You’re NOT a FILMMAKER If…

YO Darious Britt here.

You guys know me by now. I’m all about getting you to go out and make films: no matter the circumstance.

I’ve had a few discussions recently with some peeps. and this topic cropped up:

How to know if you’re a “real” filmmaker.

My initial thought was that old adage you hear in film school right: “If you wanna be a filmmaker, go out and pick up a camera, record something. congratulations you’re a filmmaker”

I agree with this. All the way.

The second you decide to do the thing, you can call yourself the thing. It’s very inspiring. But there’s more to it than that. You have to keep doing the thing.

If you made a short film 10 years ago, quite filmmaking all together and you’ve been pulling teeth for the last 7 year. You’re not a filmmaker anymore, you’re a dentist right?

Let’s kick it off with a quote:

“You are what you do everyday” – Jon Chu

I think this definition of an occupation is more accurate. You are what you do everyday. Or most days anyways.

So you are a filmmaker if you make films most days of the year.

Notice I didn’t say anything about money.

If you aren’t paid to make films, you’re still a filmmaker. You’re just not at the professional level yet. You still with me?

So here’s the good news. If you wanna be a filmmaker, you just have to do the thing. It doesn’t matter if you’re budget is 25 cents. Doesn’t matter if you arent getting paid for it. If you spend your time making films most days, or working on making them in some capacity. You’re a filmmaker. Period.

Now let’s talk about the things that stop you from being a filmmaker.

WAITING FOR MONEY

Waiting for money is not an excuse to not make films. Let me explain.
I have a friend. Went to film school together. He had this passion project. a feature film. said he couldn’t do it for less than $500,000 wanted to do it the “right way”- none of this low budget stuff cuz that’s not how real films are made.

He had to have the casting director, 1-ton grip truck, big crew, the whole bit yada yada yada yada. This thing was supposed to break him into the industry.

He tried raising money for this film for FOUR years. He almost got financing twice. Both times it fell through.

It’s been seven years now. Last I checked, He’s not even into filmmaking anymore. He gave up moved onto something else.

That really sucks for him. I don’t wish that on anyone but there’s a teachable moment here:

While he was trying to raise money, he wasn’t making any new films. No shorts. No microfilms. No nothing.
Because he refused to do lower budget films, he wasn’t getting any better. how else are you supposed to practice your craft?
Chasing money, stopped him from being a filmmaker. If all you do is spend your time chasing money every day or most days, then are you a filmmaker or a fundraiser???

Money is just 1 of many tools used to make a film, it’s a powerful tool but at the end of the day, it’s just a tool, just like a camera, or a shotgun mic, or a call sheet, or a shot list.

You don’t have to have money to make films.

The goal shouldn’t be to find money, to make a good film, the goal should be to develop your skills and your craft so well that you don’t need a lot of money to make a good film.

If you can do that, you will attract money, you won’t have to chase it so hard. There are some dope films that have been made for practically pennies on the dollar.

Just to name a few.

All those peeps made their first films for next to nothing. Relatively speaking. That’s how they started their careers. They didn’t allow lack of money to stop them.

I’m not saying you can’t have a $500,000 passion project, but you gotta temper your passion with practicality.

If you can’t make a captivating short film or a feature on a budget, having 500,000 dollars or 20 million dollars isn’t going to fix the problem.
Money isn’t pixie dust. You can’t just sprinkle money on a project to make it compelling.

If you can’t raise the money for your 500k passion project, tuck that sucker away in your back pocket for now and make another project that you can do for $500 or $1,000 dollars, whatever you can afford, and knock it out of the park.

Don’t let fundraising stop you from being a filmmaker.

WAITING FOR THE RIGHT GEAR

If you’ve got a closet full of gear and you haven’t made a film in the last two years, because you’re waiting on more gear, you’re allowing gear to stop you from being a filmmaker.

Bruh-bruh gear acquisition syndrome is a legit thing. I’m not even joking.

I’ve consulted with people that have 10x more gear than me, and they haven’t done anything with it. It’s just collecting dust. They don’t know how to use half of it.

It’s taken me years to get the gear that I have. But I’ve made films along the way.

I’ve made shorts films in the past with just a camera, a tripod, and a hot shoe mic. Didn’t even use lights.

For all, you peeps affected by gear acquisition syndrome my heart goes out to you, but here’s the deal bruh-bruh you’re not allowed to buy another piece of gear until you go out and make something.

If I find out you bought yourself another gimbal for Valentine’s Day and you still haven’t shot anything. I’m gonna have to reach through the screen and slap you, and I mean that in the most loving way humanly possible.

Don’t let gear acquisition syndrome stop you from being a filmmaker.

WAITING FOR A CREW

Having a crew is nice. There are some projects that you absolutely must have crew for. But you can still make films without a crew.

