We’re certainly not the first people crazy enough to write that script, raise some cash, hire a crew, and shoot a feature film. So knowing that there have been plenty of pioneers before us, we’ve always devoured any books, magazines, websites, and advice we could find that might inform us on how to do it better, cheaper, faster, and wiser. This article is an effort to pass along the same kind of info we sought when making our first films — whether they be short, doc, or feature films.
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Shooting a feature film in 9 cities across 2 countries for 5 weeks with over 60 speaking roles is not a recipe for a cheap picture. We knew this going in. We also knew we really wanted to make this movie, that few - if any - compromises could be made script-wise, and that we were working with a budget well under that of many independent features. How was this going to work?
Listed below are 5 decisions we made that not only helped keep costs low, but also stretched us creatively and technically. A few them may have even resulted in a more rewarding experience in a way that having more money probably could not have accomplished.
1. Shoot Digital
Sort of a no-brainer in this new era of affordable digital filmmaking. By shooting the entire movie on the Panasonic HVX200, "Coyote" never touched any film or tape. Even test screenings were shown by connecting the hard drives to a projector or widescreen television. Shooting digitally also saved us time which, as we know, equals money. For example, the day before exporting to a presentation format for a film festival, we shot an insert, sent it to our colorist where he applied the correction, sent it back, we put the new shot in the cut, then sent it off to the dub house the next day. All via FTP. Not possible with film. Now some might argue that shooting digitally counts as a compromise. Certainly a valid, if subjective, arguement, but read this, then watch this before judging too harshly (but by all means judge — we’d love to hear your opinions).
So…in the end, no tape or film stock costs means zero dollars spent on…well, nothing. For more details on our digital process, read this post from last week.
2. Combine Production/Picture Vehicles
The script called for some specific vehicles: 1) a pick-up truck for a financially-challenged vending machine stocker, 2) a van from the 80’s or earlier, 3) a "new" car, 4) two cars for a young, wealthy couple, 5) a border patrol van, and 6) a rugged, expensive SUV — something that a Mexican drug trafficker might own. The production called for hauling grip, lighting, and camera equipment as well as 12-25 people (depending on the day) on a 1500 mile loop. Now, none of the these requirements are all that extravagant — pretty simple requirements actually — but potentially expensive, and again, we needed to keep costs down if we had any chance of finishing this movie. So here’s what we did:
- Instead of renting a grip truck, we just rented the grip equipment and hauled it in the vending pick-up truck.
- The 80’s van carried people and camera equipment to set in the morning, got used in a few scenes during the day, then took everyone back to lodging at night.
- The "new" car was my 6-year-old Jeep with the best detail job pesos could buy. Seriously, for around $20 they made it look brand new. When not a picture car, we used the jeep (with the top down) to shoot just about every street and highway scene.
- The border patrol van was an art-ed $15/day rental that also carried extras to and from set.
- One of the "wealthy" cars was courtesy of a producer’s (Devin Colvin) dad. They swapped cars for a couple days, so we got some transpo use from it as well.
- The SUV belonged to Devin’s brother, Darin. When not being used as a picture car, Darin kindly used his SUV to drive our UPM and PA’s around on a myriad of errands.
Thousands of dollars saved here, but I must admit that one of the bullet items was only true for the first half of production. The truck broke down mid-shoot and it cost more to fix than it did to buy. Ultimately, we should have shelled out for a better truck, but, in theory, what we attempted is still a great way to save money. More on the epic tragedies of the truck in a future post.
Holy Hannah that truck…(still shaking my head).
3. Write For Locations You Already Have (And Can Maybe Sleep In…)
The initial kernel of the "Coyote" story came as a phone call from Brian — what if a guy gets deported and his friends go get him? I loved the idea immediately. We briefly batted around some ideas then hung up and said we’d talk about it later. We left the phone call knowing only two obvious things: 1) we’d have to shoot in Mexico and its bordering states, and 2) doing so would be pricey.
