Train spotting Case study

Low budget film making tips and advice

• Resource film making- using pre-existing resources to make a movie.
• Budget- Determine your budget to know what you can spend
• location- Once you know how much money you have then list what locations you can use. You want to use locations that are free and are easy to use
• Actors- using people who won't cost mush to use e.g. university students friends or family
• From list of actors pick people who have an interest in acting or can act.
• Don't include people who would cause problems
• Equipment- Use equipment that you already own or can borrow from friends or family so you won't have to pay for the use of it.
• Local events- Use these for production value for example going to a car show or a gun show etc 
• Script-locations to a minimum. for a feature film 4 or 5 locations and for a short film 2 or 3 locations. keep locations near in order to save money on petrol
• Characters to a minimum incase someone drops out and it will be easier to manage
• Write to your actors strength
• Avoid writing scenes when you need a lot of extras unless you can ay for the extras 
• Ensure you try to avoid filming in the night time unless you have the correct equipment to light the area
• Avoid cgi or special effects unless you can do it as it will look amateur if done by yourself 
• Pre-production- Location scouting to ensure you get an understanding of what are good times to shoot there
• Make sure actors are available at the times you need to shoot

Train spotting
1996
Budget- £3.5 million
Director- Danny Boyle
Writer- Andrew McDonald
Producer- John Hodge

This is a film of Irvine welshes cult Scottish novel Train spotting a series of interlinked stories contracting on heroin hooked anti hero mark Renton and his attempts to kick the habit despite the lack of co-operation from his similarly inclined friends.


The rights to screenplay
If you're planning to translate a novel into a movie form the most important thing is to snap up the screen rights

However john hodge starts to bash out the first draft of transporting screen play, producer Andrew macdonald and director Danny Boyle are caught up in what prove to be the only major crisis of the entire projects which was securing the rights to the book.

Nole gay who had the rights to the book he wanted to gain rights and earn money from the studio so he could gain more money

Finance
The filmmaking threesome are being badgered by hollywood mogul Scott ruin (producer of Sabrina and the firm) who offers them $250,000 to film whatever project they desire.

Channel 4 liked the script but Weren't interested in hollywood so they did not give them any money until it was all sorted out as they didn't want them to put their name to something that could potentially fail.

The author was on the film makers side  and wanted them to make the film

Deal was  eventually done for two per cent of the films budget (£30,000) and Nole Gay backing out of hand- on duties in exchange for a share of the profits and a name check on the credit.

Low budget films ally take 4-7 weeks for pre-production. Train spotting took 7 weeks for location scouting script writing storyboarding costumes etc

First and Foremost, However is the casting, Ewan McGregor who played Alex in shallow grave is earmarked for Renton role from the start and is first onboard.


Rehearsals began the second week in may in a rental flat at the top of a glasgow tower block. You don't need all the actors for rehearsals because quite a lot of them are only doing one or two days filing

Train spotting is set in Edinburgh but filmed mostly in Glasgow a lot of the top film crews in Britain live in Glasgow but were doing a couple of days in Edinburgh and also and also pick up (scene-setting dialogue free snatches shot to pad out the action

Props
Props are a fundamental part of pre-production. A lot of the pre-production props were found in charity shops or donated by cast members.

Its about finding props that look as real as possible. E.g using glucose baking powder ova glue etc in transporting

Costumes
Costumes in pre production were the actors own clothing. This means they won't have to spend a lot of money on costumes for the characters

Risk assessments
As there were only a few locations not many risk assessments were needed however they must ensure one is completed for every locations so no one gets hurt.

Love actually
 Budget: $40,000,000 (estimated) 

Staffing- AS there are big stars in the film love actually they would have a high budget to afford people like alan Rickman, Hugh grant, colin firth.

Locations and sets- Locations were kept basic in love actually for example an office, Selfridges. This would mean they didn't need to spend as much on sets and could pay the big actors more for their job.  This would bring the cost of their film down as they won't need to pay more to build lots of sets meaning more workers to pay.

legal rights- Love actually would have to pay for rights such as music, use of locations etc. This is because they would be using public places such as Selfridges that if they don't give permission can't use it. due to the fact they used simple sets and public spaces they don't need rights but if thy were using Selfridges they need permission from them to close the shop and to film for a few days.

Transport- This would be a bit costly however majority of it was filmed in London or in sets so not much transport was needed. However if it was needed they would need a lot of money to pay for it as journeys can be long and the drivers would be working long hours.

Resources- Because Love actually had a large budget it means they could use that to pay for good quality cameras microphones. This will mean that the production is between resources and staffing. and due to the fact the cast is so big then it means all the cast get the correct share of the $40,000000.