Little Costs

The part of production that tends to bother me to the most is the amount of resources that you need. Even way back in film school I didn't like spending the $5 on a tape and the 4 hours on set that I needed for a single shot... not to mention the five people I needed to help me.


College Shoot

I was reminded of how quickly costs can add up today while adding postage to a bunch of envelopes. Each large envelope cost $2.87 to ship. I was sent to print off some more postage labels and started pumping them out 80 at a time. The machine could spit out a label every second, so in a minute and a half I had spent almost $230.

That added up quickly.

And that was just for the postage.

So something to keep in mind as you work on productions: Costs can rise really quickly, even if you're not paying anyone. There is a tendency for some media producers to abuse their volunteers because they gladly donated their time. But don't forget: If you have ten people on set and you spend four hours getting your shots, that's an entire work week of man hours down the tubes.

Keep things in perspective. And be kind to the people who agree to help you out.

~Luke Holzmann
Your Media Production Mentor