The Production Triangle
I'm don't remember what book I saw this in but here is the concept:
Imagine a triangle which represents your production choices for your film:
- The Production Triangle
- CheapFastGood.jpg (42.79 KiB) Viewed 263 times
The three points of the triangle represent the ways you can go about making your film, but here's the catch - you can only choose two of them. Doing all three of them is an impossibility.
Your Options:
You can do it fast and good.
Money is no object if you have this choice. The big Hollywood studios are more in this position. If you need 1000 extras by Thursday for the big battle scene, no problem. Just show me the money. The philosophy is that all problems can be solved if you can throw enough money at it. Most of us do not have this as an option.
You can go it Fast and Cheap.
This is a way that way too many independent filmmakers follow which, I think at least, creates the reputation among audiences that independent films aren't worth bothering to spend the time to see. In this approach, any corner that can be cut is and everything has to be done fast. For that big battle scene mentioned above, it would be "just use cardboard cutouts drawn with magic marker - nobody is going to notice". This approach is very counter productive. Crews are paid little or nothing so there is often a lot of resentment, so they are not exactly behind you. The cheapness of the films distracts the audience from the story (if you can call it that) so they stay away from droves and all this money you are supposedly saving is from nothing. You might not be losing as much money but you are still losing it.
Which brings up to the last option - Cheap and Good:
There are many things you can do if you are just willing to spend the time to figure out to do it with the resources you have on hand. For that proverbial battle scene mentioned above, you can use various tricks to make it seem like you have an immense sea of people in the shot. You can shoot a small number of extras and by the use of sound and dust, make it seem like they are in the midst of a much larger group. If you have something like Adobe After Effects at your disposal, you can use the same people in different clothes and configurations and composite them all together into one massive group. You can find a sufficient number of people who want to be in the movies to be in your scene and make alterations in the time period of your script to make it less expensive to shoot. You have a lot of options but you've got to be willing to spend the time to make it happen and be willing to take the time to come up with creative solutions.
Before you do anything, you've got to consider your project during the cheapest stage of all - Pre-Production, the time when money hasn't yet been committed and you can decide what way is best for you. All three of the above options have some variation. The ones using the Fast and Good approach do not necessarily have unlimited funds. The Cheap and Fast solution is not necessarily as cheap or as fast as it sounds and may actually be unnecessarily risky. The Cheap and Good solution is perhaps the best and certainly the most satisfying of approaches. You will probably find that you do not have the unlimited time that this approach would suggest because of factors beyond your control but it seems the most reasonable of the ways of getting a film done with our resources.
