How do you know if a script is good before purchasing it?

[harmonica44]

I wanted to purchase a feature length script to produce and direct myself, and have been looking around, but so far, I haven't found a script that really pops out. How do other filmmakers tell which scripts are worth making, compared to not, if they just have one shot?

Also, just because you think it's good or bad, does not mean other audiences would. So how does one go about accessing it? Do you just say I like it, let's buy it, and make a movie, and that's it? Especially because it can be hard to get good feedback from many people, in such a small window you have to buy the script, before anyone else does. Does anyone have any advice?

Thanks .

 

[WalterB]

Stop hiding behind excuses.

I made this short short without audio engineer. Actually, half of the shots I directed while booming, because there was too little space for a larger crew
And the locations: my brother's apartment, the chickens are owned by a client of my dad and the farm is the neighbour of that client: I just asked them 2 weeks in advance.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJETM80MjsU

To who did you show the 2 page script?
Where they relevant to execute it?
Or did you look for feedback?
I'm sure that for instance the 'sad girl idea' I offered you 2 years ago would appeal to a DOP who wants to create beautiful shots and to a model/actress who wants something more poetic in their portfolio.
But if you show it to your overanalysing friends who only search for 'mistakes', then yes, they would ask where the plot is. Probably because they lack imagination.

 

[AudioPostExpert]

Okay thanks. The biggest bill when it comes to shorts is the post production, mostly the audio engineering. I just need to find someone that can work for cheaper, otherwise the short is dead in the water before I even start shooting. I can continue too look for audio engineers and hopefully I will find one that I can afford.

But then the cast and crew want to see the movie, they see it has very poor sound, and they get a bad impression of you. Even if I spent money on youtube shorts, I cannot show them to anyone to make a good impression if they have poor sound.

1. Cheap audio engineers are quite easy to find. Good audio engineers are also quite easy to find. Good and cheap is pretty much an oxymoron though!

2. Good sound is only partially dependent on the quality of the audio engineers. A film which is poorly designed, shot and pic edited for sound is going to hamstring good audio post personnel anyway.

3. Creating a "good impression" is an advanced filmmaking skill. This advanced skill can only realistically be accomplished after at least a decent level of competency has been gained in the basics.

The first of these is practically impossible and the last two are extremely unlikely or impossible without considerable practice. And, I haven't even mentioned the other essential filmmaking skills/crafts! You're stuck in a vicious circle of only considering making something which gives a good impression while realising that you don't have the resources (money and skills) to create something which gives a good impression. So you just stand there, like a rabbit frozen in headlights, not doing anything and never getting any closer to your goal. You need to break this vicious circle or in 5 years time you'll either be in exactly the same place you are now or you'll have given up!

Why don't you take not such a great script (for a short), design it for sound (and the other film crafts), shoot the damn thing and edit it. Your audio post skills will not be up to the task of realising the sound design and you'll almost certainly end up with something which is not impressive but that's a compromise you're going to have to accept from the outset, in order to break your vicious circle. It will be a learning experience, a valuable one if you go into it with that as a main goal. You are learning the basics of how to create a vision, organise and direct a film (a sound designed film) and without these skills even having the financial resources to hire good audio personnel is not going to get you where you think it will anyway! When you're done, get some feedback on here, assess and learn from it, then find a new script, rinse and repeat. Keep doing that until you reach the point that investing some money in good personnel actually gives you realistic chance of creating something impressive.

G

 

[WalterB]

............. You're stuck in a vicious circle of only considering making something which gives a good impression while realising that you don't have the resources (money and skills) to create something which gives a good impression. So you just stand there, like a rabbit frozen in headlights, not doing anything and never getting any closer to your goal. You need to break this vicious circle or in 5 years time you'll either be in exactly the same place you are now or you'll have given up!
..................

aka catch22

@H44:
Listen to APE.
Make something short to get skills. Do your best and learn from it.

When I started making videos I had no skills either... I had good ears, great imagination and perseverance.
In less than 6 years I completed at least 30 projects and helped others as well.
(Ok, I admit: was a filmstudent at artschool, so I could bevote a lot of time to it.)
That number is not the point, btw, the point is: it was always fun to make those videos, but if I look at them now, most aren't that impressive or good. However, they are part of my journey where I keep learning and honing my skills.
"Life's journey, not a destination."
You will need to travel to the point where you can make your feature, and little short projects are the stepping stones to get there.

 

[harmonica44]

Okay thanks WalterB. I was just told my short before had really bad sound, and it scared actors away, when they asked to see my previous material. So I wanted to get someone good before the next one, so I could make the next one worth showing off, without hurting my reputation.

