Friday, August 24, 2012

Tips for Indie Film Makers

In this post I would really like to hit home many of the Do's and Don'ts for indie film makers. I am sure that this is a tired subject, but that doesn't make it any less relevant. I will also be citing many of my own experiences on different sets, and bringing up points that I have been giving a lot of thought about since my last post.

Part One: Seeking Your Sound Dept.

To start off with, those of you who do not know, I am a Production Sound Mixer, and yes that is the actual title. Boom Operator only implies that they operate the boom pole, not the mic, or sound its self. Audio Tech refers to the Third member of a typical Sound Team, whose duties include running cables, laving up talent, and also Booming when a second boom is required. If you are going to put an ad out looking to hire someone or a team to run sound for your film, you should know the difference because one day you might hire the wrong person for the job. I see so many ads out there from people looking for an Audio Tech or a Boom Mike Operator (operating a boom named Mike?), or Sound Operator (a wizard that can manipulate sound its self!), that I sometimes consider applying for the job, showing up with no gear (because these positions do not ever own their own equipment), and asking the client where the Sound Mixer/Sound Department Head is, just to see if they even know what I am talking about. My point is that people seem to be so wound up in how great the Red Camera is, or the story, or whatever else they are thinking about, that they can't seem to get titles right. So imagine if you posted an ad looking for a Boom Op, thinking that this is a "One Man Team" (designed for ENG and Docu-Style shoots where quality isn't important, unlike a narrative...) with equipment, and they show up on set with nothing in hand, expecting to be working with a Sound Mixer. I wouldn't be surprised if this happens regularly, but I would love to know what would be going through the minds of the people who posted the ad and were perhaps too specific with the job title, and maybe didn't know enough to follow up with appropriate content for their job posting or to ask the right questions to the applicant. This would be like putting an ad out for a Focus Puller, thinking that they were going to be a DP with camera and equipment!

Another thing I find amusing is when people ask to see my demo reel. If I were a DP, Actor, or Sound Designer, I would certainly have a demo reel. But as it stands, once the audio that I have recorded has been edited, mixed, had sound design, foley, fx, background design, and music added, how much of that audio can you be sure you are hearing? This is why the Production Sound Dept does not have demo reels. I do however share a few links to some of my work, but again, that is still subjective to the quality of work that Post Production has done with it. Generally, if you are looking to hire a Sound Mixer, you check their credits, maybe do a small interview over the phone (most will not come to an interview in person unless they are getting paid to do so... remember, they have to take time off to do that sort of thing), and ask about the equipment that they are providing (for a kit rental of course) only IF you know what they are talking about. If you think that a boom and a Zoom h4n is "pro" or even "good enough", you are sorely mistaken, and your final product will be the proof. Not only because of the inferior equipment, but because you hired a "sound guy" who also thought that it was!

These are the correct steps for hiring your Sound Dept: When your script looks like it is near completion, and you are putting together a budget, you contact your Dept Heads (Production Sound Mixer for the Sound Dept), tell them what the project is from a technical standpoint (Never tell them how to do their job, it is up to them to decide the best way to do it), give them a timeframe (when you are looking to shoot, how many days), and ask them what their rate and kit fee, and what the rate for a Boom Op and possible Audio Tech would be for such a task. The Sound Mixer will then hire their own Sound Crew based on an agreed upon budget. Do Not Ever say that it is a passion project and you are on a limited budget, or paying out of pocket. At this point, all the Mixer hears is the worlds tiniest violin, because you and everyone else out there is trying to get favors from him/her as well. In this respect, if they don't work for you, they WILL be working for someone else, and they have nothing to gain from the experience except a pay check. Sure friends and credits, great. But honestly, that comes with the job, and they are not in the business of doing favors, after all it is their job, and they are trying to do business, not favors.

Other departments need credits and material for their reel because they have creative and highly competitive positions, and they are constantly scrambling to be the one chosen for the job. But most other departments provide little to no equipment, rather the Production rents those things, unlike Sound, where we provide everything, and only occasionally need to rent specific things that would not be part of a standard audio kit. Because a Sound Mixer must own a great amount of expensive equipment, it is more difficult to become a Sound Mixer, hence why there are fewer Mixers than most other positions. Again, these are all things that I have discussed before, but consider that one a refresher course.

