THE BUDGET MISTAKE THAT FIRST TIME FILMMAKERS MAKE

Today, everyone who can pick up a camcorder makes short films to get their feet wet and their films play on youTube and other streaming websites. Some become popular with millions of viewers, but most fall by the wayside.

Encouraged with a high number of viewers, more and more new media filmmakers are setting their sites on making a feature as a follow up. It does not matter that they have never made a longer film before. Most amateurs are soon faced with the realization that they will never obtain millions of dollars in funding to create their silver screen vision. Their only hope to produce their film then hinges on writing a budget with little money but high expectations and "wishful thinking" to insure that their film will be completed.

"No budget" and "zero budget" filmmakers usually work with "bare bones" budgets of a few hundred to a few thousand dollars. "Micro budget" filmmakers work with a few thousand to tens of thousands of dollars.

Filmmakers trying to produce theatrical films (not TV or documentaries) with more realistic initial budgets of 100k to 500k begin to learn that their project could have a budget of around 2.5 to 7 million as a low-budget feature, even if it's a non-union shoot.

Continuously under-budgeting, first time filmmakers often think of film budgeting as if they were taking a bank loan. They believe that the smaller the amount needed the better, when in reality, the reverse is probably true for making films. Film funding companies make their money funding films and they tend to be extremely aware of and all costs including the latest union and non-union fee structures, etc.