By department · Producer
Four things only you can decide.
The shape of a film budget is on its own page. This one is about the decisions that sit with you personally, and that nobody else on the production can make.
Get these four right in prep and film is an ordinary format to produce. Leave them and they arrive in week three as a crisis.
Yours
The four.
The shooting ratio, said out loud
Agree it with the director in development, write it into the schedule, and review it weekly against the camera reports. A ratio nobody has named is not a lower ratio. It is an unmanaged one, and it will be discovered when the stock line is already gone.
The lab relationship
A lab is a supplier you brief, not a service you post to. Somebody senior has to own that relationship from prep, tell them the stock, the look and the schedule, and be the person they ring when something looks wrong on a roll. On most productions that is you.
Who is loading
The loader is the single point of failure for every frame the production shoots. Name them early, pay them properly, and if a trainee is going into that role, say so deliberately and attach supervision to it. This is not a position to fill in the last week of prep.
Insurance and what “negative” means on the policy
Negative risk is its own line and brokers treat it differently from data loss. Ask specifically what is covered between the camera and the lab, who carries it in transit, and what the production would actually do if a day were lost. Ask in prep, not after.
The one that catches people
Prep days are not the place to save money.
Camera, lens, stock and lab tests, plus the day spent watching them with costume, make-up and design in the room. Productions that trim prep to protect shoot days reliably lose more shoot days than they saved. On film the prep is the risk management.
