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In the fourth episode of Short Hand, we’re asking producers how they put together a budget: where they begin, where they get quotes and how they make sure everyone has enough money to do their job. You’ll hear from short film producers Emily Everdee (Mandem, The Call Centre), Jesse Romain (O Black Hole!, Cowboy, Soft Animals) and Cheri Darbon (For Love, Bufflehead). 

Topics covered include: breaking down a script, communicating with your Heads of Department, who’s approving the budget, the difference between budgeting for live action and animation, tax credit, insurance, saving costs and being creative with how you spend your budget. 

With directors I suppose it’s ensuring that you’re constantly communicating, and that they don’t feel any type of way. If they want to raise a concern, or they’re trying to reach for the stars, like, join them, have a look at the stars. You should have the conversation and then work out what’s possible.

Cheri Darbon

SHOW NOTES & RESOURCES

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Short Hand: Hello, you’re listening to Short Hand a guide to making a short film, the BFI NETWORK and Film Hub South East podcast, whether you’re actively making a short film or passively thinking about it, this is a podcast designed to help you on the journey from coming up with a compelling short film idea to editing it into a finished product. In this episode, you’ll hear from producers about where to begin with building a budget, what kinds of things you need to cost up, and where you might be able to save costs and how to ensure that the budget is on the screen.

Emily Everdee: At the beginning of the process of making any short film, I guess I break down the script. So if you’re more experienced, or you have access to software like Movie Magic Budgeting and Scheduling, then that might be more of a formal process. But you really don’t have to do it in that way, you can just break down the script on your own. So in practice, this is just going through every scene and looking at the elements of that scene. So the way I always think about it is you pull out everything that needs to be created, or where you need to enable somebody else to achieve that, or anything that requires some form of creativity or a practical solution, or any people who are going to be in that scene.

Short Hand: That’s Emily Everdee, a BIFA-nominated film producer and founder of Everdee Media, with several short films under her belt, including Mandem, The Call Centre and Listen to Me Sing, Emily has a fair bit of practice with putting together a budget, here she discusses where to start, how to break down a script, and why it’s crucial to be in conversation with every department to figure out what they need to do their job.

Emily Everdee: So you’re going to look at things like, how long the scene is, therefore, how much time it’s going to take to film it. Which characters are in the scene, whether you need cast members, extras, what’s the location, and what do you need in that location, what props, etc. And anything else that’s a little bit different. So any animals, any special vehicles, any special skills as well don’t forget anything like stunts, or there any weapons you would need, for an example of an official armourer. Anything that stands out to you make sure you take a special note of that. And then once you’ve done that, for each scene, you essentially have the scale and the physical requirements of your film. And that’s then when I start to put a budget together. So, I do that all before I start actually looking at what I need in the budget. And that should then give you some indication of the scale of your movie and how many people you might need to achieve that. 

So for example, if you’ve got a small film, and it all takes place in one location, and there’s just a couple of characters, then you might not need such a big AD team, you might be able to cut it down, for example, to a 1st AD and then someone covering the role of a 2nd and a 3rd, as long as the first is comfortable with that.  And you might also not need multiple assistants for Costume and Make-up because there’s a limited cast. And also, if you’re limited to one or two smaller locations, then your production team. And drivers, for instance, might not need to be as big. So that’s really how I start just by taking the script and looking at all the practical elements in that. Once you have your HODs on board, I would just go back to each Head of Department and talk to them in detail about what they and their team would need to achieve their job. Because very often, as a producer, you’re not a specialist, you’re more of a generalist in terms of all of the other roles on the film. So you have to have a really good understanding of every role, but you are never going to have as great an understanding as that Head of Department. So, I have a conversation with all the Heads of Department that I have on board at the time of budgeting and take them through their job. And then I make sure that I’m applying that to the budget.

