The Pre-Production Process

Type of Production

For our assignment we were given the task of creating a 90 second film for DepicT website that would go on YouTube and/or entering it into the DepicT competition with a reward of £1200 if we found it was at a high enough standard to enter. Other media pieces that get distributed on to YouTube are music videos, films and other peoples work; examples such as Beyonce "Single Ladies" music video and Imagine Dragons live concert.

A 90 second short film is just one example of a moving image media production. There is also a selection of Television shows for different audiences. One popular choice would be different series with a specific amount of episodes in it. Examples of this would be "The Walking Dead" and "Arrow". The TV series "Arrow" holds 23 episodes within one series which goes on for the duration of half a year. Other TV series such as "Downton Abbey" provide a short 10 episode series but also the popular one off episode that is shown around Christmas. Episodes like this are there to show the end of a series or the end of the Television show altogether and are shown within a particular holiday to attract a wider audience'.
There are also documentaries which provide factual knowledge on particular aspects within our society. These can vary from wildlife, global warming, historical events and famous celebrities who have now passed. An example of a documentary would be "Lucy Worsley's Reigns of Power" Documentaries last for around an hour or two and provide plenty of information about the particular subject they are based on.
Finally you have the feature films. These films can last between 90 minutes to three hours tops, this being with or without the extended scenes. Examples of long feature films are "2012", "Avatar" and "The Great Gatsby".


Not only is there a multiple choice of moving image production for audiences' to see, there is also how they see them. Examples such as Netflix, TV, Cinema and online websites are just the few ways that people can watch the films that interest them. Netflix is one of the most popular choices to watch television shows and films. This is due to the wide range of moving image production with only having to pay a small fee each month. The cinema however is only popular for the films it shows. Some people go to the cinema to be able to go out and watch a film with friends, whilst others go to watch the latest films for their favourite actors or directors.

Finances and the Sources of Funding

When it comes to making a film there is one key thing that makes the whole process successful and that is the funding part of it. There are many ways that directors are able to get the money for their films and an example of this would be getting a loan from the bank. Another example of gaining funds for your film would be to self-fund it. This however takes a lot of time and you would consider your actors to work for cheap or even nothing to get this film made. An example of a self-funded film would be "Clerks" which tells the audience the life of a young man having to come to work on his day off and we see every possible problem go wrong. Kevin Smith, the director of "Clerks", worked in the shop that the film was created in. He would work 17 hour shift throughout the day and would be allowed to film from 11pm to 4am. He did this for 21 nights straight and was able to make the film only out of business hours. This was the reason why the shutters were always down throughout the film, to allow the audience to assume they were broken when it was really pitch black outside.

There are also ways you are able to get funding without the long wait of gaining the money. One idea would be private funding such as Megan Ellison. Megan Ellison, the daughter of billionaire Larry Ellison, who puts her money behind films that are need of money that she finds would be successful. Examples of films that Megan has produced would be "Zero Dark Thirty" and "Spring Breakers". "Zero Dark Thirty" is about the manhunt for Osama Bin Laden and the discovery of his compound. This is based on the true events that have occured over the years and is an American thriller directed by Kathryn Bigelow.


Finally an example of crowdfunding is Kickstarter. Kickstarter is where people place their ideas for films up on a website and allows the public to read about them. If the public likes it then they are able to donate money towards the film for it to become real. The director of the film will state a budget of the amount of money they would need to create the film and would have a certain amount of days to get the acquired amount. If they fail to reach this amount of money then the film will not be created but if the public fund enough money for the film than the director and his crew are able to begin the production. Crowdfunder is also another website which deals with the help of the public to create production work. Crowdfunder focuses on more than just the media production side of things and also does funding for sports, arts, music and schools. Below is one of the featured projects on Crowdfunder website. This shows the reason why they are funding, the location and the amount of money they wish to receive. They also show how many days left there are for people that are interested in this project. Crowdfunder always people to fund things that interest them whilst Kickstarter focus' mainly on music, films and television shows.   

