When Life Gives You Lemons, Throw Them At Life's Head
Stacie Herrington and I started production on our short film TOIL AND TROUBLE five days before the Telluride Horror Show which we planned to attend. We had a lovely cabin to shoot in, a carful of props and equipment, and an abundance of "let's do this!" energy only seen in the truly uninitiated.
It did not go as planned.
From one perspective, our time in production wa a total failure because we walked away from our time with no usable shots. The replacement mics we got that worked just two days before were unresponsive when we got on location. Special effects makeup took a really long time to get done. Creative differences with a cast member ground filming to a halt.
Dammit.
However, the perspective Stacie and I are choosing to go with is that this first attempt at filming our first short film is a "learning opportunity," the outcome of all failures for people that really would like not to feel like failures.
We kind of feel like failures. We're both fairly competent at things we do. Our failed attempt kind of hit us hard in the old feel bone. But, we shall not be deterred.
Our list of things learned
We learned a lot. The following are the highlights we'll definitely remember in our next attempt.
- Get the script locked earlier. Since Stacie is not a professional actor, she now knows she'll want more time with the script to get really, really comfortable with her lines.
- Pay the other actors. We wanted to keep the budget near $0. We had the whole "group of friends" thing going on. Hey, it works for other film makers! Just, our group of friends, not a single one of them is in the film industry. And, let's face it, they weren't as invested in the film as Stacie and I. One of the cast members eventually had creative differences and pulled out. That was tough because it stopped filming. Getting "professional" actors with a rate and a contract and the urge to act will probably benefit us in our next run.
- Just get some quality sound equipment. We didn't have enough hands to boom the production. We got those wireless lav mics mentioned in the last article. Whelp, that bit us in the ass. We're going to get something reputable, even if we have to pay more cash for them. We can always amortize the expense over many films so that we can keep the budget (theoretically) near $0.
- Practice make-up and prosthetics. Stacie did an amazing job with two foam latex prosthetics to make her look witchy. But, that first application took five hours, five hours which ate into the filming schedule. Practicing those should reduce the total application time by half.
More opportunities
This'll be the first time I've had a chance to color grade raw video that I shot myself. I can get some really good personal feedback on how to improve my DP skills. While we can't use any of the video shot in any distributable product, Stacie and I can get a feel for editing and some of the more important steps in post-production.
I'm also going to try my hand at layering in some digital special effects. Four weeks ago, I tried out some compositing of some animation I made in Moho into a quick and dirty video I shot on my shitty little phone. I also did a glowing effect on my eyes in some footage I shot of my face. (That was scary. Not the effects. My face.) I want to try to take that experience and make some objects magically glow in our raw footage.
Where we go from here
Stacie and I have the opportunity to visit the set of HIGHWAY GOTHIC as it's being filmed in November 2026. We're going to take that opportunity to learn as much as we can.
Next, we're going to write and shoot some shorter marketing material for TOIL AND TROUBLE. We'll get that out there for people to hopefully start falling in love with.
Finally, we're going to take the conclusions in this post and put them into practice. We are going to make this short film!
See? We haven't lost that "let's do this!" energy.
We are still the uninitiated.
Watch out.