In terms of getting other people’s input and approval over the budget, I would be careful not to ever give a director specific approval unless they also were serving as an Executive Producer and helping to finance the film, in which case, they have a producing role on the film. But I would make sure that I’m always having discussions about different solutions and ways of getting the most out of the money that we have in order to achieve the scenes in question. So, while I wouldn’t necessarily always give the director and Heads of Department full access to my budget, I would talk them through the elements of the budget that apply to them. And also, I’d be very open and honest about where the limitations are, where we might be able to push things and get a little bit more money for that area or more out of our money, do deals, for example, and just really share openly the context of the situation that we’re in, without necessarily presenting the numbers. The reason for this is that ultimately in the same way that you’re not an expert in, you know, cinematography or costume design, nobody else is an expert in producing. And so ultimately your job is to balance the distribution of the budget, according to the needs of that specific film. But what I would do is always make sure that I’m having a really good in-depth conversation with each Head of Department, and making sure that I understand their needs, and that they feel listened to. And then I might go away and reassess how I distributed my budget and move things around from one line into the other based on what I’ve learned.

I think one of the things that a lot of crew can feel most frustrated by sometimes, is that they haven’t been taken into account. Or nobody’s been thinking in detail about how they can practically achieve what they need to achieve creatively on the budget that they have. And so there’s a few things that I do to try and establish really great lines of communication from as early as possible. The first thing is that when I’m when I’m actually recruiting when I am crewing the film, I always give as much information as I possibly have to that person, even if it might be the kind of information that you feel like holding back, for instance, we have a tiny budget and our our fees aren’t what you’re going to be used to, or we don’t have massive floats for each department or, you know, we can’t provide X, Y or Z, it’s far better to give that information right from the start to be really open with the context of the project, why the budget is limited, if it is, and what sort of contribution you’re looking for from that role. I find that when you do that, that then gives people the opportunity to turn down or accept that role based on those terms. And crew often feel more trusting of you because you’ve given them more information right from beginning.

And then what I do is, when I have confirmed a Head of Department, I will have a one-to-one conversation with them, just me as the producer, which isn’t so much the creative conversations that we would have with the director or that they might have directly with the director. It’s more of a Okay, here’s the role. Here’s the budget, here are my plans logistically. What are your questions? What are your needs? And I’ve created this exercise for myself where I effectively walk myself through the experience of the HOD in my own head. So I think, you know, what am I asking them to create? Or to achieve? Where will they be prepping? How will they get there? Where will they park? What will they need to have there? For example, equipment. Where will that be stored after they finish prepping? Who else might they need to help them? What will they eat and drink when they’re there? And then how much prep time and strike time do they need on location itself? What will be required of them on the day? And you know, what is the end product that person is trying to achieve? I find that really helps you to spot in advance some of the niggling challenges that can often come up in short filmmaking at the last minute when you get a call from you know, the costume designer saying Well, how am I supposed to get five suitcases of clothes to that location? I don’t have a car that’s big enough or something similar to that. And then after I’ve done that, I’ll have that one-on-one conversation with the HOD. We’ll talk about some of the biggest challenges for that that person on the budget that we have and come up with solutions together. And once you open that line of communication, right near the beginning of the process, I find that they come to you more often, and express how they’re doing and what’s going well, what the challenges are that have come up so that you’re not then shocked at the last minute by, you know, things that you didn’t realise were perhaps going wrong or weren’t quite being achieved.

Short Hand: Next up, Emily offers some tips for staying on budget, and what other perhaps more surprising things you should be budgeting for.

Emily Everdee: One of the consequences of things cropping up last minute is that it can eat into your budget. And if you’re not careful, it could force you to tip over budget. And something that I will always say to new producers is make sure that you don’t tell yourself you can spend contingency before you get to the shoot. So, contingency should be – if you have a contingency line in your budget – around 10% on some projects, maybe 5 – 10% of your overall budget. You really should consider that for things that crop up in the future that you can’t imagine now are going to go wrong. And that happen either on the shoot, or in post-production or maybe just in those last couple of days where you’re prepping and everything’s a bit mad.

But if you are already thinking a few weeks before the shoot, well that’s probably going to need more money. Then I would do the work now to try and shuffle budget around and find ways to save money in other areas to try and come up with some you know ingenious solution of getting a better deal or doing something a different way. Have conversations with crew members that might be able to help you find those solutions, and free up that money for that thing that you already have a feeling is going to go over, rather than just dipping into your contingency because it, it seems like it’s free money there available to you.

