What film gear do we need for a short film production?
November 23, 2014 12:23 PM Subscribe
I just got a call to DP a short film next summer. I've been a videographer for about 18 months, so most of my gear is oriented towards promotional video and documentary work. I use a Canon DSLR. We want the quality of the film to be high enough for festival submissions. What gear do we need to budget for?
Here is the gear I already own:
Canon 6D SLR
50mm f/1.4 prime lens
24-105mm f/4 wide zoom lens
Video tripod with pan and tilt movements
Zoom H4n audio recorder
Rode VideoMic Pro shotgun mic (thinking this is not high enough quality for film production)
boom pole
GlideCam (steadicam)
7” LCD monitor
Slate board
42” Gold/silver reflector
White reflector
(2) small CFL lights, 300 watt equivalent
The other gear I think we'll absolutely need:
High quality shotgun mic (or two) -- Any suggestions?
External hard drive
Variable ND filter
Shoulder support rig
Diffusion panel (homemade with fabric)
Other gear we're thinking about:
Follow focus system (probably a cheap handle option)
AC Power adapter for the Canon DSLR
LED Light panels (as low budget as possible to provide indoor light)
Dolly track
What else do we need / absolutely need?
Here is the gear I already own:
Canon 6D SLR
50mm f/1.4 prime lens
24-105mm f/4 wide zoom lens
Video tripod with pan and tilt movements
Zoom H4n audio recorder
Rode VideoMic Pro shotgun mic (thinking this is not high enough quality for film production)
boom pole
GlideCam (steadicam)
7” LCD monitor
Slate board
42” Gold/silver reflector
White reflector
(2) small CFL lights, 300 watt equivalent
The other gear I think we'll absolutely need:
High quality shotgun mic (or two) -- Any suggestions?
External hard drive
Variable ND filter
Shoulder support rig
Diffusion panel (homemade with fabric)
Other gear we're thinking about:
Follow focus system (probably a cheap handle option)
AC Power adapter for the Canon DSLR
LED Light panels (as low budget as possible to provide indoor light)
Dolly track
What else do we need / absolutely need?
Response by poster: @ohisee, any suggestions for lights that would be low-cost but high output? We're thinking maybe $300-400 LED panels.
posted by mtphoto at 1:03 PM on November 23, 2014
posted by mtphoto at 1:03 PM on November 23, 2014
Best answer: DSLR quality is fine for a festival short.
Don't underestimate the power of good sound- it's actually more important than good image. You should have a dedicated sound person wearing heaphones and riding the mixer if possible. Mic the actors with both lavalier mics and a boom.
When you're done editing, spend the extra cash/time to get it audio mixed and colour graded- makes a world of difference in terms of making the project look high-end.
posted by pseudostrabismus at 1:28 PM on November 23, 2014 [3 favorites]
Don't underestimate the power of good sound- it's actually more important than good image. You should have a dedicated sound person wearing heaphones and riding the mixer if possible. Mic the actors with both lavalier mics and a boom.
When you're done editing, spend the extra cash/time to get it audio mixed and colour graded- makes a world of difference in terms of making the project look high-end.
posted by pseudostrabismus at 1:28 PM on November 23, 2014 [3 favorites]
Best answer: Honestly, it really, really depends on what you are shooting, how many actors and so on. Obviously, a 2 person drama in a single room will have different gear requirements than a period piece about an epic battle. Night shoots are going to require different gear than strictly day shoots, interiors and exteriors, on the water or aerial footage, green screen or sfx, and so on. It also depends a bit on your gear budget. The gear list can be made to cover no-budget, tiny, small, medium, top level etc. and the gear will all be different.
Here's something to think about. Do you have a script breakdown, so you know how many actors in how many scenes - because f.ex. micing two actors will be different from a larger group; do you know how this will be shot, and do you have storyboards? If you do, that would give you immediate insight into what you need gear-wise, and the director still has time to adjust his vision, if f.ex. a crane shot is not realistic budget-wise. The directing style will determine a lot of it - is it a more documentary style or found footage or cinema verite or high-impact glossy stuff etc.. - the gear will be drastically different. These are all discussions to be held long before you get to gear lists. Once all that is settled, with budget in hand, you can draw up a gear list and folks will have a million recommendations.