Part Two: How To Work On Set.

Indie film makers are infamous for making all the worst decisions because they go into production with not enough funds, and they try a number of things to cut corners. Going long days is one of them. If you ask your crew to go a full 12 hours plus lunch, keep in mind that they also have to factor in travel time, getting ready for work, etc, plus sleep. Most of the time a 12 hour work day constitutes less than 8 hours of sleep. On that schedule people will be tired, grumpy, and not very motivated very quickly. Often by day two! Try to keep your work day between 8 and 10 hours because people need their sleep. They also often need to make backups, tear down/set up equipment, charge batteries, and perform a multitude of other tasks that cut into their off time. A TV show I worked on ran us a full 12 hours plus a one hour lunch break, and most locations were at least an hour drive to and from. But when we got back to the hotel we would have to go through all of the equipment, organizing, cleaning, transferring footage and making backups, and charging batteries. The process took about five hours each night. To make matters worse, it was a very labour intensive show, and the weather was often very hot and humid during the day, and extremely cold at night, and we were constantly being bitten by all kinds of insects. You can imagine how doing that kind of a work day can be if you only have a couple of hours to sleep. A lot of times when days run late, I don't have time enough to charge my batteries for the next day! So keep the day short if possible, and expect that you might go over the amount of time you planned, because it happens more often than not.

Food. You absolutely have to feed people well. When a crew shows up on set, they expect to see Crafty. This includes snacks of both healthy (fruit, hummus, veggies, etc) and American (candy, chips, candy bars and granola bars, etc) varieties, water (always have water, and lots of it, never only soda as many people do not drink it), soda, maybe juice, definitely coffey. If your production begins in the morning, expect to provide some sort of breakfast. Remember, not everyone had time to eat something that morning. Lunch. You are expected to provide a hot meal. This is standard, and when hiring professionals, they expect some standards. If you feed your crew well, they will be happy and work harder. This does not mean Pizza, a frozen lasagna, Subway Sandwiches, or anything insulting like that. We are working hard and putting in a lot of hours, the least you can do is give us a good meal. Productions that I have been on that made the crew happy would take orders from a local restaurant, hire a caterer, or even make a delicious home made meal. But be aware of food allergies and special diets. Generally any sort of sandwich place is not a good idea. Vegetarians have a hard time finding something to eat at these type of places, and expecting them to eat a salad as the only veggie option is insulting them to their face. It is generally a good idea to inquire to everyone hired on the production what their food allergies/dietary restrictions are. IF anyone does have these sort of limitations, continue to inquire, never assume. More often than not I see people with these sorts of restrictions go hungry because they were not considered, or the chosen restaurant/caterer did not offer any options for them. Here are a couple of things to keep in mind:

Vegetarian means people who do not eat meat. Vegan means people who do not eat any sort of animal product. Most of both of these types of people prefer a Plant Based Diet, Healthy Options, and Non Processed Foods. This is to be Healthy, not just to save the chickens. So a cheese pizza will probably not be something that they will eat, because there is nothing veggie about it. A veggie pizza is just a cheese pizza with filler veggies like onions and peppers. I consider those to be more like spices than veggies, and many people agree with me. Eggplant and Zucchini are vegetables, but I still don't want a pizza if I am trying to have a healthy diet, and I don't want to get fat because you are cheap. One of the TV shows I work on always gets breakfast burritos in the morning. The vegetarian breakfast burrito is literally a tortilla with eggs and cheese. On this show there is a Hindu, and a vegetarian, and the talent are always thinking about their weight. So they never get breakfast. Kind of a bummer. People aren't happy on that show, and are always complaining.

Many films that I have worked on have hired caterers that really go out of their way to make good food that wont put you in a food coma, that is healthy, and delicious. On top of that, they include a salad (with a choice of dressings, never already on the salad, and any animal product add-ons are separate), always vegetable options, separate meat options (remember that some people do not eat red meat, others do not eat pork, others do not do sea food, etc). If you are going to provide a fish option (which I really like personally), do remember to provide a poultry option, since some people have a hard time with fish. Get my point? You are feeding a large group of people who are working very hard and long hours, make sure that they get the right kind of fuel that they need. Keep them happy, and they will work hard and do a good job...and be happy! Never Ever get Subway! I have personally walked off of set because of that! Sandwiches, pizza, these types of things often average about $5-$10 per person. So does catering. Do the right thing.

