Do filmmakers tell the cast and crew where the money is coming from in these cases?

[Brian Drysdale]

It sounds like you want a production manager or a line producer (they're basically the same) if you just want a budget. A producer does more than just the budget, it's not their main role, they may do it or get a production manager to do one, depending on how big their company is and how they personally work.

In the end, you will need to make decisions for yourself. Appearing indecisive is fatal.

[Ryan Elder]

Oh okay thanks. Well yes I would want that then.

I want to make decisions for myself, it's just I want I appreciate the advice on here, as well, and do not want to ignore it and do my own thing. But I do need to make some decisions for myself, yes.

One thing in the budget I have been considering in the shooting plan is perhaps it would cost less money to buy three cameras, and shoot with them all simultaneously, hoping to get shoots done faster, rather than pay everyone to work a longer shoot with one camera?

[Brian Drysdale]

Shooting multi camera will cut down on the shooting time. However, you still don't seem to have taken on board that, with a 10k budget, you won't have enough money to pay people on a feature film, You might on a short, but a feature film will take longer and, with 3 cameras, you've increased your camera crew,

There are other costs like insurance, location rental, costumes, art direction, food, etc, which will quickly eat into your budget, unless you're extremely good at getting some of these items for free. I'm not saying you cant do that, but it's time consuming and you may get a day, but getting longer gets more difficult.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

I would be highly skeptical of anything he says. He’ll hire a producer, buy three cameras, etc and yet he has a 10k budget. I find it unbelievable that someone who hasn’t held a steady job could fund any amount out of their savings. Of all the time he has been here he hasn’t made one major purchase. It’s all just talk. I honestly would be more surprised if this movie ever got made.

[Brian Drysdale]

Yes, buying 3 cameras (I assume BM pocket cinema 4K) and their lenses and tripods etc would quickly eat up his limited budget. The whole enterprise certainly has the feeling of fantasy filmmaking or, at the very least, someone who throws out stuff without really thinking things out.

Regarding the spending, I suspect people around Ryan want to protect him from himself.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

I agree more money isn't the answer especially in his case and people close to him are doing the right thing to protect him from himself. With a poor script, acting, and direction more money would simply yield a more polished bad movie.

Understanding how he thinks it's not hard figure out his plan with the three cameras. He's already alluded to it about shooting faster. I'm sure his idea behind the 3 cameras is to shoot 3x as fast, cutting his shoot time and his labor cost by a third. That's the plan right?

The smarter plan would be to get a reduced rental rate on the bare minimum equipment for 3 weeks and work as efficiently as possible in the time period.

[Paul R Johnson]

My experience of multi camera is that it often makes things more expensive and longwinded. He has trouble finding one decent cameraman, and now he needs three. Planning multicamera positions is tough, and the director also needs to direct the talent to the right camera, which when it goes wrong, makes the editor pull their hair out. If the idea is one main camera and a couple locked off and wider for cutting to when the main camera shot doesn't work, then a couple of cheap Chinese Gopro type cameras would do that!

3 streams to edit with instead of one is a totally different task.

Ryan - where exactly will you find this elusive producer, capable of generating income streams and yet working for very little? Have you actually made any progress? You had a poor script, poor actors, no equipment, no locations, and poor technical people, and some of these might turn up for the shoot, if they have nothing better to do. What has changed?

[Ryan Elder]

Oh well I wanted a producer who knows more about the budgeting side to help with budgeting. I haven't found a producer yet but I did attract the interest of other filmmakers I worked with before, who would be working behind the camera, so to speak, such as someone I know who can pull focus and another person I know who has done production audio for me before. I haven't looked for new actors yet because I wanted to get other things done such as script changes first. I made some improvements to the story, as well as trying to keep the budget less in the script. Then I will hand the script to a script consultant to make further changes for improving.

As for multiple cameras, I was going by the experience I had on a multi-cam shoot. So far other people's projects I have helped work on, where a single camera set up, accept for one that was multi-cam, and I noticed the shoots got finished quite a bit faster, so I thought that might help and maybe a better investment, then spending the money on paying people for more shoot days with a single camera set up. I thought maybe 3 camera people were worth it, compared to more shoot days with one person.

But I was going by the experience I had before where things went faster. But mostly right now, I am delayed on actual shooting because of covid so far, so I wanted to take the time to do script improvements I figured.

[Brian Drysdale]

Two cameras would create less issues than 3 with lighting etc, it's not usual to have A and B cameras on a feature film. Also, when you get into more cameras the film tends to look like television, which is a serious risk on what sounds like a dialogue heavy film.

You also don't have the experienced multi camera operators and camera pedestals that the 1960s TV dramas used to create surprisingly daring camera moves and shots in their thrillers. Using more cameras, without the resources, risks everything becoming like a cheap daytime soap.

[Ryan Elder]

Oh okay thanks. Sure I can just do two if that is better. I feel some of the scenes will only be able to use 2 because in some of the storyboards, you would see a 3rd one in one of the shots.

When it was said before that 3 streams in the editing would be a different beast, do I have to use 3 streams or 2 if I use 2 cameras, or couldn't I just edit the way I always have been still?

[Brian Drysdale]

Editing depends on the scene, it also depends on how you wish to cut the action.

With the risk of a camera appearing in shot, I don't know why you suggested 3 cameras, it sounds like you haven't thought anything out, It's the job of a director to think these things out in advance.

[Ryan Elder]

I mean I can use 3 cameras in some of the shots set ups, not all. It depends on the storyboards. For some we can use 3, some not I would say.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

Sounds idiotic you have a barebones budget but all you can think about how you need three cameras. In addition to needing three competent operators.

[Ryan Elder]

But if it saves on shoot time, such as it did in past experience on someone else's movie, it means less days and therefore less money. If I only have one camera operator, that equals more shoot days and more money, doesn't it? It just seems of every idea I think of to get the shoot done faster, for less shoot days, is not good. Does this mean I shouldn't try to come up with any ideas on how to get the shooting schedule down and just live with it being a longer shoot?

[Brian Drysdale]

Just cut down on the number of shots if you don't have enough time, You suddenly seem to have jumped from early 1960s, with the scene captured in scope, with all the actors interacting, to shooting TV type drama. Having 3 cameras is going to restrict shooting that way unless you've got fairly large rooms.