On the technical side, I dunno. I worry about my ability to understand it, because I'm kind of retarded when it comes to anything dealing with geometry or mathematics in general, and I could be completely off-base on this, but it seems filmmaking requires some form of comprehension for these things.
The good news is - you're completely off-base on this.
I've been making films as writer, director, producer and crew (DP, camera operator,
make-up efx, special efx) my entire working life and I'm terrible at geometry and
mathematics. I read many of the posts here where the guys talks about the bit rates,
the 1080 vs. 420, the something-or-other per seconds and am amazed and confused.
I vaguely know the difference between interlaced and progressive scan, I know I
don't like working in HDV and that it's different from HD and I know frame rates,
but there my tech knowledge ends.
Yet I can still make movies.
Though I think if I can get myself hooked up with someone who knows cameras and knows how to use them, I think I can take it from there and learn enough to maybe be able to move on to another project and carry myself a little better than I did the first time.
Not a bad idea. The movies I make with a crew are always better than the ones
I make all alone. Having someone who is good with a camera and light, a different
person who is good at audio, a different person who is good at make-up, really
allows the director to concentrate on directing.
And working on other movies is the cornerstone of becoming a good movie maker
yourself. I still work as crew for free on other peoples movies just to keep learning.
You are so right that you will learn more on one movie set than you will watching
200 DVD extras.
The nice thing about this script is that it only uses one interior location and one exterior location. Granted, it needs to be at a bus station or somewhere that could pull off the illusion of being a bus station, which creates problems with getting permission to film there and so on, but that's not a particularly troubling problem to me either.
Not only is that not a problem, it's an excellent challenge. Go to your nearest bus
station and ask. If they say no, or it's too busy to get a shoot done, go a couple of
towns away and ask. One of the great advantages you have being in Virginia is
there isn't much movie making going on there - as least not as much as in Los Angeles,
where I am - and people are more likely to actually like the idea of a movie being
made in their establishment.
Just like everything else in life, the more you do it, the better you will get. After making
10-15 short films your tech knowledge will get better, too. But if you hold off until you
read more, you won't get much better. So do it now!