IFH 243: How to Make SERIOUS Money as a Filmmaker

Welcome to the indie film hustle podcast episode number 243 choices and decisions must be supported by your passion resolve and a productive work ethic if these meet opportunity your success has finally come Archibald more with. Broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood. It’s the indie film hustle podcast where we show you how to survive and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of the film.

And here’s your host Alex Ferrari. Welcome to another episode of the indie film also podcast. I am your humble host Alex Ferrari. Today’s episode is brought to you by Black Box black box is a new platform and community. That is all about Financial Freedom for filmmakers like you. Joint block box.

You will be transformed from being a worker to being a maker of your own content and you’ll be making steady passive income from the global market Black Box currently allows you to upload your stock footage once get it too many Global agencies and then allows you to share that passive income stream with your collaborator.

Whether you want to submit old footage that’s been sitting around in your hard drives or create brand new content black box is for you. It’s really quite revolutionary with black box filmmakers can concentrate on making great content. While Black Box takes care of all the business BS just visit w-w-w find out more Today’s Show is also sponsored by Studio unknown Studio known as a crack team of audio post professionals known for Quality sound on any Indy.

Whether you need a lush surround sound mix or a quick Festival submission pass Studio known can help you with all of your posts sound needs from sound design and mix to fully and even a custom score contact Studio known and mention the indie film also podcast and you’ll get 50% off one day of ADR or 10% off your complete post sound package.

Just go to Studio unknown now guys today. I’m going to talk about something that. I’ve been asked at least a million times which is how do I make money as a filmmaker or better yet? Can I make money as a film maker? And the short answer is yes. Is it easy? Absolutely not. It is very difficult. But can it be done?

Yes, because I am sitting right here in front of you as you’re listening to my voice as an example of someone who’s not only made money as a filmmaker but has made a career out of it. So it is doable because if I can do it anyone could do it so I’m gonna go over a bunch of different ways that filmmakers can start right when they’re starting, you know, getting out of film school or just starting out.

Uh, To start building that career and then a few different ways if you’ve already established yourself, uh in in the business and want to make a couple side hustles a month throw you a couple ideas as well. So the very first thing that you can do is either you can work for somebody else. Or work for yourself.

Now, let’s go into working for somebody else first. You know when you when you starting out you don’t know anyting you got to learn. So the best way to do that is by working for other people who have been there before you who are doing what you want to do and you’ll learn just by literally standing there watching them do what they do.

So film crew work is an amazing way to get the ball rolling to get in there as a PA. Or a department PA or a production office PA or an assistant camera or or a bunch of different other avenues that you can go through on a film crew, but let’s start off with the bear the entry point, which is Pa or production assistant.

They are the blood that runs through a production set without Pas. You can’t get things done films Crews cannot. Work without having Pas running around and really is helpful to have them so Pas or production assistants are going to basically be anything and everything you need on a set to be done.

So, uh runs for coffee picking people up driving people, uh jumping on a crew helping other departments. You’re basically doing everything and that’s a great way to get started. It is ballbusting work if you’re working on big Productions, you’re going to be waking up at 3 o’clock in the morning and work at 18 hours.

For little money, but you’re going to learn a lot. That’s one way of going about it. Just being a straight up. Croupier or you can try to specialize and get into a department like, uh, the production design department or camera Department stunts all these different departments that you can jump into and try to bpa’s for them.

So being a uh, a level up like a production design PA, which means that you’re there you’re there PA. So everything that you’re gonna do on set is going to be around helping them in their Department again, if that’s a great way if you want to try to go down a certain Road, In in production, if you want to learn about cinematography wouldn’t it be great to be a PA and watching professional cinematographers first, they see second a c’s DS and so on just you get such a close personal and intimate relationship with that department and you learn so much more another great, uh area in the in the film crew of working for other people is working in the production office when I was in film school.

I had it. Lucky enough to get an internship working for free at Universal Studios in Florida, and I was able to jump from production to production working in the office and why working in the office, you’re there with the producers you’re there with the showrunners you’re there with directors and all the higher-ups.