If you’re just starting out. There are plenty of workarounds. but you have to simplify your projects. minimal locations, minimal actors, no scenes requiring extras, shoot outdoors at magic hour, easy lighting.
If you have an idea that you absolutely must have crew for, put it in your back pocket for now, and write another project. Something smaller in scope that you can knock out solo. Keep it simple.
Write a story with no dialogue if you have to. just use a ton of voice over. pull a Terrence Malick
I’ve made films with a crew of 12, I’ve made films completely solo. Plenty of videos on this channel, showing you how to do both.

I also did a video on how to find a crew. Don’t let lack of crew stop you from being a filmmaker. Next excuse:

NO ACTORS

I did a whole video on what to do if you can’t find actors. Check that video out here.

If you don’t have access to professionals, then use hobbyists or people who are interested in acting but maybe haven’t had the chance to flex that muscle. If you don’t have any of those, use friends, if you don’t have friends use family.

If you can’t use friends and family then do a Letters to July type thing where you film yourself and things around you, build a story out of that. or a video diary.

Film yourself self. We’ve done that on this channel.

Actors are great, but if you don’t have them, don’t let this stop you from being a filmmaker.

THE BIGGER PICTURE

Here’s the deal, Bruh-bruh:

If you wanna make amazing work, you have to develop your craft. There is so much to learn it’ll make your head spin.

I’ve been doing this for years and I still learn new things every day.

There is no such thing as standing still. You’re either moving forward or you’re moving backwards. If you’re always creating, you’re always learning and improving, you move forward. If you’re not making films, you get rusty, you forget things, you move backwards.

We can’t afford to waste time waiting around for money, or actors, or crew. Those things will come if you keep working at it, but you don’t need those things to develop your craftsmanship. Don’t let those things stop you from being a filmmaker.

Until next time –DBritt out!

These filmmakers INFLUENCED me…

Someone had asked me in a comment to chat about my favorite directors. I’ve never spoken on this in the past because I’m kinda weird when it comes to doing the whole “your favorite filmmaker” thing.

This is a tough question because I don’t really have a favorite director. I appreciate so many different directors for different reasons. It’s really tough to narrow it all down to one person.

Also, I go through phases where I study different directors for different reasons.
It makes more sense to talk about what directors I studied by phase.

Starting with when I first started filmmaking.

As a NEWBIE

When I started learning about film. I loved the usual George Lucas – for the star wars franchise. Spielberg for obvious reasons, dudes body of work is legendary, David Lynch, for his bizarre visions. Stanley Kubrick, the godfather of film.

I admire their work but I don’t identify with these guys.
By identify, I mean I couldn’t see myself or my values as a filmmaker reflected in them.

I loved their movies but I could never see myself making them. As a newbie, I identified with filmmakers like:

Mike Nichols

Mike was known for being an actor’s director. He could pull really great performances out on any actor regardless of their experience level. he’s the guy who did the graduate, classic. He had a background in theater and improv. I’ve always been interested in getting great performances. he was someone I could learn from Closer was my jam. Love that movie.

Ingmar Bergman

Ingmar Bergman manages to capture so much texture and emotion in his movies. All of his films feel very personal and distinct.
Cries and Whispers is my fav. It’s very dark, very powerful and personal.

The Seventh Seal is studied in film schools everywhere.

He was famous for his use of close-ups, depicting the struggle with morality, loneliness, and existential questions. Some of his films are almost like philosophical debates.

He had this super long uninterrupted closeup in Winter Light. I don’t remember how long it was exactly but it felt like a good 10 minutes and it still worked. He made some bold choices.

Spike Lee

I got into spike for obvious reasons. Not too many us doing it on that level at the time. For me, he represented what’s possible being a fellow African American.

There are more now but when I started, eh not so much.

Malcolm X, Inside Man, Bamboozled, were all my jams. So many classics, too many to name.

Color and race relations aside Spike has a very distinct voice. Hate it or love it, you know when you’re watching a Spike Lee film. I love that about his work.

Chan-wook Park

I love me some Chan-wook Park. For those who aren’t familiar he’s a Korean director. His earlier movies we’re just bat shit crazy.

He’s one of those directors whose work I admire, but I would never make the type of films he makes.

I really love the way he moves his camera, the angels, the shots, the production design. The attention to detail.

Lady Vengeance, Oldboy, Thirst. All very wild yet beautiful films.

MAKING A FEATURE PHASE

I need to preface this. Making a feature film is incredibly stressful and terrifying.

If you haven’t seen the documentary I made on how I shot UNSOUND my first movie: Making UNSOUND, you should check it out.

You’re about to spend loads of money you don’t have, in most cases and time. I found it more beneficial to study directors who pulled off other low budget features.

Jurassic Park is cool and all but studying movies like that aren’t going to help me make a no-budget feature film.

Vin Diesel

I studied Strays, Vin Diesel’s first feature film. I talked about STRAYS before on this channel. Vin Diesel wrote, produced, and directed and starred in his first feature film and shot it for 40 grand.

I probably watched that film 10 times. I broke down the shots: just the texture, the blocking.

Again these are all things that I could do for my budget. That film was a huge inspiration.

Last I checked, both the film and the behind the scenes featurette are on youtube.

