YouTuber Offered $30M Contract with Sam Raimi

[ryanjm]

Every time they say "made the movie for under $1k" you basically have to assume they aren't including any money for the guy's time and the software programs needed to make the fx. Obviously, if he was being paid to make this, rather than doing it on his own, it would have cost quite a bit more.

 

[Greg_77]

It seems like the robots were wasting their time. Why blow up individual buildings when you are going to blow up the whole city in one bast anyways?

 

[logitic]

I have to agree, a hobbyist didn't make this film. It tooks weeks to render it, much less design it. Good work to the guy, but don't say it only cost 300$ to make...

 

[plbyrd]

[citation][nom]logitic[/nom]I have to agree, a hobbyist didn't make this film. It tooks weeks to render it, much less design it. Good work to the guy, but don't say it only cost 300$ to make...[/citation]
Why not? Please give some meat to your argument that he didn't have to mete out more than $300 to meet the requirements of making the movie in his own time.

 

[azcoyote]

Well whatever the real cost or time spent, I see a future for this fellow. Bring on the movie in 2010 or 2011...

 

[filmman03]

its hard to understand why most of u ppl think it cost more than $300. It was less than 5minutes, he had very few ppl acting in it, he obviously used a consumer level hdcam and im assuming final cut, probably not avid media composer (hollywood standard non linear editing suite). the cgi took a huge amount of time, but didn't interrupt the editing process, assuming that he had a rough cut done and exported the QT and imported it into motion or after effects for the cgi.

he probably did the filming, editing, and cgi himself. so all in all, he only spent that $300 probably on the hd tape, and getting permits to film in his city, and probably some food for the actors rather than a paycheck.


just coming from someone who is in the film industry

 

[masterasia]

WOW!!! I would actually pay to go see a feature film like this instead of getting it off bit torrent.

 

[scurvywombat]

Cool!

 

[pepperman]

[citation][nom]plbyrd[/nom]Why not? Please give some meat to your argument that he didn't have to mete out more than $300 to meet the requirements of making the movie in his own time.[/citation]

Econ 101: opportunity costs.

It may be true that he only spent $300, but the question is; how much does he value his time?
He could have been working during the time it took to film and edit it, he could have been exercising, golfing, gaming, etc.
Unless he values his life at $0, he 'spent' much more than $300.

 

[plbyrd]

Actually you are citing the difference between cost accounting and managerial accounting. Whether it's by accrual or cash basis, cost accounting is only concerned with dollars spent. Managerial accounting deals with things such as opportunity costs. I doubt seriously that there's a large enough section of the THG readership that gives a rats @$$ about managerial accounting that's trying to rationalize how much this guy should have been credited for spending based upon his potential earnings based upon the contract he just got from Sam Raimi.

And BTW, if you really want to start splitting hairs, you can add time into the equation and force the opportunity costs to be depreciated over a set number of years as the creation of the video is an actual property of the creator and may be depreciated over the time of the copyright period for the piece which could easily make the current costs of the video to be less than $300 even when including opportunity costs.

 

[pepperman]

Indeed, however (opportunity costs aside), one must consider his electrical expenditures from charging the video camera battery, the energy used to power the machine with which he performed his editing (unless of course these were done using public power, which I'm guessing at least the editing was definitely not).
If we want to be totally inclusive, we need to consider a portion of the cost of the camera, the computer, etc. that were used.
Though you are probably right about not many people caring...

 

[deviltenchi]

Having a actor friend I've head many stories of working for pizza so she can fill up the resume. So many of the actors probably where friends or from acting school looking to get some experience.
I agree with filmman03, he probably spent the money on food, permits and tapes for his HDCAM.

 

[plbyrd]

Pepperman,

Without a full disclosure of how $300 was arrived at, how do you know all of this isn't included?

But this is devolving into an accounting 101 homework problem now. Let's just be happy the dude made the frickin' video, the video rocks, and it didn't take the budget of a small country to create it.

 

[pepperman]

You're absolutely right; none of the data was included with the article, and likely the only person who knows the entire cost (if he even does) is the filmmaker.
I do agree about the video itself, I hope he can provide the same (if not greater) level of film-making when applied on a larger scale.

 

[Guest]

HE invested $300. Someone else invested the THOUSANDS of dollars it took to make it, no doubt.
But pretty sweet anyway.

 

[jalek]

So many people around convinced nothing can be filmed for less than a million.

Face it, every other industry's doing more with less. You're next.

 

[Shadow703793]

It's amazing what you can do with consumer level hardware/software.

 

[matt_b]

That's one way to post your resume out on the web!

 

[griffed88]

wow, I struggle to believe he spent only $300. This looks waaaaaay better than that Turbo movie that USC grad student made and his budget was $100,000

 

[Glorian]

Again another article that people come shit all over it, Of course there is over head with anything you do but who knows if the software and hardware he used wasn't already payed for by something else he did.

I mean a bunch of yall bitching and nitpicking at the cost, you probably built your own system right? When you tell people how much it cost do you figure in the cost of your hourly rate, your screwdriver set, the knife you used to cut the tape off the box, or the soda you drank when you installed the OS, the cost of the keyboard from your previous build, or even the electricity it has used since you built it?

It not like this guy decided one day he was going to going to buy a new pc, buy brand new software, higher people he didn't know and and get a new camera to make a CG movie from scratch, I can almost guarantee he had all that equipment.

Its like a Mechanic buying brand new tools to do his own car when he already has all the tool in his shop.