Plan, Plan and Plan Again.

Being an independent filmmaker, one has to wear many hats- especially in the early days of pre-production.

When planning Phobia, I planned out an extremely tight schedule. I planned every shot and how to best work the days. We had 21 pages of script and 6 days, over three weekends. Which would work out to about 3 ½ pages a day. However, we had quite a bit of small bits of actions and also several special effects that took hours of prep.

No one thought that we could make the 6 day shooting schedule, especially one key crew member- who fought me every step of the way.

I knew what I could do and just had to keep everyone on schedule. I had a phenomenal 1st AD that helped me keep everything to my tight schedule. We worked well together, and even though I planned most of the schedule and shot list myself, I kept her and everyone on crew in the loop as much as possible.

I cannot say enough how great it is to work with a dedicated cast and crew. Dedication can help get things done when there is no more time, money or energy.

If you create a realistic production plan and can sell it to your potential cast and crew, you can develop quite a dedicated group.

You have to plan, plan, plan. And, then look at the plan and plan again.

Don.