McCracken Part 2 "The First Delivery" - The Making Of Micro-Budget Storytelling

So I'm out of rehab and hungry to create more McCracken. Wayne has returned from a trip to Europe and he is also raring to go. We have had over 1000 hits on our original McCracken skit, which was soon to be renamed Part 1. I had the script ready to go - It was about McCracken reporting about his first delivery went on the road… not too well.

So we needed a new cameraman as our original guy, Abe, was in jail on murder charges and didn't look like being released anytime soon. I managed to find one on twitter of all places. He made corporate video's for a living and was keen to do something creative, even if it was for little or no money. His name is Kearon De Klouet @kearondc and he turned out to be the best money ever spent- $200. Not only was he a gun behind the camera, but he could to great sound, colour grading and sound mixing.

I managed to get my make-up artist friend, Natalie, to help with make-up. I had written a screenplay for Natalie at a cheap rate so she was more than happy to provide free make-up. I also had a mate, Phil, who I had helped out with a short film as a production assistant, so he was happy to return the favour.
What this illustrates is the importance of helping out other budding filmmakers in the hope that they will return the favour when it comes time for you to need their help. If they don't… fuck 'em!

On top of this I asked an old acting teacher of Wayne and mine from drama school, Laurence Coy - he was now a successful television director. I sent him the script, which he loved, and he agreed to direct it for $100. This was a massive boost for us.

So now we had camera/sound man, make-up artist and production assistant. As both the actors/producers/directors/writers Wayne and myself. Compared to the first shoot it now felt like the set of a high budget blockbuster… Okay, not quite, more like the back of an old, shitty landscape yard. My girlfriend (who works at the site) had cleared another shoot with her boss. All he required was a case of beer - $40.

So the budget so far:
Camera/Sound - $200
Director            - $100
Location           - $40
Food/drink        - $20

Total Budget    - $360

Now when you hear about preparing yourself for things to go wrong on a set, it's true. We were all on time and ready to go and I was getting make-up done by Natalie when Wayne and Laurence came to discuss the script. As they were talking to me I noticed their expressions changing to a concerned/disturbed look. I soon found out why - this is what they saw:

Haha I looked like mime artist! Wayne hastily dragged me into a back office out of site from natalie so as not to offend her and he rubbed all the make-up off with the sleeve of his shirt. By the time we were ready for the first shot we were already half an hour behind. Natalie is a usually good make-up artist, I just think she had a brain fart that morning.

Besides that the shoot went pretty smoothly, around four hours. On set at 9am and finished by 1pm. My only concern was the DOP and director working together for the first time, but except for a few artistic differences it was all good.

Now we still couldn't afford a proper editor so Wayne was got to work again in post. Kearon, however, said he was happy to do a colour grade for us. A main rule Wayne and myself had set for ourself was that every episode must be a step up in terms of overall quality than the previous one. I highly recommend you take on this rule as it works in lifting your game, constantly learning and improving.

I was now living in a Halfway House and met another fellow in recovery who was an ex-sheep shearer from the bush and now studying music at Tafe. He is extremely talented and had really had that acoustic guitar country music thing down-pat which I thought could suit McCracken perfectly. I showed him what we were doing and what kind of jingle we were after and a few days later he had put together the McCracken theme song. For free!

When making micro budget film or series it is SO IMPORTANT to be aware of the potential resources you have around you. All the time. My jingle creator did this for me for free and I have since returned the favour. Remember, what goes around comes around.

The end result of McCracken Part 2 "The First Delivery" turned out well. With the colour grade, theme song and overall higher production value it was definitely a step up and although we weren't the Coen Brothers just yet, we had stuck to our goal and delivered on it.

https://www.facebook.com/McCrackenTruckstop?ref=hl

McCracken Episode 1 - The Unplanned Shoot

McCracken wasn't initially intended to be a web series, but only a one off skit for Wayne Bradley's online sketch comedy series. I had approached him with the character, McCracken, which he was willing to give it a shot as long as I organized the shoot. I needed a location that resembled a trucking companies office. My girlfriend works for a landscape sales company and she said their old office had been abandoned up the back of their site and I could use it. Perfect. I scoped it out and it was full of dust, falling apart and just basically shit. It would have to do.

Now I had to find my crew. Seeing as though I only had a couple of days until we shot and no money, I called upon a colleague called Abe who owed me a favour from a film course I did. I was happy to do it as long as I fed him. He would take care of sound too. Sweet! I had my crew - Abe.
So we all met up at this crappy office abandoned at the back of a landscape yard and set up inside the office. Wayne (who plays Boss), Abe and myself (who plays McCracken. None of us really knew what we were doing. Wayne decided to direct and set up a basic two shot of us sitting down doing the scene. It was a while since I had done any proper acting so it took me a while to get into it, and Abe talked too much but besides that it went pretty smoothly. There was no power up there so we had to rely on natural light through the windows. We only had one mic so we had to alternate depending who the shot was on. After four hours we were done. I ordered subway sandwiches for lunch which cost around $20 and ended up being our entire budget.

Wayne's normal editor had moved overseas and I couldn't afford a proper one so Wayne was good enough to teach himself final cut pro whilst editing the sketch. What a legend!
He put a rough cut together and after getting some feedback from a real editor he polished it up pretty good - for a first time editor I'd say damn good actually.

Then the complications came. First Wayne's collaborating partner didn't think the production value was high enough to be part of their sketch comedy series. Of course, myself having created this character, took it personally thinking it was "me" that was shit and not the "production value". Subsequently I went on a bender. I had completely returned to my own pattern of behaviour and had to go to rehab. On top of that I found out Abe was in jail detained over an alleged murder charge… next time I will research my crew a little more thoroughly.

So here I was - in rehab, my sketch and character having failed, and I still had to break the news to Wayne that our cinematography was a potential murderer. Thankfully Wayne took that news quite well. He also lifted my spirits back up expressing that he liked and believed in McCracken. He said he wanted to post it on his own Youtube channel and possibly make a little series out of them.  

While this both excited and frightened me at the same time, I set about writing several more episodes whilst in rehab.

Episode 1 still remains one of my favorites, purely because of the rawness of it and the fact it kick started the whole journey. It currently sits at about 30,000 hits on YouTube since September... Not bad for a cast and crew of three and budget of twenty bucks! You can view Episode 1 here:

McCracken: Truck Stop - Part 1 "The Job Interview"

 The only photo of the original McCracken played by Tim Roberts from Episode 1

 The abandoned office up the back of the landscape yard

The Journey of McCracken - Low to No Budget Film Production

So I finally know what I am going to blog about - the evolution of my web series McCracken:
McCracken: Truck Stop - Part 1 "The Job Interview"
from a no-budget sketch comedy clip to a developing fully funding series. I hope to inform aspiring content creators, filmmakers and storytellers on how they can get out there and do it too.
My next blog will start with how we shot Episode 1 with a budget of $20