1

As a producer, “Hello Cherry” is a short film that can be done with a micro-budget. I planned to shoot for 3-4 days. Because many of the scenes in the script were at night, the first day started in the evening. In the afternoon, the shooting team will arrive at the location early to set up the equipment. The estimate is 2-3 days of shooting, save the time to make up for the recording time. Regarding the budget, the first is the location. There are three places in the script – Street, Cherry’s house, and Office – and I am going to rent a friend’s house, which is structured in such a way that you had to walk through a hallway to get to the living room. There is a large space in front of the kitchen. There are four rooms on the second floor. One of the master bedrooms is very spacious. I will use the master bedroom as the room where Cherry meets Jenny. Since there is a large space in front of the kitchen, I decide to set up a simple office location here. It’s like a company where each person has a cubicle of their own. Only 3-4 boards are needed to form a cubicle. Just need to set up Cherry’s cubicle. I have used this method before and it was successful. This will save the budget for renting Office. About the shot the street, this street nears the house. So the whole shooting does not need to drive to change the venue. Although the house is in the suburbs, we can still save a part in transportation. And I have my own equipment, the only thing I need is light, which I need to rent. This short film requires two background music tracks.I have a list of songs that copyright is free and have chosen two songs in it. I also need some sound effects, such as the sound of a door opening, the sound of a message, the sound of chains colliding, etc. There are many free sound effects available online. If there are hard-to-find sound effects, such as the sound of chains colliding. I can record this sound in the live.

Regarding the staff, four people make a shoot team. I think it is possible to find students who are studying media to work together. In this way, we will also have experience and the cost will be cheaper than a team that is already working. The whole film doesn’t need special effects, so the most important part of editing is color. The actors need to be two long-haired girls – two people of the same age. And the body type is to be similar. The script extras-colleague, need to shoot a member of the team to temporarily participate in the role. Because this role is not required to show their faces. Since some parts of the film have to be shot at night and the next day is a full day of shooting, overtime is required. According to the Motion Picture Production Certified Agreement 2010, overtime is paid at 1.5 times the rate. In the cost of actors, the cost is relatively high. The next thing is the makeup costumes, such as the T-shirt, I think the actress can wear their own T-shirt. As for the red dress and some things to decorate the room, I will buy them on “Tao Bao”, a Chinese online shopping app. Adding the postage also is cheap. The whole film doesn’t need special effects makeup, the makeup is basic, so I can take on the role of a makeup artist.

Overall, the cost of this short film mainly lies in the cost of the actors, so a micro-budget of 5k is possible to complete the production of this short film.

2

“Hello Cherry”  is mainly about a weak girl Cherry, who meets a girl Jenny in a dream world, who is the opposite of her personality, Jenny is her second personality, in the dream world they have a dispute, and finally, Cherry was constantly verbally stimulated by the situation,  the main personality was occupied by Jenny. The story. As a director, this short film is a drama and contains a few thriller elements. For example, at the end of the dream, Jenny brainwashes Cherry and makes her break down in the midst of these verbal stimuli. In the end, in real life, Cherry’s right hand has a tattoo with stars. Some of these contain thriller elements. Since it is expressing two personalities, in the selection of actors, not only do you want two actors of similar physical size and age. I also wanted my acting skills to be good. I envisioned that the main way to distinguish the two personalities is through the eyes, which can express many emotions. Not only that, at the end of the dream, I envisioned an exaggerated physical collision between the two actors. For example, Jenny pinches Cherry’s chin, forcing her to look up at herself in the mirror, and then speaks close to Cherry’s ear. As if this can slowly destroy Cherry’s last line of defense. So the second half of the dream requires a lot of handheld shoot and also needs a lot of expression close-up. The close-ups of expressions plus the shaking of the camera will have a strong sense of unease. This will bring out the atmosphere of the film. For this short film, I also want to try the one-take shooting format. For example, in scene 2, Cherry walks home while throwing away her bag and walking to the couch. Here you can use the one take form of filming, first a close-up of the clock, and then slowly become a wide shot, showing the panoramic view of the living room. When the door is opened, the camera turns to the door, follows Cherry a little backward, and finally slowly turns to the window. Most of the others are shots that need to be smooth, using a tripod, dolly, or camera stabilizer.

The whole short film was shot mainly at night, so it is very important for lighting during the shooting process. You need to use them to imitate the moonlight and the street lights outside. The beginning part is mainly cold light, and a little blue will use when editing. When she enters Jenny’s room, the light inside needs to use a color filter, when the scene is shot, there will be a little orange light mixed with a little green in the dark environment. Such an atmosphere will look more bizarre and abrupt, reflecting the room appears unreasonable. Orange light can be mainly candlelight. The color can be deepened when editing at the end. The whole film needs to be adjusted in the editing is the color. I want to use a dark tone for most of the whole video. For music, do not make special production. Just need to find some sound effects on the Internet, and background music that has been selected and can be used directly.

Since the whole film is basically done in a house, it saves a lot of time to not change locations. So it was possible to finish the shooting in 3-4 days. The reason why I chose this house is that there is a lot of space to use. For example, the space in front of the kitchen. Here you can temporarily set up as a desk. Because this part of the shooting is mainly mid-shot, this space is just right. Since there are no special effects in the film, needs 3days of editing. I think the whole production schedule of one week is perfectly fine.

3

My script reduced the number of address changes and actors in order to achieve a micro-budget. I originally intended to rent an office as a location, and the part where Cherry works in the office was originally intended to be a dialogue between her and her co-workers. But that would have increased the budget, and I couldn’t just shoot mid-shots.One of the biggest challenges of my script was shooting in a set-up cubicle, and the other was the exaggerated physical contact between the two actors. Filming in a cubicle requires care because the space is relatively small and easy to have goofed. And in the shooting, the physical contact between the two actors will need to shoot after the storyboard is prepared in detail. Because this part needs to shoot a lot of shots. In general, I don’t have a problem without over the budget for this work. I hope this work can be really produced. This will prove that creative short films can be made even with a micro-budget. I think this is the main content of the studio.