I already tried to pitch the sadgirl idea several times now, but everytime, people looked it and asked, 'where's the plot'?

I will try again when I am free from other people's projects, but I have tried about a dozen times now with that one, and people still think it's not plotted enough or too short. Do you think they want a script that is beyond just a couple of pages?

As for reading through feature scripts to pick one I think people will like, I guess I haven't found one that blows my mind yet. Once I find one that literally blows my mind, I would feel confident with that one, cause you want your first feature to be really good to sell obviously. I guess it's just a matter of reading and waiting for that mindblower.

 

[FilmmakerJ]

Okay thanks WalterB. I was just told my short before had really bad sound, and it scared actors away, when they asked to see my previous material. So I wanted to get someone good before the next one, so I could make the next one worth showing off, without hurting my reputation.

I already tried to pitch the sadgirl idea several times now, but everytime, people looked it and asked, 'where's the plot'?

I will try again when I am free from other people's projects, but I have tried about a dozen times now with that one, and people still think it's not plotted enough or too short. Do you think they want a script that is beyond just a couple of pages?

As for reading through feature scripts to pick one I think people will like, I guess I haven't found one that blows my mind yet. Once I find one that literally blows my mind, I would feel confident with that one, cause you want your first feature to be really good to sell obviously. I guess it's just a matter of reading and waiting for that mindblower.

Any idea what would blow your mind? It might help to ask yourself and think it over just so you can better understand where your expectations lie. Cause if someone hasn't made that mind-blower yet, you might be able to write it yourself, or work with someone else to.

Heck, if I'm going to make an Indie feature-length film, I'd much rather it be an idea that I came up with myself, and had someone co-write it with me who's better at creating character-specific dialogue. Because plot and story is one thing, but creating believable and natural dialogue to fit different character types, personalities, and accents is a lot more difficult to achieve.

 

[WalterB]

Okay thanks WalterB. I was just told my short before had really bad sound, and it scared actors away, when they asked to see my previous material. So I wanted to get someone good before the next one, so I could make the next one worth showing off, without hurting my reputation.

I already tried to pitch the sadgirl idea several times now, but everytime, people looked it and asked, 'where's the plot'?

I will try again when I am free from other people's projects, but I have tried about a dozen times now with that one, and people still think it's not plotted enough or too short. Do you think they want a script that is beyond just a couple of pages?

As for reading through feature scripts to pick one I think people will like, I guess I haven't found one that blows my mind yet. Once I find one that literally blows my mind, I would feel confident with that one, cause you want your first feature to be really good to sell obviously. I guess it's just a matter of reading and waiting for that mindblower.

Good to hear you tried.
How did you pitch it?
I would emphasize it will be more about atmosphere and beautifull shots (with in the end low sun): more like a mood film, than plotted drama. (But I must say: I know enough people by now who would like to join such a project. It might be more interesting for a model with some acting experience and ambitions, than an actress focussing on plot and dialogue.)
I can't completely script the idea for you, because the idea is more about aesthetics than plot and I don't know how things look like where you live... Location scouting is a big part of preparing this: looking how it more or less looks like .

 

[sfoster]

Can you post the short with bad sound? or PM me a link if you don't want it public.

Like I said I did my own sound and no one complained about the quality of it.

 

[harmonica44]

Okay thanks. The short I am talking about with bad sound is the same short I did a few years ago. I'll PM you it.

As for location and whether where I live for the sad girl film I really left that out of the pitch and concentrated more on what was required for the scenes dialogue and action wise. But if I try to pitch it again, perhaps I could be more specific on realistic locations.

 

[FilmmakerJ]

Okay thanks. The short I am talking about with bad sound is the same short I did a few years ago. I'll PM you it.

As for location and whether where I live for the sad girl film I really left that out of the pitch and concentrated more on what was required for the scenes dialogue and action wise. But if I try to pitch it again, perhaps I could be more specific on realistic locations.

I ended up catching the link to In The Mood of Wrath before you edited the link. And if I could offer some criticism towards it, the first main issue with your sound is that the levels aren't normalized, and the second issue is that your quiet moments don't have enough sound in them, if that makes any sense.

To elaborate: the opening scene has that exterior shot with the motorbike sounds starting at a pretty good level, but then we pop inside the Prosecutor's office, and the sound completely cuts out rather than tapers off: which I believe is how it's supposed to be done. It makes changes in soundscape a little easier on the ears. But then after the secretary comes in, we cut to a hallway, and it's nearly silent with only minor feet shuffle (likely live camera sound), before the Prosecutor says his first line, and it's about 50% louder than the previous 3 shots. This is a problem because if you don't keep your dialogue all at a certain level and your other sounds at a certain level, then you are forcing your audience to either have to be bombarded by loud noises that shouldn't be loud (which can cause mental whiplash and headaches), and/or you're forcing them to have to turn their volume up and down for each shot that's too loud or too soft, when they should almost never have to do that.