Shane Carruth

I studied Primer Shane Carruth’s first feature. This was made for $7,000 grand. A sci-fi film for $7,000. That’s practically pennies people. It’s unique, it’s textured, well-directed. It did well at the festivals, launched his career. The behind the scenes featurette is loaded with goodies.

Bellflower

Evan Glodell’s Bellflower was also a huge inspiration. Very edgy, very stylistic film. They even built their own camera specifically for the film. You wouldn’t believe that film only cost like 15k. amazing accomplishment

I saw this film 6 months before I started shooting UNSOUND. I got to meet the cast and crew in person. Again. another film that’s showing me what’s possible on a small budget. (green room)

p.s. I don’t advise anyone to go out and rack up $30 grand worth of dept to shoot a film. it’s incredibly irresponsible, but also if you wanna make it happen, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.

Robert Rodriguez

El Mariachi was a big one. Also made for 7 grand. Watched that a few times. Read the book Rebel Without a Crew*

*Affiliate link

POST FEATURE PHASE

After shooting UNSOUND. I looked at filmmaking through a whole different lens. I learned so much about myself as a filmmaker, storytelling. There are a lot of things I’m happy with but it’s not perfect. One of my biggest regrets is the lack of atmosphere.

I was so focused on telling a great story and I think we did that well but I never felt like we reached that visceral level of filmmaking. when a film has that almost hypnotic quality.

Part of it was I could only do so much with my budget, but that’s also something I need to work on. I found myself studying more lyrical directors like:

Nicolas Winding Refn

Drive is a prime example of a film that has a visceral quality, part of it’s the music, part of it’s the pacing. a number of things give it that quality.

Kar-Wai Wong

I studied Kar-Wai Wong‘s films. He’s another lyrical director. His films aren’t so much about what happens, but how it makes you feel. most of his films are meditations of love, but again, he has a visceral quality to his work.

Kar-Wai Wong has a unique fluid production process, He basically has a bare-bones idea of the story, shoots and allows his actors to improvise on the day. He shoots his films almost like a documentary and when he feels he’s shot enough then he cuts the film.

Barry Jenkins

Love me some Barry Jenkins. Moonlight has that hypnotic visceral quality in my opinion. I was just blown away by that film. I knew about Barry before Moonlight, back when he did Medicine for Melancholy.

And funny enough. After making a low budget feature I’ve become an even bigger fan of the Mumblecore genre.

In a nutshell, the Mumblecore movement was basically a bunch of filmmakers in the early 2000’s made these crazy no budget dialogue-heavy movies at around the same time and it became a thing. Most of these movies, use a lot of improv, some are scripted, and there’s usually not much of a plot. Some directors associated with this genre are:

Mark and Jay Duplass
Aaron Kats
Andrew Bujalski
Lynn Shelton
Gretta Gerwig
Joe Swanberg
Barry Jenkins

The two biggest things that draw me to the genre are.:

Great performances from actors with little to no experience
Producing films for little to no money. I really like working with actors and I love making films but I hate how expensive the process can be.

After going $30 grand in personal debt and spending 7 years on one movie. I got burned out on the classical filmmaking model. The get a crew and find money thing. It’s a huge undertaking because you wind up having to wear like 20 hats. I need a break from that.

I just love shooting. I’m happiest when I’m on set. I hate fundraising. I hate asking people for money. There has to be another way to make movies.

These mumblecore guys and gals were making movies the wanted to make for next to nothing. Granted there are limitations to what you can do with next to no money, but you get to just focus on making films without the money part.

When you lower the budgets, you lower the risk, you get to keep making films, improve your skills, and eventually work your way up to a point where people want to invest in you.

Almost all of these filmmakers who started off making movies for 100 dollars, 1,000 dollars 5,000 dollars, they’re all doing big things in Hollywood or Netflix now. I’ve studied a ton of mumblecore movies. some notables you should see if you’re interested:

The Puffy Chair by the Duplass brothers,
Mutual Appreciation by Andrew Bujalski.
Quiet City by Aaron Katz.
Medicine for Melancholy by Barry Jenkins

Just look up Mumblecore. There’s a ton of them.

NOW

Who’s work am I currently into?

Jordan Peel
Denis Villeneuve
Ava DuVernay
Ryan Coogler

Like I said. really tough to name a favorite. There’s so much you can learn from everyone else’s process. I feel like if you limit yourself to studying one or two people you’re doing yourself a real big disservice. There are loads of peeps I haven’t mentioned too many to stuff into one post.

There are a lot of problems facing new filmmakers, I talk about the biggest one that single-handedly causes most filmmakers to throw in the towel. If you haven’t seen that video I think you should check it out. Here’s a link right there.

As usual, thank you for reading, keep hustling and DBritt out!!!!

3 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Started Making Movies

Yo, yo Darious Britt here.

I’ve been doing this film thing for 10 years now. Wow. It sounds crazy when I say it out loud—time flies. Hopped onto my first film set back in 2009 literally didn’t know anything. I was just a PA on a student film.

Fast forward 10 years later:

Went to film school.
Worked on over 40 short films.
Produced 8 of my own shorts films.
Countless micro films.
Produced two feature films.
Toured the festival circuit three times.
Started a YouTube channel.

