WARNING... I'm attempting to give you a detailed look into the week-by-week process for the development of a low-budget film project. While everything I'm writing about is essential, most of this is really dull, so if you have trouble sleeping, bookmark this post and read it before bed.
This has been a busy first week. In our recent meeting with the EP, he suggested a budget amount that will fall within the SAG Moderate Low Budget Agreement, so my first step is to perform an official breakdown of the script and determine the number of shooting days. Thank goodness for Studio Binder, right?
Since I'm the writer, I know this screenplay front to back, so when Studio Binder started showing me weird scene breaks, I knew I needed to go into the document and perform a line-by-line review of the material to make sure the scene breaks were importing correctly. They appeared to be, but that didn't solve the problem until I figured out that the application performed better when I used the "write your script" function rather than the "import your script" function. So, after a quick copy and paste, I was able to see where some of my scene breaks were improperly reading as action blocks (mind you, they were not like this in Final Draft). Once I spent several hours fixing this issue within the application, I was able to spend several more hours rearranging the strip board to determine the number of shooting days. With 80% of the locations already soft-locked, I guessed 20 days and was able to fit everything into 19! WooHoo! Celebrate the small victories, folks!
Now, I can start on the first pass of the budget, 40% of which will be guesswork until I start locking in cast, crew, etc.
So, who out there has a juicy scheduling story they want to share? HA!
Until next week...
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Congratulations on fitting everything into 19 days, Michael Fitzer, MFA! Do you decide the order of shooting days during a breakdown (the script breakdown, not the emotional kind)?
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Great question Maurice Vaughan . I approached this with the idea of front-loading the first 10 days with 2 of the key supporting cast. Paying for name actors and getting their scenes done first. This, combined with grouping locations, worked the best. It helps that the bulk of the locations will be in extremely close proximity to one another. That will be our base camp for 11 out of the 19 days.
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Thanks for the answer, Michael Fitzer, MFA. I used to think all movies were shot in order, but it makes sense to film them out of order sometimes. I'm looking forward to your Week 2 post!
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Michael Fitzer, MFA, thank you for pulling back the curtain! There’s always that moment in low-budget development where tech hiccups become unexpectedly epic time-eaters, and your workaround is such a great tip for others juggling script formatting and scheduling tools.
Also, congrats on squeezing it into 19 days, that’s a huge win, especially with 80% of your locations soft-locked already. Sounds like you’re setting the foundation smartly before diving into budget chaos.
Looking forward to following this journey week-by-week. And yes, scheduling war stories? I’ll grab popcorn.
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You literally can squeeze any production into any kind of budget. I shot a 1hr 50Min. feature film for $2,200.00. Ultimately it made double it's budget. The next question I have is, what exactly is the budget and what is the genre? While these two questions don't seem to be that important for someone who has their heart set on a project, the genre does play a role in marketing. As far as talent goes, SAG scale is $1,204 day rate for films with a $2,000,000 budget and above. There are plenty of talented people that are looking for work so you have a wide color pallet for your brush. @0 days. Are those 8 hour days? How many overtime days are you planning for? Is it 5 days a week? How many pages a day are you planning to shoot?
I know you probably know all this, but people following along with you might not think about these things, so if you're using this as a teaching opportunity, no one should find this boring.
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Hello Philip David Lee , thanks for your questions.
The project is titled Music Therapy, and it is a comedy/drama. The budget is still in the works and I won't divulge the exact amount just yet, but it is based on the SAG Moderate Low Budget Agreement that, as of July 1, 2024, lists a daily rate of $421 and a weekly rate of $1463.
For leads and key supporting cast we're assuming most favored nations for many of the contractual provisions (lodging, rental vehicle, etc), but for this first pass, we can assume most of the day players will receive the minimum.
12-hour days (8-to-9.5 hours filming) / 5-day week. I'm planning an average of 6 pages a day. Some days will have a page or two more if we're in the same location all day with few actors and lots of dialogue, while other days (i.e., driving scenes with a process trailer) are as low as 2 & 4/8. About 40% of the film takes place in 2 different interior locations which we have found situated on the same grounds. This makes a huge difference.
You can check rates here: https://www.wrapbook.com/blog/essential-guide-sag-rates
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Michael Fitzer, MFA Thank you, Michael. I'm working on a $1.5M action/thriller production with a 38 day, 8 hrs a days, 5 days a week schedule. I've put in some days for overtime and have 3 different crew sizes depending on the scene. I'm going to try something radical to get the financing for the budget that doesn't involve Powerball numbers. If it works, it'll maybe revolutionize a few aspects of filmmaking.