It really pays to go back and monitor your sound levels before you finish a project, no matter how simple it is. Because "unwarranted" loud noises or dialogue will always turn off a good portion of your viewers.

An in regards to your more quieter scenes, the problem is that quiet scenes should never be "too" quiet. There needs to be sound there because there naturally would be, but the sounds you include also help to emphasize the moment. When things are quiet and tense (like during a buglary, or a heist, or a break-in), the most minute and quiet sounds are better to be emphasized and amplified, in order to add to the intensity and uncertainty of the scene. If sounds of sneaking around and shuffling feet sound louder than they ought to, it helps keep the audience on their toes wondering if someone is going to hear any of these noises.

So instead of just working off of camera sound for those four guys sneaking into that house in the middle of the film, you ought to have recorded Foley for foot-steps, cloth rubbing, tactical armor noises, carpet scrapes, and whatever else might make a noise in their vicinity.

You might not realize it, especially in your own projects, but for me, when I watch a scene that sounds too quiet: unless it's incredibly quiet for a particular purpose, I usually wonder why is there no sfx or Foley here, because there almost always is, even when a scene is supposed to be dark, moody, and suspensefully quiet.

 

[sfoster]

Okay thanks. The short I am talking about with bad sound is the same short I did a few years ago. I'll PM you it.

As for location and whether where I live for the sad girl film I really left that out of the pitch and concentrated more on what was required for the scenes dialogue and action wise. But if I try to pitch it again, perhaps I could be more specific on realistic locations.

"In the mood for wrath"

I think I saw part of this a while back, but I just watched the whole thing for the first time. I was expecting much worse sound by what you said - like some jarring transitions between dialogue tracks but it's really not that bad. Pretty decent by youtube standards IMO.

You spent a lot of time on the Foley and have some good scenes in here. There are one or two places where audio could be smoothed out (26 second mark for example) but I think the biggest sound problem is a lack of ambience. Occasionally there is nothing but the Foley, whereas the parts with music layered in are much more engaging.

I would question whoever told you that sound is the problem.
It's not that bad. Personally my last casting call didn't get many replies and I've been working on my pitch. Going to send out a better one tomorrow plus a higher payment for the part.

I bet you could go back and spend another day or two on the sounds and eliminate the few problems that you have. There aren't that many.

 

[FilmmakerJ]

"In the mood for wrath"

I think I saw part of this a while back, but I just watched the whole thing for the first time. I was expecting much worse sound by what you said - like some jarring transitions between dialogue tracks but it's really not that bad. Pretty decent by youtube standards IMO.

I'm pretty sure the exact issue with the sound is the transitions between dialogue tracks. Not all over, as I didn't notice any major problems for a good 3 minutes or more in the opening scene. But the first four shots were all over the place in terms of sound levels. And the fight scene around the third quarter also had similar problems. Far too loud and sharp on the screaming.

I tend to see a lot of micro budget (and smaller) Youtube-based film projects not monitoring their audio levels before they get uploaded, and it's always a troubling aspect that makes the rest of the film hard to watch.

 

[sfoster]

But the first four shots were all over the place in terms of sound levels. And the fight scene around the third quarter also had similar problems.

Yeah the beginning had a few jarring parts, like at 26 seconds, but also a very simple fix. On the whole it's a 14 minute video and most of it is perfectly fine.

 

[harmonica44]

Okay thanks. But the sound on that was done by an audio engineer who worked for cheap. I wouldn't know how to improve it myself, especially since the mix was already completed by him. The point being that for the next project, I would have to spend more to find someone better. I am not sure what I can do to improve his already completed mix.

What do you mean jarring at 26 seconds?

 

[sfoster]

Okay thanks. But the sound on that was done by an audio engineer who worked for cheap. I wouldn't know how to improve it myself, especially since the mix was already completed by him. The point being that for the next project, I would have to spend more to find someone better. I am not sure what I can do to improve his already completed mix.

What do you mean jarring at 26 seconds?

By Jarring I mean you can tell that the sound goes from one audio track to another. When the location changes what you SHOULD do is have the audio track from the first location keep going but slowly fade out. And you have the audio track from the second location slowly fade in.

Instead, what you're actually doing at 26 seconds is there is a very abrupt change from one to the other, and it's jarring.

It could be improved without the original mix, if you were motivated enough to do so. I've done it for others before and I'm no audio engineer.

Add a 3rd ambient track in before the cuts. This will disguise the abrupt change between the two. You could also fade in and fade out the existing ones into this third ambient track, to help smooth it out further.