And here we are.

Thinking back on everything. There are a few things I wish I had known from go. I could have saved my self a lotta time and grief.

Here are 3 things I wish I knew before I started making movies:

1. Mindset Is Everything!

Your mindset is everything. How you view your abilities. How you view your potential influences your behavior and ultimately your success. I had the wrong mindset starting out. Lemme show you the math on that:

I planned on my first feature film being a major critical and financial success. I imagined having that Cinderella story just like everyone else. Get into Sundance, make a big sale. Be the next big voice in Hollywood. I wanted to prove that I had what it takes to be a success. That didn’t quite happen for me.

It doesn’t happen that way for 99% of filmmakers. Alfred Hitchcock didn’t have massive success until much later in his career. He’d already made like ten movies before he hit his stride. It’s not fair to put that kind of pressure on your first movie, especially since you still have so much to learn.

I was approaching this all wrong. I had a fixed mindset. The fixed mindset says that: your intelligence, creativity, skills, and abilities are all predetermined. You’re either born with raw talent or your not. Your qualities are carved in stone. You can’t change it. If you’re successful, it proves that you have talent, if you’re not successful, it proves you don’t. It’s an all or nothing way of looking at it. Will I succeed or fail, win, or lose. It’s very binary.

I was stuck in the fixed mindset for years, trying to make everything perfect, trying to prove how good I am. But then I realized something.

All of the filmmakers I looked up to had a passion for learning the craft of filmmaking. These guys weren’t good because they were naturally gifted. They were good because they put their 10,000 hours in. They were successful because they loved learning, Not because they were trying to be successful. They had a growth mindset.

The growth mindset says, whatever qualities and talents you have they’re just the starting point in your development. You can cultivate new skills and abilities through practice and experience. Anyone can be anything through training and education. It’s about improving and unlocking your true potential over time.

Having a fixed mindset creates a hunger for approval; having a growth mindset creates a hunger for learning.

Ahhhhhh. I get it. If I want to be successful, I can’t chase success; I have to chase self-improvement. Then success will find me. I have to be hungry for learning. Hungry for new skills. Hungry for knowledge. I have to put in the 10,000 hours. That’s the ticket to the chocolate factory.

I switched to a growth mindset. I stopped doing projects to prove myself and started doing more projects to improve myself.

My goal became to learn as much as I can as fast as I can and enjoy the process of learning. I shot more microfilms bc you can rack up more experience a lot faster shooting really small projects.

When I made that switch, I learned more in one year than I had in the past three. And I had a lot more fun.

Had I known this a lot sooner, I could have shot so much more.

2. The Real Goal

If you’re a writer-director, the goal is to come up with a cool premise that attracts a lot of money and attention, Pitch investors or industry contacts if you have then. Get money, make the move, blow up. This is the classical way of thinking when it comes to film. 2 problems with that.

1. This places the emphasis on having a great idea, a super clever twist, a crazy premise, etc. It perpetuates this idea that you are one clever idea away from success. This couldn’t be further from the truth.

Ideas are a dime a dozen everybody has ideas. You can wake up tomorrow with a cool idea. Ideas mean nothing without a solid script. Ideas mean nothing without a writer who can turn it into a great screenplay. Ideas mean nothing without a director who can tell the story in a compelling way.

Ideas mean nothing without execution.

There’s this invisible thing between your good idea and a good movie, and that thing is craftsmanship. I say invisible because if done well, people don’t even know it’s there. All you see is the finished product. You have no clue how much expertise went into it.

Tarantino, Fincher, Hitchcock, Spielberg, Denis Villeneuve. They don’t just have good ideas. They have skills. They have craftsmanship.

If you are starting out, your goal should be to hone your craft. All the cool ideas can wait. You don’t have to have a catchy high concept premise to make a good film.

With craft, you can take a simple story and tell it in an exceptional way. Your execution is what will set you apart from everything that has come before you. Then when you get the occasional cool idea you can knock it out of the park.

Here’s the good news You can build your craft on small, cheap, inexpensive projects. You can build your craft shooting micro films. It’s just about collecting those 10,000 hours. Put in the work. Study other films.

2. The second problem with that line of thinking. It’s kinda hard to convince financiers to give you money with no track record. They wanna see that you know what you’re doing first. Again, making movies is about more than just having cool ideas. There’s a craft behind it.

You’ll probably have to self finance your first few projects. You’re looking at small budgets here. If you know your craft, you can shoot it so well that nobody would know your budget was handshakes and hotdogs.

If you learn how to make ¢10 look like a dollar. You’ll never go out of business.

You don’t build a film career by just having “cool ideas.” You build a career by knowing your craft. The cool ideas and big budgets are just the cherry on the top. If you can really wrap your head around this concept, then you will focus on the right things, and you will have more success.

Don’t chase money. Chase craftsmanship.

If you become an amazing craftsman, you can make amazing films for next to nothing. If you’re a good craftsman, money has a way of finding you.