On short films, if you’re going to go over budget, you’re in quite a different position to if you’re on, say, a big feature film or studio film, because very often those are being run by companies that have quite a lot of money. And they may be able to just find a bit more money for you. But very often on a short film, that’s not the case, the budget that you’ve got is the budget that you have. So it’s especially important that you really think your way through, like I said, the experience of everybody who’s contributing to your film, and make sure that you’re communicating regularly with the director so that they have expectations that are in line with what you can achieve for them. And that you’re both going to be really happy with the end result. Because if you do go over budget, then that’s when you have to either make cuts in other areas that you weren’t planning to make, or maybe raise a bit more money in post.

When it comes to costs for marketing and distribution, for example, applying to festivals, if I’m completely honest, that is often the thing that comes out of the budget, when you’re trying to make cuts. If you are required to fit your budget to a certain amount for an application or you’ve been given a grant of a certain figure, sometimes it can be difficult to carve out money for distribution and festivals because you do feel that your priority is getting the film made. And that makes sense. But if you can include a bit of money for at least one festival entry, and a bit of money for, for example, a poster design that’s going to be really eye-catching, it can do world of wonders for your film, because ultimately what you want is for audiences to see that film. But I would say that, the average say BAFTA-qualifying or Oscar-qualifying festival, which is often a marker of one of the more established festivals, would be between £10 and £15, up to you know, £60 – 70 entry. So if you aren’t going to apply to a handful of festivals or more, you’re probably going to need at least a few hundred pounds for that. But this is also something that you can definitely raise more money for in post-production through crowdfunding using the resources that you now have from your film, if you don’t manage to fit that into your initial budget.

Sometimes I think some of the most challenging things to budget for are some of the elements that are newer for producers and that we have started to take into account in the last few years. One of the things you might want to think about is sustainability on your production and what your carbon footprint is. This doesn’t need to be a complicated and as scary topic, as you might imagine. I would recommend going onto the BAFTA Albert website. You can get some free training from BAFTA Albert talking about how the industry impacts on the planet. And look at some production case studies. And you can also then get a carbon calculator to work out what your specific short film’s footprint would be. And if you manage to, you can also pop a little bit of budget in there towards offsetting the carbon footprint of your film and BAFTA Albert can help you do that. So you make a contribution to them and then they make a contribution to causes and charities that help with that.

You also need to obviously think about the COVID situation at the time of filming and what your COVID protocols are going to be. And very often, especially if you have actors who are going to be acting in close contact unmasked, you’d want to account for some testing costs. And the best advice I can give for getting a sense of what’s appropriate at the current time of your shoot is to speak to First Option Limited if you can, or another health and safety organisation who are really up on the latest information on COVID and the testing that is recommended. Because it does really change as the COVID situation changes. All in all what you need to do if you have budget elements, and you just don’t know how much it’s going to cost or exactly what’s required, give a call to anybody that you can who’s a specialist in that area. You would be amazed how open people are to actually talking you through their services and what the costs are. And if you’re open with them about the scale of your film and that you’re still learning very often people are very generous with their quotes as well.

Jesse Romain: Eating an elephant one bite at a time is very much the way of going about it. You break the script down into sections traditionally called eighths and you figure out how many eighths can you shoot in a day. You may be looking at shooting three pages a day. And that also depends on how many unit moves you’ve got. So, when you’ve got your locations, your cast members, you can then look to build the budget around that. And at the beginning, it will be this completely, you know, moveable feast. It will be changing from the day you start till the day you finish. And I think you’ve just got to be wary of that.

Short Hand: That’s Jesse Romain, a film producer whose credits include animation shorts, such as O Black Hole, and Soft Animals, as well as live action projects, such as Cowboy and White Girl. Here, he’s talking about what it takes to build a budget, where you find quotes, what you should be paying people and why a budget isn’t a fixed entity, but rather something that you adjust and amend.

