Amazon Chalk Hill Books Chalk Hill Books The Writer's Store Category:  Technology Publisher: Chalk Hill Books ISBN-10:  0976817802 Pages: 432 ISBN-13: 9780976817802 A comprehensive guide through the steps of preproduction planning, this book gives your students practical information that they can use in planning their next project, whether it is a class assignment, a thesis film, or a major motion picture. Includes chapters on: • Lining the script • Indentifying shooting sequences • The production board • Breakdown sheets • Scheduling • Locations • Day-out-of-days • Scheduling software • Unions • Analysis of a film budget • Tracking a film’s progress • Appendices, Glossary, Bibliography, & Index

Library Journal
Copyright Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier, Inc. Feb 1, 2006
PERFORMING ARTS Brown, Robert Latham. Planning the Low-Budget Film. Chalk Hill. Mar. 2006. c.432p. illus. filmog. index. ISBN 0-9768178-0-2. pap. $29.95. FILM
A spate of insider-written books about the practical aspects of making movies has been published during the past few years. All are replete with advice to the would-be filmmaker; one of the most recent, On Film-making: An Introduction to the Craft of the Director, distills the wisdom of the late director Alexander Mackendrick. Brown (cinema & television, Univ. of Southern California) brings 30 years of experience in the motion-picture business to an exceptionally detailed manual on making "low-budget" films (so-called because only in Hollywood would $5 million be so described). Among the topics minutely covered are readying the raw script for shooting; the actual process of shooting, including scheduling the sequence of scenes and locations; and, of course, budgeting. Useful appendixes include an extensively detailed budget of an actual movie, and practical information is provided for completion bond companies, state film commissions, and film guilds and unions. Illustrations complement the text throughout. Recommended for cinema schools and large cinema collections.-Roy Liebman, Los Angeles P.L.


Netribution
Planning the Low Budget Film
Written by James MacGregor Sunday, 21 January 2007
by Robert Latham Brown
Chalk Hill Books, L.A, March 2006, 416 pages, $29.95

Low budget film production is a chicken and egg scenario. For the production to be successful you need experience to avoid potentially costly mistakes. If you have that sort of experience already, you are unlikely to be making low budget films at all. If you want to go the low budget route, how do you get the experience you need to make a success of it?

The sensible and constructive answer to all these things is to get your hands on a copy of this book, Planning the Low Budget Film. It will cost you $29.99 which is excellent value and it is a good guide. Seriously good.

Robert Latham Brown who penned it, is known as Bob Brown in the business. Mel Brooks calls him "Mr On-Budget." Bob Brown has had 30 years in the movie business and accumulated a lifetime of knowledge and hands-on practical experience, on location.


His credits include producer, line producer, production manager and 2nd unit director. His films include Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Return of the Jedi at the top end to The Anarchist's Cookbook at the $2m end of indie production and he has for the last ten years also taught film production at university level, which makes him a tutor of distinction. He can not only do it, but he really knows how to teach others to do it.

"This is THE guide to budgeting and scheduling a low budget film. "

The text divides into three sections; The Basics, The Schedule, The Budget, followed by an appendix of very useful information and sources as well as a complete budget.

The essential detail within these sections is the practical stuff anyone in production needs to have a firm grasp of. Filmmaking has evolved slowly to where it is today and it has evolved this way because only practices that work well have survived. It is not clever to re-invent the wheel, so following Bob Brown's layout of film production method is probably the best exposure to the process you can get without being in a studio or on location to get it.

Brown not only feeds you the hows of everything, he gives you the whys as well. Many of the anecdotes he uses to explain these forwhys are amusing now, though were not at the time, but the funny stories will help to pin them in the memory. As permanent fixtures in a production board.

That reminds me of another important tool in the book. Before film scheduling software and film budgeting software was developed, people used the production board to schedule and budget their movies. Brown likes to use a production board and without the distractions of computer technology, it is still the best possible way to plan a production. The difference is that it is YOU who works the production board, not a piece of software, so you become much more aware of what you are doing with your production planning and what the implications of any changes you make are going to be. It is going back to the drawing board to some extent, but this is a fallback position that still works efficiently without a megabit in sight.

"Even before securing the rights, secure this book. "
Brown's text is clearly laid out in sections and handy-size learning chunks and it is very readable. There are a few line drawings, topsheets and day-out-of-days tables to provide clarity where examples are needed, but this is a book for intelligent minds that are addressing a steep learning curve, so there are no distractions, just essential knowledge.

Bob "Mr On-Budget" Brown is a moviemaking mentor of distinction. No one can guarantee success with any movie, but armed with Bob Brown's formidable 30-year accumulated knowledge and insight is the best possible insurance against failure in production at any budget level. This is THE guide to budgeting and scheduling a low budget film. Even before securing the rights, secure this book.