Ups and downs during pre-production July 31, 2007
Posted by joost in : LFA, producing , comments closed“Location location location” has been my mantra the past weeks. We want to shoot in an artist’s studio, a sculptor’s workshop. Most of these can be found in East London, quite a distance from our film academy. We managed to find some studios just a couple of blocks away that were suitable, but eventually we did not get permission to film there. Days pass by, stress levels go up, calls are not returned, still no location. People from the LFA start talking us into shooting in the LFA studio at the second floor. Far from ideal and not really suitable either. A blitzkrieg search delivered new promising leads. Time to gamble: secure a somewhat suitable location or wait a little longer until other and better leads develop further..?
The cut-off point – forget about shooting on location – was yesterday. We stretched it to today because we arranged to visit the most expensive (but spacious and available!) option, and to gain an extra day for our backup option.
Tomorrow we’ll lock this location, which is an important milestone because almost everything else depends on this step; the choreography of the shots, the remaining budget for the sculptures and set dressing, approval for our cashflow (which means we can actually spend money), the lighting setup, catering options, rehearsal dates, transport arrangements, etc etc etc.
Pre-production is unfolding like a series of ups and downs. Location hunting is a roller-coaster ride on itself. Other activities range from fun to annoying. Casting and auditions were entertaining, budgeting and cashflow relatively simple, finding a sculptor was a headache with a surprisingly easy but good result, and getting people to attend meetings and to be pro-active is a whole new ballgame…
The general vibe of the group differs each day. There are four “core pre-production teams” consisting of the producer and director, and the directors of photography and 1st assistant directors backing them up. Each team tries to get their own production up and running, on time, on schedule and within budget. In this intense period irritations, unfulfilled expectations and miscommunication are unavoidable. So yeah, some days suck due to lack of progress, tension between people, bad weather, motivational problems or just general suckiness.
Last Tuesday was one of the worst days so far where everything seemed to go wrong, from printers not wanting to cooperate, locations falling through, people feeling down or distracted, and just a wrong kind of energy floating around and affecting people. This aggravating day had an unexpected happy ending because a flatmate of mine had borrowed “Extras – Series 1″ on DVD. We watched all the episodes and by the time this was finished I was totally Zen again 
Not every day is scheduled for pre-production, we have some regular classes in between, such as a masterclass on make-up in film, script supervision (by one of the top people in the UK who did some big blockbusters, most recently the new Bourne Ultimatum film!), location management, production design. Great fun these classes, because we got an overview of these specific parts of the film process, but also because we could ask for specific advise regarding our upcoming 5 minute films.
I almost forgot to tell about the sculptor. A classmate of mine just happened to run into a sculptor at a party last week. Turns out that she is one of the four people who are allowed to touch the sculptures at the National Gallery AND who has a degree in sculpting AND who is very interested in making our main sculptures that feature in the film AND offers to do this for virtually no money!
A day of pre-production July 18, 2007
Posted by joost in : LFA, producing , comments closed08:30. The alarm of my phone rings. *snooze*. What day is today? Tuesday. I promise myself ten more minutes to postpone the start of this day.
Around half past nine I leave my house and greet a cautious sun. A short walk to the LFA for another day of pre-production. I make my way through the Certificate students that are booking out equipment for a exterior shoot. First stop: our kitchen to make an instant coffee. The foul taste of it surpasses the desired caffeine kick but does its job. Next stop: the production office, a 8 by 12 feet barrack at the back of the LFA building, The Old Church. I literally have to drag the key to open the door, because it is attached to a chain and an empty film can 
I prepare myself for a day at the “office” – if you call four 5 year old pc’s, some wobbly desks, a handful of power and ethernet chords and some chairs an office. Quite cosy nevertheless, especially when people slowly start to trickle in as the day develops.
The casting call I sent around to 21 actresses yesterday leads to some phone calls and emails during the day. We have an audition planned this Monday, so my goal is to fill as many slots as possible with actresses that might suit the role according to the director. Because some of them are not available or not interested and the success rate of casting calls sent out by other producers is not that high, I conclude that we need to select more prospective actresses. That means that the director has to help finding and agreeing on more actresses.
“Where is he anyway, he ought to be in right now, delivering the new rewrite.” A phone call learns that he is not feeling well and wants to send the rewrite at the end of the afternoon. Not acceptable, and after come convincing he comes in an hour later to discuss the rewrite-in-progress, additional casting and some lighting ideas with the DoP.
The hours of the afternoon fly by. I spent time finishing the one page outline of the sculptures that need to be made for the shoot, updating the pre-production schedule, playing with options in the budget, describing the tasks and responsibilities of the 1st assistant director, discussing new ways of finding an affordable location that is nearer to the LFA than all the way in East London, supervising the selection of actresses and sending out extra casting calls.
All these activities are intermingled with talks with the rest of the pre-production crew that work on other films, swapping experiences and sorting out common issues. And don’t worry, plenty of chitchat, jokes, laughter, swearing – in English, Spanish and Italian today – and tea/coffee/cigarette breaks.
My day at the production office ends twelve hours after it started. I walk home, somewhat tired but also with a brain that is still in a high gear. The funny thing I have experienced the past few days, is that the pressure cooker of these pre-production days seems to lead to more energy and creativity. I feel very much alive! I am excited doing this part of the film process, and at least once a day I am suddenly hit by an idea for a screenplay or a scene of a short film-to-be. No idea where I will find the time to do something (more) with these brainwaves besides writing them down, but it’s a comfort to know that the main character in my screenplay that now is in pre-production owes its very existence to such a brainwave almost four years ago.