These little details, while you have to keep your work protected, are still important for those just learning how to build a business plan. Even if one in going for the inferior (my opinion) Pitch Deck, one still needs to know how to answer any questions an investor or investment group might ask. How many EXT. scenes does a screenplay have that will need generators which can make a lot of noise. Locations where you can't shut off the AC in the building and ADR will be needed to clean the dialog, how many days will you need porta-potties (SAG talent hates wearing Depends)... all these little things have to go into the budget as well as wasted resources like insurance, SAG fees and completion bonds, Lawyer fees, set medics... so many needs that need a price tag. You just gotta love filmmaking!
I have some driving scenes as well. I was thinking of attacking them with green screen.
If you need any feedback, advice, or another pair of eyes, let me know. I try and help where I can.
Your future reports will be enlightening, informative and very intriguing..
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Thank you Michael Fitzer, MFA for keep us updated and learn with you.
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Kudos on your film. Low budget filmmaking is tough, but once you've been able to make that feature, it definitely sets you up for the next project. I think a big thing I've run into with filmmakers over the years is really knowing what your budget is. People will say it's a $1 million budget, it's a $2 million budget, without really breaking it down and dialing in exactly what the crew rates are and what you're going to pay the cast. Because the cast does determine what the budget is. If you have a no name cast, and the sales potential is very low. You can't shoot a 1 million, 2 million, $3 million film. You can, but you'll never make your money back for your investors, and that should be the number one goal. You don't want to take somebody's money and not have a realistic plan on how to get it back for them. The budget of a film is what someone's willing to pay you for that film. You might think it's $2 million, but if your sales company doesn't think they can sell it for that much, and your investors are only willing to give you $500,000 then your budget is $500,000. Or whatever the actual amount is. I think this is also the challenge with first or second-time filmmakers. If you haven't made a $10,000 feature, or $100,000 feature, or a $300,000 feature, why would someone give you $1 million or more for your movie? You have to build up and prove what you can do at various budget levels to be able to get to that bigger film. Looking forward to hearing how your experience continues to go.
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Tony Armer I hate to disagree with you, Tony, but I don't think you're taking in the current state of affairs into your little explanation. All Rachel Zegler did was tank Snow White with her mouth. All Robert De Niro did was tank Alto Knights with his mouth and now it looks like Pedro Pascal, who really isn't known for anything, is set to tank Fantastic Four with his mouth. No one in Borderland did anything to secure a rich box office performance and Patterson didn't do squat for Mickey 17. So if investors would rather lose $60M- $100M on overpriced, out of control budget agenda fueled dumpster fires as opposed to $1M-$3M on an indie flick, maybe they should get out of film investing and try everyday household items made out of plastic. Award show television ratings are down and Springsteen is getting booed at his own concerts for sticking his nose into something he should back off from.
And what about sales agents? or marketing? or presales or sales projections? Who did the numbers for the $300M budget Pixar Elio? That must have been a mountain of paperwork BS because projections for opening weekend are only for $25M-$30M. Hopefully it'll do better. Kids still need to be entertained. Where was the marketing strategy for Novocaine? I didn't hear about the film until the YouTube critics put in their two cents the week before it's release and the poster they were using was horrible and amateurish looking as if they stole it off a game of Operation. Let's not get me started about all the girl boss force feeding to a target audience that still mostly is comprised of males ages 17-45 and according to ticket sales are still the majority of ticket buyers to films that aren't chick flicks. People are making these extremely huge budget movies and at an average of $10.78/ticket can't entice at least 5 million people out of 340 million people in the United States to go out and enjoy a movie? Yet you claim it's independents that are making investors lose their money?
I'm working on a $1.5M action/thriller independent film with 1 worldwide known talent interested in the lead role and mostly unknown cast members that just need exposure and maybe another moderately known actress. There's only 9 people in the cast but you can be sure that I will do everything in my power to try and get 3.5Million people to buy a ticket in the US. If a sales agent can't sell this project, he's not much of a "sales" agent and is probably overpaid. So please stop with the old school smoke and mirrors and really start talking the truth about the industry because right now it doesn't make sense. If you don't try to change it for the better than you're just sucking the blood of everyone you're trying to rip off which boils down to mostly the investors themselves and your customers which is never a good business plan.
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Tony Armer, your insight here is gold. You’ve summed up one of the most critical and often overlooked truths in filmmaking: your budget isn’t what you want it to be, it’s what the market, your investors, and your cast can realistically support. That kind of grounded, experience-driven perspective is invaluable, especially for early-career filmmakers who are navigating the complex relationship between budget, cast, sales, and return on investment.
We’re incredibly lucky to have someone like you in the Stage 32 community who not only has the experience of the business side of filmmaking, but who takes the time to share that knowledge with generosity and clarity. Thanks for being part of the conversation. I know how busy you are, and I love to see you when you have the time to chime in.