11 Short Film Rules

Summary

In this insightful and engaging transcript, film creator Jesse Senko shares his personal journey and the rules he follows to make compelling short films. He emphasizes the importance of moving past fear, avoiding clichés, and making thoughtful decisions in filmmaking. Senko encourages creators to plan meticulously, respect roles on set, and leverage unique resources for production value. His advice extends to not cutting corners on important aspects like hair and makeup, selecting the right actors, and ensuring good audio quality. Ultimately, his message is about finishing projects, telling original stories, and embracing the creative freedom that comes with making short films.

Highlights

• Starting a short film involves overcoming the initial fear of failure. 🎬
• Planning meticulously is your greatest luxury when you lack big budgets. 📋
• Casting should prioritize talent over convenience to avoid 'bearded bro' clichés. 👥
• Leverage locations and elements you have access to that others might not. 📍
• Professionalism on set extends to respecting each crew member’s role. 👔
• Do not skimp on critical elements like makeup, acting talent, and audio quality. 🔊
• Finishing a project, even with imperfections, trumps leaving it incomplete. 🏁
• Original storytelling with personal meaning outshines derivative high-budget stories. 📖

Key Takeaways

• Fear can hold you back but moving past it is vital to create something meaningful. 🌟
• Planning is key; treat even small projects with professionalism. 🗂️
• Avoiding clichés and casting based on capability rather than convenience enhances the quality of work. 🎬
• Using unique locations and props can add free production value to a short film. 🎥
• Completing projects is more important than achieving perfection. Done is better than perfect. ✔️
• An original story that’s meaningful to you resonates more than a high-budget imitation. 📝
• Embrace the freedom of creating short films without external constraints. 🚀
• Respect each role on set, even if you're working with friends. It empowers everyone involved. 🤝

Overview

Jesse Senko dives into the filmmaking process with a fresh perspective, tackling the common fears and mental blocks that creatives face. He shares his own struggles with procrastination and fear of judgment but emphasizes the fun and satisfaction of creating something for oneself. Senko believes in the power of storytelling and the importance of paying attention to the details that sum up to make a meaningful film.

The heart of making a great short film, according to Senko, lies in thoughtful planning and making choices that prioritize quality. Avoiding 'inside joke' projects with friends and instead opting for skilled collaborators can elevate a film’s professionalism. His emphasis on using unique resources and ensuring a well-organized, professional set makes a significant difference, even on a low budget.

Senko advocates for embracing originality and the freedom of creative expression that comes with making short films. He stresses the importance of completing projects and learning from each experience, underscoring that done is better than perfect. With unique themes, a solid director’s treatment, and respect for each role on set, filmmakers can create exceptional work that stands out.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 02:00: Introduction and Overcoming Fear This chapter revolves around the theme of overcoming fear and procrastination. The narrator expresses a strong desire to shoot a short film, emphasizing the habit of delaying projects for a seemingly better time. They feel somewhat depleted and need to pursue personal fun and fulfillment, mainly through creating something for themselves on set. This highlights the importance of self-driven projects in rejuvenating energy and enthusiasm.
• 02:00 - 04:00: The Role of the Director The chapter 'The Role of the Director' explores the fears and challenges faced by a director when embarking on creating a short film. It delves into the internal conflict of safety versus creativity and the human tendency to avoid change. The narrator reflects on their concerns about producing a low-quality film and questions how to make a project successful despite these innate fears.
• 04:00 - 07:00: Avoiding the Bearded Bro Trap In this chapter titled 'Avoiding the Bearded Bro Trap,' the author discusses the personal rules and guidelines they follow to ensure the production of high-quality short films. These principles help in making the films appear legitimate and professionally made, while also emphasizing that these rules are personal and others can choose what to adopt from them, as rules can be flexible.
• 07:00 - 10:00: Planning and Professionalism in Filmmaking The chapter discusses the importance of honesty and self-awareness in filmmaking. It highlights the human tendency towards confirmation bias and emphasizes that it's crucial for filmmakers to critically assess their decisions to ensure they aren't self-sabotaging. Additionally, it underscores the potential within oneself and their team that can be unlocked through honest evaluation.
• 10:00 - 14:00: Utilizing Available Resources The chapter titled "Utilizing Available Resources" delves into the often overlooked aspects of effective resource management in creative projects, particularly in filmmaking. It highlights that success is not about one singular trick or piece of equipment but rather about the cumulative impact of various small details. The chapter explains the misunderstood role of a director in this process. While most people can easily grasp the visible roles like cinematographers, who handle cameras and lighting, the director's job is less tangible as it involves overarching creative decision-making that shapes the final product. Therefore, utilizing resources effectively goes beyond mere technical skills, involving a keen creative vision that encompasses all project elements.
• 14:00 - 17:00: Do Not Cut Corners on Key Aspects The chapter emphasizes the role of the director in filmmaking, portraying them as the pivotal decision-maker. It argues that while tools like lenses, cameras, and editing techniques are important, they alone don't make a film. Instead, a cohesive story combined with wise decisions is essential to creating a successful film.
• 17:00 - 19:00: Finishing Your Short Film In the chapter titled 'Finishing Your Short Film', the discussion centers around the concept of 'the bearded bro'—an archetype commonly observed in short films and YouTube test footage. The 'bearded bro' thinks he's funny and profound, often casting his friends in films with convoluted plots like 'a dream within a dream.' The text humorously notes this stereotype and suggests making a conscious effort to avoid these clichés to enhance the watchability of short films.
• 19:00 - 21:00: Tell an Original Story The chapter discusses the importance of thoughtful story and character creation in filmmaking, using the metaphor of a 'bearded bro' to illustrate the tendency to cast roles out of convenience rather than choosing actors who truly fit the part. It encourages creators to introspect and evaluate their own storytelling choices, questioning whether they are opting for easily accessible options over more suitable and effective ones. The importance of originality and deliberate casting is emphasized, urging filmmakers to look beyond their immediate circle and typical archetypes when developing characters and stories.
• 21:00 - 21:30: Conclusion and Call to Action The conclusion chapter encourages readers not to make casting decisions out of fear, highlighting the importance of collaboration and making choices based on talent and suitability for the role rather than convenience or comfort with friends. It references successful collaborations in film as exemplars of this approach, such as Wes Anderson and the Wilson brothers, and the team behind 'Good Will Hunting' and 'The Lonely Island.' It urges to prioritize the best fit for a role in a project even if it means stepping out of one's comfort zone.