Requirements

Once you have been able to gain enough funds to begin your film, you then have to start getting any essentials needed for your film. The first important part that the budget is needed for would be the talent. Without anyone to act in your film then you cannot go ahead with your idea. This not only includes people to act within the film but people that have specific jobs to help the film function smoothly. Examples of these jobs would be make up artist, producers and script writers. Another key requirement that is needed would be the equipment you use. This would be your cameras, tripods, mics and lighting equipment which all comes at an expensive cost. However if you are unable to buy your own equipment for your film you can go onto the site called hireacamera which lets you loan out equipment for different set times for reasonable prices.

 Another requirement would be the props, travel and catering services. For props you would need make up and the artists, costumes, props themselves, someone to create props or fix damaged props. For travel you have to consider transports for actors/actresses, props and technology. You also have to consider the catering needs for each member of the production and more. That would mean suitable dietry needs and access to food and drink throughout the day which could take up a fair bit of money if you plan to make a full length feature film.

For our own short film we had to consider what we would need and how we would obtain it. The equipment that we needed was a canon DSLR camera, a tripod and rode mic. We also had to obtain props for our production work. These props were bottles, hoodies and a fake gun. We were able to get all of the equipment from the AV department and the media studio.

Personnel

When it comes to making the moving image production you need your required talent and crew. But it varies between what type of production you are producing. If you are making a low budget short film you would have a small group of people to help you with the work. They would not only be acting as extras or main roles within your production, but they would also be doing stuff behind the scenes as well. They might also have to work on operating the camera, doing script work and looking after props. An example of this would be Civvy Street which is a short ten minute film based on a true story.
A television programme is slightly different to a short low budget film. For television series you have particular actors act out specific characters throughout the entire series.Not only would there be more actors for the production but there would be more crew to help with sounds, shots and scripts. An example of a cast list for an episode would be the first episode of Arrow. This example shows the people in front of the camera alone but the list would be longer if the crew was added also.

Finally there is the Hollywood feature film. This is significantly different to a television series and short film. For this everyone would have there own specific role to do throughout the entire film. If you were a script maker then you would remain on this job throughout the entire production. These types of production not only allow people to maintain one role, but they are also considerably longer than other productions such as a television programme. A feature film could take a year or two to create, not including the preparation time, interviews and auditions as well as script writing. Another essential that makes feature films a lot more bigger compared to others is the money aspect of it. An example of this would be the cost of actors and crew. For a feature film you have celebrities being paid thousands to act in your film whilst in a low budget short film you would have people being paid a minimum wage per hour for their assistance on the film. The costs for a celebrity to star in a feature film is just for their acting and playing of a particular character. However when it comes to the low budget film that person would not only have to act but would probably be asked to bring props or help behind set when they are not acting and other various jobs to help make the production a success. An example of a feature film like this would be A Team, Paul and Top Gun.

For our own production work we chose what to do on that particular day and assigned each of us a part of the pre-production to do. For the filming we chose particular and the rest of our members became extras and helped with getting props and working the camera. For the role of the younger we had Declan and for the older brother we had Jack. Both members of the group had not had any experience within roles like these and found it a new challenge to work on. Ross was an extra and assisted in props and had worked on similar productions doing these jobs in another group that was short of members. I was also an extra and helped with location recces. I had not done the location work but I had experience of being an extra due to other projects.

Not only are there talent and crew members within a production, there is also other contributors needed also. An example of a contributor would be a script writer and storyboard artists. Without these two people the production would not go on ahead and would fail easily. Each contributor stated above helped the production by allowing the actors/actresses to know what they were saying, where they were going to be for each scene and how they appear on set. It would also help cameramen due to knowing what particular shot they needed to do for each clip and how the scene would appear in general.
Another important contributor towards the production would be an accountant as well as a producer. Without these people the production would struggle with the costs and being able to afford anything. An accountant would help with how much would go into particular things in the production, such as prop repairs or replacements. The producer would help with the costs of talents and try to maintain within the film budget with the help of the accountant. Examples of people that are contributors would be Steven Spielberg (Producer), Quentin Tarantino (Producer and Script Writer), Woody Allen (Script Writer) and Mark Andrews (Storyboard Artist). These contributors are well famous for their success within the film industry and have manage to create some strong, unforgettable films over the years. Steven Spielberg has directed, produced and screen written a lot of famous films over the years with some popular choices being "Raiders of the Lost Ark", "Jaws" and "The Goonies".

