MEGACONDA - BEHIND THE SCENES (AND CAMERA)

Many people ask me a lot of the technical stuff about building a SciFi Channel movie (answer: Don't write one. The Channel is dead) including asking me about cameras and so forth. While I have a general producer's knowledge (just enough to make me dangerous and know whether or not I'm getting a bargain) here's an article by D2DVD mogul Fred Olen Ray (HOLLYWOOD CHAINSAW HOOKERS, CYCLONE, LOST EMPIRE and a dozen or so BIKINI movies) that will answer many of your questions better than I can:

In May of 2009, we began shooting Megaconda, another giant monster movie aimed squarely at the straight-to-DVD and television market.

My oldest son, Chris, would again direct, this time from a screenplay by SciFi Channel veteran Steve Latshaw (Stan Lee's Lightspeed, Curse of the Komodo). Under the SAG low-budget agreement we added TV’s Greg Evigan (BJ And the Bear, My Two Dads) and Stella Stevens (The Nutty Professor, The Poseidan Adventure) to the cast for star power.

We decided to shoot the entire feature in HD and felt that we needed a better camera that went beyond the limitations of an HDV camcorder like the HVR-V1U, but something a lot less pricey than hiring the Sony F900 Cine Alta we were normally using for our television work.

While the show was to be a very low-budget affair I wanted a better image quality than we had had on Reptisaurus and it still had to be affordable.

We also wanted to buy instead of rent.

From left, director Christopher Douglas-Olen Ray and DoP Matt Freund with their EX1 rig while shooting Megaconda, featuring an onboard Ikan monitor, Cavision matte box and Hoodman viewfinder shade.

Enter the Sony XDCAM PMW-EX1.

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Fred goes into greater detail in the article and it's one of those you want to bookmark, as he touches on issues that rarely enter the mind of the low budget filmmaker when it comes to delivering a movie - QC issues, production workflow, etc... Fred knows his stuff.

Had a Great Sunday Afternoon

I ventured over to Van Nuys to see Fred Olen Ray, Jim Wynorski and Dave Decoteau at Spudic's Movie Empire. It was nice to chat with the guys who gave us such B-movie classics as HOLLYWOOD CHAINSAW HOOKERS, CHOPPING MALL and SORORITY BABES IN THE SLIMEBALL BOWL-A-RAMA.

(I do not make this stuff up, people)

What was interesting was listening to the guys speak about their careers and discuss the niches each has carved out for themselves. While these guys aren't household names they have been very successful with their movies and make a good living at it (unlike many other folks here in Hollywood).

If one were to take lessons away from their experiences, I would imagine it would be these:

1. Find your market and know it backwards and forwards.

2. Control your costs by writing, shooting and producing only what you need to make a professional looking movie and nothing more. That takes experience, getting your hands dirty and entrepreneurial spirit. This also goes to rethinking how things are done.

3. Stay in contact with your audience and know their wants and needs.

4. Love movies and moviemaking. When the chips are down you have to love this so much that you'd do it for free. Success doesn't happen overnight.

5. Rinse and repeat. Build a library of material and leverage that to distributors and audience alike. One movie is a fluke - what you need to do is make yourself a business.

Discuss.