CarsonCoePrice Exclusive
This is an exclusive interview with three of the most talented independent film makers I've ever had the privilege of talking to, well here it is, and don't forget to like their Facebook and check out there films on YouTube, links at the bottom!
1) How did you all meet?
We've all known each other for along time now, which I think really helps when going through the creative process. I've been friends with David Price since high school, and I met David Carson at university, where we first worked together on our second year film project. But we first became the three Daves on The Long Hard Goodbye.
2) Did you always want to make films?
Yeah, I think for all of us writing/film-making has been the only thing we've wanted to do since we ever wanted to do anything, and If we've done anything else since its because we've rather sensibly acknowledged that bills need paying.
3) What education did you guys have, or are you naturally talented?
Myself and Carson studied Film at Portsmouth University, but that’s it as far as education goes. We’ve kept a good relationship with our lecturers and the last couple of years we’ve gone back to speak with the students about the films we’ve made and how we get from concept to distribution. A degree in film is certainly helpful but anyone in the know will tell you the best education in film is to go out and make one. As for the talent I think the Jury is still out on that one…
4) Where do you draw your inspiration from?
All things really. As a group we’re into all of the same things and very much on the same page creatively. Often a short joke, or conversation can quickly turn into a short or feature, which is a really privileged position to be in as a group of collaborators. Inspiration has never been a problem for us, we’ve got a long list of shorts that we would love to make but are held back by a total lack of funding. So how we develop an idea, or what we put into production next, is largely dictated by a lack of money and resources. So I guess right now our biggest inspiration is being broke.
5) What steps did you go through from writing to editing?
Well, we have three kinds of shorts; Mini-Shorts which have a budget of £50 and a 1 day shoot, (Remain, Spot, Event), Middle-Shorts which have a £250-300 budget and a 1 day shoot, ( A Doubt), and Big-Shorts, which have a budget £500-2000, and a 4 day to 1 week shoot (The Long Hard Goodbye, Me & Zeus). The process tends to be concept, script, re-writes, pre-production, casting, script feedback, more re-writes, testing, rehearsals, production, the shoot, the edit, test screening, final edit, press and distribution. There isn’t really an order to it as a lot of the stages overlap and we won’t actually go through all of those stages, just the ones the film needs; The Long Hard Goodbye went through almost all of those stages, whereas Spot was improvised, shot and edited in 12 hours. I’d say the Two key bench marks are getting a draft of the script that isn’t perfect but works, then setting a realistic shooting date. Once we have a date its full steam ahead on the production, doing all we can to with what little we have. Its hard to be specific about the production stage as each film we’ve made has been completely different to the last. Sometimes we’ll even being experimental in our approach to how we’re going to put the project together, like not meeting the actors until the day of the shoot. The funny thing is in a lot of ways the shoot is almost the least important part of the whole process. If your preparation is on the mark then the shoot should go smoothly, giving you the opportunity to take advantage of the moments of creativity that happen naturally on set. Then the edit is mostly locking myself away and really getting stuck into the film. About a week or so later comes a point we’re I get too close to the edit and can’t really be as objective as I’d like to be and that’s when the other Daves get back involved and help steer the film to the finish. Once the editing is done we’ll have test screenings to get feedback on the film, then when we feel its ready we start sending it to festivals. Where at this stage currently with our most recent short ‘A Doubt’. On a whole I think we’d all agree that the most important stage for us is Pre-production, probably followed by editing.
6) How do you find your actors and Crew?
Typically everyone we’ve worked with we’ve found through the ads we place on various cast and crew sites like Shooting People, Mandy, Casting Call Pro etc.
7) Where do you normally premiere our films?
It changes from film to film. Recently for A Doubt we held and rap party and the first screening for the cast and crew, and friends and family, at a Bar that had a cool cinema setup. We tend to send out updates and invitations to any events we’re holding through our Facebook page so that’s the place to check if anyone’s interested in coming along.
8) You’ve done a lot of different genres: do we have a favourite and what do you plan on doing next/again?
Well we’ve written a sitcom, called Imitating Life, which is about an ex-mechanic who inadvertently finds himself running an independent art gallery in central London with his estranged son. Its an American show in format and structure, but with British humour. We’re hoping to get made as soon as possible. We also have half an eye set on a sketch show in the future too. So its likely the next year or so could be dedicated to comedy. I’d like to have a real go at horror though - Event flirted with the genre, but we’ve got a script for a feature horror which we’d love to see made. I think we’ll always jump from genre to genre. One of our strongest qualities as a group is that we’re capable of producing anything. I don’t think anyone of us could pick a favourite genre though - we’re inspired by all of them, and I’m certain we’ll go through them all again at least once. Often is the case when you just finished being wrapped up in one genre like Noir or Drama, you come off the production with a new insight and an education into how the genre works, or doesn't, which is only inspiration and incentive to revisit the genre again with this new insight or approach.