11 Short Film Rules Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 [Music] Guess what? It's time to shoot a short film. Got to get something done for myself. You always put off things until you think there's going to be a better time. I just got to get over these projects. I just got to get all this stuff out of the way. There's a part of me that feels a little bit depleted and I got to fill it up. And there is nothing more fun to me than being on set shooting something purely for myself.
• 00:30 - 01:00 Well, whenever I start to think about doing a short film, a little bit of fear creeps up. That little thing inside of you that tries to convince you to do nothing, cuz nothing is safer, right? That's what humans are programmed to be. They're programmed to stay the same. I start to think about bad, cheap short films and I start to wonder, is my short film going to look like these? How do I make my short film not look like garbage? To be honest, I don't even know
• 01:00 - 01:30 the answer to that. So, whenever I'm starting a short film, I start to think through some of the details and the points that help me make sure that I'm going to create something that has some quality to it. What are the rules? What are the red flags that help me make sure that my short films look legit, that they feel real to me, they don't feel amateur, but also keep in mind that these rules are just for me. You can take what you want from them. Rules are meant to
• 01:30 - 02:00 be broken. But also, people love confirmation bias. They like thinking that what they're doing already is right, and anyone who says something different is wrong. So, make sure you're really honest with yourself to know that the decisions you're making are not sabotaging yourself. They're not sabotaging the potential you have inside of you, the potential that your team has and is ready to share with you if you let them. Let's get going. Film making is not one big
• 02:00 - 02:30 choice. It is the sum of all the details. On YouTube, people like to preach about one editing hack or this lens changes everything, but it really comes down to the sum of the details. People don't really understand what a director is. They can understand a cinematographer, someone who holds a camera or moves a light or something like that. But a director steps back and they are the creative vision. They're the ones who make the decisions that shape the project as a whole. A
• 02:30 - 03:00 director oftentimes on set doesn't physically do much. They are literally a dedicated decision maker. The film is the sum of their decisions. Yes, a lens and a camera or a editing gimmick that can all be a part of it, but those singular things don't create a film. story linked with a bunch of really great choices are what makes something
• 03:00 - 03:30 watchable. If you're a bearded bro, don't take this the wrong way. I'm a bearded bro. But my bearded bro rule exists because I'm a bearded bro and there are a lot of bearded bros around me. And it's something I've noticed by watching a lot of short films, a lot of YouTube test footage and created a little bit of a mental note to consciously avoid. The bearded bro thinks he's hilarious. He thinks he's super deep. He casts his bearded bro buddies in his short film about a dream within a dream uh and thinks it's
• 03:30 - 04:00 amazing. I've done the dream within a dream short film. This is me who I'm talking about. I'm not literally saying that you need to avoid bearded bros in your film. The bearded bro is an archetype. I'm asking you to think about who is the bearded bro in your work. Who are you casting out of convenience instead of capability? Are you making a short film with your friends where you're casting a 23-year-old broccoli headed kid to play a Manhattan lawyer?
• 04:00 - 04:30 Sure, cliché are meant to be broken, but don't make a choice because you're scared to ask someone else to be in your short film. And I'm sure your bros, your gals, your buds, they're the exception. Bros gave us Wes Anderson and the Wilson brothers. Goodwill Hunting, it gave us the Lonely Island. There definitely are exceptions. If your bearded bro is the best choice for the script you've written, then by all means go for it.
• 04:30 - 05:00 But I find the work that people make with their bros versus collaborators, they tend to be subjective. They tend to be full of inside jokes sort of like a skit played at a school graduation that as soon as you take it outside of that context, no one has any clue what's going on. At some point, you'll want to elevate what you're creating in casting is a really great way to start. Make sure you build around capability rather than convenience. Totally make short films with your bros, your gals,
• 05:00 - 05:30 whoever. Have fun. Find your voice. But when you start to get serious about what you're creating, make sure that your choices get serious alongside you. So, how do I avoid the bearded bro trap? Well, the short film I'm planning right now stars some young women. The short film I have planned after that stars some seniors. Once you start getting outside people involved, it forces you to start to take things way more seriously. If you have sort of a stranger showing up on set, you're going