My advice would be to get as much granularity as possible about the script requirements and storyboard/how the film will be shot. That will clue the below the line people, such as sound and dp and light as to what gear will be needed. You may find out that it will be easier and cheaper to rent gear than to buy gear - often times it will be cheaper to rent high-quality gear for that special shot, or day or whatever, than to buy cheap low quality gear that you then are saddled with. Seriously, strongly consider renting at least some of your gear. A grip package can be had super cheap per week rates, depending on where you are.
But again, it all comes down to what and how you're gonna shoot - the gear list might change depending on all these elements, down to shooting inside a car versus in an open field etc..
It would be a lot easier to recommend gear (and again, consider renting!) with more info, otherwise we'd be answering a bit blindly.
posted by VikingSword at 2:55 PM on November 23, 2014 [1 favorite]
Here's something to think about. Do you have a script breakdown, so you know how many actors in how many scenes - because f.ex. micing two actors will be different from a larger group; do you know how this will be shot, and do you have storyboards? If you do, that would give you immediate insight into what you need gear-wise, and the director still has time to adjust his vision, if f.ex. a crane shot is not realistic budget-wise. The directing style will determine a lot of it - is it a more documentary style or found footage or cinema verite or high-impact glossy stuff etc.. - the gear will be drastically different. These are all discussions to be held long before you get to gear lists. Once all that is settled, with budget in hand, you can draw up a gear list and folks will have a million recommendations.
My advice would be to get as much granularity as possible about the script requirements and storyboard/how the film will be shot. That will clue the below the line people, such as sound and dp and light as to what gear will be needed. You may find out that it will be easier and cheaper to rent gear than to buy gear - often times it will be cheaper to rent high-quality gear for that special shot, or day or whatever, than to buy cheap low quality gear that you then are saddled with. Seriously, strongly consider renting at least some of your gear. A grip package can be had super cheap per week rates, depending on where you are.
But again, it all comes down to what and how you're gonna shoot - the gear list might change depending on all these elements, down to shooting inside a car versus in an open field etc..
It would be a lot easier to recommend gear (and again, consider renting!) with more info, otherwise we'd be answering a bit blindly.
posted by VikingSword at 2:55 PM on November 23, 2014 [1 favorite]
Best answer: This is going to 100% depend on the scope of the short film. Also, a few things from the experience of working on several shorts and producing/directing my own web series:
1. If you've been asked to DP, you're likely not going to be involved with the sound kit at all. I wouldn't worry about this unless you've been specifically told you are also the sound mixer. Which sounds like it would not really work at all unless you're only wiring people and not having a boom operator at all. Most narrative films do not use shotgun mics. If you are being asked to handle both camera and sound, I would stress to the producer that this is not a great idea and you need to hire a sound mixer/boom operator with their own full kit. Said kit should include enough wireless lav mics for the max number of actors in each scene, as well as a boom mic.
2. It's customary for the producer or director of the film to handle the hard drives, because they're the ones that will own the footage after it's shot. If you supply a hard drive, you're basically out a drive after the shoot. Because otherwise where is the footage going to be stored?
3. It's impossible to suggest specific lenses, filters, reflectors, lighting gear, etc. without knowing at all what sort of short film it is. This is something that is going to 100% depend on things like the location, what the available light situation is, does the director have any really ambitious shots planned*, etc.
4. You should be looking into rental houses for the vast majority of this stuff, not buying (unless you're looking to add to your kit for future jobs). This means that much more important for your budget is going to be the length of the shoot and how ambitious the film is overall, and not so much the pricetag on a given piece of equipment. I was surprised by how cheap it is to rent most of what you need to produce a pro-quality short.
4A. Money-saving rental tip: shoot over a weekend if it's a 2 or 3 day shoot, and you get the whole weekend for the price of one day.
4B. Money-realism rental tip: don't forget to factor in pickup and returns, either in budgeting how many rental days you need or in terms of the overall expense and labor involved in the shoot. You are pretty much 100% not going to be able to pick up equipment and then go shoot same-day, or shoot and then get stuff back by the time the rental house closes up.
5. C-stands. Even if your current kit is all you need, you're going to wish you had a few c-stands.
6. In terms of the budget, don't forget expendables. Gaff tape, various clips and clamps and such, bulbs, duvetyne, zip ties, etc. Not to mention durable extras like stingers, sound blankets, and the like.
