How to Make a Feature Documentary Movie Budget

By Justin Joseph Hall

Producer Mahomi Ejiri and Justin Joseph Hall filming in Ebina, Japan for Frames of Reference. Photo by Yoshitsugu Kosaka.

You have your idea for a documentary and need to create a budget for a grant, potential partner, and just to have a good plan of attack. So, what does a professional feature documentary budget look like?  What is the range a feature documentary should cost?  These common questions are sadly hard to find the answers to. 

Even though I don’t consider myself a producer, I have had to stand in the producer’s role creating budgets many times.  From asking fellow filmmakers with more experience to teach me along the way, I’ve gathered that information into one place for others to learn what I have over the years.

First off, you’ll need a spreadsheet budget template. Below is our company’s documentary budget template.  The numbers in the template are my budget for a feature-length documentary I directed that is currently in post-production, Frames of Reference. The rates I have are not industry-standard, but rather rates for a particular project.  Rates vary widely depending on region, whether it’s a union job or not, and on each individual person you’re hiring.  

You can take the link below and duplicate it (File→Make Copy) and save it as your own to modify for your needs.  It also is what you can follow along to understand what I’m talking about in the below paragraphs.

FOURWIND | Documentary Budget Template

Along the bottom of the google sheet are three tabs. While working in this document, 99% of the time you’ll just be changing information in the first tab.  All of the first tab (Details) correlates to the second tab (Topsheet). The "Topsheet" is a quick summary of the entire budget at a glance. In the second tab you’ll find the typical industry breakdown on top, and a breakdown at the bottom in the section,  "BREAKDOWN BY FILMMAKING PROCESS."  That's not in most budgets, but I personally found it to be a helpful estimate for me to understand cost differences between Production and Post-Production.

The third tab (Fourwind Films_OldFormat) is the way I create budgets for smaller projects.  These budgets are fine if you’re not applying for grants from third parties outside the film industry.  For the purpose of this article, we will ignore the third tab. 

Starting the “Details” Tab

In the “Details” tab there are "Above-the-line" and "Below-the-line" costs.  Above-the-line costs are what the film will cost whether or not the project is completed.  These are starting costs and are usually the amount you should raise before starting to officially work on the project.  The below-the-line costs are what things cost as you complete the project.  

Let’s start at the top.  There is an estimate of how long I plan to work on each step of the project. The steps I plan for are Research, Prep, Shoot, Wrap, and Post. 

Research

Estimate how long you may need to research or nail down what you need to know before you can make effective decisions on casting and locations.

Prep

Prep is how much time is needed for pre-production before the shoot. Are you shooting internationally and need to gather local crew, get visas for parties traveling, and possibly vaccinations? Think it through. When doing your first budget it’s wise to include everything you can think of and then cut the budget down after a first estimate. I’ve heard this advice from many line producers.

Shoot

How long will you need to shoot?  How much travel time between locations?  As a general estimate, I like to assume for an interview-based documentary that I’ll need a minimum of 115 hours of footage.  However, if your documentary is a vérité documentary, I’d say you need about 50% more footage as there is less ability to direct and produce on vérité documentaries.  In that case, I’d aim for at least 180 hours of footage.

Producer Yoshitsugu Kosaka during production for Frames of Reference in Ebina, Japan.

Wrap

Wrap for a documentary really depends on how much paperwork and rental returns you expect to have when you get back.  For documentaries usually, this is not a lot of time as crews and personnel tend to be smaller than narrative sets.

Post-Production

For post-production, I have been told that four months to edit a feature documentary is pretty standard.  The more produced the script is and the more support your editor has the more feasible this would be.  If you have four months to edit a film, I assume the director or producer is highly involved in the editing process and, at the very least, has an outline of what they would like the film to look like.  I also would assume there’s at least one highly capable Assistant Editor if not two, as well as some sort of Production or Post-Production Assistant.  To hit that four-month mark you may even need more than one editor.

Now, scheduling changes again when editing vérité footage.  Vérité footage takes twice as long to assess as interview footage.  Constructing the narrative tends to be much more complex.  Because of this, I’d suggest a minimum of one year of editing for a vérité feature-length documentary.  Again this is assuming a great Assistant Editor and/or Associate Editor is on board to fully aid the editor.