Multiple Cameras. Many indie film makers think that by using more than one camera to shoot a scene, they can go twice as fast. Wrong! What happens here is that you reduce the amount of overall takes that you do, and if something goes wrong and no one catches it on set, and you only do a couple of takes total, you may not get the coverage you need. I have seen people go back on a pickup day months later to re shoot a scene because of this very mistake more often than I'd like to admit. The other problem with that scenario is that when doing this sort of thing people often like to try to get different angles and sizes of angles at the same time. Sounds like a great idea really, get the wide shot and the tight shot at the same time! Well there are a number of reasons why this is a horrible idea. First, let's take it back to sound: Most Sound people will admit that if you cannot boom a shot, the shot is not worth getting. What this means is that you do not rely on wireless, for a number of different technical reasons, but mostly because they do not sound as realistic as a properly handled boom. If one camera has three feet of space above the heads of the actors and the top of the frame, and the other is tight on their face, then when you cut to that tight shot in post, they will sound very distant. Makes sense right? Perspective. Because the boom has to stay out of the shot of that really wide shot you decided to do at the same time! So you see, we have physics and simple logic at work here! Other reasons for not doing that sort of thing are that sometimes an actor's wardrobe does not permit a very good place to conceal a wireless mic pack, so depending upon the shot and the actors movement, the pack needs to be moved to a different spot on their person. I worked on a film where they decided to work this way, and the wardrobe did not allow a place to conceal the mic pack, or even let the wire come anywhere near the actors voice, so there was basically just no way to mic them. They may as well have been nude from my perspective. So wireless, a good backup system, was not possible, and I could only boom the scene. But the wide shot was too wide, and they sounded too distant, even for that angle. The whole film was like this. I pleaded with them to work WITH me and not AGAINST me, but my pleads fell upon deaf ears and were unheard. So was the dialogue for the film. They had to re-dub the whole film, and it cost them three times the initial budget, and took months to finish. All because they wanted to cut corners, and wouldn't listen to their department heads. A non-sound related reason why it is a bad idea to use multiple cameras at varying degrees is for lighting. You almost always have to relight when you go in for the tighter shots. So if you are not going to relight, your shots will not come out the way you want. Keep in mind that film making is not just about telling a story, there are a lot of technical tricks, otherwise known as "Hollywood Magic" that go into play to make it looks like nothing changed at all!

Legality. Believe it or not, just because you are working on your life's passion project, and even if everyone is in it for the fun (good luck making that happen!), does not mean that you can break the law. You need to get production insurance, provide at least minimum wage, compensate for expenses such as rented items, expendables, etc. and get permits. If you ask your crew to shoot without a permit, and are not providing insurance, many counties reserve the right to confiscate equipment, stop production, even bring you in to jail, on top of fining everyone involved. What this means is that, aside form the obvious, everyone that provided equipment and had it confiscated, is now out of luck. They more than likely make their living with that equipment, and you just got it all taken away from them. How do you think that makes them feel? Out of a job maybe? Also, if your project involves animals, stunts, many types of practical effects, and certain locations, you need to have an EMT on site. If we are working out in the desert and someone gets bit by a snake, a ride to the nearest hospital probably wont save them. I recently worked on a film where one of the camera operators decided to get creative while the producer wasn't around, and got on the roof of the building next door (keep in mind that this is around 1AM and we didn't have access to that building), and started filming while shimmying to the side to get camera movement. Well, he stepped on a skylight, and fell 30 feet onto a concrete floor. He broke his camera, and a couple of bones, and had to spend a couple of weeks in the hospital because he also had a number of other injuries from the fall. This drained all the funds for the film, and we didn't finish our day. So the producers had to find more funding and tried to get the crew to work at a reduced rate. Needless to say the film was never completed. So be safe, and be sure to provide the simple assurances to your workers that their health and equipment are safe.

