Above is the first slide in my pitch deck for my feature-film-in-development "Ice Cream Man". It's simple, and yet captivating, in my opinion. The image was created by the talented Ken McCuen, https://www.kenmccuen.com/, and the deck was enhanced by a nameless graphic designer I found on "Fiverr". The graphic designer made the deck easy to modify, so I could personally update it at will.
Film is a collaborative medium, but at the same time, good help can be hard to find. In a perfect world, we'd all have the perfect cast and crew, the perfect marketing people, and an audience that spreads word of our greatness, far and wide. Our world is far from perfect, and none of us are close to perfect either. There is always a balance to be struck in indie film production. I've seen people fail because they relied on the wrong people, but I also watched people fail because they wanted to do everything themselves.
On my own seven short films, I've worked with four Directors of Photography, and served as my own DOP on two of my short films. Two of my shorts were for film competitions, and I wouldn't have survived the process, and the time limits, without good cinematographers. One of those cinematographers served as DOP on two of my shorts, and he was a blast to work with.
My first two short films were made for fun, so I didn't sweat cast and crew too much; I pretty much relied on friends, although some of those friends were super talented. For my third film, titled “Grow the Fuck Up!”, I really wanted to up the overall quality. I really worked hard trying to find the best crew I could, which was a long and painful process, but I did fill most of the roles. One thing I couldn't find, was a DOP who had the ability to create the look I wanted, who wasn't a big time professional DOP. Because I served as DOP on other people's shorts, had experience with photography, and had been a professional lighting technician for years, I knew I could do it. It wasn't an easy process; I gave myself six months of pre-production time, and I designed much of my lighting scheme, in advance, using scale floor plans of the sets. I was lucky enough to find an awesome Camera Operator, who brought on great camera assistants, and my Gaffer and Key Grip were great people to work with. I don't advise people to be both director and DOP at the same time; I made plenty of mistakes in the process, but got far better results on my own, then I would have gotten with the amateur DOPs I knew at the time. That short gave me a big boost, and I eventually met a lot more talented artists who could take some of the weight off of my shoulders, for subsequent projects.
Sometimes, we find ourselves out of our element, and we really need help. Finding the right help, that's the real challenge. Years back, I was putting a lot of work into my dark comedy feature-in-development “Ice Cream Man”, and I needed a really good pitch deck. I came up with something myself, but it looked terrible. I somehow came across a couple of young women who just started a marketing company specifically for film. They came off as really professional, and said they'd give me a good deal. I worked with them on it, but there were red flags. One of the red flags was that they kept fighting me on including my 3D storyboards, and other previz materials. They believed that producers wouldn't understand the previz. I couldn't believe these young women didn't understand the previz, because these practices have been around forever, and everyone in film is familiar with them. After a rocky process, they finished the pitch deck, but I couldn't use it; it visually didn't look right for the project, was full of stuff I didn't need, and just didn't represent my project well.
These women knew the basics of film marketing, but the basics by themselves don't make for a master of the craft. After that, I took another stab at creating a pitch deck on my own, got all the info in there I needed, and then hired a graphic designer off of “Fiverr”, and he made it look amazing. The two film “marketers” charged me $900 for a pitch deck I couldn't use, and the faceless graphic designer charged me $90 for an awesome enhancement of a pitch deck I loved. I didn't ask the marketers for a refund, but I did learn a valuable lesson. I gave the graphic designer a nice tip for his quality work.
Sometimes you can rely on other people, and sometimes you have to do things yourself. I've screwed myself over relying on the wrong people, and I've also screwed myself over trying to do things I didn't know how to do. It's all a learning process, and a balancing act.
If you want to learn more about the author, Chris Griffin, you can check out his website at www.angrybearfilms.com
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