If you haven’t gotten the message yet here’s the layman’s version:

Finding money and or cool ideas are not your ticket to the chocolate factory, honing your skills are.

Embrace your limitations. If you don’t have money embrace it. At the end of the day, those things aren’t what’s important. It’s your skill, your craft, your execution.

Cool ideas and money those things come and go. You have no control over that, but hard skills don’t. Every skill you earn stays with you.

Everyone has cool ideas. You can wake up tomorrow and have a cool idea. Your mom could wake up tomorrow and have a cool idea. That doesn’t mean anything. Not everyone can wake up with a new skill. Not everyone can wake up with 10,000 hours of experience. Do you want to base your success off of something that can happen to anyone, or do you want to go out and cultivate something for yourself that not many have?

It’s okay to be passionate. It’s okay to want to do big ambitious projects. just make sure you always put learning your craft first.

You have to temper your passion with practically.

3. Embrace Failure

One thing is for certain. You will fail. You will fail a lot. You will make lots of mistakes.

You can’t avoid failure by just watching more tutorials and whatnot. Doesn’t work that way, Bruh-bruh. It’s not gonna happen.

The trick is to make inexpensive failures. Inexpensive in terms of time and money. You wanna burn through all your big mistakes on small cheap projects, like micro films. This way you have a safe little sandbox to play and fall on your face while nobody is watching.

For example, you just got a new camera, shoot some b-roll with it. Shoot a small scene with a couple of friends. Shoot a vlog, fumble through the settings. Do camera tests. Odds are you’re gonna run into a few problems. That’s the point. Now is the time to figure all this stuff out. Not on set.

The more mistakes you make the better. It means you’re doing something. If you’re not failing you’re not trying.

There’s nothing you can do at this level that’s going to hurt you. You can’t ruin your career.

What can you practice by yourself to expedite your learning? Could you be shooting 1000 photos at the park working on your composition? There’s always something you could be doing to improve yourself? Ways to burn through mistakes on your own time.

Fail fast, fail often. fail forward.

Thank you for reading. Keep those cameras rolling and rack up your 10K and learn something new every day.

-DBritt out

3 Small Lights Every Filmmaker Should Have

Yo, yo Darious Britt here.

Still in quarantine. Can’t shoot stuff. It’s very depressing to have to stop right in the middle of shooting a project.

Film gods…why have you done this?!?

But hey everybody is happy and healthy. I finally saw Hereditary. Loved it. Anyways…

Lights, lights, lights, lights, lights, Fam. They make a big difference. Lots of videos on lights. Let’s talk about lights.

To be more specific, let’s talk about 3 small lights you gotta have on set.

A Light Bar Style Light

The first type of light you should get your paws on. a light bar style light. Bunch of companies make these lights. The one I use is by Youkoyi.

This is my favorite handy light by far. That’s why I’m talking about it first. Personal bias-don’t judge me.

They come in two flavors. Bi-color or RGB. The RGB is like 20 bucks more. They’re both dimmable.

They have internal lithium batteries. They charge via micro USB. they have 2600 milliamp batteries On a full charge they last 2 hours on 100% output. They last even longer if they’re not on full blast.

They each come with wireless remotes. It works up to 20 feet away. I can audition lights, while I hang out at camera. You can operate multiple lights off 1 remote. I always keep one of my remotes in my chest rig so I always have one on set. I love the Youkoyi light bar. It’s crazy useful.

Because it’s a light bar the quality of the light is a little softer than a credit card style light. Remember the bigger the fixture, the softer the light. It’s a bigger light source in that it’s longer. You get a little more wrap on your talent.

I can use it without mounting accessories if need be. For me, that’s part of the appeal.
They’re lightweight — I can gaff tape these bad boys to doors, ceilings, shelving.
It has a Standard 1/4 20 tapped hole at the bottom.
I can throw it on any stand and use it as a kicker light.
I can throw them on a Pedco UltraClamp and clamp it to a tripod’s legs

I love using these little guys for fill light. If there’s a white wall nearby please believe I’m bouncing these bad boys off of it.

Since I bought them a year ago, I’ve used them on every shoot Bruh-bruh. Every shoot. I lit an entire scene just using Youkoyi lights.

I have not used many light bar style lights but I can say that these here lights punch higher than their weight class. I love them so much I’m thinking bout getting me two more bruh- bruh. If you’re thinking of getting one it’s worth the extra dough to get the RGB version. They’re about 80 bucks. Ya gotta get on it.

Ultracompact Light

The Second light you should have. an ultracompact light of some sort.
The one I use is the Godox Mobile Light. This light is marketed as a clip-on phone light. But it can do so much more.

It has a Built-in 300mA Lithium Battery. Last about 40 ish minutes on full blast.
Daylight color temperature.
Dimmable.
It has a CRIof 95 and a TLCI of 94.

I’ve never tested it but it seems accurate I’ve never had a problem with my colors looking funny. This thing is super lightweight. I mean look at it It doesn’t get much cuter than this, boys and girls. It’s like a baby light.