9) What’s the main goal for you?
There’s no one goal, but we’re always looking to make bigger and better films. I’d say the only thing that’s really important to us in the short term is getting funding for a real budget, then we can produce some of our bigger work like the sitcom, or one of the feature scripts.
10) What’s next for you guys?
When planning bigger projects like sitcoms, or writing feature length scripts you can go long stretches of time without producing anything, so we have a rule that every six months no matter what we’re doing we produce a short. These tend to be our Mini-Shorts, which we improvise, cost virtually nothing, and can be completed quickly. These are films like Remain. We do these challenge films to mainly stop us from getting rusty, or bogged down in admin work, but they’re a great way of learning new things, and experimenting with the medium. A Doubt was also another one of our 6 month challenge shorts but we wanted to really push ourselves with it and so decided that this time the challenge would be a new genre, ‘Drama’ in this case, and to go from ‘first draft to first cut’ in 30 days. Which we just about managed. We also upped the budget a little to get some better equipment to improve the look of the film. The next one we have planned is sort of ‘half experimental comedy/advert for ourselves’ which currently has the working title Like. We’re set to film it at the end of June, so we should have another short ready in the not too distant future. Further to that I’m also really keen to get a music video made this year, but we haven’t had much luck finding a band we’d like to work with, so if there are any up and coming musicians out there, get in touch!
11) Do you plan to make a feature film?
Absolutely. We have a lot of ideas we’ve developed that would make for some truly fantastic films, but they are all impossible to make on a shoestring budget. So until we get funding they’ll just have to remain at script stage. I think one mistake a lot of independent filmmakers at our level make is to rush to produce a super low budget feature, one that is of an idea that has been redacted to suit the inevitable budget and production limitations. I’m more interested in producing interesting and varied shorts that allow us to experiment and grow as filmmakers than rush to make a feature film that we couldn’t sell and that no one really wants to see. Features are definitely in our future but only if we can do these ideas justice, otherwise its just a waste of potentially great work. Having said that if we had an idea that was perfectly suited to our production limitations, and we’re certain it could be done without losing what is great about the concept, I’m sure we’d be doing it already.
You can 'like' these guys on Facebook via the link below, and view all the short films mentioned in the interview at the DCCP YouTube channel, now I've seen them all and I for one can tell you that you really should give them all a watch, 'A long hard goodbye in particular'!
http://www.facebook.com/carsoncoepricefilms
http://www.youtube.com/user/CarsonCoePriceFilms/videos
Tommy Terry-Green
1) How did you all meet?
We've all known each other for along time now, which I think really helps when going through the creative process. I've been friends with David Price since high school, and I met David Carson at university, where we first worked together on our second year film project. But we first became the three Daves on The Long Hard Goodbye.
2) Did you always want to make films?
Yeah, I think for all of us writing/film-making has been the only thing we've wanted to do since we ever wanted to do anything, and If we've done anything else since its because we've rather sensibly acknowledged that bills need paying.
3) What education did you guys have, or are you naturally talented?
Myself and Carson studied Film at Portsmouth University, but that’s it as far as education goes. We’ve kept a good relationship with our lecturers and the last couple of years we’ve gone back to speak with the students about the films we’ve made and how we get from concept to distribution. A degree in film is certainly helpful but anyone in the know will tell you the best education in film is to go out and make one. As for the talent I think the Jury is still out on that one…
4) Where do you draw your inspiration from?
All things really. As a group we’re into all of the same things and very much on the same page creatively. Often a short joke, or conversation can quickly turn into a short or feature, which is a really privileged position to be in as a group of collaborators. Inspiration has never been a problem for us, we’ve got a long list of shorts that we would love to make but are held back by a total lack of funding. So how we develop an idea, or what we put into production next, is largely dictated by a lack of money and resources. So I guess right now our biggest inspiration is being broke.
5) What steps did you go through from writing to editing?
Well, we have three kinds of shorts; Mini-Shorts which have a budget of £50 and a 1 day shoot, (Remain, Spot, Event), Middle-Shorts which have a £250-300 budget and a 1 day shoot, ( A Doubt), and Big-Shorts, which have a budget £500-2000, and a 4 day to 1 week shoot (The Long Hard Goodbye, Me & Zeus). The process tends to be concept, script, re-writes, pre-production, casting, script feedback, more re-writes, testing, rehearsals, production, the shoot, the edit, test screening, final edit, press and distribution. There isn’t really an order to it as a lot of the stages overlap and we won’t actually go through all of those stages, just the ones the film needs; The Long Hard Goodbye went through almost all of those stages, whereas Spot was improvised, shot and edited in 12 hours. I’d say the Two key bench marks are getting a draft of the script that isn’t perfect but works, then setting a realistic shooting date. Once we have a date its full steam ahead on the production, doing all we can to with what little we have. Its hard to be specific about the production stage as each film we’ve made has been completely different to the last. Sometimes we’ll even being experimental in our approach to how we’re going to put the project together, like not meeting the actors until the day of the shoot. The funny thing is in a lot of ways the shoot is almost the least important part of the whole process. If your preparation is on the mark then the shoot should go smoothly, giving you the opportunity to take advantage of the moments of creativity that happen naturally on set. Then the edit is mostly locking myself away and really getting stuck into the film. About a week or so later comes a point we’re I get too close to the edit and can’t really be as objective as I’d like to be and that’s when the other Daves get back involved and help steer the film to the finish. Once the editing is done we’ll have test screenings to get feedback on the film, then when we feel its ready we start sending it to festivals. Where at this stage currently with our most recent short ‘A Doubt’. On a whole I think we’d all agree that the most important stage for us is Pre-production, probably followed by editing.