Jesse Romain: Working out how much things should cost on a short is incredibly difficult. You’re starting off from the fact that you’re hoping people are doing it for the, for the love, rather than for the money, and that everyone’s aware of that when you start. So you’ve got people and you’ve got locations and you’ve got kit, it’s super important that you pay everyone. Your starting point is minimum wage for most of your crew. And then maybe, personally I’ve identified maybe a Head of Department buyout rate where they’re all on the same amount of money, then it’s just clearer for you in your head when you’re dealing with things. And then actors are on equity minimum, and that’s clear. And there’s no deviation from that. It’s likely, there’s never any income that comes from this film, which does make things I guess, slightly easier at this point that you’ve got nothing to share out in the future. As I said, it’s really important that you pay people. Maybe as a possibility, if you’re working with with students, where the experience is beneficial that you may be able to work with volunteers. And I’ve done that and it’s an amazing energy and lifeblood they bring to the set, and it was brilliant to work with them.

In terms of kits, that’s harder. You might want to speak to your DOP early on to work out what they need, and hope and pray that they have relationships with kit houses. Ultimately, you know, lots of people would rather be making short films creatively than adverts or more commercial work. So there might be deals that you can do, if people have got other relationships. And then locations are always tricky. I suggest putting numbers in the budget early on, and just working towards them. And then you’ve also got to be aware of if you’re filming outside, you know, you should probably I’m not saying new people will do this, but you should probably ring up the borough. They’re all film savvy and there’s film councils. Ring them up and find out how you film there and what the costs are. But initially, it’s about putting numbers down in the budget, which you can then kind of tailor and amend as you go along.

Short Hand: In the next segment, you’ll hear Jesse discuss setting up a production company, how you decide who you need on set, how to save money on a film, and why the key to a happy set is making sure people know what their jobs are and what they’re responsible for, before filming starts, and how involved the director should be in budget conversations.

Jesse Romain: The first thing you probably needs to do in when you’re going for BFI funding, and you can change it as you go, so it doesn’t have to be for the for the actual initial funding round. But if you were to get funding, you need to know quite early as whether you’re going to make the film as an individual or as a limited company. There’s pros and cons of both, setting up a limited company is not hard, it’s on Companies House, and anyone can do it. Although once you have a limited company, you have to do accounts, which have costs and complications, but you are protected as a as a limited company that should anything go wrong, then it’s not your liability, which I think helps me sleep at night when there’s lots of other things rolling around in your head. And then again, when you’re a limited company, then you can consider the tax credit. I would think that it’s worth thinking about that if you’re making a film for you know, £15k, then you’re looking at possibility of two or three back. You make a film for 18 and it’s actually 15 if that makes sense because two or three of that it comes from the tax credit, but you need to spend money on accountants to make that happen. Some people have done it themselves, but it does sound complicated, I haven’t actually got to that stage yet. I’m just doing it with a film I’m making, if you’re saying that there’s £3k that you’re going to get from tax credit, then you need to show where you’re going to get that from because you don’t get it back till after you’ve made the film.

So first of all, coming back to that I’d recommend setting up a limited company. Then before the BFI gives you any money you need to have insurance and that is money you will have to put that out yourself to get insurance and that’s about ringing around – they’ve got a list of brokers on their site – and you ring them and you tell them what your what you’re planning to do, what the budget is and how many days the shoot is and they’ll insure you.

Defining the parameters for you need on set is is incredibly tricky and will depend massively from one set to the other. If you’ve got a lot of cast, you’ll probably need a 2nd AD. But it might be that you can do without. If you’re shooting outdoors, you won’t have a lot of light setup. So you probably won’t need the same amount of sparks, or, you know, technical crew, which will make shooting a lot quicker and easier, but will bring with it its own problems. If you’re shooting inside with lights, you’ll probably need sparks. And if you’ve got one spark, you probably need two because there’s carrying and lifting and all of that was going on. If you’ve got children, then you’ve got to check the licensing laws on this, but you’ll need a chaperone. And then you’ll need a space for the child as well when they’re in downtime. So these are kind of all things to consider. Runners-wise, you just need someone on the base to, you know, to look after the teas and coffees. Because if you don’t, then they’ll go everywhere. And I personally have worked with, you know, I’ve been fortunate to have Production Managers, which have been great because you just can’t be everywhere as a producer and you want to be creative producing as much as possible, though, invariably, you’ll probably be, you know, locking up at the end and doing the bins and everything else.

