how many days for your shorts?
- Thread starter Joe999
- Start date
Pre production and scripting is usually me puttering around for a month or two sending emails and slowly working my way up (no budget = more time)... then I usually try and schedule the shoot around a weekend or two.
My first directed short film, "The Perfect Sandwich", was shot in a day, edited over two weeks. Took about a day to write, a day to revise and a day to plan and story board. Clocked in around 5mins.
My next short, "Orange Crush", was made FOR the 48 Hour Film Fest in Toronto, and took... uner 48 hours to write, shoot, edit and submit. Clocked in at 10mins.
Next one, "Bloody Hell" took about two weeks to write (it went through at least 4 COMPLETE revision/revamps) and a week to plan. Shot in two segments- one Friday night at my apartment and a midnight shoot on a rooftop... second day (saturday in the main location covering the rest of it. Editing took about a week and a half, sound guy took about 2 days, and score took a week or so from the final cut. Clocking in at about 5mins again.
Next, "French Onion" took almost a month to write between me and a guy in England (Nicholas Simon Hugh James Mohammed Woodhouse). Pre-production took about 2 weeks of working my ass off and scheduling. Filming was over 3 days- first day at Bill's house shooting one sequence, next day at my apartment filming the lonely-crying-nipple scenes, and the third day in a downtown park running around in the snow. Editing took longest, clocking in at 16mins and taking over 2 weeks.
I've also done a 40min documentary on a rural film festival- zero pre-production, 2 days of shooting, and over a month editing it together.
I'm currently working on a web-series of sketch-like video game banter and such... each episode has been from 5mins-15mins, and I find the more time you spend prepping, the shorter the video is, the more concise the shots are and the smoother he shoot.
The thing about this project is that other than writing scripts (and not even, always) we do very little prep. This usually leads to us shooting over a few weekends... in fact, I'm shooting today, and we're getting pick-ups and VO's which are missing from previous episodes. We're missing at least one shot/line in each episode, because we're barreling through trying to pump out the jam, so to speak. Makes it longer to edit too.
On a 5-10 min video, a month prep usually makes for a good weekend shoot, and if it's really organized, will only take 1-2 weeks in editing before a reasonably good cut is reached.
My first directed short film, "The Perfect Sandwich", was shot in a day, edited over two weeks. Took about a day to write, a day to revise and a day to plan and story board. Clocked in around 5mins.
My next short, "Orange Crush", was made FOR the 48 Hour Film Fest in Toronto, and took... uner 48 hours to write, shoot, edit and submit. Clocked in at 10mins.
Next one, "Bloody Hell" took about two weeks to write (it went through at least 4 COMPLETE revision/revamps) and a week to plan. Shot in two segments- one Friday night at my apartment and a midnight shoot on a rooftop... second day (saturday in the main location covering the rest of it. Editing took about a week and a half, sound guy took about 2 days, and score took a week or so from the final cut. Clocking in at about 5mins again.
Next, "French Onion" took almost a month to write between me and a guy in England (Nicholas Simon Hugh James Mohammed Woodhouse). Pre-production took about 2 weeks of working my ass off and scheduling. Filming was over 3 days- first day at Bill's house shooting one sequence, next day at my apartment filming the lonely-crying-nipple scenes, and the third day in a downtown park running around in the snow. Editing took longest, clocking in at 16mins and taking over 2 weeks.
I've also done a 40min documentary on a rural film festival- zero pre-production, 2 days of shooting, and over a month editing it together.
I'm currently working on a web-series of sketch-like video game banter and such... each episode has been from 5mins-15mins, and I find the more time you spend prepping, the shorter the video is, the more concise the shots are and the smoother he shoot.
The thing about this project is that other than writing scripts (and not even, always) we do very little prep. This usually leads to us shooting over a few weekends... in fact, I'm shooting today, and we're getting pick-ups and VO's which are missing from previous episodes. We're missing at least one shot/line in each episode, because we're barreling through trying to pump out the jam, so to speak. Makes it longer to edit too.
On a 5-10 min video, a month prep usually makes for a good weekend shoot, and if it's really organized, will only take 1-2 weeks in editing before a reasonably good cut is reached.
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Very informative and useful, thank you for the detailed response for several of your projects.
I am gearing up for several shorts, I was thinking perhaps I was doing overkill in my estimates. But even for a 5-10 minute short I am figuring 2-4 days or perhaps half days of shooting on set. I am also racking up time finding the actors, and i want to try storyboarding to some degree (using Toon Boon Storyboard, it it turning out to be fantastic). I have been commiserating over whether to try my own soundtrack with loops or royaltyfree stuff, but I really think I am going to try to find film scorer composers willing to do it for free or a few hundred dollars per short; I think a film scorer will do a much better job, time the music to the scenes, etc. I really think music is huge for a movie.
I am gearing up for several shorts, I was thinking perhaps I was doing overkill in my estimates. But even for a 5-10 minute short I am figuring 2-4 days or perhaps half days of shooting on set. I am also racking up time finding the actors, and i want to try storyboarding to some degree (using Toon Boon Storyboard, it it turning out to be fantastic). I have been commiserating over whether to try my own soundtrack with loops or royaltyfree stuff, but I really think I am going to try to find film scorer composers willing to do it for free or a few hundred dollars per short; I think a film scorer will do a much better job, time the music to the scenes, etc. I really think music is huge for a movie.
It depends on how much work you do yourself. If you rely on other people you always to wait their turn!
In my latest short The Voice Of Jack pre production took 5 days (writing the script, casting, checking out locations, etc), production took three days and post about two weeks due to interlacing problems and finding the right sound effects.
In my latest short The Voice Of Jack pre production took 5 days (writing the script, casting, checking out locations, etc), production took three days and post about two weeks due to interlacing problems and finding the right sound effects.
My first short took 2 days to write, 2 nights to shoot, 3 days to edit and another week on an off of screwing around with fixing things, sound, rendering types and testing, etc. I think it all depends on the nature of the script, number of people involved, number of locations, the more of any = more time. I can't imagine there being any formula. It takes as long as it takes.
Tony in Duluth
Tony in Duluth