We're shooting some HIDE AND CREEP scenes at my parents' house, somewhere south of Montevallo, Alabama. My mother, being the more-than-gracious hostess as always, not only gives us the run of her house and land, but also prepares a plate of cookies that doubles as crew food and set dressing.

While we're between shots, Mom asks how much this movie is costing me. I tell her I'm in for about $15,000. So far.

My mother, being the overprotective type, expresses concern. I tell her not to worry -- I have a boring day job to pay for fun stuff like filmmaking. And, anyway, it's cheaper than film school.

Cheaper, maybe, but definitely no less educational.

Genre Rules

After shopping HIDE AND CREEP around, I think I understand the "rules" of the horror genre a little better. Not that there are really rules when it comes to making movies. However, people that screen movies for distributors seem to be looking for certain elements...

• At least one character should be killed in the first few minutes of the movie. This request of filmmakers from distributors is so common it's been nicknamed "top loading."
• There should be several more gruesome killings during the remainder of the movie. Any effects should look as professional as possible. As far as fake blood goes, the more the better.
• Female nudity and drug use are not required but are definitely appreciated. Sex scenes are cool, too, but keep it "R" rated. Some of the industry's big buyers (Blockbuster Video, for example) won't carry unrated or "NC-17" movies, which means the distributors won't touch them, either.

Put the Cart in Front of the Horse

It seems like everybody loves movie trailers. These days, you don't even have to go to the theater to see them. An ever-increasing number of web sites stream the trailers of films large and small.

I guess it's no surprise that distributors like trailers, too. When trying to get the attention of a distributor, a kick-ass trailer can be your best friend. Will your 90-minute feature hold the attention of the guy at the distribution company who watches movies all day? Maybe. But the odds of him sitting through a two-minute trailer, that shows off all of the great parts of your opus (and maybe glosses over some of the not-so-great parts), are pretty high.

I mean, studios use well-cut trailers to sell movies to the moviegoing public. Why shouldn't indie filmmakers use trailers to sell their flicks to distributors?

People who invest in movies aren't immune to trailers either. Filmmakers often put a trailer together before they start shooting the "real" movie, just to show investors how much money their (eventual) movie will make... because it has a killer trailer, and everyone will want to see it. Wow. That logic gets pretty circular.

Maybe You're Not Spending Enough Money...

In addition to good-looking effects, distributors are seeking movies where everything else looks great. You might be making a movie for ten dollars, but it'll need to look like it cost ten million dollars. Most of the general public isn't going to cut you any slack because your movie is "independent." It's not really fair, but your tiny, self-financed movie is competing with the studios' big-budget horror flicks.

And, as I've said more than once, great sound is very important. Before I do another feature, I hope to turn my spare bedroom into a foley/ADR studio. Since I now know exactly how difficult it is to get good production audio, I'm already planning to re-record a lot of dialogue and effects during the post process.

I also plan to mix the soundtrack in 5.1 surround sound. Not that I have any idea how to do that. But I'll figure it out, because lots of people who buy DVDs expect a surround mix on their DVDs. And, again, they're not going to cut you any slack just because you're "independent."

... or Maybe You're Spending Too Much

I've heard and read a little about exactly how much distributors are paying for indie horror movies for home video release. And there's a huge range of numbers -- anywhere from a couple thousand bucks to a couple hundred thousand bucks. The thing is, if you shoot on film, like we did, you're already probably at least ten grand in the hole. So if the only deal you can get is a ten thousand dollar deal from a small distributor, you're never going to break even, much less pay any deferred wages or make a profit.

The thing about the smaller distribution companies, though, is that they'll also buy movies shot on video. And, being smaller companies, they're a little more flexible with the genre rules. They have to be, since other companies are paying more money for the more "marketable" (a cynic might say "formulaic") flicks.

If I had been only concerned with the bottom line on HIDE AND CREEP, it would have been smarter (and probably more profitable) for me to have shot it on video. But HIDE AND CREEP is not just a product -- it's my first feature, and I'll never regret shooting it on film.

I hope to shoot my next feature on film, too, but I also plan to really squeeze as much production value out of the budget as possible. It's obviously a long ways down the line, but I'm hoping I can spend... say $40,000 and make it look like $140,000.

Planning Ahead

I've admitted many times that I didn't do enough pre-production on HIDE AND CREEP. Since I'm still paying for that first feature, I can't afford to go into production on another movie anytime soon. But lots of pre-production work (writing, planning shots, scouting locations) can be done on the cheap, so I hope to use these next few months of "in the hole" time to get a head start on my next flick.

It's Not Done 'til It's Done

One of the coolest things about working on HIDE AND CREEP was finally getting to watch it with a (rather large) hometown audience at the 2004 Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival. In hindsight, I think we should have called that screening a "work in progress" instead of a "world premiere." Not that it would have made a difference to the audience. But to us, having a "world premiere" of HIDE AND CREEP made it seem like we'd finished something. Which gave me an excuse to quit tweaking the movie for a few months.

If I had, instead, used those months to tighten the edit and improve the movie's audio, I wouldn't have had to rush when the distribution deal came in from the Asylum.

Be Ready to Go It Alone

Sometimes filmmakers get lucky. Sometimes a distributor buys a fun, but rough around the edges, flick from a filmmaker and hires a crack team of professionals to make the movie look and sound as good as possible. Sometimes that's the way it goes, but not always.

I'd initially hoped, and even counted on, getting some technical assistance with HIDE AND CREEP if we ever sold it. But we did a small deal with a small distributor, and anything technical that needs to get done falls in Chuck's and my laps. Like I mentioned last time, I've got to create a PAL version of HIDE AND CREEP, which involves changing the picture resolution, frames-per-second, and probably a couple of things I'm not even aware of yet. I'd really love to just hand off the hard disk that houses the HIDE AND CREEP master video and audio files to someone else and let them worry about it, but that ain't happening.

On the bright side, I'll get it done eventually. And I'm sure I'll learn a few more lessons along the way.

I guess that about wraps it up. HIDE AND CREEP is, for the most part, done. It's been available for sale or rental in North America since July 19. Sometime in the future, if we get lucky, it'll show up elsewhere in the world. Regardless, it's out there, and anybody who wants to see it will be able to. Anybody with a region 1/NTSC-compatible DVD player, that is.

The only big mystery at this point is whether the movie will pay for itself. But only the producer in me cares about that. The writer and director is just glad he's not selling the movie out of the trunk of his car.

In the preceding sentences, I mentioned my next project a couple of times. I've written the first draft of a script, and I think it could be a fun movie to make. It's a more ambitious project than HIDE AND CREEP, but I hope I learned enough making HIDE AND CREEP to take on something more ambitious. As for the plot of the new script, it's got girls, guns, gore... and it's set on a planet other than Earth.

But I don't want to give too much away. If you're curious to see where it goes, if it goes, stay tuned to Crewless.com. And feel free to e-mail me any time: chance@crewless.com.

If anything interesting happens the next time around, I'll try my best to take good notes.

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