Planning. Planning is everything, and a poorly planned shoot will inevitably end in disaster. This means having a realistic schedule for every day, and a detailed shot list that you have gone over with your Department Heads so that they can tell you what is realistic, and so that they can prepare for them. When I am Told what a shot is instead of me being a Part of that decision, I am often put in a position where other departments are knowingly or not, working against me (since their decisions are usually creative and mine are mainly technical). And if a scene requires special preparation or equipment, I need to know about it in advance. I have a lot of equipment that I do not bring with me every day because it is not practical for me to do so. But I have that equipment because I would like to offer more than the bare minimum. I would just like to know about it first. A lot of times I will be Told the day of that we are doing a certain kind of scene that may require special equipment or additional setup time, but no time was allotted for me, and maybe I didn't bring that particular piece of equipment. Well, not my fault, because I wasn't a part of the process, and the film misses out because of it. Car scenes with dialogue are good examples of this sort of thing. Getting usable dialogue in a moving car (or even a non moving car for that matter!) can be tricky, and requires someone with experience and the right equipment to pull it off well. It also takes time to set up. Most indie films have horrible sound during car scenes for this reason.

A Properly planned schedule will also help keep production on time. If you are not on time, you either have to keep shooting and go into over time (and pay the crew more), and then push the call time for the next day (12 hour turnaround minimum is always mandatory) so you keep starting later every day, or you have to cut some shots or even scenes from the schedule, or you can plan for extra shoot days. Those are your options, notice how non of them include magically getting an over packed schedule into a small amount of time? Again, keep things realistic. It is fine to be ambitious, but do not be over ambitious. Your crew and actors may not share your ambition, and most likely cannot bend the laws of physics to make your ambitions a reality.

One more thing to add to this section is Parking and Directions. If you do not make sure that everyone has detailed directions, preferably with a map that is marked, and parking instructions, do not be surprised if people do not show up or are late. I cant tell you how many times I am told to show up at a particular place at a particular time, and I cant find it, or there is no available parking. I was once even given detailed instruction from a Production Coordinator, who was Coordinating from out of town and had never been to the location personally, that I needed to park at the adjacent lot, and above all, not in the underground parking. Well, the adjacent lot was for service workers of the building only, and the attendant wouldn't let me enter. There was no street parking available for blocks (keep in mind I have lots of equipment that I need to haul to the location, so I need to park close!), and I ended up circling the block while trying to call the crew for help, and my only option was to park underground. Why did they not want me to park underground where there are elevators that bring me directly to where we were shooting and I could park close to? Well, because being Los Angeles, parking there cost $16 for the day. Was it worth me being late and missing the interview? Apparently being cheap was worth missing our reason for being there... Was it MY fault, even though for whatever reason I was the ONLY person who didn't find street parking? No. Bad planning means you get to accept the outcome of every possible scenario, even if it means not getting what you set out to get. Oh, and yes, I still got paid for the day. I expect a map with details illustrating and explaining to me where I need to park, or where I need to load in equipment before moving my vehicle to a permanent parking space. Expect to pay for parking, and if you need people to front those fees, let them know the day before, and do not let them find out upon arrival. That day I had no change for meters, and only a credit card on me, so the paid parking was my only option. You should also give directions to the location coming from common routes, like for example if the location is Paramount Studios, you should include directions from downtown, the valley, and probably Santa Monica as well. This will allow people to verify that the directions that Google Maps gave them are in fact accurate. Many times they are not, and people show up late, so please cover all of your bases here!

Why You Shouldn't Fix It In Post:

If you couldn't get it done right the first time, or didn't make the effort to, then trying to fix it in post is like, well, polishing a you know what. Most of the time, if you start with a bad product, you will end up with a bad product, and no amount of fixing it in post will change that. Sometimes you get lucky, but with the amount of time and money that you are already spending, wouldn't you like the assurance that you are in fact getting something that will be usable? Sound is more than often the thing that suffers most from this sort of mentality, and ironically is the thing that will make or break your film above all else! But realistically, if you do not do things right the first time, it might cost you a lot more than you would like later on.