Time

Our time frame for our Depict unit was two weeks on each part of the production. We had two weeks on pre-production paperwork, two weeks filming and two weeks editing and getting last minute shots. For the pre-production I found that our group did very well keeping to the time frame of the two weeks. When it came to filming it became a lot more difficult with members of the group not being there and the rest of the group having to find parts of clips we could shoot. The editing went a lot better than the filming but found we had a lot more reshooting to do than anticipated.

When it comes to a professional film industry going over deadlines is a big deal. For low budget short films you have the possibility of not being funded any more which could lead to an unfinished film. This happens a lot within the film industry leaving a lot of films unfinished or not edited. When it comes to the big Hollywood feature films its the directors reputation that is at stack. Not only do you have to keep paying for the extra days you need for the film but you are also placing your reputation at stack. An example of a director that did this was Micheal Cimino who became a huge success with his film "Thunderbolt and Littlefoot". After his success on this film he began work on "The Deer Hunter" which was over-budget as well as over-scheduled. After Ciminos films beginning to slowly go downhill he took a gamble on a film called "Heaven's Gate" which came to the conclusion of bankrupting the entire studio due to Ciminos' constant over budgetting which therefore left a large dent within his reputation. From Cimino's mistakes, directors have avoided reaching the same conclusion as he did and push their crew and cast to their limits to get the piece done within the set date.

Equipment and Facilities

When it comes to obtaining equipment for a professional moving image production there is a website called hireacamera. Hireacamera is a website that provides different types of cameras, lenses, tripods and other production resources. The costs of these items can vary on what you wish to loan out. There is also the fact of how long you wish to have the equipment for. For example, if you wanted to get out a canon xf205 the price of that is around £80. However if you wanted to loan it out for  just under two weeks (12 days) the cost of the camera alone would be £507.84 including VAT, with the nearest facility being in Mayfield, East Sussex. This is a clear example of how much people would have to pay for one piece of equipment alone if they wanted to make their production work. Before anyone would be able to shoot the film the people making a low budget film would have to save the money or get a loan to get the equipment out.

For our own depict project we had the available equipment of a canon DSLR camera, SD card, tripod and a rode mic which we obtained within the AV room in the media department.

Locations

Location recces are photographs taken when scouting out a particular location for the  production. For the production, there would be specific places that the crew would look for. The location is one of the key requirments that makes a production a success. It not only informs the audience where the characters are, but also sets the mood and time of the event taking place. For our production work we chose places that would give off some personality trait of the two brothers. For the younger brother we showed scenes from the college to show a form of structure that he has within his life. He wants to succeed and develop but also not go down the path his brother has chosen. For the older brother however, we wanted to show his struggle with life in a unappealing way. With this we chose the docks due to it being away from a civilisation and cannot be disturbed. The final place we chose for our locations was the graveyard due to it portraying the death of the older brother after the attack. This enabled the audience to get a sense of what happened after the attack and how it has affected the younger brothers life. Overall  our location recces were Gorleston docks, East Norfolk Sixth Form College and Gorleston graveyard.


A location release is where you have to get permission to use that location within your production. For the docks we didnt have to get permission for it but we did have to make the police aware that we were using a fake prop gun. For this we had to get permission for using the gun by sending the police a letter of awareness. Once this was completed some of the members of our crew had to where official East Norfolk Crew shirts to inform people that this was not a real attack.
For our second location area of the graveyard we also didnt need permission due to it being owned by the council. However if we were higher than a low budget short movie than we would have to get permission by the council for our shooting. The final place of East Norfolk collage was split into two seperate parts. One was the front of the college and the other was the West Block. For the West Block we got our media teacher to sign the agreement and a member of staff at the reception for the entrance of college.

