Many people ask how you can raise funds to make a movie. I always asked myself, “How can I make money to make a movie?” And that’s what I did.
One of my first jobs after college was asking for money on the street for non-profits like Amnesty International and ecological causes. I was pretty good at it. I got a lot of large donations. But I knew I didn’t want it to be the rest of my life. I didn’t want to be a salesman. My father was a salesman for many years and he thought it was ok. I aspired to avoid this.
What I did want was to make films and to create stories I found were meaningful. So what I did was create media constantly. I just wanted good footage to assemble a story. After a little while I realized that I wasn’t satisfied with the media other people created, so I was like ok, I’ll have to go capture my own.
Pictured Gabriel Mayers - photo by Joe Mischo, for a corporate documentary I made a little bit of money on and am proud of.Coast to Coast Winner: Gabriel Mayers
Since then I never stopped creating. This effort and drive to gather good footage and people would be interested in increasing my skills in making video, the field I wanted to be in. And by this I mean, I never stopped making money refining my skills creating for others. Applying to over a thousand jobs and gigs in the video industry and making small and large projects along the way.
Many people suggest going and fundraising to make your project. This is a great idea and by doing so you can string together work with whatever you get. Most likely increasing your money you receive on your next project if you finish what you promised.
However, I didn’t do that because I wanted to learn first. Become great at as many of the tasks I could to make a movie look presentable. I took the jobs and gigs I got and learned how to do creative tasks that were required to make a video look professional, not just to me, but to others. I did not make much money, but I was constantly noting amazing talent along the way. Who was good at their job and could help me with the tasks I wasn’t as good at? I now understood many jobs in the industry: sound mixing, cinematography, directing, editing, sound editing, color, motion graphics. This is an education. I know how to save money, what each task costs and people who know how to do them.
In the meantime I made enough money to live. I still had a small amount of time to do my own creative work in film. I made animated logos, mixed music, mixed podcasts, took photos, did color correction, etc. In the end I had projects to show my abilities. I still didn’t have that much money, but people could see my experience.
Being from the Midwest from a family that never was in the entertainment industry, I had no idea what people should get paid for tasks, how much my time was worth, or where to find jobs. So my pay increase was slow, but it was steady. I increased my income every year by slowly making more contacts and learning my skills better. With this money (if I didn’t have student loans or debt) I could have made a film.
I began writing script ideas and saving and paying off my loans. Through my searching I found a few partners in writing and finally one that stuck through the process and wrote my script idea. This was Piper Werle making the short film Prologue. By now I had finished several movies for networks. Refined my color correction ideas, learned a lot about sound design, and saw many other directors and cinematographers work on set.
We produced new animations for Facebook and other companies to make the short, Prologue
I knew I still needed some help to get to the finish line, but I had enough money to rent the location and pay everyone. It was all my own money. I decided to make the film from a larger gig I received from post-producing ads mixed in with my other income. I put some more money on my credit cards (unhappily, but I still had student loans to pay off) and shot the movie.
Still from the beautiful set of Prologue - Photo by Daria Huxley
While I finished editing the film I continued to work, paying down my debt and began a Kickstarter campaign to help pay for post-production costs. By spreading out my income this way I funded the film. I still have a bit of debt on my card from this film and others, but it’s coming down. My skills were refined and I have a higher paying gig now and look to have paid for the entire movie myself through my own money and help from crowdfunding to get me over the finish line.
I can’t say how much work this was, but I know how much I learned by earning the money myself and never giving up on the quality I wanted for the film. Films cost a lot of money. I hate fundraising and didn’t want to compromise. I made Prologue this way and at the same time have self-produced all the costs for a Feature documentary called Frames of Reference which is in post-production and a web series season called Marcellus Hall in New York City. I would recommend only working on 1-2 projects at the same time (usually once one gets into post-production, you can start thinking about pre-production for the next film). But overall I had free reign over capabilities, I am an expert director, colorist, and editor. I’m not as good at sound and cinematography, but I understand the whole gamut and earned money while doing this.
Marcellus Hall an Artist in New York City debuted at the prominent Catalyst Content Festival after many years of work that included this luxurious venue, photo owned by Catalyst Story Institute.
I just wanted to write this to say there’s more than one way to make a film. If you have any questions on how to get started or to begin to save money or begin your first short film. Please write me at justin.joseph.hall@fourwindfilms.com or follow Fourwind Films on LinkedIn where we talked about the business side of making films.