So you watch what’s going on you’re sitting there all day listening learning. It was awesome. I would love to any time they needed help. I’d go out to set uh, and and then. There it was in men sleep important in my development as a filmmaker. So when you starting out that is a great way, um to learn as much as you can as well as networking with big people.

I mean you’re gonna get access to people in the office and the production office that you will not get to on set. You will not be able to have a conversation with a producer on set you will not be able to build the relationship with a producer as a PA on set but as an office, PA. If you’re there every day and you like, you know, you’re getting coffees, you’re getting Bagels people know who you are.

You’re running around. You’re making copies your face. They start recognizing you and then all of a sudden the producers are starting to take notice of you and that’s a real quick way to jump up the ladder very very quickly in if you want to go down that road, but you’re still going to learn a lot even though if you want to go off and make your own films and do your own thing.

This is still an immense opportunity for networking and for Education. Now. Another thing you could do is work for a actual production company. Uh, when I first got out of school, my first job was interning and then work at a job at a huge commercial production company in Florida and I learned so much from working there and I got a job and I was getting paid and I was learning and networking with people in my area and my community my film community.

So I was. If I wanted to go shoot something I could borrow their gear on the weekend and use their editing systems after hours for free all these Resources by working at a production company was amazing. I learned the skills that helped me build my career at that first job. And right afterwards, I mean literally I was a tape dubber.

So I was making dubs of uh directors realize I was editing custom editing directors reels tape the tape there’s old school 3/4 inch uh stuff but uh next door to me was an avid and in that and that was the first time I ever saw really like a full-blown. Avid editing system, so I actually went out and got certified and then I practiced every day at in the morning before work and after after hours and on weekends, I would go and just build my craft learn my craft started editing the demo reels putting things together because I decided that that was the rod I was gonna go I was going to learn that skill.

I was gonna learn editing now you could have easily gone down the camera route. You could have easily gone down the production design route. The Wardrobe route the stunts route or any other any other areas, uh in the film industry, but for me, I felt that that was what was going to help me become a better filmmaker because I was going to be able to edit and I think the best filmmakers are always they always come from being editors or understand the craft of editing.

So so well that it helps them become better directors. So that’s what I decided to do. And then soon after that I ventured out and became a skilled freelancer, which is the next thing you could become to make money as a filmmaker become a skilled freelancer. So I went out and I started I already built up a demo reel a fake demo reel.

Uh, it’s called Speck of a bunch of commercials that I that weren’t real, but they showed my skills off and I happened to slap a couple of big big brand logos at the end of it. So people thought that they were bigger than. Then they were you know, I was bigger than I was but if they asked me I always told him it was a spec but if they didn’t ask me they assumed and that was fine with me and that helped me get going.

So well that first demo reel work for me that I did not change it for two and half years that demo reel continued to get me work for over two and half years till I finally updated it. So I went out and I started freelancing and I sent my demo reel out and I became a skill freelancer where I was starting to make real money.

I was 22 23 years old. I had been busting my ass for about a year year and half and then I started making serious money. I was making 50 bucks an hour sometimes over time depending if I was working on a network or not, and it was great and I was making money hand over fist back in the days because it was a 90s and money was flowing like crazy, but it was a great time.

So what I decided to do then is like I’m going to become an editor and I’m going to be a freelance editor and that’s the rod I’m gonna go and I’m gonna make money so then I could start going off in either making a commercial demo reel to become a director or. Music videos or actually trying to go out and shoot a feature and back then the options are shooting a feature were much less than they are.

Now that technology was very expensive and so on so I decided to go out and make my commercial reels, but I was at my point is I was making money editing as a skill freelancer and what I did is once I. Taught myself that skill I branded myself that way. I had my business cards made up websites and so on to Brand myself as a skilled freelancer or as a freelance editor again, you could do this in multiple areas in the business, but I’m just trying to show you that as a skilled freelancer you can um go out and make money as a filmmaker While You’re Building yourself up your skill set up those tools and those toolbox up and the war chest the money that you’re able.