Throughout our production we faced a lot of risks that needed to be informed of to other members of the crew. One particular risk was the change in weather conditions when shooting and we advised people within our group to bring suitable clothing they could wear incase of rain. Another risk that was advised was the use of props on set. The use of glass bottles and cans caused a threat of people tripping over them or even worse cutting themselves if they were to brake. There was also the problem of being near strong deep water that could cause a risk of drowning if personnel were not careful on where they were positioned. For these three incidents we informed the members of the groups of the risks there were present. If these actions were not followed we would inform the members of the group again and move any damaged/broken props as well as keep people a safe distance from the water and the road.

Materials

Not only do the production team need specific equipment to film and create the piece, but they also need certain materials as well. An example of this would be soundtracks from music as well as sounds fx. Without these the piece would not convey enough emotion and suspense towards the audience and not make it as exciting and/or entertaining for them to watch. Another example of extra materials would be the titles, credits and graphics for the production. This is an essential piece of information for it allows audience to know the name of the piece as well as who was in it and who created it. Finally there are the visual effects. When it comes to shooting an action film you expect a lot of explosions and gun fights. But for this to work successfully the production team need to come up with visual effects that make all the fighting and explosion work to be affected. For these they place realistic images on top of the work whilst editing to make it look like a realistic shot has been fired. When it comes to successful Hollywood movies, they create special clothing that the person wears so a realistic shot can be taken without anyone getting hurt by the effects.

When it comes to all these materials, the producers and directors have to think about the financial considerations for their film. On an everyday scale, the directors would have to insure that everyone was getting wages for their work throughout the day. The cast, crew and the loaning of equipment would take a lot of the money alone within the movie industry and failing to pay would result in an unfinished movie due to materials and equipment being taken back and no cast or crew.
Another important factor would be insurance in general. For this the director would have to have insurance for the cast and crew so if injury become a problem they would be able to get treated easily. Another important insurance would be the equipment. If not loaning any of the equipment than insurance would be a key item to have for your film. If an incident occurred, such as a fire, you would loose months of filming, props, costumes and the equipment itself which would result in the loss of money to regain all that equipment and materials, as well as more payments to get a new deadline date.
Finally there is copyright. For this the directors and producers would have to get permission and/or pay the company or person for using something in their film. An example of this would be a particular song in the film or for the credits. Many films have musicians created their own music for the piece but if they want a specific song to it than they would have to pay for it. An example of this would be the James Bond movies. For each high rate blockbuster we have seen Adele and Sam Smith place a song for the upcoming films and represents that particular film. This has also occurred with Christina Perri for The Twilight Saga, Ed Sheeran for The Hobbit and The Fault in our Stars and Bryan Adams for Robin Hood Prince of Thieves.Also the copyright of having specific types of brands is a key one as well.

Legal Issues  

A key legal consideration you have to consider when filming would be the permission of people being within your film. Whether it is a short low budget film or a feature length movie everyone has to have permission to be or work on this film. For younger children you have to have the agreement from the parents as well as any child till the age of 18. Once 18 the talent is able to accept on the terms due to being placed as an adult themselves. We had a mixure of talent within our own group when we did our media production work. Declan and I were above the age of 18 so were able to accept our own talent releases whilst the other members of our group had to get their parents permission due to being under the age. An example of what a talent release looks like is this:

Copyright is where you get protection over your work and no one is able to copy or steal your work without permission. Copyright protects any source of work from literary writing and illustrations, television and film producing, music and sound production and broadcasting. There is no fee or form you have to work on to get copyright protection and helps to protect your work from being sold, shown or adapted. It becomes your own personal work and no one is able to do anything unless you give the approval. However there is a so called sell-by-date on your work. The protection begins as soon as the work is created but depending on the creation, they all have different protection times. Here is a table with examples of copyright materials and there times of protection:

Not only does this show the amount of time copyright lasts for, it also varies on how long it took to create the production, hence why films and musicals have a higher copyright rate than others.
You are also able to choose how your work is used and if you wish to sell it off but will have to sign an agreement to do so. Actors are eligible for getting performers rights if they are within a film or musical and should be informed on what will happen to the piece of work. Finally when it comes to people using your work the first thing to do is to check. Places like schools sometimes have permission to use your work if it is within the learning criteria. Some people will also ask if they are able to use your work and that is within your power, if you feel as though your work could be in any harm or your own personal reputation than you do not have to agree. When it comes to people using your work without your acknowledgement, than you must see if they have a licence which insures them to do that. If not than you must apply for the licence to be stopped and for them to pay any fee, if there is one, for using the work.

