In today’s post of Behind The Scenes; a series of blog posts where I discuss the creative process, technical aspects and much more, behind my projects. Anything from short films to my short stories and novels!
Today I wanted to go over one of my short films; Love Lost.
This short film was released on YouTube in May 2023 and still stands as the most viewed video on my channel!
Love Lost was based on a short story I wrote in October of 2021, about a pregnant woman who confronts her husband for sleeping with a prostitute, but it takes a chilling turn…
I had a lot of struggles trying to make this film, it was only my second short film and I was still learning the basics of how to make a movie. How to direct, how to use my second hand camera I was filming with, understand how audio worked, ect. A lot of those aspects were still unknown territory for me.
But after I wrote the story into a script it was time to find actors! The short film only has two characters, Lyam and Macy. Unfortunately, only a single person responded to my casting call. But I didn’t let that stop me and I continued my search! I casted this actress as Macy and she was a perfect fit for the role!
The entire crew was made up of myself, my makeup artist and my producer who was also the head of sound (as I had no audio equipment whatsoever). I asked the producer if he knew of anyone who would be willing to portray Lyam in the story and he asked around. Over the course of the couple films I have made so far, I have discovered that it is difficult to find people who will portray the type of antagonists I write, for free.
I make NOTHING off my films and most of the time they have a ZERO dollar budget, but I make it work! So in order to make these films I must rely on the kindness of people who are willing to volunteer their time and labor to the project. The type of content I write is very dark and psychological. It involves humans being cruel to one another, and a lot of people will refuse to portray that type of character, for free. Now I’m not bashing anyone who will not volunteer for something like this, it’s your choice and I understand you have bills to pay. I get it!
Thankfully, the producer found an actor who was willing to portray Lyam in the short film. Then, it was time to book a table read! After many many back and forth emails with the actors, we booked a date and time to get together to read through the script and officially meet each other. Unsure of a great and semi-private place to meet for this table read, I decided to use the backroom of my mothers occult shop.
The table read took twenty minutes tops, we read through the script, I gave pointers and taught the actors a bit about their characters, and we all parted ways. At this point I didn’t even have a location, I was talking with a local landlord of an Air BnB who was going to let me use their space for free, but they eventually ghosted me. I needed to film in a house with a staircase, as it was an important part to the plot. For some reason, this was very difficult to find…
One day, I was working at my mothers occult shop for the day and one of her good friends came in to say hello. We talked, and I brought up the fact that I was struggling to find a location for my short film and shooting was only one week away! Yes, at this point, filming was only ONE WEEK AWAY, and I didn’t even have a location yet. I was panicking!
This friend then offered her house, she said it was an older farm house and had a beautiful wooden staircase. I immediately agreed. And so a location was found! What else could go wrong? Famous last words I suppose.
The morning of the shoot, my producer called in and informed me he could no longer make it but I could still swing by and pick up the audio equipment. So I did. Thankfully the actors showed up on time as well as the makeup artist and everything went smoothly. We did a blocking run, took some promotional pictures, talked through my ideas with the makeup artist. We were ready to film!
Filming itself was a little difficult, as I had to hold the boom mic, the camera and a script so I was aware of what was happening. But we got through it!
The entire shoot from beginning to end took about two hours, and we all packed up and headed home.
Little did I know both actors drove nearly FOUR HOURS to come volunteer for this film. After hearing this, did I feel bad about making them drive that far for a twenty minute table read that could have been done online? Yes, I did, and I apologized for it! I had absolutely no idea they lived so far away. But it did warm my heart that two people were willing to do that drive, while there was still snow on the ground, to volunteer for my film.
After that I began editing, it took me all of two weeks to edit and upload the short film. To this day it has about five thousand views, which isn’t that bad!
I am very proud of this film, especially for how well it came out for having next to no experience on what I was doing.
If you haven’t watched Love Lost, check it out on YouTube!
LINK: https://youtu.be/ZQiXdE3fbAs?si=_J1aWBlZHR9GUxlG
And If you want to read the short story that inspired it all, it’s right here on this blog!