How to save money on a film is a really tricky question. People have been making films for a long time and the roles are quite clearly identified for a reason. You know, you need everyone on a set. But if you are making a short with a small crew, do you need need everyone? I mean, can you get by without a DIT? Without a Script Supervisor? Can the actors do their own makeup? Will someone do stills for you? If you are going to try and go without some of these roles, who are all super important in their own way, I think I think it’s important to let everyone know what the situation is. And, you know, if you’re not having a Script Supervisor, which we went without on my last short, is the director aware and are they happy? And luckily the director was brilliant and that wasn’t a problem. If you aren’t going to use a DIT, are the camera team okay with that? So it’s just having the plan and just talking with people, and making sure people are aware what their jobs are going to be before they start because the main thing you want and the most efficient way to film is having a happy set with people who are well-fed and know what they’re doing.

Bringing the director in with the budget and their vision is hugely important. And again, they should know what the limitations are in terms of what they’re trying to make. And I think it’s very likely, with the BFI shorts that we’re talking about here, it’s quite possible the director isn’t being paid. They might well be, but it’s very hard to finance the film when on that level. So they’ll be aware of the budget. And then it’s just about trying to make sure that you work with them, to give them the confidence that you trust them. And you want to give them what they want. But also, you know, they want a sunset scene and a sunrise theme, that’s just not going to work in a three day shoot. And so they’ve got to pick one, and it’s about picking kind of the hero shot that defines the world and working with it. But you don’t want to be ‘No, no, no,’ you don’t want to be that producer. But at the same time, you know, they’ve got to be aware, there’s got to be some give and take on everything.

Short Hand: Finally, Jesse speaks to the differences between budgets for animation and live action. And his tips for filmmakers on putting together a workable budget that gives everyone what they need.

Jesse Romain: There’s quite a few differences between live action and animation. There’s less inputs into an animation. You’re not going to be dealing with as many complications of crew and scheduling isn’t going to be the same. In a live action, you’ve got quite a stressful couple of days shoot where you’ve got to get everything in and you’re beholden to the weather or these things, which don’t exist in animation. But budgeting for animation, again, it starts with the schedule, and you need to break it down bit-by-bit to work out what you’re going to achieve. And it’s slightly different between 2D and stop-motion. And also, one key thing for animation, is that you want to get to an animatic quite quickly because an animatic a storyboard essentially, which shows your film. A script doesn’t quite do justice for an animation, well depending on what your animation is. If it’s a normal house in a normal world, then the script is fine. But then animation can go too much further, far off places than that so it’s nice to have that and then you know work out how many seconds of work per day your animator can do and how much support they need and what their rates are will then feed into the budget.

I guess the big costs in animation, which you haven’t got in live action, is you might need a studio space where your animator works. And an animation it’s kind of the opposite of a documentary, whereby a documentary, it’s likely that you may form the film in the edit at the end. Whereas in an animation, it’s important to form the film in the edit at the beginning, so you don’t have to reanimate or go back. But you know, the approaches at the beginning I think, are very similar to the live action of just breaking it all down. And just trying to understand what each individual element will cost. As I said, with that live action, you might learn as you go, that some things are going to be over or something’s gonna be under but putting numbers down to start with, you’ll get there.

Just to be fully aware of your budget is, is the most important thing. You want to have some fat in it maybe so that you’ve got some things to play with. But you know, you don’t want to have a film and have money left at the end. That’s not great either. But again, you don’t want to go over. So it’s about knowing your budget, being aware of it, there’ll be some things which you will make, which will happen cheaper than you expected to happen. But they’ll probably be more things which happen  at a greater cost than you expect to happen. If you do get to the stage of you know, if you’re running late on a day, have a thought to yourself about whether you can afford overtime. It’s probably likely that you can’t and if you can’t afford overtime, how are you going to deal with that the next day. If it’s the last day, maybe there’s some different thoughts in your head. There’s a real difficult balance between saving wherever possible and then also, you know, keeping everyone happy and making sure everything works. The key thing really is to haggle before you get to set, get the best deals before you get to set and get everything for the best price, with a good team. You’ve got three days or four days, and everything’s got to run as smoothly as possible. And everyone’s got to be happy. And some things you just can’t save on.