It’s a crippling endeavour to start a script already handcuffed by production limitations, so when the writing process began we decided to ignore any monetary, geographical, or logistical concerns and just concentrate on telling the story we wanted. Once we had the scenes indexed and outlined, only then did we start thinking about how we could pull it off within our budget.
Our first decision was the biggest as well as the easiet: where does this story take place? Well, I’m from Tucson, AZ. Devin, one of the producers, is also from Tucson, and both of our parents live about an hour from Nogales, MX. There was nothing in the script that dictated this story needed to take place in Brownsville, TX or San Diego, CA, or any other border town for that matter, so Tucson it was. From there, it got a lot easier:
- Houses we shot in and around belonged to either friends or family. We slept in these same houses.
- The high school I attended as a kid was kind enough to let us use school property as a location double.
- The script called for long walks in desert. The Sonoran Desert - the exact desert many immigrants cross - is within walking distance from my house.
- We needed a base in Mexico to shoot and sleep in…my parents have a condo in Puerto Peñasco.
- We really wanted to shoot at a small location in Phoenix, but were over-budget on lodging costs. So…one of our actresses, Carley, put some of us up at her parent’s house in Mesa, while our Location Manager, P.J., let the rest of us crash at his Scottsdale abode. Thanks guys…
- Etc., etc.
You get the idea. If a location or setting wasn’t necessarily specific, we modified it to something similar that we knew we could get on time and within budget. And because we were working in very familiar Arizona and Mexico surroundings, solutions arrived quickly. There were, of course, times when we had to pay some high location fees, but we had saved enough money by that point that the fees didn’t hurt as much.
Some locations are worth fighting and paying for, but a lot aren’t. And for those that aren’t…don’t. Many times you’ll find a modified solution that turns out better anyway because it forces you to look at the nuts and bolts of your scene and decide what’s really most important. Is this scene about a Waffle House or trust between friends?
4. Cast Yourself and Your Crew
This doesn’t always work. What if it’s a SAG project? What if you’re making a musical and none of you can sing? What if you’re filming an indie version of Cocoon 3 and most of your crew isn’t old enough to remember Steve Guttenberg was a major star?
There are plenty of reasons not to cast yourself and your crew, but the main one, in my opinion, is that actors act…just like sound mixers mix and so on. It’s what they do, and chances are they’re much better at it than most people who don’t do it. So you should always try to hire the best people for the right jobs. Period.
BUT!…this is a cost-cutting article, so let’s go ahead and put the boom guy in the picture! He looks like a regular guy, right? Have him be Regular Guy #2. He’ll probably be glad to rest his shoulders. You just saved $100, at least.
(P.S. When we pulled in our footage and heard the crisp dialog on the boom track, we thanked our lucky stars for having such quality on-set sound mixers as Trevor and Todd. Thanks guys…and sorry that "Phil" and "Joe" didn’t make the final cut…)
5. Cook When You’re Not On Set
Feeding your cast and crew is, of course, a must. It’s also sneakingly expensive. Most productions can hire a catering service and that works out great. Catering really wasn’t an option for us. This was a run and gun production that moved. We had to come up with something else.
We were very fortunate in that most of the cast and crew were either long-time friends, had worked together in the past, or were just really cool people we got lucky enough to have referred to us. A system sort of worked itself out where the people who weren’t scheduled to work much that day ended up making food for everyone. On days when everyone was needed on set, someone’s friend or parents might offer to make us food or donate it from their restaurant’s menu (props to Pete’s Fish and Chips!). Other days we just hit up some fast food. In the end, we saved a lot of money on food through the generosity and teamwork of everyone involved on this project.
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So…that’s what we did. Nothing too revolutionary, but these 5 simple decisions kept the budget in check and contributed to a fun, memorable, and adventurous shoot. There was even an instance where we combined all 5 of the above tips (well, sort of…swap "production/picture car" with "cast & crew lunch/pool party scene" and you get 5/5). Good times.