Great, now you have a sense of how much time the project will take.  You can use this information for the “#” and “UNIT” columns. 

Finishing the “Details” Tab

The rest of the process is reading through each row and deciding which ones you want and need to create a budget for. Begin with above-the-line costs. Who are the personnel you will need to get the project made? The main director and producer as well as any executive producer costs should be included here.

As a starting basis for a feature, I put a year’s salary for the director. This way, if the project takes 1-2 years, the director is covered to concentrate on the project long enough to make sure it is always moving forward.  If you’re creating something shorter, or there’s much more support than normal, you may want to adjust this.  But I start there as it’s important to have someone to keep the project on course to ensure a timely finish.

Things that really rack up production costs are executive producer costs and the number of crew you bring to set. This all depends on your style of filmmaking and changes from project to project. If you have questions about specific line items please write to me at my email address below.

Producer Ricky Rosario during production for Frames of Reference in Barranquilla, Colombia.

As for finishing in post-production, this is something many people do not have much experience in budgeting. Luckily for you, I run post-production for Fourwind Films and we estimate these costs for any project that comes in our door. This is the basis for how I estimate how long each of these post-production steps may cost:

The edit will last 4-6 months per 120 hours footage shot (again recall vérité footage takes almost double the time to edit and assess).  

Coloring takes 1-3 days per 10-20 minutes of finished video. Keep in mind, the longer you spend on color the more detail your colorist can pull out of the image.  

Sound Design is optional, especially in documentary film. Whether you do this really depends on the director and style of the film. I’d suggest budgeting for this even if you think you won’t need it. In general, I’d suggest a sliding scale of 1 day (cheap) to 1 week (expensive and stylized) per 30 minutes of finished video. 

Dialogue Editing is normally 1 week per 30 minutes of finished video.

Sound Mixing you can estimate at 3 days per 30 minutes of finished video.

Promotion and marketing are often the most forgotten part of the budget.  Almost wherever you look, it is suggested to tack on 1/3 to 1/2 of the total budget to make the film just for marketing. If you don’t tell people about the movie you made, no one will know it exists and no one will want to watch it. Promotion is part of filmmaking if you’re making a film for an external audience.

That’s about the quickest summary of creating a documentary budget I can possibly put forward. Any additional questions, please write to me at justin.joseph.hall@fourwindfilms.com.

Find out more about Justin Joseph Hall and his work at the Fourwind Films website. Or, follow him as host of the podcast Feature & a short or on LinkedIn.

If there are other questions you want to be answered in a blog post, let us know at info@fourwindfilms.com or visit our website at www.fourwindfilms.com. Also, we work with a large, diverse community of crew and artists working in most aspects of the filmmaking process and are always happy to help make connections. And we are always building our community! Send us your work for review or feedback.

How Wearing Many Hats Led Me to the Director’s Chair

By Cat Tassini

Photo by Albany Capture on Unsplash

“If you can think of literally anything else to do with your life, go do that.” This was the mantra that I heard many times during my first year of acting training. “You have to be obsessed with your character,” was another slogan, this time from my contemporary scene study teacher. As a nervous freshman in college, I took these words literally. Growing up, I had been enthusiastic about visual art, dance, theater, filmmaking, writing, music, and sports, but now I turned with laser-like focus to acting. Any time another desire entered my head, I felt agonizingly conflicted. I had auditioned and secured my place in the second most competitive undergraduate theater program in the country. Was I going to blow this opportunity by being unfocused and undisciplined? I was determined to give it my best shot. But I couldn’t keep all of my doubts — or passions — from creeping in.

I stuck it out for the two consecutive years at a professional acting studio required to graduate. However, once I had that under my belt I looked into other opportunities for learning. I ended up interning at a multidisciplinary art space in Brooklyn for credit. That was my introduction to the North Brooklyn DIY music and art scene, which indelibly molded my artistic perspective. It’s where I truly came of age. It felt like I had wandered into a creative wonderland—inspired, intimidated, and elated that I finally found a place that felt right. I even put up my own theater piece there, composing it with my theater troupe, and doing the sound, costume, and set design myself. It felt like I had arrived. 

