Budget

Budget (how much dough you are spending list) - Once you know what you are doing, who is doing it, and in what order, now is an excellent time to figure out how much it is going to cost. The budget is calculated by evaluating the individual pieces of work we are doing. So let's return to the WBS and look at the example below:

Typical film expense categories:
•Film stock and processing (a hard cost no matter who you are).
•Equipment rental
•Permits, locations
•Crew
•Production supplies (expendables, meals, knick knacks)
•Talent, actors
•Sets, props, wardrobe

There’s an old saying about being sure to focus your spending on what ‘shows up on the screen’. Only spend on what actually is going to enhance the final product. Try not spend on anything you can get free/cheap (as long as the risks are reasonable). Trade favors and work down the line for a break right now.

Budgeting out each section of the project, section by section, gives us a methodical approach to allocating our funding throughout the life of the production process. Having a strategic approach to budgeting gives us the opportunity to produce cutting edge creative work while still maintaining a managed fund.

Schedule

Once you have a list of tasks (from the super-task list WBS), you have to put them in some type of order. Especially if you are doing a great deal of the work yourself or are borrowing and asking favors of people, it is always best that you be as organized as possible in order to get the most value for your time. The easiest way to order your tasks
is to use a flowchart or project network (see example below):

It looks a little more complicated than it really is... basically, you are taking each of your mini-task lists and putting them in order. You are either doing one thing before another or there are some things you can do at the same time. Period. These are called dependencies and concurrencies, which means 'what has to happen before something else' or 'what can happen at the same time'.

One you've identified the flow of your work, it will be easier for you to know when and where you are going to need people or time in order to get your project complete. You’ve created a schedule. Do this for the entire project and you know have a workable technique to evaluate whether or not you are capable of completing your film on time.

Crew List

Crew List (People list) – The next step is to assemble a production team. We are not talking actual shooting crew here, we are talking about your production crew who are helping you with the project. If it is just you, it is just you. Hopefully, you've convinced, cajoled and beat someone into helping you.

At this point you need to assign a resource to each of your tasks from the WBS. If you do not assign a resource, by default, you will be the one doing it. Realize that. Live it. Get people to help and make it happen.

Here is a example from the TASK LIST portion of the site. Below are the list of tasks:

Now, you need to assign each of these tasks to somebody. See below:

Not the most complicated thing in the world to do but vitally important. Just the simple act of writing this out will help you to think through the project and make sure nothing is slipping through the cracks. Don't skip this step.

Task List (aka Work Breakdown Structure)

You need to develop a task list of everything you need done on your project. Everything. This part is not very complicated but often requires the most work. Minimize your chance of forgetting something on your project by creating this WBS. Film project WBS's are organized by phase:


Underneath each phase, you create 'categories' of work. For example, under Pre-Production you may have the following categories for your short film:


Once you've identified each of the major categories of work you'll be doing in each phase, it is time to 'decompose' your WBS until you end up with actual tasks that need to be done. For example, under the category for “Talent” (see above) you may have the following set of tasks:


Create a mini-task list from each of your sub-categories. For the categories above, for example “Creative”, “Crew”, “Equipment”, “Locations”, “Talent”, “Logistics”, “Financing”, there should be a mini-task list for each. The combination of all of your mini-task lists becomes your super-task list. Every possible thing you will need to do to create your short film will be on the super-task list. As you start work and other tasks become apparent, add them to the super-task list and keep developing it. The more you know and have written down, the more organized you will be.