How To Produce Your Own No-Budget TV Pilot

I am the director and a producer for a proof of concept short called Innocent Love that we developed for a tv series that we called Forgotten Wisdom. It’s set in historic times but also very relatable to current-day problems. It is also meant to be educational in showing how problems were once dealt with.

We were able to shoot during the summer of 2020 with the intention of pitching to a local streaming service in Slovenia and maybe even internationally.

1. How It All Started

In early 2020 a friend of ours, Sandi, told us about an idea he had for a tv show and that our team would be a good fit for producing it, after seeing a short film we made the year before.

Our local streaming services work a little differently than international ones. That meant that we had to produce a proof of concept film to pitch it to them without a budget.

Easy! We just needed to do everything on our own time and dime.

Poster for "Innocent Love"

2. The Development

The first thing was getting the crew together, which for the most part is more or less the same people. I was the director, Stage 32 member Leya Marincic was the cinematographer and editor, and Leya’s sister Iza Kokoravec, was our writer, assistant director, and more.

As a small production, we wore many hats during all stages of production. Which was great as it always kept it interesting. So we started developing the concept for the tv show.

The first thing we needed was a story and we decided on something that was relatively simple, that we could shoot with the resources that we had at hand.

After deciding on a simple love story, one Saturday morning I wrote an outline and passed it on to Iza, who filled in the blanks and rewrote it into something we could shoot.

3. Pre-Production

Then when we knew what to shoot, it was time to scut potential shooting locations.

Thankfully, we mostly needed exterior locations with only one interior.

We quickly identified a small lake near Leya’s parents' place that fit the story. They very graciously allowed us to use it and explained that they were happy to support young people trying to create something. With that location, we could have as much time as we needed and they gave us permission to also use all the surrounding forests that they owned. Of course, we didn’t want to impose too much and take advantage of their generosity, so we were as respectful of their property as we could be.

Production still from "Innocent Love"

Next, we had to find a higher rocky location that could serve as a mountain top and I knew of a great one that was on a hill with a great view and, most importantly, was accessible by car. It also had rock formations that we used to fake shots of talent climbing.

The final location was the most challenging because it needed to serve as two different places, an old farmhouse with a good interior and a usable exterior. A friend of ours knew of a perfect location where they even had farm animals that fit the narrative, as our lead was a shepherd.

Then we started looking for talent.

Since we had no budget, we decided to think outside of the box. Writer and AD Iza is also actively involved with a local LARP (Live Action Role Play) group, so we offered some of the roles to a few great performers who were all willing to participate and a few other parts to friends that we had worked with before.

We wanted to shoot in May 2020 to catch the beautiful spring colors but we got hit by Corona lockdowns and had to postpone our principal photography, but kept rehearsing with the talent over Zoom sessions.

In the meantime, the team and I started creating storyboards, shot lists, and shooting schedules for production.

We enlisted help from our friends, so Leya’s mother who used to do costume design at a theater, pitched in to help with the wardrobe and Iza tackled the production design and props since she had experience from other projects we had done.

It wasn't long before we had everything we needed and once the lockdown restrictions were lifted we could start shooting.

Behind the Scenes of "Forgotten Wisdom"

4. Production Time (Or Maybe Not)

After a few live rehearsals with talent, we were ready to shoot.

According to my shot-list we needed four days to film everything but talent schedule problems forced us to cram everything into three long days.

As we were approaching the first shooting day, disaster struck and our main location, the old farmhouse, backed out without much explanation only a week before we were scheduled to begin production.

We started looking for alternative locations, which wasn’t easy. We got lucky and found a nice place to shoot, that would give us most of what we needed, though not all.

But disaster struck again and the day before we were supposed to start shooting at the backup location, while confirming with the owner, they backed out. So another location was gone without the possibility of finding a new one before we lost that day.

Thankfully we got even luckier and the next day found a perfect location that was even better than the original one. The owners were really excited and decided to let us use the location for as long as we would need.

Great! But we had already lost one production day and had to rework the schedule into two very, very long and fast-paced days.

Leya and Vital on the set of "Forgotten Wisdom"

5. First Production Day

We started off on the first day setting up base camp at Leya and Iza’s parent’s house, which was near our primary filming location, the forests, and fields.

The government was still advising social distancing, so it was decided in pre-production that everyone would self-isolate for a week before we started shooting and if anyone had any symptoms they would let us know. Thankfully, everyone was ok, but as a precaution, we decided to keep the number of people on set as low as possible, forcing everyone to pull double or even triple duty.

Our producer Sandi was also our sound guy. Iza was the AD, script supervisor, and continuity officer, while also keeping us fed. I was the director and the drone operator, as well as the driver. I also held the light bounce and handled DIT. Leya was the DP and Gaffer. The PA was also the assistant camera and kept check of what we had shot.

Everyone was on their best behavior keeping their distance and sanitizing their hands. Of course, watching out for our oldest talent and making sure we didn't keep her on set more than necessary.

The first day went great because we were all well-rehearsed and in good spirits.