The 5 minute film process July 11, 2007
Posted by joost in : LFA , comments closedHere is the long awaited update and news on the 5 minute films. I waited with this post because some details had to be finalized first, and straight after that we kicked into pre-production mode. But let me start by the beginning.
In the first term me and my classmates worked on developing our script for a short film. Based on the length of the story and the number of locations / actors, eight of these scripts got labeled “5 minute film”, and seven as “10 minute film”.
At the end of June, the LFA selected 4 of the 8 scripts that they feel have the most potential and are most viable to turn into a 5 minute film during this term. Students then pitched to direct one of these scripts. During a pitch you tell a committee of four people (the principal of the LFA, a writing, a producing and a directing tutor) what your vision is on the script, the mood, the actors, the difficulties, the visual aspects, etcetera. Those with the most convincing pitch are assigned to direct that script.
Next up is pitching for the key roles, that are involved during the period of pre-production. These key roles are producer, director of photography and 1st assistant director. Because a lot of people want to do camera operating, that also is considered a key role.
In this round of pitches you can submit a written pitch with the key role that you’d like to fulfill on a particular film and your reasons for this choice.
The same committee of the LFA assigns students to these key roles based on the pitches.
After the key crew has been selected, the rest of the roles – such as boom operator, gaffer, editor, etc – gets divided. In this term this is done by the LFA as well, mostly based on your performance during the 2 minute films.
Tuesday the 3rd of July the selected scripts that go into production and attached directors were announced. My script is one of them!
A few days later the role allocation was announced. I pitched to produce one of the films, and got assigned on my preferred film! Furthermore, I am editor on one of the films, continuity person on another, and focus puller on the shoot of the script that I have written. I am very happy with these roles!
On a sidenote: I did not pitch for director this time, because the 10 minute scripts are more appealing to me. I can connect more with two or three of those scripts, and not really with the available 5 minute scripts – except mine of course, but you’re not allowed to direct a script that you have written yourself. Also, you are only allowed to direct one film, so you have to choose wisely.
Besides those facts, I also wanted to experience what it is like to produce, because I think that will help me to gain a better understanding of that process and it will help me as a director.
The downside is that the competition will be heavier when pitching for a 10 minute film, so I’ll have to do a really good pitch in the third term.
What happens now (roughly the whole month of July) is a period of four weeks of pre-production. I am heavily involved because I am the writer of one script and producer on another.
As a writer you have to do several (major) rewrites to really get to the essence of your story, to incorporate the ideas of the director and to take production issues into account. I am very happy with the director that gets to film my script, I feel it is in safe hands with her, and I am very lucky with the producer because he has the guts and energy to produce the most difficult of the four scripts. Some of them take place in just one room with 4 people talking, my script has – amongst other things – a snake and a mouse, and takes place in an elevator… Every now and then I apologize to him for giving the producer such a hard time with my script
As a producer on the other film I am quite busy as well. I basically have to manage the film; arrange castings, props, locations, equipment, transport, shooting schedule, budget, rehearsals, technical review of the location, risk assessments, clearing rights, arranging extra crew such as a composer or production designer, you name it.
Hopefully everything will be arranged in the given time frame, because in August we do a total of 3 weeks of shooting. Every shoot has one day of getting all the gear and sets / locations ready, three days of filming, and one day of returning everything again. Repeat this for the four films, and you have 20 days of filming starting the 6th and ending on the 25th of August.
What all of this means is that the next 8 weeks will be very intense and that I will be making long days (my estimate is 60 hours per week?). Which is great, because that is exactly why I am doing this year at the LFA! Forget about summer, let’s make some movies! 
Producing 101 July 1, 2007
Posted by joost in : LFA, producing , comments closedIn preparation for the 5 minute films that we will be making this term, we had several classes on producing. During these days we went through a 6 centimeter pile of forms, rules, regulations, screenplays, callsheets, tables and similar paperwork. Not the most stimulating way of making people enthusiastic about producing, but “with great power comes great responsibility“.
One of the things we practiced was breaking down the script into production sheets and scheduling the shoot. Every scene can be represented by a 1 cm horizontal strip which contains the location name, interior / exterior, day / night, a one-line summary and the length of the scene in pages. Print all these strips, cut them out of paper, group the strips by location, arrange them, look at the constraints (actor availability, difficult shots, time…), rearrange, and repeat this process a number of times. Eventually you’ll end up with an ambitious but hopefully realistic schedule.
A good exercise that makes you think about the complexity of trying to arrange a film shoot. “Now that we’ve done this by hand, I will show you how to use Movie Magic Scheduling, the industry standard software to support this process.” -”Cool,” was my response, “I’m curious to see what results the auto-schedule button will deliver!”. Turns out that there is NO auto-schedule button (!). People in the film industry apparently schedule films using paper, scissors, a big table and their producing experience. I was stunned, to say the least. The little I know about film scheduling, it just seems like a mathematical optimalisation problem where you have tens of parameters and a number of constraints. Add the rules of thumb that an experienced producer / 1st assistant director knows by heart to this equation, and software could make your life much easier! I see opportunities here! Anyone @ xs interested in joining me in a new startup that will revolutionize the film industry?
Besides scheduling we also learned about budgeting, cashflow, bookkeeping and other kinds of reporting. No real rocket science, and when you’re dealing with these topics specifically in the context of film I found it not as boring as I would have expected. But I guess the proof is in eating the pudding. More on this in a few days.