• 05:30 - 06:00 to be a lot more professional. You're going to make sure that they're taken care of. And they're also going to need information before your shoot. They don't want to just show up. They want to know what they're doing. They want to rehearse their lines. When this forces you to plan all of that stuff out and start to become a professional, you come up with an idea and before you can even finish writing it down, you're picking up a camera, you're texting your buddy saying, "Let's go. Let's shoot." For some reason,
• 06:00 - 06:30 humans don't like planning. It's boring. Being on set is about execution. It's not about figuring anything out. And if you're shooting a short film with little or no budget, the one luxury you do have is time to plan it out so that when you get to set with no budget and just a couple friends, you know exactly what needs to happen to make it a success. Don't just scribble down the idea and pick up a camera. Follow the proper film
• 06:30 - 07:00 process. The same process on huge big budget films. Not only will it make even the smallest project less stressful. It'll start setting the stage so that when you get onto a bigger project, you already have a process. Nothing's worse than starting to work with a new person and to figure out they have absolutely no process. They're not a professional person. That's really stressful because then you force what really is your job onto the people around you and they'll
• 07:00 - 07:30 maybe start to resent you for it. One of the things I recommend is looking into what is called a director's treatment. And I'm talking about treatments from a commercial director perspective. That's what I came up through. So, I understand that director's treatments for films are usually less visually heavy, but I recommend sort of following what a commercial director would go through because we need to lay out all all of the details, all of the references, the look and feel, the talent, the wardrobe. Everything is visually presented. It's
• 07:30 - 08:00 your vision. and put down on paper or digital or PowerPoint. I use Google Slides. What this does, even on the world's smallest project, is it forces you to figure out your script and then build pages for each department, even if you are all of those departments. I'm doing that right now for my short film. I've got pages for wardrobe, for casting, all of those things. So, when I ask someone to get involved, they look at it and they can see the whole picture. They see what they're getting into. And it really makes people excited
• 08:00 - 08:30 to say yes. Even if they're working for free, even if it's your friends, it shows that you are buttoned up, that you've thought through all the details and that the shoot day is not going to be a gong show. It's going to be a lot of fun. That treatment is going to start to tell you where you need to start putting your attention, where you need to ask for favors, where you need to bring people in. I've heard stories about people who get really highprofile actors in their short film. You know what would make that really easy for someone to say yes to is putting together a director's treatment that has
• 08:30 - 09:00 the script and the visual look and feel so that an actor who's maybe going to work for free or like an incredibly low rate they might say yes. A lot of people are willing to really put themselves out there if the creative opportunity is legit. So build that through your treatment and you'll be amazed at who gets excited to get involved in your project. I don't know if you've ever been on a like high school or college film set, you know that it is a total gong show.
• 09:00 - 09:30 And once you get into the professional world, you very quickly realize there are departments and roles defined for a reason. I remember when I was just starting as a commercial director being nervous on set because I've heard about how protective people are about their roles on a film set. But as I've worked on film sets more and more, I understand that that is for a reason. You don't mow your neighbor's grass. They're there for a reason. All of these departments exist
• 09:30 - 10:00 for a reason. Even your short film, if it's you and two friends, needs every department represented. Even if you're doing six of those departments jobs and your friend is doing four, every department needs to be represented and roles need to be signed. If your best bud, Cindy, if she's helping you out on your short film, give her a role. Maybe you've already collected the props for your shoot, but on the shoot day, you
• 10:00 - 10:30 can't do everything, so you bring Cindy along and you tell her, "You're my onset dresser." Look at roles for films and give them to your crew. That way, Cindy is empowered. She knows that she's got to dress the set with props. And if something needs to be moved, don't ask the cinematographer. Don't even move it yourself. Ask her. Respecting those roles is a way to make sure that the people you've brought on set feel empowered, feel like they have a job to do, and they can feel ownership over the final image. When I'm starting a short
• 10:30 - 11:00 film, one of the things I often think about and I keep a list of is what do I have access to that no one else does? There's a bit of a cliche with a first-time filmmaker that they write a script and it turns out to be a hundred million sci-fi epic. Don't make a short film about something that you have no chance of pulling off. Wes Anderson's first film was not a big production where they built a whole small town in the desert. It was a 16 mm short film he made with friends. But that was the