The only thing both Leya and I wished is that we could have had more time for each shot. Cramming everything into two days meant that we only had two or three takes for each setup. All in all the talent was well-prepared. But in retrospect, I still wish we had more time for more takes.

The Cast and Crew of "Forgotten Wisdom"

The most time we spent on one shot was when the lead actor had to ride his bicycle up and down a dirt road while Leya and I sat in the trunk of the chase car.

We ended the first day with a light rain shower that actually added to the final scene that we were shooting as the two actors reacted perfectly to the raindrops and I was quick enough to shout out to some of our crew to hide, while Leya was able to follow them running through the grass field trying to hide from the rain. It couldn’t have gone better even if we planned it.

The second day of production was going to be a long one since we had to start shooting really early in the morning on top of a hill in order to have the location to ourselves.

Thankfully in Slovenia, a small indy production like ours can get away with filming without permits in public as long as you don’t prevent access to anyone else and don’t show anything in bad faith. So we were good and in most cases if people see you shooting something they are interested and love to watch.

Later that morning came the most “dangerous” scenes where the lead had to scale a rock face which was a bunch of rocks that were accessible from all directions and when shot from the right angles made it look like he was scaling a mountain. Even though he was only 3 feet off the ground.

A few days later, Leya and I drove to the Slovenian Alps and shot some B roll to intercut with the shots of him scaling the mountain and it worked perfectly together.

We also filmed at a fairytale-like rock formation near the scary forest scenes and then continued to the old farm.

The farmhouse was where we had the most to shoot and had to keep to a tight schedule because our talent was scheduled very closely together. I wish we had more time, but luckily they did a great job.

That evening we were just about done, but not yet...

Behind the Scenes of "Forgotten Wisdom"

6. One Last Thing… Shoot Now Or Shoot Later?

As part of the concept, we wanted a narrator to tell the story and bring the episodes together by showing the narrator in a chair at a fireplace sharing the whole story.

We had thought we could do that in a matter of a few days.

But because we were in such a rush during principle production, I wasn’t confident that we didn’t make any continuity mistakes. I decided to postpone the narrator scenes until we had a rough cut of the pilot episode so that we could fix any problems we found in pickups or post. Instead, we used temp audio for the interim.

This was a huge mistake! Everything cut together beautifully but before we could film the narrator scene, COVID season had returned. We were stuck in lockdown again with no way to shoot the final short scene.

Just two shots really, but it’s all on me for not having the confidence in what we had already done.

As the weeks passed and we were getting no closer to shooting the final scene, we decided to change the narrator to someone closer to home and Leya’s mother kindly stepped into the role of the narrator.

Behind the Scenes of "Forgotten Wisdom"

7. Post-Production Time

We had all of the footage from our initial production, the added narrator scenes, and some B roll and drone shots that Leya and I shot on our own time.

We organized the footage, synced the audio, and then started editing.

First I did the two VFX shots, while Leya pieced together the story.

One VFX shot went together beautifully. It was shot on a tripod and when I added camera shake it looked like a handheld shot to match the rest of what we filmed. The second one was not as easy since we were in a hurry and shot it handheld making it much harder to add the VFX we wanted with proper tracking.

We chose the best shots for the dialogue scenes and I edited them together in a way that flowed and felt natural. For some reason, I love editing dialogue-heavy scenes. It's one of the best feelings in the world when I am able to edit together a scene from multiple shots and make it feel natural. 

The two longest dialogue scenes included a moment where one of the actors would disappear and we made filming decisions, especially for this purpose. One was harder to do because it was a one-take orbiting shot where the actor disappeared behind the camera, making it look like she vanished. Everyone needed to hide behind the moving camera as Leya orbited around the other actor in the scene. It worked great and I couldn’t believe we got this shot in only two takes. I'm convinced it's because we rehearsed well and were confident that it would work while rolling.

Soon we had a rough cut and everything spliced together nicely as an enjoyable story.

After refining the edit to bring things together better and improve the flow, we were ready for sound design and color grading.

We locked in the assembly edit! Leya started the color grading while I did some of the sound editing and cleaned up the audio. By then the lead actor Rok, who is also a musician, offered to score the short and he sent us some of the music that he had produced.

Our biggest mistake which eventually came back around while in post, was we had neglected to shoot ambient sounds for each location, which would have helped tremendously in the edit. Learn from us and NEVER forget to record your location ambiance.

Trailer for the Pilot Episode of "Innocent Love"

8. Where Did That Leave Us?

Most of the post-production work was done.

The intro titles and the ending credits had been created, color grading was locked and most of the sound design was completed.

The master export for the short film had been rendered.

The artwork had been created, as well as pitch decks and all the info needed.

The feedback from people had been very positive and encouraging!

It made me realize that if we can do all of this without a budget and with a very light crew, what could we achieve with a budget and a chance to create something great?

Behind the Scenes of "Forgotten Wisdom"

9. Where Is This Project Now?

The beginning stages of this project were in early 2020. Without any type of budget, we went into production in the summer of 2020 and post-production in the first quarter of 2021. We even submitted the short to the Stage 32 short film contest and got into the semi-finals!