Dave hopefully to go out and make your own projects. So that’s one way I went down the post route. You could have easily gone down the camera route where you buy a camera and you start just making stuff and you just open up a production company. So building your own production company is another way of making money as a as a filmmaker now.

I know that sounds really big and grandiose but look in today’s world. Do you have a camera? Do you have some lights? Do you have some basic editing gear your. Auction Company, even if you’re working outside the back of your house or in spare bedroom in your house or out of your kitchen, you are a production company, you can brand yourself as a production company.

If you can bring the goods if you can do what you say you’re going to do the best thing you could do when you open up a production company. Become a predator a producer director editor because if you can’t do all three of those parts, you’re going to have to hire someone to do those parts those jobs.

So if you can do them all guess what you get to keep all the money, that’s one of the reasons why I’m always working. All right, I always have something going on because I do. Hundreds of different jobs and have multiple different ways of making money, uh as a filmmaker because I’ve been able to build those skill sets up over time.

So become a predator, uh producer director editor, it really helps you out a lot when you building out your production company now the clients what are the kind of clients you’re going to go after as a production company. You can go after corporate jobs. Now corporate jobs are not always fun.

They’re generally kind of boring. You know, you’re going to be doing Talking Heads, you’re going to do all that kind of stuff. It’s not really fun, but they do pay and there’s money to be made so I know a lot of times you might not want to do a job because it’s not creatively fulfilling. Well, welcome to the real world because I’ve done multiple jobs.

I can’t even tell you how many jobs I’ve done in my career that I did not want to do, but I did it because of the money because it was a good experience. Me I was able to I would be able to build up my clientele build up my client list and make that money to be able to survive and keep fighting for another day.

So sometimes you’re going to have to take those corporate jobs and I’ll give you a perfect example great story, uh, which is the duplass brothers. Um, Mark and uh Market Jay duplass. They their first job out of film School. Uh was build up there. They built their own production company. They got some editing gear and they went out and did a corporate job and that corporate job paid them.

I think like 65 to 70 though. It’s like 80 or 90 thousand dollars, um for this this little documentary on like the making of this company and that’s a lot of money. They actually took a portion of that lived off of it and then took the rest of it it took $65,000 and they made their first feature film.

That money mind you the first feature film was uh was burned because they said it was absolutely horrendous. But that’s irrelevant. The point is that they were able to go out and make their first big movie or the first feature film because of a corporate job, so don’t look so down on those things, you know money is money.

And if you can make it doing even remotely something close to what you want to do as a filmmaker my God take it because it’s better than going to Starbucks and you know and working there or. Or flipping burgers, you know, would you like fries with that? There’s nothing wrong with any of that. But if your goal is to be a filmmaker wouldn’t you rather be doing something in that world than doing something?

That’s not in that world. Another great thing that you could do is music videos. Now music videos are going to be extremely creative. You’re gonna have so much fun doing them. But there’s gonna be very little cash if any cash at all, especially the way the world works today music videos are a great way for you to show off your creativity.

The show off what you can do in a production standpoint, but you’re not going to get a lot of money for it. But you’re going to be able to be free and creative. So music videos are wonderful way of going about that. Another idea is why don’t I’m sure you know, somebody that owns a business or a friend of a friend that owns a business somewhere in town in your town.

Why don’t you offer to make them a commercial for the website a free commercial free don’t charge free do two or three of them and have and then all of a sudden. You have a demo reel of commercials you’ve done locally. Now, you can start charging for what you’re what you were giving away for free originally just so you can prove that you can do it and you will have to do that.

So you’ll have your camera gear you have your editing gear and go out there and do it. So if you’re if you’re able to create one two or three of these commercials, then you can start pitching other companies, like look what I’ve done with these other companies my rate to make your commercials going to be 5 grand if you want.

