Production
Filmmaking - Production
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Secrets of the Glam Squad: Inside the World of Film Hair and Makeup Departments
You’re the producer of a low-budget movie, and, as usual, there isn’t enough money. Each department is straining against their budgets, and you don’t want the production value of the film to falter. So you are forced to prioritize. More lights? Well, that’s hard to argue with — the movie has to look good. Another van? No way around that; you have to get people to the next location in time. But makeup and hair needs a space heater? Um … can’t they just put on sweaters? “If the electric department says they need two hours, no one questions it,” […]
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Using a Stair Climber for a Crane Shot
Sometimes a piece of everyday equipment can be used for an unusual purpose. While shooting a recent music video for the band Run 8 Rider, director Sean Meehan noticed a stair climber at the location and wondered if it couldn’t be used to create some kind of crane shot. An additional twist is that the shot would consist of three sequences shot at different times in the shooting day and be spliced together. Sean explains how the shot was made: We walked in, I saw this stair climber and my first thought was “That’d be really cool to use for […]
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Ryan Koo on Amateur, Feature Fundraising, and the Kickstarter Long Game
In the Fall of 2011, filmmaker Ryan Koo — featured along with then-partner Zachary Lieberman on our 2008 “25 New Faces” — announced his debut feature, Man-child. Embarking on an ambitious Kickstarter campaign, Koo leveraged not only the community he had been building via his excellent website, No Film School, but also his project’s selection for the IFP and Film Society of Lincoln Center’s Emerging Visions program. The campaign was a success, raising $125,100, and, as he’s moved his story of youth basketball forward, Koo has been, essentially, open-sourcing his progress, giving advice on not only social-media fundraising but screenplay […]
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Why Filmmaking is Like Software Design
Before becoming a filmmaker I spent 15 years designing software. Started out as a Mac OS programmer and then moved to Microsoft Windows. My endeavors included all things visual—from icon design and screen layout, to the more abstract design patterns found in system architecture and coding. What I discovered along the way was that the most elegant solutions—the products that worked best, most reliably, and resonated strongly with their user base—were always the most simple and minimalist in design. And there was always room for improvement via testing, focus groups, and refactoring (a techie word for the iterative process of […]
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Stunt Driving with the Biscuit Rig, Jr: Interview with Engineer and Driver Robert Nagle
Robert Nagle studied mechanical engineering and racecar design before becoming a professional race driver. But when he found out that some of the other drivers were working in the film industry, it piqued his interest. Said Nagle, “What I found was that it fulfilled a creative side of me that I didn’t really realize was there.” He left the racing world and hasn’t looked back, doing stunt driving for a number of films, including The Dark Knight Rises and Drive. One piece of equipment he’s been driving lately is the Biscuit Rig Jr., a driveable platform developed by Allan Padelford […]
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Hero Punk: A Cyberpunk Superhero Film Shot on the Blackmagic Cinema Camera in Green Screen
Kanen Flowers describes himself as a “former technology guy” who got into filmmaking around 2001 with the goal of writing and directing his own material. In 2007, he started work on Jack Forgotten, a project that he says is still in postproduction. Other projects have met with greater success; he started the That Post Show podcast, and a show called That Media Show, and has produced a variety of shorts and web-based content through his production company, Scruffy.tv. At the moment he’s working on Hero Punk, a full-length feature which was shot using the Blackmagic Cinema Camera. Hero Punk is […]
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Production Design on a Budget
On small budget productions, coming up with locations can be a challenge – especially if you need something a bit unusual. An upcoming music video for the band Run 8 Rider required that a single location represent three different time periods to tell its story. Using a borrowed house as the location, director Sean Meehan turned to production designer Riley Fearon to supervise the transformation of the location. In this interview Riley talks about the challenges of working on a small budget, how he approaches production design, and how he came to the field. Filmmaker: For this project what have […]
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Five Questions with Orc Wars Director Kohl Glass
Microbudget film doesn’t venture into the expensive world of science fiction too often, and certainly not the brand that features hordes of orcs and other fantasy creatures. But that’s exactly where Emmy-winning director Kohl Glass, whose short film Der Ostwind played at Sundance in 2007, wanted to go with his debut feature, Orc Wars. The film, which has wrapped and is currently gathering its finishing funds on Kickstarter, features ex-Marine John Norton (Rusty Joiner) who buys an isolated western ranch that turns out to contain a portal to another world; when orcs use it to threaten an elf princess (Masiela Lusha) […]
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My Journey From Doctor to Actor/Filmmaker: How I Produced, Starred in and Profited from My Indie Films
“There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.” -Bruce Lee If you are pursuing something as ambitious as acting or filmmaking, you know that one of the most valuable assets you have is your time. I work full-time as a doctor, and if you work full-time like I do and you want to make it big in the film industry, you’ve got to learn how to make sacrifices and budget your time. For instance, I performed surgery this morning, did an interview at noon, and edited some scenes of […]
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Working with Hair and Makeup – Interview with Maya Landi
Maya Landi is Boston-based hairstylist and makeup artist who works on everything from weddings and music videos to horror films. I talked to her recently about her work, how to age characters and how to create a head-shot effect, during the shooting of a music video for the band Run 8 Rider. Filmmaker: What have you been doing for this project? Landi: One of the characters plays a grandfather and a father in different eras in time. I had to do some aging makeup for him, as well as make everybody look appropriate for the era that they are supposed to […]