• 11:00 - 11:30 beginning of a career that ended up with him building a whole town in the desert. It didn't start there. And if Wes Anderson wanted to start his career by building a small town in the desert, he wouldn't have had the resources to pull it off and it probably would have hindered his film making career and probably bankrupted him. Even if you have a ton of experience as a filmmaker, it can still bankrupt you. Jacqu Tati, he directed a ton of films and starred as the main character. Maser Hulo who was sort of a slapstick bridge between
• 11:30 - 12:00 the silent era stars and inspector cluso from the pink panther. But a very famous story about Jacqu Tati is for his film Playtime he ended up building a version of Paris literally bankrupted himself and never really recovered from it. So my rule that I asked to myself is what big piece of production value can I add to my short film at little or no cost? My first short film was a camera test with the original Blackmagic camera. We
• 12:00 - 12:30 shot it in the hallway of a 1930s house. It looked timeless. It didn't look like a modern suburban Home Depot house. It made this little scene that I was shooting feel legit. Free production value. Well, not free. Owning a house is not free. In another short piece, I wanted a black unicorn on a beach. I live in a rural area, so it was surprisingly easy to find a black horse and a secluded beach on Lake Erie that
• 12:30 - 13:00 we snuck onto and filmed sort of a spoof fragrance commercial. I had access to a bookstore, so I shot a short film there. It looked great. Free production value. Another short film we shot in a friend's cottage in the offse. like a good producer. I took a full photo survey of the room so that at the end of the day, we could move everything right back and it looked like no one had ever been there. My upcoming short takes place in a church and there's lots of churches in
• 13:00 - 13:30 my area. So, a cheap rental fee and we've got a beautiful location can make a period piece for next to no money. That big thing that can elevate your short film, it doesn't have to be a location. It can be a prop. Maybe you have a friend who's really great with models or you know someone who could build something really interesting, really cheap for you. What are the resources that you have access to with little to no money that can really elevate your piece and make people go, "Wow." It's not about thinking you're awesome for writing a big sci-fi epic
• 13:30 - 14:00 that needs you to build a whole spaceship interior without ever having picked up a saw in your life. It's about being realistic with what you can pull off at a really high level without a lot of resources. Spend your time there. I can generally do short films pretty affordably because I'm fairly technically proficient. I can shoot. I can light. But there are aspects of production that I'm not great at. Here are some corners that I don't like to
• 14:00 - 14:30 cut. The first one is the hair and makeup department. Someone who doesn't look good on camera can sabotage your whole production. If you're staring at a cold sore because you didn't bring a hair and makeup artist. This comes from experience. That's all the people watching your video are going to look at. They're going to be grossed out by this dude you had to interview that has a cold sore. I do a lot of commercial work, corporate videos, and my baseline for production is to never shoot a face without a hair and makeup artist. And
• 14:30 - 15:00 I'm not talking about like a local bridal hair makeup artist. Making someone look great in real life is very much different than on camera. I'm a makeup artist, Sam, that I work with a lot. And the very first thing I actually worked with her on was a short film. And it was remarkable how she made our actor look a little bit ragged, but she did it in a really incredible way that looked great on camera. A no makeup look is very different than having someone who's actually wearing no makeup. The next thing I don't cut corners on is actors.
• 15:00 - 15:30 I love actors. I love working with people. So, I don't just ask people if they want to be in stuff. I really think about who is right for it. And even if it is a local person who's a non- actor, I will actually have them audition because it shows me how much they're willing to dive in and take what we're doing seriously. And the last thing not to skimp on, and I'm sure there's a lot more. Let me know what I missed here. What are your sort of valuable things that you would never skimp on? But the next one is audio. Whether it's having good location audio to capture dialogue
• 15:30 - 16:00 on the day or just a professional to do a good audio mix at the end. If you're watching your piece and you're you're happy with it but it's not quite right yet, usually color audio mix. Those are some of the details that really make it click. The other thing I'm careful to do with people who I'm even asking to work for free, I'll always give them deadlines. If you don't, then things will never get done and then you're
