Cheap Movie Tricks

How to Shoot a Short Film for Under $2,000

By: Rickey Bird

Narrated by: Matt Weight

Length: 3 hrs and 33 mins

Publisher's summary

Want to know how to make a movie on a tight budget?

How to make a movie: Filmmaker Rickey Bird and screenwriter and novelist Al Guevara are on a mission to help indie moviemakers everywhere. Today’s indie film market is growing by leaps and bounds. At the same time, many aspiring filmmakers are running into their share of problems:

• Not enough money for crews
• Over budget and more than likely making the wrong movie
• Can’t get the attention of an indie studio
• Should have started with a short film to gain attention

Cheap Movie Tricks: Film school numbers aren’t down. They’re increasing, at more than 2,600 film-related courses worldwide. You probably didn’t even realize 48 percent of all film schools are in the US and UK. Thousands of aspiring filmmakers are literally learning how to use cheaper, widely available filmmaking technology, as well as the craft of making movies from books pulled from bookstore and library shelves. They’re totally DIY and the most creative people you will ever meet.

Rickey Bird’s Hectic Films is a Southern California enterprise that is building a filmmaking empire on a budget. His short films, feature films, micro docs, and tutorials have landed in some of the biggest American film festivals and have been seen online throughout the world. The result? Millions of views worth of exposure from films online, in festivals, and creative marketing literally on the street. His many projects have seen leading B-list actors like Hulk Hogan and Vernon Wells (Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior), make-up artists from the TV show Grimm, and stuntmen from the Call of Duty games.

What you’ll learn from this audiobook:

• How planning and shooting a short film today can lead to a feature-length project tomorrow
• Everything you need to know about writing a movie project on a burger budget
• Tips on how to find locations and not get arrested
• Shooting tips galore for building exciting scenes
• Sound and film editing tips and all kinds of special effects wizardry, including puppetry
• Screenings, promotions, and juicy tips on film festival strategy

©2017 Mango Publishing Group (P)2018 Mango Publishing Group

Basic principles for making a short film

I can’t complain about the content. This book gives exactly what it says it’s going to give

Great Information Poor Narration

This book has good info on movie making on a budget. Its hard to say whether its the writer's attempt at humor or the narrator'sdelivery, but it was a struggle to get thru it. There is a good amount of tips and info in there, it just takes some sifting to get thru.

It was a good book

I enjoyed this book I got some helpful tips not a fan of the "Jokes." in this boook but overall if you're an indie filmmaker like me you should give this book a listen to.

awesome book to get you fired up to make a film

awesome book to get you fired up to make a film. short and to the point no wasting time.

nothing new to the table

very generic information that you can Google. good for very beginner, but not anyone that has a little experience

A better title might be "Cheap Horror Movie Tricks

As I am learning how to be a better videography, with the plan be to film a show of my own, and doing so on a budget, I thought this book might offer some good tips and insights.

I didn't expect anything ground breaking and I knew going in that it wouldn't be fully applicable to me since what I will be making is largely unscripted. But even with those lowered expectations I was still a bit disappointed.There was some interesting tips and ideas. I wrote about a page worth of notes that I think will be useful, and some of the stories that were told were at least mildly interesting.

Overall I found the tone of the book to be a bit, well exactly the tone you would expect of a book with a VHS tape box as its cover. Its not bad, but it doesn't feel authoritative and insightful. It felt like a lot of the suggestions were genre specific, with a lot of mentions of zombie, horror and slasher flicks. If I had known a bit more about the authors background, then I might not have been so surprised by this.

I think for someone with a goal to create a short film for under $2000 then this book will be helpful. It won't be something you carry around everywhere. But it could be helpful. And in audiobook form, its ideal for commuting as its light, easy to digest, and at least gets your mind thinking about your own project, perhaps in a new light that could be useful.

If your not producing a short film, you can skip this book. If you are, there are certainly worse things you could spend your money on and it might offer just enough tips and ideas to be worthwhile.