Cheri Darbon: So, your relationship with the director is the most important one, it’s such a partnership, you both want to know that you’re setting out to make the same film, there has to be trust there. And that also filters into transparency on the film’s budget. Like they don’t need to know the inner workings of your budget because they should be focusing on their own craft. But I’m always happy to talk budget with the director. I think it’s helpful to have that transparency over it because they need to know what we can achieve really, and how to maximise the budget that we do have. I try to encourage directors to leave the negotiating to the producer and to not talk money as it can it can sometimes complicate the relationship with their creative partners. And like I would rather have those difficult conversations.

Short Hand: That’s Cheri Darbon, a film producer whose credits include short films such as Sensational Simmy, For Love, Bufflehead and as Executive Producer on the BFI NETWORK and Film Hub South East-backed The Last Days. Here, she’s discussing how to navigate budget conversations with the director, and how to ensure that your budget is on the screen. And what that even means.

Cheri Darbon: With directors I suppose it’s ensuring that you’re constantly communicating, and that they don’t feel any type of way. If they want to raise a concern, or they’re trying to reach for the stars, like, join them, have a look at the stars. You should have the conversation and then work out what’s possible. If your director is coming to you, and you say no, immediately, then you’ve left no room for exploration. You never want to be the person to say no. I would always say to not say no straightaway, because you might find that actually, after a conversation, that there is a happy medium there. Or that something is possible. I found actually a lot of the time those people, for instance, with the most expensive equipment are those who actually probably have the most money and the most time to be able to then give you their equipment or operate it for you for a discounted price. And so, it depends on their relationships with everything. So, I think a constant kind of communication and making sure that you’re both set out to make the same film and have the same intentions.

I always find that question quite interesting about trying to ensure that your budget is on the screen. So when the audience can watch it, they feel like the production have spent their money well. I suppose it’s a bit of a balance really, like don’t get caught up in prioritising expensive camera gear if you haven’t nailed the location. Or if it’s going to take half a day just to travel to your next location. There’s a lot of empty time that you’re paying, that isn’t shown on the screen. So, I suppose it’s making sure that that empty time is used to the best of your ability as well. So, if for instance, your setup is quite intricate, make sure you put in prep days, and that you’ve not got the actor there for half a day waiting around. And then only when the afternoon comes in, are they able to come on to set, you won’t have a happy set after that either. And that’s what’s on screen, your talent as well. So I think it’s making sure that everything that you’re doing, and those empty spaces is all serving to the screen and to the story of what you’re showing the audience in the end.

Short Hand: Next up, Cheri discusses some roles that you might not initially factor into your budget. But depending on the story you’re telling could be well worth considering and setting some money aside for, as well as her tips for stretching that budget creatively.

Cheri Darbon: I think it’s easy to become really practical with budgets, especially shorts. So there’s like so much to deliver, and it adds up so quickly. But I think depending on the scripts nowadays, I really try to consider the benefits of a wellbeing practitioner. So we recently on a short I did last year worked with Lou Platt. And she had also previously worked with Michaela on I May Destroy You. And so with our director, it was a very personal story of hers and so it created a lovely moment for them two to be able to talk and go through exactly what it is that she was bringing up and essentially the trauma. And so I think it’s really, really important actually, especially as a producer to kind of create that safe space for the director. But not only one-to-one’s, she offered like group therapy, almost. It was a moment or a chance to have the crew all at the start of the production get together and just chat about the script. And actually like the characters and topics and everything that they felt was relatable to them. Because a lot of the time when you’re working in shorts, you’re doing it for things that you love as well. And so for the most part, you want to be able to connect. So when you have quite sensitive issues that you want to talk about as a filmmaker, it extends to your gaffer, it extends to your Art Department, like everyone who’s coming on to the set, you want to make sure you’ve created a safe space as possible. Also think along the same lines, an Intimacy Coordinator, like movement coaches, in the similar vein as well, just making everyone feel like they’re in that same safe space, that’s something that we’re doing more and more often. Definitely bring that same practice from television and features into shorts, and making sure that that’s across the board for for all of our work. So, I’d say those are probably two things that I would suggest as something you might not consider, first of all, especially if you’re a new producer.