Another big thing you could do would be to simply add more music in places where you have none. That can cover up a lot of mistakes too.

 

[harmonica44]

Okay thanks. The audio tracks I got back from the audio engineer though are a stereo track only, so I cannot fade the room tone change, without fading the whole sound mix. However, when the character gets up out of his chair, and the scene changes to him walking down the hall, a few seconds have already gone buy. The scene cuts from one to the other in the video, so would it make sense in the audio to fade, even though the time of the characters getting from here to there, is a few seconds?

As for making changes to the woman's screaming, since the audio is on a stereo track, I cannot make changes to her screaming without those changes effecting every other sound at the time on the mix, such as music, or the other character's voices, etc. Am I missing something when it comes to just changing one thing on the mix?

As for adding more music, I would have to hire another composer to do more, and I figure I might as well save the money I have now for future projects. I already went over almost $2000 overbudget on that short anyway. Plus I figure music be added in if it's emotionally called for at that moment, rather than just be there to cover up mistakes. But if covering up mistakes is more important, perhaps I should consider more music. But is it worth paying extra money for to find a new composer? I could create more tracks from what I already have, but then music just starts to sound generic, like you are using what you already have over and over, rather than it being scored to the actual moment.

 

[sfoster]

I wouldn't spend more money on it, but I bet if you tried you could fix it up yourself in just a day or two.

And if you are losing actors because of the sound, then yes it's important to cover up mistakes.

 

[FilmmakerJ]

Okay thanks. The audio tracks I got back from the audio engineer though are a stereo track only, so I cannot fade the room tone change, without fading the whole sound mix. However, when the character gets up out of his chair, and the scene changes to him walking down the hall, a few seconds have already gone buy. The scene cuts from one to the other in the video, so would it make sense in the audio to fade, even though the time of the characters getting from here to there, is a few seconds?

As for making changes to the woman's screaming, since the audio is on a stereo track, I cannot make changes to her screaming without those changes effecting every other sound at the time on the mix, such as music, or the other character's voices, etc. Am I missing something when it comes to just changing one thing on the mix?

As for adding more music, I would have to hire another composer to do more, and I figure I might as well save the money I have now for future projects. I already went over almost $2000 overbudget on that short anyway. Plus I figure music be added in if it's emotionally called for at that moment, rather than just be there to cover up mistakes. But if covering up mistakes is more important, perhaps I should consider more music. But is it worth paying extra money for to find a new composer? I could create more tracks from what I already have, but then music just starts to sound generic, like you are using what you already have over and over, rather than it being scored to the actual moment.

In our line of work--as I assume we are all "Filmmakers" in our own way--it's important to be versed, in part, in all aspects of production: because not only does it allow us to do some of the work when no one else can or no one else is available, but the knowledge we learn to gain from each part of the process allows us to know if we're getting good work back from the people that we hire into those departments. That way we don't get ripped off, we can better collaborate and communicate with the designers and the editors and the artists, and we can even push our crew to do their best, especially if they are being paid or compensated in a meaningful manner for their work.

My point being, you should definitely learn to do certain things regarding sound so that small issues like your audio levels you can fix yourself.

But you also just said that all your sound editor gave you was a stereo track mix-down, and so you can't make changes anymore without altering everything. Which then begs the question, why didn't you make sure to get the raw sound files and editing files from him so that you could have them for later?

If he was working in Pro Tools or another expensive D.A.W., then I totally understand. But if he used something like Premiere, or Adobe Audition, or something else that you might already own, it's your movie, it's your project, so it might have been good to get those files from him so that you could always go back and tweak things if you realize that you need to, since your sound editor is no longer available.

 

[sfoster]

I fixed the sound for you, it only took me 10 minutes and I'm not an audio engineer.

I don't know if you want me to post it here so I'll send you the link.
I only fixed the 30 seconds because that was all the worst part, it's unsolicited and you're not paying me

You're welcome to rip the sound from this and use it to help you better recruit actors. Link in PM.

Quit saying what you can't do. Stop inventing obstacles for yourself!!!
I told you how to fix it, i said exactly what to do, very clearly and you say it can't be done. Then i go and do it in 10 minutes.

What do you think about that?

 

[harmonica44]

Okay thanks. He used Pro Tools. I can probably get the original pro tool project from him. Well if the sound can be fixed even though it's already premixed in a just a few minutes, then I can do it myself with the original stereo mix then probably, if it's that easy. I will get it on it and see.

 

[sfoster]

This is what I did - I chopped out ambient parts of your sound track, then I layered and faded them appropriately.

I used no new sound I just cut and pasted what you already had.

Now the transitions are smooth instead of jarring.