We all remember the infamous Blair Witch, and how a small group of indie film makers managed to make a feature film that made them millions of dollars, all on the meager budget of $20,000. This old fable is quickly regaining popularity because as of late, film makers have also figured out that a "Found Footage" style film can help save them money, and give their film a trendy edge that certainly will not date their film by any means.... What people don't know, but you can look up if you had the mind to, is that fixing the sound alone cost them more than five times their initial budget, and the film spent about eight months in post AFTER the indie film makers had made THEIR final cut. You see, what happened was that the film got picked up for distribution from an actual distributor, and they have standards. So they made them re cut the whole film and re record all the audio based off of some test screenings they did. Initially people hated the film and couldn't understand what anyone said, not to mention the plot holes and technical problems because these people were not seasoned film makers. Once everything was said and done, Blair Witch cost about 1.2 million dollars. If they had done things right the first time, they probably could have made the film for $50,000. I see a lot of people trying to make their film the same way, thinking it will be cheaper, but realistically it will always hurt them in the end. Any film or TV show that has people running around with handy cams, even if they are supposed to be on their own with no crew, always has a pro sound team. You have to get good sound on these types of productions, because you can always dumb the sound down to make it SEEM like it is all camera audio, but you can never just go off of the camera's audio because it WILL let you down and cost you a lot to fix. Aside from acting and plot holes, bad audio (even if it is intended) will always be the number one criticism of a production, even if the audience doesn't know that they don't like it because of the quality of the sound, and any seasoned film maker of any department will tell you this. Anyone who says different, well, you probably shouldn't be taking their advice. I've worked on ghost hunter shows where I wasn't actually supposed to be there, but there was no other way. They dumbed down the audio in post, and everything came out convincing and great. We had over a million viewers when the show premiered! Far cry from people actually hating the Blair Witch because of the overall poor quality and lack of professionalism in the methods of the film makers.

Camera choices, and how they affect many things: The resolution you shoot your film at will determine the life of your film. If you shoot on a DSLR at what we currently describe as "HD", your film will only be relevant as long as those technical specs are. So in let's say two years when the new HD is 2k and no longer 1080p and we all have to buy new TVs again, your film will not display correctly on those TVs. It will also not display correctly on projectors in theatres, and will likely have to live out its life on the internet, buried amongst a multitude of low rez weekend warrior passion projects that didn't have the foresight to shoot in a higher definition. Now, if this is your student film, or one of your first films and you are still learning from your mistakes, don't wast your money renting a high end camera. But if you honestly believe that the film you are making is going to get back end funding and distribution and all the works, then maybe you should take the tools you work with more seriously. The camera you choose will determine a lot of things for your film, such as the film's budget and lifespan, as well as the amount of time it will take to finish the project. In my experience, a RED camera will usually add about an hour per shoot day for boot ups, hickups, REDisms, and building and disassembling the damn thing. In my opinion it is more trouble than it is worth, and that goes for all the camera models that they make. A DSLR, aside from only being standard HD, has no usable on board camera audio (not a big deal, you shouldn't record to camera anyway), often needs to swap out memory cards and batteries, and it also doesn't have Time Code. What is that you say? Well it is this magical thing that will save you hours in post and lots of money in the long run. A lot of cameras do have time code, and I strongly suggest going with a camera that does. But be sure that if the camera of your choosing requires proprietary cables and adapters, that they be included in your camera rental. Some cameras today have camera specific audio and time code cables and adapters that I would never own since they are proprietary, not standard. Many productions assume that I will simply be able to interface with any camera of their choosing and then neglect to tell me about it or seek my wisdom. They usually end up having no audio reference track and no time code, and have to manually sync everything in post. If they do not slate their takes correctly, then this can be an even more difficult task that can not only be time consuming, but costly. Running Time Code with sound and picture properly will basically eliminate the sync process in post because they will snap together on the timeline. Whats more is that in those hasty moments where there is no time to slate the take, and you decide to do a tail slate, but then forget to do so, the takes will still sync up thanks to the time code! The Sound Department usually provides the time code, but if you need things like Lock-it Boxes, those are usually a camera rental. Some Sound Mixers will have these, but you will have to rent it from them. Do not expect them to have them, and do not expect to get them for free.