This package if you want this package with a little bit more bells and whistles. It’s going to be 10 grand and if you want the big big bad boy package, it’s 15 grand and all of a sudden you my friend are a full-blown production company where you’re doing commercials for the web online. Let’s say they’re not the things you want to be doing, but you’re able to make money.

So then you can go off and make the movies you want and have that freedom understand money equals Freedom. So if you could if you’re able to. Take that money by doing what you love to do. Even if it’s not exactly what you want to do. You will be ahead of the game because if you can have that money so you can go off and make your $10,000 feature film, um or short films or a series or whatever you want to do.

That’s the goal. So these are just options on how to get. And another way of making money with a production company is of course weddings and event filming where you can event you can film conferences. You can film uh, obviously doing wedding videos, which I have no experience doing wedding videos.

As one thing. I’ve never done in all of my career. I’ve never done anything with a weddings at all. So it’s a whole other world. There’s plenty of videos and tutorials about wedding videos on YouTube and many many courses. I’m sure online but it’s an option. An option to go into uh to make money and it is money and they do pay well, so again another option to make money as a filmmaker and believe me some of these wedding videos.

It’s not like it was in the olden days. Some of these wedding videos are beautiful like gorgeous documentaries about the Journey of these two people and all this kind of stuff. I’ve seen some stuff. I was blown away by I know wedding videos are being shot on Alexis and reds and have. You know 40 50 thousand dollar budgets, if not more depending on how big it is.

So it’s not like it used to be where it’s just you know, a fifteen-year-old with a camera shooting a wedding video. So it’s definitely something you might want to take a look at again in in getting to where you need to be. It’s another way of making money. Now another way to make money is a filmmaker that I’ve just recently discovered because of a company that I’ll talk about in a minute is stock footage creation.

Now stock footage gets a bad rap, but in today’s world with so much need for video content stock footage is blowing up and you can easily honest as an amazing side hustle. Even if you’re interning somewhere, even if you’re going so if you’re if you’re working 9:00 to 5:00 somewhere you can go off on the weekends and do a side Hustle by shooting stock footage and trust me.

I actually put some stock footage up for a for a little while ago and I make money with it every month. It’s insane. I know guys who are making 60 70 thousand dollars a year. Off their stock footage library and again this like someone who’s been doing it for years and he’s built up like four or five thousand Clips.

Um, but it is doable and it’s a great way to make side money or you can actually turn your business into stock footage Creation with Drone footage and 4K footage and raw footage and all sorts of different routes. You can go down but it is remarkable. It’s a great way to make passive revenue streams.

Which is what I love, I love passive revenue streams. I love waking up in the morning going. Oh something I did a year or two ago. It’s giving me a dollar now, you know, I still sell my short films that I did from 10 years ago, and I’m still making money with him. It’s a wonderful way to create passive revenue streams.

Um, so either borrow a camera or buy a camera and shoot your shoot your stock footage on down tine find unique locations around where you live because there’s so much stock footage out there. Now if you’re gonna shoot the. Think everybody else is shooting. It’s not gonna work. So if I go out and shoot Hollywood Boulevard because I live in Los Angeles.

Guess what L, a–‘s, you know stock footage world. I mean a lot of people have shot Hollywood Boulevard, unless you shoot it in a unique way. You should at time-lapse you shoot it, you know with a fisheye you do something else to make it stand out that’s another way to make money. Now another way is I’m sure if you’ve shot a bunch of stuff you’ve got hard drives full of raw footage of either b-roll of stuff that you didn’t ever use in those.

Whether they be documentary corporate whatever uh or their um scenes or action sequences or something that you have the rights to and you have the permission of the actors to do and you can just use that as stock footage uploaded to the different stock footage houses and start. Getting that money guys now a great service and I know you guys have heard this name a bunch because they are a major sponsor of the podcast is black box now Black Box allows you and this is what I’ve never did stock footage before because I always found it to be so difficult and such a pain in the ass and you got to upload it to like six or seven different companies and have to deal with all that and submit it.