In early 2022 we were able to pitch the idea to our local streaming service and they absolutely loved the concept and wanted to go forward with it. We started developing and writing a pilot episode called Water Of Life.

But because of the current financial situation in late 2022, the streaming service said that they were no longer able to take on new shows and were even cutting a lot of their current programs.

Since the proof of concept short was basically tailored for the local streaming service, we were kind of screwed. Not that the concept couldn’t be modified for any other place, we just haven't yet found the place where it could be pitched successfully.

Basically, we’re still looking and trying to find a way to get it placed somewhere and because one of the producers doesn’t agree, we’re also not able to apply to any film festivals.

So we have a finished proof of concept short, a concept for a TV series, and a pilot script ready to go!

Leya and Vital on the set of "Forgotten Wisdom"

10. What Did We Learn?

For the most part, I’m really proud of what we have achieved. We actually shot a film in two days without any budget and did a really good job, with a minimal crew, and only with the equipment we had at hand.

That being said, the first thing I would have done differently, is to take my time with a few more rewrites of the story. Not that it would have changed much, but we could have slowed down and streamlined it a bit more.

I wish we had been more daring with the type of shots we planned. Yes, we got all the coverage we needed but I wish that we had the time to have fewer static dialogue scenes and made more dynamic camera choices.

In a perfect world, I would have taken more time during production. I know we had limited scheduling options, but it would have been great if we could have had just a few more takes for each shot.

While I’m really glad that we had the onscreen talent that we did, I wish that we had more rehearsal time with the actors or that we would have been able to cast actors who had more experience working on tight schedules. All of our actors were non-professional actors and did a great job, but they would have greatly benefited from more time and more takes. I think that even though our days were always fun, there is an inherent stress to moving fast and I honestly think that this impacted the performance of both crew and talent.

What really bugs me is that due to outside factors we were forced to compromise at every step and that impacts the overall project. Sometimes in a good way but a lot of the time in a negative way. A compromise here and another one there and the project, while still great, starts to change.

While we were able to shoot everything on our shot list that we needed to edit the film, which I believe was around 200 shots, in the end, we only lost one shot and the rest of the post-production was a pleasure. However, that ties back to not having enough time to shoot more takes and I wish we had done a couple more interesting setups.

Ultimately, what I regret the most is that due to a lack of consensus between the producers, it took a long time before we were able to pitch the idea to the streaming service. Forcing the project to stand still at times when it should have been moving forward.

I actually consider all these problems minor and I think that this would be relatively easy to mitigate. At the same time, I consider myself lucky to be surrounded by amazing people who really gave everything they could for this project, and as a result, it gives me the drive to give everything that I have to finish what we started.

It's truly amazing that from one idea, a group of people can get together and create something where everyone contributes, and out comes a film in the end.

Poster for The Digits

11. What's Next?

Actually a lot. In the time between starting production of Innocent Love and now, my team and I have shot and produced a number of music videos, a couple of documentaries, quite a few commercials, and a bunch of narrative films.

The longest project that we have been working on is a feature film called The Digits. It’s a psychological thriller that I had been developing for a few years and wrote the original story for. But I didn't know how to proceed from there. In a weird turn of events, I met Dan Guardino here on Stage32 and he actually helped me turn the story into the final screenplay that will eventually be made into a movie.

He loved the idea and wanted to produce the film, so we started looking for a way to make it happen and to shoot in the US. Recently, Dan and I were able to attach Suzan Perry as one of the talents in the film's cast.

Leya has created the storyboards and was also able to edit together a promo video using my voice for a voice-over. At the same time, Dan has created a budget, pitch deck and was looking for distribution and financing. We’re currently working on that and looking for ways to get this film into production.

When I first got the idea for The Digits, I never imagined that I would be working with so many great people trying to make it happen. So I’m very grateful to Leya for encouraging me to push forward against all odds in order to one day make this film happen.

During this time I have also written another comedy feature film screenplay that we are trying to get made, called Problems Until The End. It’s actually based on a true story and will make for a really funny film that I hope will make people laugh like they once did while watching comedies. Recently, I was able to get the screenplay into the hands of another producer, which I’m hoping will eventually lead to production.

Leya and I connected with this really great writer from the US, who is also on Stage32, Michael W Hogan, and together we produced a short film for a film competition. We had a great time, with even our cat Misty in the main role in the film. I think that we’re all looking forward to the next opportunity that we’ll have to work together.

I’m also currently developing this really cool science fiction screenplay called The Procedure that I would like to see made one day because it touches on a lot of contemporary humanities topics while exploring how things turn out. Does it end well for humanity or not…?

We have been so fortunate to meet another Stage 32 member from Los Angeles, an actor called Branden Garrett, who is also a fellow countryman of mine. Together we have been able to shoot quite a few films and we are currently even working together to possibly produce Branden’s own biographical narrative film in the near future in LA.

I’m really glad that I've had a chance to meet so many great people through Stage 32 and work with them on really cool projects.

Let's hear your thoughts in the comments below!

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