. Then start working on some of
your dream scripts and stories (which will be your second learning
phase in my opinion).

Since this thread is about your **FIRST** movie I think these
things are very, very important. Therefore I would not focus too
much yet on a great script/story, do that later in the process.
For now focus on:

1. A story to tell
2. getting all the people and equipment together
3. shoot it
4. edit it
5. GET IT DONE AND FINISHED

You will learn so very much (check out my article for a slight idea)
about what you did good, what you did wrong and how to fix that
the next time around.

All the luck to everyone who is working to get that first one out!

p.s. to Jaime's defense, he was talking about the HARDEST thing
to do. The script/story is certainly among the top 5 indeed. I just
wanted to make sure people who are starting out take a few
things into account (in light of the thread's title!)

<<<-- Originally posted by Rob Lohman : <<<-- Otherwise, it's a waste of your time. -->>>Personally I would not put too much time into my first couple of
scripts, put it in learning the as much as you can about the entire
workflow which includes writing the script, other pre-production
work (planning for example), shooting, editing, effects, DVD
production etc. etc.

After you've done that a couple of times you will have a FAR
better understanding about what makes a not so good script
or a better (shooting) script. What kind of stuff you will cut that
doesn't advance a story, what kind of shooting material you need.-->>>

I agree that one shouldn't "make a film" based only on a good screenplay. I just think that having a good screenplay is step #1 in making a GOOD movie. Anyone can make a FIRST movie, but they're usually terrible. Not because the framing was off, or the lighting could have looked better, but because the story was bad.

If the question had been "what's the hardest thing about making a GOOD film?", the answer is getting a good screenplay. As far as making a first film, I'd think you're better off being a part of someone else's 2nd or 3rd film, so you can see how it works. Then, write an awesome screenplay, and come out with YOUR awesome first film.

If your talking about a feature then indeed script is king. Get a good dp and he'll take care of the look and coverage.

Then get good actors and preproduction, preproduction and preproduction will cover your butt on lots of things.

[edit] Oops, sorry for the forum necromancy, I didn't look at the date of the last post in this thread before replying. I'm not sure about ettiquette on resurrecting dead threads here, but if this need a lock, please go ahead and lock it.. [/edit]

I'm currently in post-production for a 12-minute video project I shot as part of an introductory film/video production class at university. I'm not sure how much of my experience will be applicable to anyone here, but I'll try to share what might be helpful.

First of all, planning is key. I knew I'd have exactly one month (November 1st to December 1st) to shoot and edit the piece. I started writing my script in September, and went through about 8 versions, getting feedback from various friends, professors, and so forth. Because I knew I'd have to make do with locations available in and around the university, and work with actors who were as busy with other coursework as I, I went intentionally minimalist -- two interiors, two actors, twelve minutes. I think Rob and Jaime are completely right about treating first films as learning experiences, by the way. I realize my first attempt at a script isn't going to be that great, and experience has since verified that my first film isn't going to be that great, but I've learned a lot from the mistakes I made.

I started casting in the second week of October, by pinning up notices around my campus and submitting notices to various theatrical listservs. The listservs didn't get the message out until a week later, though -- I presume they were moderated by busy professors or students who didn't have time to approve my submission -- so I had already begged a friend of a friend to fill one of the roles, thinking that my listserv submission had been rejected and my posters were ignored, and I actually had to turn down several actors who responded later. Thankfully, I did find one actress, but I only nailed details down with her about a week before my first scheduled shoot. The lesson here: Cast early, cast often. I can't speak to the commercial acting scene, since I was working with student actors who I paid in pizza and wings, but even there this probably applies -- allow more time than you think you'll need due to snafus that may crop up. Also, if you're a student filmmaker working with student actors, realize that your actors won't be perfect. I was lucky enough to get some very talented people working with me, but even so I had to make compromises in my original vision in order to cover for scenes that were just too ambitiously written (long takes with lots of subtle emotion required, etc).

One detail that caused a major snag for me was finding locations -- as I said, I was shooting in and around a college town, so I knew lots of people with apartments that would work, but convincing me to move in with actors and tons of film equipment for 7 hour days for two weekends in a row did not go over well. I eventually used my own apartment, with judicious set dressings, as one set, and found another friend who was willing to let me use her apartment as she crammed for an exam in the library. Of course, one of my actors had a scheduling conflict that day, so I wound up begging another friend to let me use her apartment down the hall for the other location, which was a less than optimal solution -- you can tell both apartments are in the same house, unfortunately, when they're supposed to be in different buildings.

I started my first shoot with a fairly firm notion of what was shooting, when. Not a shot list, but a good idea. Things went reasonably well, but in the excitement of my first day's real shooting, I missed one or two critical shots. Plan all that in advance, and stick to it. Lesson learned: Have a firm shot list, and stick to it.

In terms of equipment, I was lucky enough not to have any major problems, but make sure to have spare batteries for everything. Multiples if possible. Have spare bulbs for your lights, and entire spare lights if possible. Tape down all your cables with gaff tape, because actors WILL trip over them and send the $1000+ light you probably don't own slamming into the wall/floor, which is not good. Didn't happen to me, but I've heard stories and they aren't pretty.

I thought I'd wrapped shooting after the second weekend (total time: about 12 hours for the whole piece, which works out to about a minute of footage for an hour of work, which I believe is pretty damn good) but after a test screening of a very rough cut later that week, I realized I'd have to make some substantial changes and redub parts of the audio, which lead to this past weekend being very busy with me trying to schedule time in the audio suite with my actors' schedules, and then also pick up some missed shots. Lesson learned: Plan to fix problems in post. Better yet, learn from the problems you fix in post so the next time you're shooting, you'll accomodate for them ahead of time, because when working with 'real' actors, getting everybody back on site for another two days may not be economical in the least.

In terms of music, I strongly suggest you abandon all hope of liscensing "big name" music unless you have some personal connection to someone in a studio. Big names demand big cash (we're talking multi thousands of dollars for the right to play a recording of one song at -one- theatrical showing) and thus aren't economical for student films. However, if you know of local bands, they can be a great resource. I'm personally avoiding music in my piece, as a stylistic decision, but I know of some students in the advanced class who are working with music composition students and friends in bands to score their films.

And that's where I am so far. I hope some of this is useful. It may not be if you're coming from a professional perspective, but.. this is my experience, hope somebody can profit from it.

Thank you for your elaborate response Ryan, much appreciated!
It is fine to resurrect "older" threads, that's actually preferred so
you get longer threads with much information inside instead of
the information scattered around lots of threads.

Your points are excellent and I couldn't agree more!!