SHOW ME THE MONEY!

At the point at which you start to solicit money for your movie you become a business and as such, should start acting accordingly. Get yourself some legal representation. I know it sounds dreary and expensive but there are numerous alternatives such as Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts and the many guild and professional organizations that have legal councilors that sometimes help the occasional loose cannon.

Then there's the actual budget. A decent script with a funky budget has less chance of getting made than a mediocre script with an outstanding budget. Put a good script together with a great budget and you've got a true formula for success. Good budgets instill a sense of reliability and confidence in those dilly enough to invest in your little venture.

Since the budget is such an integral and necessary element of production you might want to hire out this process if no one in your immediate production entourage has the aptitude. Don't feel bad. Many right-brained individuals have a hard time with the budgeting process. The important thing is to have someone who will keep you focused on it through the entire production process. Small extravagances at the beginning can snowball into painful overages by the time you hit editing. The result could and often is a drastic reduction in the amount of resource left to print the video to film.

An intelligent way to create a budget is to get some good software like TURBO BUDGET or MOVIE MAGIC BUDGETING, and a copy of Michael Wiese's book FILM AND VIDEO BUDGETS. It has a wide selection of samples from various production scenarios ranging from feature film productions all the way to "film school chutzpah". It also breaks down the cost per day of every job description in both standard and non-standard productions as well as supplying you with a comprehensive list of industry standard budget codes.

As a producer you'll need to communicate with a wide range of craftspeople, each with their own lingo and concerns. An excellent resource for understanding the disparate endeavors and motivations involved in the cinematic manufacturing process is DIGITAL FILMMAKING by Thomas Ohanian and Michael Phillips. Their book deals with the procedural and technical aspects of production in the form of interviews with some of the best craftsmen working in the industry today.