It’s just too much time where black box you’re literally allowed to upload One Clip and they submit it to all the all the major. The stock footage houses for you, they collect the money. They take a little bit of a percentage. But honestly for the amount of uh time that you save is so well worth it.

And on top of that if you want to let’s say you have a friend who’s an actor you go out there and shoot something with that actor. You guys can split it you guys can split it and it’s all done within Black Box. Uh, so like you, okay. Look I’m gonna have you uh, John I’m gonna have you go out there and shoot a bunch of running shots on the beach great.

We’ll split it 50/50. So now every single time a clip is sold John gets uh, a percentage of it gets 50% goes right to his Paypal and 50% goes into your PayPal. You don’t even have to worry about it. It’s amazing. So you just go to Black Box check it out. And I’m not thinking this is not a big advertisement for it.

I just love what these guys are doing. They are really helping filmmakers out a lot to be able to make money. And again that is a passive stream of income. It is wonderful. So definitely check them out. Now another way to make money if you’re not already rolling around in the cash after all these tips, I’ve given you um, no, but another way to actually make money’ become an online content creator now being an online content creator or a YouTuber.

Let’s say is very creative. You have complete and utter freedom to do whatever the hell you want. You have to find an audience and then serve that audience whatever that audience is. So if you are going to be the person who opens up Disney toys, uh, and that’s and those are the videos you make that’s the audience you’re gonna have to go after believe me that is a thing and they’re making lots and lots of money doing it.

Um, but look when it comes to being an online content creator. It’s a long game. If you expect to put videos up on YouTube and just collect that money. You are really badly mistaken. It’s not that easy it takes millions and millions and millions of Youth for you to be actually be able to make. A decent amount or sir, you know something that you can survive on from just YouTube ads now, you can get sponsorships as well.

Uh, once you build up the audience big enough, but that you have the creative freedom to do what you want. That’s what I was able to do with this podcast. I do whatever I want whenever I want with this podcast and I have I have sponsors and have other ways that I monetize, uh these podcasts so I can give this information to you guys for free and not charge you for all the information and all the time and energy that.

Do by putting these things out there for you guys and another way to monetize a videos on YouTube and things like that is patreon where you actually are asking your audience to pay you a small amount of money to have exclusive access to certain content and support you making these videos and I know some guys on YouTube that are making three four five thousand dollars.

Per video and they put out two videos a week a month. Um, so they’re making a lot of money and on top of sponsorships on top of other things. But again, that’s about building that audience and really taking a long time to do and it’s taken me I’m going on three years now guys in the beginning of July indie film house is going to be having its third birthday.

So it’s taking me a long time to build up the audience that I’ve been able to build up but it’s doable, but you have to understand. You we will take time to do and it’s not going to happen overnight. Now, you can also do this on the side at first, you know, start doing little videos every once in a while, um doing them on the weekends and then just make sure that you’re consistent whatever you’re going to do.

Make sure you’re consistent show up every week at that time that you tell your audience. You’re going to oppose something and post it and slowly but surely you’ll be able to build something up. It won’t get rich off this but it will help you build your brand and it will help you show off. Skills in production depending on what kind of videos you’re making.

So if you’re making uh, like the rocketjump guys, these guys were making a short film a week and showing you how they made it every week and they did that for years and they were able to build up a seven or eight million followers Audience by doing that and they were able to do other things with that and I’ll leave in the show notes the um interview I did with the one of the founders.

Um, There’s of of the Rocket Jump boy so you can hear their stories and how they were able to do it, but it is doable and you can do that and finally. Doing free jobs don’t write them off guys. Don’t write off doing just free work because you never know what can happen with it. Depends on the kind of free work.

You’re gonna do I’ll tell you A Perfect story when I move to Los Angeles. I was just starting out as uh here. I mean I had already been directing but I was really doing a lot of posts work at the time, uh, trying to get my, you know, just trying to build up a business. I knew a couple people when I came out to LA, so I didn’t know a lot of people so I was slowly starting to do commercials music videos features.