7. If you are looking to build a kit for future jobs, the one thing I'd invest in is a green screen. I see SO MANY requests on listservs and facebook for green screens. It'll sell you as a DP for future gigs if you can say you already have one the job won't even have to rent, and you can likely rent yours out to others to make a quick buck. It also creates massive good will in a networking sense if you can lend it out.
8. I agree with others who've said you need to get your hands on the script and do a breakdown of equipment you'll need. You should also have a sit down with both the director and the producer (separately if at all possible) to talk about things like the shot list (especially if the director has anything ambitious in mind), locations, length of shoot, and other important overall parameters that you will need to clarify before you can finalize a budget.
9. Labor. More bodies is at least as important as more equipment, if not moreso. If you have a ready supply of free labor to be your camera and grip/electric team, go you! If you're going to need to pay people, do not forget to factor this into your budget. As a producer, honestly, I'd feel more comfortable hiring a bunch of guys than I would be renting a bunch of equipment, if I had to choose. The more stuff you guys are going to rig up for each scene, the longer it's all going to take. But the more bodies we have, the easier it's going to be whatever the equipment needs are. At the very least, you are going to need at least one other person on your team to be combination operator and grip. A couple or three more people would be even better, especially if there will be dolly track or you have any lighting equipment to speak of.
10. You better pray that the producer of the short knows like 99% of what I just typed.
11. You better pray that there IS a producer of this short.
*I shot my web series without any dolly shots at all. It was either still camera or steadicam. However, I was also a first time director, and as a director my visual style is really not flashy at all. Also, it's comedy, and the cast is relatively large, and there was lots of business and sight gags and jokes and visually interesting locations. I later produced a short where there was only one actor in an apartment and EVERY damn shot was some kind of crazy rack focus tracking weird nonsense, just because the director needed to make something actually HAPPEN on the screen. So it could really go either way.
posted by Sara C. at 10:15 PM on November 23, 2014
1. If you've been asked to DP, you're likely not going to be involved with the sound kit at all. I wouldn't worry about this unless you've been specifically told you are also the sound mixer. Which sounds like it would not really work at all unless you're only wiring people and not having a boom operator at all. Most narrative films do not use shotgun mics. If you are being asked to handle both camera and sound, I would stress to the producer that this is not a great idea and you need to hire a sound mixer/boom operator with their own full kit. Said kit should include enough wireless lav mics for the max number of actors in each scene, as well as a boom mic.
2. It's customary for the producer or director of the film to handle the hard drives, because they're the ones that will own the footage after it's shot. If you supply a hard drive, you're basically out a drive after the shoot. Because otherwise where is the footage going to be stored?
3. It's impossible to suggest specific lenses, filters, reflectors, lighting gear, etc. without knowing at all what sort of short film it is. This is something that is going to 100% depend on things like the location, what the available light situation is, does the director have any really ambitious shots planned*, etc.
4. You should be looking into rental houses for the vast majority of this stuff, not buying (unless you're looking to add to your kit for future jobs). This means that much more important for your budget is going to be the length of the shoot and how ambitious the film is overall, and not so much the pricetag on a given piece of equipment. I was surprised by how cheap it is to rent most of what you need to produce a pro-quality short.
4A. Money-saving rental tip: shoot over a weekend if it's a 2 or 3 day shoot, and you get the whole weekend for the price of one day.
4B. Money-realism rental tip: don't forget to factor in pickup and returns, either in budgeting how many rental days you need or in terms of the overall expense and labor involved in the shoot. You are pretty much 100% not going to be able to pick up equipment and then go shoot same-day, or shoot and then get stuff back by the time the rental house closes up.
5. C-stands. Even if your current kit is all you need, you're going to wish you had a few c-stands.
6. In terms of the budget, don't forget expendables. Gaff tape, various clips and clamps and such, bulbs, duvetyne, zip ties, etc. Not to mention durable extras like stingers, sound blankets, and the like.
7. If you are looking to build a kit for future jobs, the one thing I'd invest in is a green screen. I see SO MANY requests on listservs and facebook for green screens. It'll sell you as a DP for future gigs if you can say you already have one the job won't even have to rent, and you can likely rent yours out to others to make a quick buck. It also creates massive good will in a networking sense if you can lend it out.