Qualified Personel: Every department has specific jobs and duties that cannot always be cut or substituted by someone inexperienced or unqualified. A fine example is wardrobe. I worked on a film where the writer/lead actress of the film (yup, one of those...) also chose the wardrobe for the whole cast. She put every male character in a satin neck tie. A professional wardrobe person would know not to use certain fabrics such as satin if they can avoid it because it is a rather noisy scratchy type of fabric. Usually when someone is wearing a neck tie, that is the only place to hide a lav mic, but if the material is a no-no for sound, then that person will simply have bad audio for as long as they wear that tie. In this case, practically the whole cast was wearing those cursed ties, and needless to say that made my life difficult. Let's just say that a lot of that film had to be re recorded. A TV show I work on, the makeup artist is also the wardrobe person, but she is not exactly qualified for the job. She knows how to make people look good for camera, but thats it. She always puts the host of the show in a stiff starchy button-up shirt. Those are no-no's for sound as well. So every time the host speaks, and he does a lot of that, you can constantly hear clothing rustle. Theres nothing I can do about that except ask them to change their shirt out. It's not the mic rubbing against the fabric, it's the sound of the fabric rubbing against its self. Attention to details like this go a long way. But when they are neglected, the problems roll up hill. So trying to save money on wardrobe suddenly becomes my problem. If there's nothing I can do about it, then it becomes the actor's problem (because if you sound bad, you look bad, but if you sound good, you look better!), and then it becomes production's problem because they now have the choice of having a poor product, or spending the money to re record the dialogue.

Part Three: Funding.

The gist of it all is that making a film is an expensive venture, even if it's a simple story with minimal characters and locations. You still need to cover your bases and do things right. So doing your homework ahead of time and talking to your Department Heads before you put a budget together will help you get a good idea of what your film will actually cost to make, instead of trying to make it with some random number you came up with or can put on a credit card. Getting proper funding is key for so many reasons; reasons beyond what I have described to you here. There is always the unforeseen, inevitable, and any number of things that can come up that will make or break your project before you can get it off the ground, or stop it dead in its tracks. A great example of this is when people tell me what my rate is, rather than just paying me my rate. If you set aside x amount of dollars per day without doing your research, and expect people to work for that pay, keep in mind that they may take the gig, but move on to a better one when it comes along. For indie films, my minimum rate is kind of high. Not because I'm in some sort of union, or because I have a high opinion of myself, but because I have a lot of obligations with big productions that have a tendency to call me at the last minute. A lot of people are in the same boat as me. When they do, I have to drop what I am doing and find a replacement for myself. I have a lot of great Mixer friends that I trust and know that I can call upon them, but I can't if the rate is too low. They just won't take the gig, and I'll be forced to leave the project and offer no one in my place. Simple as that. Also, my equipment is insanely expensive, and honestly I need a project to be worth my time. Remember, if I'm not working for you, I AM working for someone else, so I need a good reason for working on any particular project. Lots of indie films are always hiring me at a higher rate than they were initially paying their Sound Dept because the previous person was either doing a lousy job, or just up and left the production. This is because they weren't paying enough to get anyone good, or they weren't paying enough to make anyone want to stay and see the project through. It's a tough reality, but it is the truth, and you can't make someone sign a contract saying that they will stick with the project until the end if you aren't meeting their financial needs. So like I said, you need funding. There's a lot of ways to get funding for your film, so any time someone says that they don't have enough funding for this or that, what I hear is that they didn't TRY to get funding correctly, or their project is too ambition for their budget. I have several links to resources on my web-site that talk about finding funding for your indie film, but really what it comes down to is that you need to hire a producer to take care of that. If they don't find funding, they don't get paid, so they have a vested interest.

Much of this is stuff that I have talked about before, but I encourage you to read my other posts because they go into more detail. If you have questions about things, please feel free to contact me, or do more research. If I just blew your mind with all kinds of info that you didn't know or your film school didn't tell you, you need to learn more about the biz before you attempt a project. An under funded, half cocked project will almost always go off in your face in more ways than one, and many of these attempts never see the light of day because they didn't get enough usable material. If you feel like you need more hands on experience in order to get to know how these things work, PA or volunteer on some film sets for a while until you get to see how things work. Once you do that, keep reading, because you probably were working on a set that wasn't doing things right. I know I talk a lot about Sound in relation to indie film making, but like I said before, it is often the most overlooked, and so many things can affect its outcome, and of course it is so important that it cannot afford to be overlooked. So I am trying to get indie film makers in the correct mind set. Believe me, there is a reason why most indie films suck, and never do well. Sound is mostly that reason, aside from other drawbacks due to lack of funding and professionalism. So do yourself a favor and keep doing research, and make this a part of your life if you are truly passionate about it, and please pass this link around. I would like to see a golden age of indie film making, but alas I believe that in this current day we are far from it. This sort of "inside information" could really help so many people, if they only cared enough to get past their egos and personal limitations.