6) How do you find your actors and Crew?
Typically everyone we’ve worked with we’ve found through the ads we place on various cast and crew sites like Shooting People, Mandy, Casting Call Pro etc.
7) Where do you normally premiere our films?
It changes from film to film. Recently for A Doubt we held and rap party and the first screening for the cast and crew, and friends and family, at a Bar that had a cool cinema setup. We tend to send out updates and invitations to any events we’re holding through our Facebook page so that’s the place to check if anyone’s interested in coming along.
8) You’ve done a lot of different genres: do we have a favourite and what do you plan on doing next/again?
Well we’ve written a sitcom, called Imitating Life, which is about an ex-mechanic who inadvertently finds himself running an independent art gallery in central London with his estranged son. Its an American show in format and structure, but with British humour. We’re hoping to get made as soon as possible. We also have half an eye set on a sketch show in the future too. So its likely the next year or so could be dedicated to comedy. I’d like to have a real go at horror though - Event flirted with the genre, but we’ve got a script for a feature horror which we’d love to see made. I think we’ll always jump from genre to genre. One of our strongest qualities as a group is that we’re capable of producing anything. I don’t think anyone of us could pick a favourite genre though - we’re inspired by all of them, and I’m certain we’ll go through them all again at least once. Often is the case when you just finished being wrapped up in one genre like Noir or Drama, you come off the production with a new insight and an education into how the genre works, or doesn't, which is only inspiration and incentive to revisit the genre again with this new insight or approach.
9) What’s the main goal for you?
There’s no one goal, but we’re always looking to make bigger and better films. I’d say the only thing that’s really important to us in the short term is getting funding for a real budget, then we can produce some of our bigger work like the sitcom, or one of the feature scripts.
10) What’s next for you guys?
When planning bigger projects like sitcoms, or writing feature length scripts you can go long stretches of time without producing anything, so we have a rule that every six months no matter what we’re doing we produce a short. These tend to be our Mini-Shorts, which we improvise, cost virtually nothing, and can be completed quickly. These are films like Remain. We do these challenge films to mainly stop us from getting rusty, or bogged down in admin work, but they’re a great way of learning new things, and experimenting with the medium. A Doubt was also another one of our 6 month challenge shorts but we wanted to really push ourselves with it and so decided that this time the challenge would be a new genre, ‘Drama’ in this case, and to go from ‘first draft to first cut’ in 30 days. Which we just about managed. We also upped the budget a little to get some better equipment to improve the look of the film. The next one we have planned is sort of ‘half experimental comedy/advert for ourselves’ which currently has the working title Like. We’re set to film it at the end of June, so we should have another short ready in the not too distant future. Further to that I’m also really keen to get a music video made this year, but we haven’t had much luck finding a band we’d like to work with, so if there are any up and coming musicians out there, get in touch!
11) Do you plan to make a feature film?
Absolutely. We have a lot of ideas we’ve developed that would make for some truly fantastic films, but they are all impossible to make on a shoestring budget. So until we get funding they’ll just have to remain at script stage. I think one mistake a lot of independent filmmakers at our level make is to rush to produce a super low budget feature, one that is of an idea that has been redacted to suit the inevitable budget and production limitations. I’m more interested in producing interesting and varied shorts that allow us to experiment and grow as filmmakers than rush to make a feature film that we couldn’t sell and that no one really wants to see. Features are definitely in our future but only if we can do these ideas justice, otherwise its just a waste of potentially great work. Having said that if we had an idea that was perfectly suited to our production limitations, and we’re certain it could be done without losing what is great about the concept, I’m sure we’d be doing it already.
You can 'like' these guys on Facebook via the link below, and view all the short films mentioned in the interview at the DCCP YouTube channel, now I've seen them all and I for one can tell you that you really should give them all a watch, 'A long hard goodbye in particular'!
http://www.facebook.com/carsoncoepricefilms
http://www.youtube.com/user/CarsonCoePriceFilms/videos
Tommy Terry-Green