And then all of a sudden I had someone come in a director come in and offer me like look dude. I don’t have any money to pay you but I haven’t music video with Snoop Dogg in it and I’m like really he’s like, can you do this for me? I need you to call her greatest for me. I’m like. Absolutely, I’ll do it for free and because I did that for free I knew exactly what I was going to get paid what kind of payment I was gonna get from that having Snoop Dogg on my reel automatically added so much cachet.

So much value to my brand as a colorist as a as a post-production house or company and it did exactly that I wrote that music video for years where anytime anybody showed up to my site they go. Oh, wow. He’s worked with this guy and that one music video that I did for free. Spawn 20 or 30 other music videos where I worked with huge Stars, uh in hip-hop and Country and did a ton of different work all because.

I did that one job for free. So be strategic about the kind of jobs you do for free. You might be able to get on a big project with some big stars and you might not be able to get paid everything. But if you could get those stars on your reel if you’re a DP if your production designer something like that all of a sudden that’s a tremendous amount of value and I can’t say to do it all the time.

But when opportunities present themselves, then don’t don’t just go. Oh, I don’t work for free. Think about it and it’s a great see what kind of value you can get out of doing that job for free because many times there’s more value in doing the job for free than getting paid something small to do a job.

That is not going to take your career or your company anywhere else. And that’s it for this episode guys. I hope you learned a little something about how to make money as a filmmaker. These are just a few things that I’ve been able to come up with over the course of my career to make a living as a filmmaker and you know, what we do at any muscle is to help you survive and thrive in the business how to actually make a career of doing this.

You know, one thing I didn’t talk about is about making feature films at a lower budget to sell them at a higher budget. There’s that model their short film models that you can make short films and put them up on. And do other things like that, there’s so many different other avenues. You can go down in today’s world where opportunities that I didn’t have when I was coming up but a lot of the stuff that I talked about here or all the stuff I talked about here has value in one way shape or form depending on where you are on your journey as a filmmaker.

Don’t don’t don’t put your nose up at certain avenues. Like I would never do a corporate video. That’s such a sellout. I hate to tell you man. You’re gonna have to do something like that if you’re going to survive. In this business, sometimes you have to do stuff like that. We all do it. Everyone does it all of us do it?

No matter how big of a filmmaker you were at one point or another you have to do something you didn’t want to do to get get your foot in the door. So keep keep that mind open and always just think of other ways that you can make revenue streams and that is one more piece of advice. I can give you guys.

Revenue streams as many different kinds of revenue streams that you can come have coming into you is is the key is diversity because if you’re not able to make money as an editor, uh in May maybe you can make money as a colorist and then the so that month you get a job as a colorist, but if you didn’t know that skill.

You would not be able to get that job not work and sometimes because you’re doing the color work. They’re like, oh well, we also need a rillette it. Okay. Great. I could do that job too. Oh, we also need to post supervisor. I’ve got credits in that as well. I could do that as well. Oh and we need some help with VFX.

I can do that as well. I’m just using the post production aspect of things. But all of a sudden if you’re doing in the production standpoint, you just come in as a camera guy all of a sudden you’re like, oh I also edit. Oh, I also call the grade RS will do other things find multiple ways that you can make money.

Don’t just. One thing because if that thing that one thing dries up you’re in trouble. Okay, and then you’re going to be really really bad place. That’s what I’ve never done. I’ve always been doing multiple things at different ways. And if you can create multiple passive revenue streams, that’s even better.

If you can figure out other ways to do different things, um and get different revenue streams coming in. That’s the best especially passive revenue streams. And that’s it for this episode guys. If you want to hear you want to Links anything. I talked about in the show. Just head over to indie films for the show notes, and if you haven’t already, please head over to filmmaking podcast and leave me a good review of five-star good review.

You have no idea how much it helps our rankings and iTunes and getting this information out to more and more filmmakers. So thank you guys for listening and as always keep that hustle going keep that dream alive, and I’ll talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to the indie film hustle podcast at indie film hustle. com