In this interesting behind the scenes video Parker Walbeck from fulltimefilmmaker talks about a commercial he recently shoot and walks through some of the different aspects involved in such a relatively low cost production including going through the budget.
This video is something you don’t see online every day. A pro videographer talks openly about a commercial project he shot including a detailed breakdown of the budget for the project and how it was spent (this might be the first time we published something like that here on LensVid and we really hope to find more examples like that for you in the future).
In the video Walbeck explains how this entire toothpaste commercial was shot using only two lights (one from the side with a diffuser and one from behind), the idea was to shoot sad and happy faces (smiles, teeth etc.) which is what Walbeck did using a number of actors (he states using pro actors and not simply “people from the street” makes the result that much better).
Getting back to the budget part – most of it actually went to the actors while the rest was distributed to the photographer and producer as well as the edit and finally the makeup and a few other things – this actually shows you that it is completely possible to make a professional looking commercial even on these tight budgets (of course Walbeck did take into consideration the cost of his gear – he uses a RED camera which alone cost several times the cost of the entire production – but you can always rent a camera like that for a day of shooting).
We have a full section devoted to everything that has to do with being a professional photographer/videographer called “photography as a business” here on LensVid.
Via: iso1200.