This thing lives on my chest rig. It’s apart of my kit. Seventy percent of the time I use it to see in the dark. Get things out of my camera bag and whatnot.

I’ve used it to mimic light coming from a cell phone in a couple of my shorts.
I’ve used it to add fill light in dark scenes when I need just need a little punch of light for exposure.
I’ve used it as an eye light numerous times.

I have had this light for years. This is the best 20 bucks I’ve ever spent.
I strongly recommend having a tiny light like this on hand. It doesn’t have to be this specific light but a small Form Factor light is essential. I will not entertain any opinions that say otherwise.

Credit Card Size LED Lights

The third style of light you should have. Credit card lights.
My go-to for this was the Aputure Al- MX. Aputure sent me one. I loved it so much I bought another one. They’re heavy. Built like a German tank. Airforce grade aluminum chassis.

They’re bi-color, high color accuracy.

On a full charge at 100% output, it will last about an hour. At minimum out output up to 4 hours. These guys get crazy bright. Up to 3148 lux. That’s brighter than the Youkyoi lights.

I use these style lights as pop lights. they make great kicker lights on your talent.

Because of their size, they work great for replacing lightbulbs in lamps. You can still get the look of a practical but you have more control over the light.

I like to bounce’em off of other things for fill in close up shots.

Recently Aputure sent me the new Aputure MC lights. It’s like they took everything that needed improvement with their prior lights and made this super light.

The diffusion secures onto the light better than prior lights. I can just leave it on. That was a problem I had with the AL-MX. The magnetic diffusion would always pop off. Ninety percent of the time I just didn’t use the diffusion.

The MC has RGB hue and saturation built right into the light. No more using tells. It’s crazy light and it has magnets built into the body.

You can stick’em on to a C-stand. Boom.
Need little pop lights in a kitchen scene. Boom

Its also dope as an on-camera light to add just a little more fill in videos like this. Credit card style lights. Get on it.

Bonus Light: Spiffy Gear — Lumiee Light Bracelets

On the note of ultra-compact lights. Recently spiffy gear sent me two of their Lumiee bracelets. They look cool AF. Definitely get points for the cool factor but how useful are they on set? Seems like a gimmick.

After kickin’ em around a bit, I dig’em. I haven’t taken them out on set yet because…well…quarantine but I can already see 3 reasons to use it.

Crazy convenient. Slaps right onto your wrist. You always got a light on you.
Camera bag light. If it’s dark and I need something outta my bag, boom. I got a hands-free light.
Eye lights. These lil guys will probably make great eye lights. Dim it all the way down. Hold it just outside of the frame, pan the light off of your actor’s face. Boom. You always have an eye light on you.

With the bi-color version, you get daylight and tungsten. Fully dimmable. Of the two, this one is more useful for film.

For the RGB version, the main colors are red green and blue but there are also 15 different sub colors. If you use lots of RGB lighting in your line of work then you’d find this version useful.

Supposedly they can last an hour on a full charge and up to 4 hours with low output. We’ll see. I’m curious to see if they’ll eventually dethrone my Godox light. And become my new go-to ultra-compact solution. Time will tell.

Lemme know in the comments if you found it useful.

Links to all the lights I’ve mentioned are bellow. They are affiliate links. If you use them I do get a small commission. Goes toward keeping the lights on around here.

Keep the cameras rolling. Make everyday count. Rackupyour10k (rack up your ten thousand hours)
-Dbritt out.

LIGHTS MENTIONED (on Amazon):

Trouble STAYING productive? Productivity hacks

How to Stay Productive- Head on Laptop image

So how do you stay productive? Or are we actually talking about procrastination?

In case you live under a rock, procrastination is the act of delaying or postponing a task or set of tasks.

Whether you’re procrastinating or whether you’ve just got a lot going on in your life and you can’t seem to get your affairs in order, the question is:

How do we combat those forces that prevent us from following through with what we set out to do?

So Darious, why are we talking about this?… Well behind the scenes boys & girls underneath all this deeper Darious nice there’s a huge battle I’ve been waging for years against myself on how to get more s*** done!

I feel like I have a lot of goals and a lot of things I want to do with this channel and with my film career and with my business. It’s hard to find the time to do everything. If I’m being transparent, sometimes it’s hard to find the motivation, given the mountain of work I’m looking at.

Everything seems to take longer than planned, and everything takes more work than I thought. And just yeah.

I’ve tried many things. I’ve read many things. Some tactics work, some tactics don’t. I know a lot of you are grappling with the same issue because I see it in the comments.

“Yo D4 put me on some game. I got know, how do you stay productive?”

Let me hop on a soapbox with you, Fam. Let’s have a heart to heart.

If you feel like you’re a procrastinator, I can say with confidence that 90% of the time, it’s not because you’re lazy. So let’s start there.

Productivity Hack #1 Batching Tasks

Task batching is when you group a list of similar tasks together and do them in one block of time. This is also known as time blocking.

Each time you switch between tasks, there’s a lag in your brain where you have to refocus on the new task. Guess what happens when you go through that lag? You get resistance distractions. It’s harder to get back in the groove.

