Best Advice You Have Received?

R

RollaSelbak

This has probably been covered on the boards, but I'm new and interested to hear...what is the best advice that you have received about filmmaking??


Mine are probably:

Make sure you love and believe in the projects you work on. Making a film is a long, hard, arduous, ride, and the only thing that will keep you going is if you truly believe in what you're doing. Otherwise, it'll be extremely easy to just dump what you're doing and get a real job.

Another person told me 'sleeping is for suckers'. This is true, I don't sleep much.

Another one is 'it only takes one yes'. Meaning don't be afraid of hearing 'no', because it only takes one 'yes' to change things around, and chances are, if you stick around long enough, that will happen.

In the words of one my heros, Steve Jobs "Stay hungry, Stay foolish".
 
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The best advice I received is almost the exact opposite of yours:

Making a film is your real job. And it's a job. If you treat filmmaking as
your hobby or think of having a "fall back" job it is easier to fall back.

What keeps me going is not the love or belief in what I'm doing. If I don't
work in film I do not earn a living. Film is my real job.
 
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"You can spend your time and money on partying, or you can spend your time and money on your career. The first leads to a good time, the second leads to a good life." - Tina Weymouth of Talking Heads

"Life has been meant for you to enjoy, but you won't enjoy it if you don't pay for it with some good, hard work. This is one price that will never be marked down." - Harpo Marx
 
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Don't tell people what you're going to do, just do it.

No way to put that fancy. The more you tell people about the things you're going to do (especially in this industry) the more they second guess you. Ask advice for a friend, keep your enthusiasm to yourself (where applicable), get stuff done.

Even if you can't, really? You're better off thinkin' that you can. =D
 
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Kinda mostly related to life in general but applies heaps to film making still: Never give up. Especially if you have the passion.

I've had a lot of people (before even seeing my work) tell me how almost no one makes a living making films. Everyone has a story of a nephew or cousin who tried in the industry and failed. Most of these people have changed the way they talk to me after actually seeing that I'm at least half decent at what I do
 
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Focus.

Make to-do lists and start checking things off until there's nothing left. Then think of more things and repeat.

Find the best people you can to work with and treat them well--a GOOD, RELIABLE cast and crew are really hard to find and/or replace.

NEVER NEGLECT YOUR SOUND.

And if you find "We'll fix it in post" becoming your mantra on set...you're doing something wrong.
 
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Knowledge is power. It reveals the BS from the real mccoys in cast, crew, and post people.

The more you know, the less people will be able to pull the wool over your eyes.

Film is art made by collaboration with others.

Stick with people who prove you can rely on them.
 
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We had an tongue in cheek phrase "It was an artistic choice." applied to mistakes we made.

One of our actors (Martin Doyle - from several of our films and one of our writers) asked if we could fix the artistic choices in post... we stopped using the phrase after we stopped laughing about it.

We now use the phrase "We don't want to have to fix the artistic choices in post." on set all the time when justifying extra time lighting or an extra take to our 1st AD and our producers.
 
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