Photo by KASHILEMBO WABU on Unsplash

My time interning opened up my mind and I felt confident enough to keep exploring. By graduation, I had designed costumes for a short film, taken art direction and set design classes, studied directing and producing, interned for a special event production company, stage-managed a show, attained a minor in art history, studied abroad, and put up multiple original theater pieces. 

Photo by Isi Parente on Unsplash

However, once the anticlimactic reality of postgraduate life set in, I looked back on my many experiences and wondered whether they actually added up to anything cohesive and meaningful. It didn’t help that I graduated into the 2010 job market. It was easy to feel like all the effort I’d put into my undergraduate education didn’t amount to much of anything in the real world. As I wandered through postcollegiate disorientation, hopping from city to city, and trying out different jobs in and out of the entertainment industry, I felt weighed down by nagging doubts. Would I ever be good enough at anything if I couldn’t concentrate on one thing? Would I ever be able to support myself without a “day job?” Would I ever be able to get a day job outside of the service industry? I felt restless, but I still felt guilty about it.

These doubts still haunt me, but less so than when I was a bit younger and greener. I now have the knowledge and perspective of someone who has written, directed, and edited a body of work, screened short films at festivals and racked up years of experience working in film, television, and event production. What I didn’t realize before is that it’s common to bounce from department to department or take time off from one career to pursue another.  It is also totally okay to take time off from filmmaking because you need to work a day job, care for a child or sick loved one, or take care of your own health. In a field as unstable and full of financial barriers as filmmaking, changes are inevitable. Managing your passion for your craft with real-world demands is a balancing act. As circumstances and priorities change, a career will inevitably go through any number of evolutions.

Multimedia is a constantly changing field, and one must make a conscious effort to keep up throughout one’s career. Along with that learning comes paying for classes, trading something you already know and are adept at, and learning on the job. If you’re trying to work your way up starting as a production assistant, it’s great to have multiple skillsets since you never know quite what you’ll end up doing. It is also valuable to have lots of skills in your back pocket to offer in exchange for someone else teaching you the skills you lack. A mentor of mine once described trading art direction work for an After Effects lesson. Finally, there is the practical reality that until you are locked into a union, if that’s the path you choose, it can be easier to get freelance work when there are more roles you can fill.

Photo by Julio Rionaldo on Unsplash

Now that I am directing my first feature, I can see how my varied experience has prepared me for this. It’s essential to be able to wear multiple hats in independent filmmaking. On a typical day, when working on my own work and freelance projects, I utilize some combination of the following: social media, graphic design, grant writing, crowdfunding, blogging, research, correspondence, scheduling, and video editing. These involve wildly different yet interconnected skill sets. On set, I’ve worked in the following departments: camera, sound, art, locations, wardrobe, makeup, transportation, and of course good ol’ fashioned general production assistance (PA). Having many tools in your toolbelt and a spirit of adventure makes you an asset to any production. 

If there’s one thing I could tell my younger filmmaker self, I would say: don’t be afraid of having multiple interests. Embrace it! And don’t worry so much. Pursue knowledge for the pure love of learning, don’t try to force yourself into something because of its perceived market value. Something that you’re not sure about now could end up being one of your greatest assets in the future. “Follow your bliss,” as Joseph Campbell would say, and try not to be too preoccupied with how it will all turn out. Life doesn’t follow a linear path and that’s okay. Real life isn’t compressed into two hours and doesn’t have to follow the audience’s expectations for continuity of logic. Real life is messy and strange and beautiful in its own way.

Follow Cat Tassini on Instagram @disco_nap_art and check out her website. Follow her current project, a feature-length documentary about Trish Keenan, the visionary creative force behind the English experimental band Broadcast, on Instagram @echos_answer, Facebook, and Youtube. 

If there are questions you want to be answered in a blog post, let us know at info@fourwindfilms.com or visit our website. Also, we work with a large, diverse community of crew and artists working in most aspects of the filmmaking process and are always happy to help make connections. And we are always building our community! Send us your work for review or feedback.