For our own Depict! production we had to go through things that had copyright on them. One was the use of sound. For the sound within our production we used Bensound.com or Royalty free. Both of these sights give permission for people to use them with free purchase and they have a range of musics to suit different situations and moods. Another key copyright example we had to face was the permission to use assets such as cast and equipment. With this we had to fill out forms such as talent releases to allow us to shoot and work on the production. We were not able to use specific songs like the films I stated above earlier had. If we failed to do this than we had the risk of our Depict! production to be removed from YouTube.

When it comes to media production there are specific terms that are used. One is the word clearance which means that you need permission to use anything within that piece of work. This could range from music to a track or even to a simple logo. An example of logos would be Adidas, Superdry and apple products. Another key term is Public Liability Insurance which is were you get cover for the film and other types of work. An example of a place to get insurance is a website called Aon. On this particular website there is loads of different types of insurance that is specific to what your line of work is. From film making to photography there is a different insurance for anyone.
The final key term is Completion Guarantee/Insurance which is the insurance which makes the deadline for the film. It is basically the time limit they have to complete the film and if the film is not completed when the insurance goes out than the film and everything is not covered. An example of this would be Michael Cimino and his film that went way over budget and time. His work is a key example of a film not reaching its deadlines and loosing his insurance, a lot of money and his reputation.

Regulation

A regulatory body is someone that is there to help protect the public and is not within your organisation. In some aspects they are they to protect the legal issues within the production even when they are not part of your organisation.

OFCOM is the communications regulator within the UK. There job is to insure people are able to get the best possible results from the communication devices such as phones and laptops and are prevented from getting any scams or hacks. The BBFC, formally known as The British Board of Film Classification, which was funded in 1912 and is responsible for the classification of film ages due to the details and imagery use on screen. Examples of this would be PG, 12, 15 and 18. For any form of language used within a film the classification rate gets raised. This is also the case for violence, sexual scenes and gruesome images. Take Disney Animation film - Bambi which was rated a U rating. This means it is suitable for any viewer to watch. Compare this to Mad Max: Fury Road which is rated as a 15 due to violence. The difference between the BBFC and OFCOM is that the BBFC provides restrictions on what films people are able to watch due to their age. OFCOME enables people to communicate and discuss new films and therefore allows audiences' to discuss films they have watched on the internet due to not being able to watch it in the cinema due to the BBFC classification. 

From my own Depict! production we found there was a lot of restrictions on the internet that we had to try to avoid. We had limited websites that we were able to go on due to them being blocked and found it difficult to find anything that helped us that wasn't blocked. In the end we got all that we needed but found it took longer due to there being particular sites that we could not use. 

Trade Unions and Trade Associations

A trade union is a group of people that work to protect their rights and interests. There role is significant as they help make communication between the workers and management. They are there to help make sure that no major conflict breaks out between them and to insure that the issues that have come up are resolved.
The final two terms are PACT and BECTU. PACT is a formal agreement between individuals or a party.  PACT refers to Producers Alliance for Cinema and Television which is a rade association for independent producers in feature films, photography and television programmes. It focus' mainly on the issues relevant to its members within the work. A trade association is an organization founded and funded by business within a specific industry with them mainly focusing on advertising and publishing. Finally, BECTU, formally known as The Broadcasting, Entertainment, Cinematography and Theater Union, which is a trade union stated within the UK. The members of BECTU represent the staff and contract who are based within the UK and support their notions. They help to negotiate payments and wages, training support, advice on health and safety and career development opportunities. Altogether these trades are there to help and benefit everyone within the film industry and provide a happy and reasonable work space to create films and television programmes.