An example of batching would be instead of writing one YouTube video write two or three. Once you’re in that headspace and you’ve got the mojo all worked up to write, it’s easier to keep writing.

It’s the same thing with shooting YouTube videos. Say it takes you an hour to set up everything for a shoot. Well, it’s easier to shoot two or three together back to back, Then to spend an hour setting up just to shoot one. Depending on the types of videos, you should, of course.

Finding ways to batch your tasks together will make a big difference in productivity.

One of the things I’ve been doing lately is just having a thumbnail day where all I do for an entire day is shoot thumbnails for videos I’m working on and videos know I have coming up. Once I’m in that groove of shooting thumbnails, it’s easier to just stay there and get a whole bunch of them done at once.

Productivity Hack #2 Go For The Low

When we look at our list of to-dos, we have a habit of looking at it as a big giant forest. The reality is it’s not a big giant forest. It’s just a bunch of little trees.

Break your tasks up into smaller manageable chunks or steps and then go after the easiest step first. Pick the lowest hanging fruit first or “go for the low.”

It’s a good way to trick yourself into working If you’re feeling unmotivated.

For example, I have a shoot tomorrow morning. It’s just an assistant and me maybe, but I’m doing all the heavy lifting, and I’m already tired after a long day. It’s 9:00 at night.

I’ve got:

Batteries to charge
Shotlist to make
Planning and reviewing the script,
I’ve got to check all the media and format the cards.
Clean lenses
Check my GoPro bags
Fire up my camera rig one last time to make sure I’m not going to have any surprises on set.

*Amazon links are affiliate links*

How do I trick myself into getting all that done when it’s the last thing I feel like doing?

I go for the low-hanging fruit; what’s the easiest thing I can do, and I do that first. Put the batteries on a charger. Okay, just start moving.

What’s the next easiest thing to do? Do that.

Then the next easiest thing, do that keep putting one foot in front of the other, and before you know it, you’re there.

Little by little, a little becomes a lot.

I apply this same philosophy to writing scripts. If I feel like I just don’t have the writer juice in me today, I might just write dialogue and start there. Or I might just write a list of scene descriptions back to back, of scenes where I think things will take place but no dialogue no action. Go for the low hanging fruit.

Whatever comes easiest, do that first. Nibble your way into the task

Productivity Hack #3 Reduce Inefficiency

Aside from life emergencies and other mandatory obligations, your biggest enemy keeping you from productivity is inefficiency.

Inefficiency creates resistance, wastes time, and drains motivation.

If it takes you ten steps to do a task that you could have gotten done in three, that’s called being inefficient. If you’re already feeling demotivated, It’s easier to push yourself to do something that only takes three steps, as opposed to something that takes 10.

Complexity is the enemy of execution.

Your 10-step process is more complicated than it needs to be. The more complicated things are, the less likely we are to do it.
Here’s the rub though, you don’t know that your ten-step process could be done in three steps.

Part of your job is to find ways to simplify your process: to trim the fat.

For example, when I set up wide shots for my YouTube videos, it used to take me about 45 minutes to an hour and a half to set up. I know it’s ridiculous, but if you want quality, you’ve got to do it right.

There would be days when I need to shoot a video, and I can’t bring myself to do it knowing it’s going to take an hour just to set everything up I’m tired I’ve been I’ve already been working other gigs all day.

My subscribers are just going to have to wait; there’s only 24 in a day, Fam.

Over time, I kept looking for ways to streamline the process. Now it only takes 20 minutes.

Just recently, I purchased a boom arm specifically for this table. Before this, it was saying back in my stand, this alone shaves probably 60 seconds to a minute and a half off of my setup time, and my space is less cluttered with stands. That’s one less stand that I need to move out of the way when I’m moving other things around.

All these little incy, wincy, tiny things add up to a lot of time saved.
Now it’s a little easier to find the motivation on those days where I’m just not quite feeling the mojo, you feel me?

Because now I can tell myself, setups only going to take 20 minutes just do The easiest thing first keep moving as opposed to setups going to take possibly an hour to an hour and a half.

A good system shortens the road to the goal.

If you keep looking for ways to refine and simplify your processes for doing things, you will have less resistance to doing them.

Complexity is the enemy of execution. That’s why we have to simplify. It’s our job to find ways to streamline what we do so that we can keep doing it.

I hope this was helpful. At the end of the day, we’re all in the same battle—the war ourselves.

The hardest enemy to conquer is the one you see in the mirror.

Get in the comment box and let me know what’s been working for you.

These are things that I do, but if you have a system that gets you results, please share I’d love to hear it.
Make everyday count.

Keep hustling

-D Britt out.

What To Do When Film Projects Fall Apart

So what do we do when projects fall through?

When you spend all that time and energy on something, and it kind of goes up in smoke right in front of you. What do we do?

Do we just roll over and play dead?

I was working on a short film called Stay Pretty. You guys know about it. I posted on Instagram and talked about it on the channel.

