[Mark Suszko]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnBC5bwV5y0

Some contents or functionalities here are not available due to your cookie preferences!

This happens because the functionality/content marked as “Google Youtube” uses cookies that you choosed to keep disabled. In order to view this content or use this functionality, please enable cookies: click here to open your cookie preferences.

[Mark Suszko]

Use Wordle, then screen capture?

[Mark Suszko]

You could have some fun with the wall mirror for some shots. The couch and table area look useful. A typical scene would also be standing near the big picture window, looking out while talking. Get another piece of glass to stage in front of the character, *inside* the room, *near* the real window, that could be fun to shoot thru.

Did you get the hotel room to be an *actual* hotel room the character is using, or is it supposed to look like some other place? Exactly how many different scenes will you shoot here?

[Mark Suszko]

If it makes sense that the door can remain open, that’s a good place to shoot in some practical light, as is a window. Doors and windows can also suggest time of day or night, depending on the color and color temperature, but also on the ANGLE the light comes in at. Sketch and post the general floorplan of the bathroom, it will help.

[Mark Suszko]

The bottom example is using, at a guess, at least nine individual lights between the background and the foreground.
the blue-looking top example could be mostly bounced daylight from the window, but probably has a little bit of directed fill from an HMI in it as well.

If you can describe the camera direction and narrative action in a sentence, that helps the LD figure out what mood to set. “Girlfriend and Boyfriend’s relationship is damaged, they are working out their good-byes, in a cold, “the morning after” atmosphere.”
Or…
“The initial sparring and other preliminaries, when they both know they really want to get to it, but each is still not completely trusting the other. Action moves around the set from area to area, each time, they get closer to each other.”

[Mark Suszko]

Greg’s advice is good: take it.

Regarding how you report the income, IANAA, I seem to recall that below a certain amount, if your income is below the poverty line, or you’re a teen just starting out flipping burgers, I think you don’t have to, but you should, anyhow, since the burger outfit will file for it and you’ll get W-2’s. Among your options is to file 1040 long form with Schedule A, ( also known as slow torture method 1) and you could report it as “other income” in addition to whatever work you get W2’s for.

If you consider yourself self-employed, then you need to look up how to file the SE version of the IRS1040 for that, and beware, because Uncle expects you to estimate your total projected take for the year, in advance, then make quarterly advance payments based on that estimate. If you made less than the estimate, you’ll get a big refund. Make more than the estimate, you need to pay extra at the end of the year. But you don’t get to enjoy the money until after tax filing. Miss the quarterly payments, however, and you get big penalties.

Big. Penalties.

I once got bit that way, and mistakenly reported the extra income as “other income” when it should have been quarterly payments. Cleaning up the mess using a pro accountant and making the penalty payments with all the rest of my profits from that venture, got me out of trouble, but not making the quarterlies cost me a lot of money that I’d rather have spent on many other things. Like that Sisyphean attempt to save enough dough to get to Hawaii for a few weeks before I croak.

[Mark Suszko]

Camera isn’t the issue:

You need to bring along the right lighting gear to deal with the differences in color temperature. I’d suggest balancing for daylight and bringing an LED fill ; where local practical sources are tungsten, they’ll add a bit of golden glow but that should actually help.

You also need a ton of advance legal clearances from the mall owners to shoot there. What a specific store owner says doesn’t mean anything until mall management gets its say-so.

[Mark Suszko]

I’d count on it.

[Mark Suszko]

My final answer still comes down to this: the ONLY way to avoid losing out to piracy on these small gigs, is to pre-sell with a minimum number of orders, and make the parents be the order takers and enforcers. If you don’t get the minimum number of orders to make your profit, you don’t release, or, if you’re really drastically hard-core, you don’t record it. You get paid in advance for fifty orders, and any extra dubs after that, charge whatever the market will bear, but it isn’t likely to be much, because dishonest and cheapskate parents in the group will share between each other or post to the web anyway. You don’t want to have to make a career out of watching the net and issuing take-down notices, do you?

There * is * a way to pirate-proof a product of this sort… by giving it away, thus taking away the pirate’s financial incentive, but promoting the wider sharing of the content, beyond your original market space. How do you do that? You find an underwriter or sponsor for the program, get your production fees and profit up-front, then release the media for free, but branded with the underwriter’s advertising. Which also lets you up-sell your ad production services, making the commercials that are inserted into the thing.

A few possible underwriters for a high school show:

soft drink bottlers
grocery store chains
sporting goods store
Franchise restaurants
Car dealership
Youth clothing store/formalwear store
Department store
US armed forces recruiting
local bank or credit union
Dental clinic
Sports rehab clinic
Music (instrument) store
Local water or theme park
Local movie theatre chain
Realtor

Yes, that’s more legwork for you to set up. But you get paid off the top. Guaranteed.

[Mark Suszko]

That is possible, but, thumb drives cost more than blank media, and unless you buy a duplicating tower for them (they do make such things), you’re dubs are done one at time. Which may not be bad for an occasional twenty dubs, but believe me is torture for fifty or more. Playing long videos direct off a thumb drive comes up against problems with FAT32 or other storage formats – remember how longer songs sounded on 8-track, with the interruption mid-song to click over to the next track?

And then what? Unless it’s encrypted or something, it just takes one person to pirate that file, and you are done making any more money.