And then there’s the mundane things like cleaners, I actually found that really helpful to put a little bit of dollar aside for a cleaner because sometimes you are moving from one set to the next and you don’t have the luxury of a location manager. So, it’s helpful sometimes to not round up your poor coordinators who end up sweeping the floors of a restaurant or scrubbing windows and desks. And so I think it’s a small thing, but a very helpful time and energy saver.

Give yourself little pockets of money secretly in your budget, so if you’ve got drives already at home, and you know that you can use them, but BBC are giving you a bit of money for some drives, put them in, because they’ll always be a time where you know, you might find that you actually do need the drives anyway and or you want to use it for a makeup box or something different you kind of can put that budget in knowing that you can move it and shift it around constantly. And they know that as well, especially the networks and channels because that is what you’re doing when you’re a producer and you own a budget, you’re kind of moving it around constantly.

So I think giving yourself that extra buffer and allowing space in your budgets to just have a little breather, so you can kind of shuffle things as and when you need to. And also with your Heads of Departments, just allowing them a certain amount of the budget that you’ve put in for them and then you’ve got a bit of an overhead there for yourself in case they do go over because it does happen a lot. They might think that we’re holding money away from them on purpose but it’s literally our job to make sure that we can we have that buffer there.

I think the most resourceful way [to save money] is probably just to re-use and borrow, especially in shorts. I think we were just a little community out there, just trying to do our best. And there’s a million and one shorts going on at the same time, to be honest. And so you’ll actually find that people will have leftovers. And you can do call outs and ask if anyone’s got spare trestle tables or chairs or urns and those little things that are really, really helpful. You don’t necessarily have to spend loads of money on them to be able to have them on your set, there’s just loads of productions around who might be wrapping up and they might be able to give them to you or lend them to you. Lots of shorts are filmed at the weekend and so you might be able to use another productions, if it’s allowed, take that onto your set. So I’d say kind of re-using as much as possible as well It’s also quite resourceful and it’s like environmentally-friendly.

Short Hand: And finally, Cheri talks about why you shouldn’t be afraid of the budget, or spreadsheets, and how you can gain confidence if you’re putting together your very first budget.

Cheri Darbon: To those who suck at maths like myself, Excel is your friend, she is your best friend. She is just there to help you along your way, so don’t be scared of it and just get stuck in there. Get a good budget template, from another producer, and cost report and stuff and just play around with it. It’s really satisfying to like get your head into there. And I always really like it when I’m like, like I know this budget inside out. I know exactly what numbers are where and how it works. And I would say to always double check your formulas match up, because that is just a very easy, but often overlooked mistake where you’ve just not connected the right formulas together. And so it’s not actually adding up to what you’ve spent or what you need to spend. And so you can find yourself at a bit of a loss for money.

I’d probably say have another person check your budget as well. I always like to work with co-producers or my Production Managers be really close with me on the budget, too, so that they can triple check things. And also just in terms of like, when we’re speaking earlier about what would you put into a budget that might surprise others, I just like getting their take on it as well. And I would probably say the only other thing would be for new producers who aren’t, let’s say VAT registered or don’t have a limited company that to make sure that you think about the extra VAT that is added on to everything that will be quoted to you. So bear that in mind because you don’t want to come to the end of your shoot and be left with 20% extra to pay than you thought you were going to pay.

Short Hand: Thank you for listening to Short Hand. Look out for a new episode next week that will focus on casting and what you need to know about embarking on that process. Thank you to our guests this week: Emily Everdee, Jesse Romain and Cheri Darbon. Short Hand is a BFI NETWORK and Film Hub South East podcast produced by Nicole Davis with support from the BFI NETWORK and ICO team. Special thanks to our editor, Graciela Mae Chico and Epidemic for the music.