I started this project in September of last year. Yes, this was just another short film, but I was pushing myself into new areas and pushing myself out of my comfort zone with this one. This is the first short film where I was working with an editor and a legit composer.

Anyways fast forward and the Coronavirus pumped the brakes on all of that.

And now the whole thing is kind of a mess. Everybody took a hit. I mean look at the studios, they took a major blow.

I’m sure some of you are in the same position with your projects.

It sucks.

It’s not just that you don’t get to do this cool thing that you wanted to share with the world, but it’s the:

The time
The energy
The effort
The money
The opportunity cost.

You could have done other things with all that time you spent working on this project that ultimately might not be happening.

That said here we are now what? What do you do from here, where do we go?

Pocket Projects

The first thing is pocket projects. I’m a firm believer in always having a project in your back pocket, maybe even a few.

Back pocket projects are those ideas that don’t require as many resources to pull off as your ambitious projects.

If your main project has a budget of $1,000, then your back pocket idea might cost $200, and use fewer actors… you get the idea. This way, if your main project tanks, you just move on to one of those ideas in your back pocket and keep the momentum going.

You see the same thing in the professional film space. Why do you think producers have so many projects and development? There are so many times when you think a project is a go, and it’s going to take off, and then it just fizzles. The only way to insulate yourself from that risk is to spread out the risk to have more things going more irons in the fire.

If five of those projects never go anywhere, but one makes it through, then boom that’s progress.

Focus On Progress

There are no guarantees in this game we play, boys and girls: Success, failure, fame, projects getting projects greenlit, securing financing. We don’t always have as much control over these things as we would like.

But here’s the good news. You will always learn more from your failures than you will your successes.

Knowledge stacks. It’s like interest in a bank account. The more you learn, the more you’re able to learn. Eventually, you reach a tipping point where success is inevitable. You know too much not to be successful.

Rather than dwell on what didn’t work and what didn’t happen,

Shift your focus on what you learned from the experience, what you can take with you into the next project.

You did not come out of this experience empty-handed, You actually learned something. You probably learned a lot of things.

Take a moment and list out what you learned. If you do this I think you’ll find you’ll feel more empowered by the experience rather than defeated.

Success is nothing but a series of small wins.

Some of those wins come from failure. Most people fail their way into success.

As they say, the master has failed more times than the beginner even tried. I take heart in that.

Walk While You Think

Last but not least, keep your head up. Sometimes it’s hard to do, but here’s a trick. It’s called walking while you think.

You have more perseverance than you realize.

Perseverance is the hard work you do after you’re exhausted from the hard work you’ve already done.

Nobody feels like they have what it takes 100 % of the time. You show me someone that confident, and I’ll show you a narcissist or a liar. Doubt is apart of the game. It’s a natural part of this journey we call filmmaking. It’s hard. It’s challenging.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought of quitting both YouTube and filmmaking. Those thoughts will always cross your mind at some point, but then you just keep going. You press on, and you push past it. You figure it out.

Honestly, Fam. Sometimes you just don’t fucking know. You second guess yourself. You overthink things, and the only way to combat that is to follow your feet. Walk while you think. Take all the time you need to doubt yourself. Just make sure you’re walking while you do it.

For example, say your last project fell through. You don’t think you have what it takes? That’s fine. While you’re doubting yourself, just work on the next film. Walk while you think. Just keep moving.

You’re not alone in this. This will not be the most disappointing thing to happen to you, I promise.

There are lots of peaks and valleys on your journey. There will be lots of disappointments. It’s all a part of failing your way to success.

As for me, I don’t know what will happen with Stay Pretty. Hopefully, I can finish it. We’ll see. I’ve got a few back-pocket ideas under my belt, if not.

Meanwhile, I’ve already started writing my list of what I’ve learned.

Get in the comments and tell me how this pandemic has affected your projects I’ll be reading them. I can’t answer all of them, but I do read all of them.

Make every day count, rack up the 10K, and keep hustling.

-D Britt out

How to record BETTER audio for your films

So you want to record better audio? Let’s talk about that.

To record the best audio your mic should be no more than3 feet away from your talent. It doesn’t matter what type of mic it is; lavaliere, shot gun mic, doesn’t matter. Often times we find ourselves in situations where getting our mics within 3 feet of our actors becomes very difficult.

A few tips…

Continue reading “How to record BETTER audio for your films”

Why we don’t need another Quenton Tarantino

You’ve already seen the title of this post. You have an idea where this is going.

I see a lot of films and read a lot of scripts. one of the most common things that I run into is filmmakers mimicking other filmmakers is especially Quinton Tarantino. The extended dialogue scenes, the golorification of gore, the non linear story telling, pretty much everything that you can mimick about him.

Some of these imitations are quite good but at a certain point we as an audience lose intereste because we’ve already seen this before. Watch the video to see the full discussion.

Top 20 Filmmaking Channels on YouTube

YouTube has changed so much in the 4 short years that I’ve been on the platform. There weren’t as many resources for film education as there are now. In this video I rifle through some of the most useful filmmaking YouTube channels making videos today.

Playlist of the YouTube Channels mentioned HERE