• 16:00 - 16:30 going to start nagging people and then they're going to become resentful and they're going to wish they never got involved. If you get a colorist involved, promise them a locked cut by a certain date and then ask for them to return a colored final by a certain day. Ironically, a deadline for a free project takes a lot of pressure off because people know they're going to be free of it a lot earlier. It protects you as a filmmaker of, you know, letting something go too long and throwing off your whole
• 16:30 - 17:00 post-prouction. Over the years, as I've been around, I come up with a lot of ideas and had a lot of intentions. One thing I consciously do is I talk less about things that I want to make. I only talk about them when I have a date in the calendar because then you're going to become that guy who comes up with lots of ideas, who has lots of dreams, who wants to start a lot of things, and then they go nowhere. people when they hear about them or when you're asking for them to get involved, they're wondering, "Is this going to happen?" Be
• 17:00 - 17:30 professional. Imagine your short film is under an NDA. Which leads into the next point. Finish your short film. This comes from personal pain. I've never not finished a short film, but I've let them drag out a long time, and it feels terrible. I'm sure I'm not alone with shooting something and then going home and looking through the footage and thinking, "This is garbage." I'm learning to remind myself that of course it's garbage. It's raw footage. It's not
• 17:30 - 18:00 anything. Editing is where you really find your story. And I feel like it's a place where a lot of people freeze. Just before the pandemic, I shot a short film and this happened to me. I looked at the footage and I just wasn't happy. And I sat on it for months and it wasn't until the pandemic forced everything to slow down that I opened that project back up again and I finished it and it was great and it's a piece I'm happy with. It's not perfect, but I tried a lot of stuff
• 18:00 - 18:30 in it. I tried VFX for the first time. In the end, it has a shot that I look at and I think of like this is the most like cinema shot that feels the most legit. It's just the simple shot of our actor through some bookshelves. That doesn't really matter. What matters is that I finally finished it. I asked for hair and makeup on it. I asked for a favor from the actor on this. And I'm never going to sit on something that I've asked for favors again. Done is way better than great. Definitely better
• 18:30 - 19:00 than not done. Not done is the worst. I'd put money on the idea that most people whose work you think is perfect, all they see are the holes and the failures and the missed opportunities in it. So, get the work done, get it shipped, and move on to the next thing. And lastly, in conclusion, tell a story. I joked about the dream within a dream cliche. I did it. I did a dream within a dream short film. Christopher Nolan did it really well. Inception is great. That
• 19:00 - 19:30 story though is done. You got to move on. So you need to write something that is meaningful to you. Whether it's depressing or optimistic or goofy or stupid or a horror or whatever it is, if you are building something that is derivative of movies that have $200 million budgets of Marvel or Star Wars or something like that, you're never going to be able to pull your thing off to that level of finish. You already are
• 19:30 - 20:00 starting from a place of comparison with something that looks so slick, that looks so finished, that is going to look like a cheap knockoff. Write something original. Write something that has a theme. The story for my short film stars two young women, something I don't know much about, but its theme is all about God and religion. Something I know maybe a little too much about. And because creating a short film is relatively low risk, low budget, low expectations, you
• 20:00 - 20:30 have something that big Hollywood filmmakers are jealous of. You have freedom. You don't have people looking over your shoulder telling you what you can and can't do. So make those people jealous and do something incredible. Do something weird. Do something original. People will be there in your future to try to soften you and censor you at the beginning. You don't have to do that. Artists aren't conservative. It's the system that they end up in that is
• 20:30 - 21:00 conservative. Your good old days are right now and then finish it and then move on to the next one. I do want to make a quick plug for myself. What I've been thinking about is figuring out a way to connect with my viewers, with you in an algorithm free way that's separate of this YouTube platform. And the best way I could think of to do that was to start a newsletter. I would love for you to sign up. It's in the description, maybe in the first comment or something.
• 21:00 - 21:30 It's down below. I promise not to spam you. It's a way that I can let you know what I'm up to and let you know when a new video is up, probably intermittently. Maybe there's a piece of equipment I'm struggling with and you can provide an answer. I'll probably ask on the newsletter. Sign up below. You can unsubscribe anytime. Let's figure it out together. Thank you for watching. [Music]