I am a newbie filmmaker in Miami Fl. I hope to produce my screenplay for a indie feature"Just A Small Town Boy" The vast majority of an aproximately $12,000 shooting budget, for locations, insurance, cast, crew, costuming, equipment, and incidental items will be self financed. What pitfalls or unexpected expenses can I expect? I have no expectations of actually making a profit, (although it would be nice) the whole reason for doing the film is as a labor of love. The story involves a small town high school basketball star, who is ostricized by his teammates and community when it is learned he is gay. Our hero does not give up his dreams, and learns that bullying, and intolerence can be overcome, and "It does get better"
Financing / Crowdfunding : Just A Small Town Boy by Dave Mills
Just A Small Town Boy
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Pitfalls are many. The more you prepare the more you will avoid. Development and preproduction is crucial. Setting a realistic schedule and sticking to it will save you tons. Work with your Director and or DP on storyboarding + shot list to schedule everything effectively. During production you can check off your shots so when you get to editing you wont have any shots missing and have to go back into production. Also, if you can have locations near each other so if for some reason you can't film for whatever reason at location A then you go to location B and film that scene so its not a wasted day. Sometimes a story is written really well but has a scene that has some aspect that is costly. Sometimes you have to trim the fat and do some creative writing and work with your limitations. Ex.- Instead of having your star player playing in a game with the stands full you have him entering the locker room celebrating and sweaty and someone congratulates him and then something else happens that progresses the story. Don't make things too difficult for yourself and don't pay for stuff you don't have to because things will add up. As far as equipment I have everything you need for a film production and I could play the role of several crew members in exchange for credit and the pay of one member. I'm currently planning for a short film I'm making at the end of May and I have a hand full of Crew members and actors working for credit and added footage to their reels. I don't suggest trying to get people to work on your feature length film for free other than PAs (film students on break) but there are talented people available that will take less money for the opportunity. I ran Jib on a feature film where everyone was working for less than the going rates. Those are some off the top of my head. Contact me if you want to talk more. Thanks.
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Good advice Steven!