8. I agree with others who've said you need to get your hands on the script and do a breakdown of equipment you'll need. You should also have a sit down with both the director and the producer (separately if at all possible) to talk about things like the shot list (especially if the director has anything ambitious in mind), locations, length of shoot, and other important overall parameters that you will need to clarify before you can finalize a budget.
9. Labor. More bodies is at least as important as more equipment, if not moreso. If you have a ready supply of free labor to be your camera and grip/electric team, go you! If you're going to need to pay people, do not forget to factor this into your budget. As a producer, honestly, I'd feel more comfortable hiring a bunch of guys than I would be renting a bunch of equipment, if I had to choose. The more stuff you guys are going to rig up for each scene, the longer it's all going to take. But the more bodies we have, the easier it's going to be whatever the equipment needs are. At the very least, you are going to need at least one other person on your team to be combination operator and grip. A couple or three more people would be even better, especially if there will be dolly track or you have any lighting equipment to speak of.
10. You better pray that the producer of the short knows like 99% of what I just typed.
11. You better pray that there IS a producer of this short.
*I shot my web series without any dolly shots at all. It was either still camera or steadicam. However, I was also a first time director, and as a director my visual style is really not flashy at all. Also, it's comedy, and the cast is relatively large, and there was lots of business and sight gags and jokes and visually interesting locations. I later produced a short where there was only one actor in an apartment and EVERY damn shot was some kind of crazy rack focus tracking weird nonsense, just because the director needed to make something actually HAPPEN on the screen. So it could really go either way.
posted by Sara C. at 10:15 PM on November 23, 2014
Oh, one more thing from a producer's perspective, especially re renting vs. buying and labor.
If I got a budget from you, and it was a bunch of equipment you wanted to buy, and nothing under either rentals or labor, I would be very concerned about whether you knew what you were doing at all.
While you might want to buy one or two things to round out your kit, as I said above most equipment can be rented very cheaply. This makes buying stuff not very cost-effective. However, having more bodies on set is a win-win because it means you can do more with less stuff, change camera set-ups faster, copy cards onto hard drives faster, and in general facilitate what I, as a producer, am trying to do better.
Also, any smart producer is going to hands-down refuse to give you money to buy equipment that you will then own after the shoot.
posted by Sara C. at 10:26 PM on November 23, 2014
If I got a budget from you, and it was a bunch of equipment you wanted to buy, and nothing under either rentals or labor, I would be very concerned about whether you knew what you were doing at all.
While you might want to buy one or two things to round out your kit, as I said above most equipment can be rented very cheaply. This makes buying stuff not very cost-effective. However, having more bodies on set is a win-win because it means you can do more with less stuff, change camera set-ups faster, copy cards onto hard drives faster, and in general facilitate what I, as a producer, am trying to do better.
Also, any smart producer is going to hands-down refuse to give you money to buy equipment that you will then own after the shoot.
posted by Sara C. at 10:26 PM on November 23, 2014
Best answer: Just one thing: I've personally never been on a set where an AC adapter was used for a DSLR. Just bring at least three batteries, two of which are being charged at all times. Make sure at least one is fully charged before you get there or your director will hate you and curse your entire family
posted by Smallpox at 6:02 AM on November 24, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by Smallpox at 6:02 AM on November 24, 2014 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Thanks everyone for the insights! Much appreciated. Just found out that the film is definitely going to be a micro budget, with only about $1,500 for equipment.
We realize that lighting and sound are going to be very important since we want to submit to festivals, so most of our equipment budget will probably go to those areas.
The hard drive issues is an important one. The film will be shot in Montana and taken back to New York City to be edited, so they will definitely need to provide the hard drive and keep it.
posted by mtphoto at 9:50 PM on November 28, 2014
We realize that lighting and sound are going to be very important since we want to submit to festivals, so most of our equipment budget will probably go to those areas.
The hard drive issues is an important one. The film will be shot in Montana and taken back to New York City to be edited, so they will definitely need to provide the hard drive and keep it.
posted by mtphoto at 9:50 PM on November 28, 2014
This thread is closed to new comments.
Don't forget backups for your hard drive.
Move better lights up into the absolutely need pile. If you can get a good kit with flags, even better.
Also, you probably need more lenses. A good 16-35 for wide shots. You've got middle covered. And maybe a 70-200, depending on the script.
But seriously, don't skimp on the lights.
posted by ohisee at 12:59 PM on November 23, 2014 [1 favorite]