As an Editor of low-budget feature films, you will have a lot of conversations with Producers about their upcoming projects. They will usually turn the subject pretty quickly to schedules, with the intention of discussing how long you (and they) think it might take to edit the film. So what should you say?
A Common Suggestion
For some reason, a large proportion of low-budget feature film Producers have the idea that roughly 10-12 weeks is long enough to edit a feature film. I’m here to tell you that this is rarely a sensible starting point for an edit schedule.
Some Producers will talk about the edit separately from the Assembly, but seeing as the Editor of the film will usually do the Assembly, I always talk about the total time I will be on the job for.
To answer the initial question of this post, I would suggest that an absolute minimum of 16 weeks is scheduled for the edit, with the expectation that it will most likely take something like 20.
As Shaheen Schleifer, an experienced Post-Production Supervisor whose knowledge you can benefit from as part of our Post-Production Demystified course explains, the expectation should be that a low-budget film will actually take longer, as the filmmakers have less experience, meaning that there will likely be more issues to fix.
This assumes of course that the filmmaker’s are able to identify and fix those issues, but that’s a post for another day.
Let’s run the numbers
So, why is 20 weeks a more reasonable duration than 10? Aside from the fact that more time means more time to fix things of course.
I think what most of those who suggest 10 weeks don’t do is to break down what actually needs to happen in that time. An edit usually takes place in stages, and in order to complete the edit to a high standard (which is really what we’re talking about doing here, not just asking “what’s the shortest time we can edit our feature film in?”), those stages all need, broadly speaking, to happen.
Let’s break down our imaginary 10 week edit schedule then. Starting with the Assembly, if we have a 20 day or 4-week shoot, which is pretty common for a sub-$1m film, then you should expect the Assembly to take up to 5 weeks. It may be done in a little less, but you should expect your Assembly to take about a week longer than the shoot if you’re doing a character-based drama. If you have multiple action sequences then you should expect the Assembly to take longer, but let’s stick to 4+1.
OK, well that’s already accounted for 5 weeks of your 10 week schedule.
Now we’ll jump to the end. Ideally you should spend at least 2 weeks doing your Fine Cut, but we’re working to a tight schedule here so let’s get that down to 1 week. 6 weeks accounted for. 4 remaining.
You’ll also most likely have to screen the film at least once or twice for the Producers and spend some time addressing their notes. Again, this is super tight, but let’s say a week each to do a screening and a notes pass, x2. 8 weeks accounted for. 2 remaining.
So now let’s look at the Director’s Cut. We have 2 weeks left. 2 weeks to do at least one pass on the whole film (one pass won’t be enough to leave you with a happy Director, but let’s carry on running the numbers). If you divide your c85-100 min film into 5 reels of c20 mins each, these 2 weeks give you 2 days to work on each 20 minute reel.
I would hope that long before this point you’ve realised that these numbers just don’t add up. We’ve already scheduled several stages super-tight, and yet we still have barely any time for a Director’s Cut
Why don’t we just cut corners?
A sentiment that I also come across often is the idea that we can just, you know, cut a few corners? Surely removing a few weeks here and there won’t make much of a difference?
As it happens, yes, those few weeks do make a big difference.
What I’ve also frequently experienced, and also seen friends and colleagues experiencing is what you might call “producing by budget”. In other words, “this is all the money we’ve set aside for the edit, so this is all the time you will get”. What frequently seems to happen in this situation is that 10/12/14 weeks will be scheduled for the edit, the Director and Editor will exhaust themselves trying to deliver something strong in a crazy short amount of time, and then, a few weeks out from the final deadline, everyone will start to worry about the fact that the film isn’t looking like it will be in good enough shape in 2/4/6 weeks time.
So money gets moved around, deals get made, sound work gets pushed, and a few extra weeks magically appear on the edit schedule. The problem now is that the edit team have been working flat-out for 3 months, a load of steps have been missed and corners cut (as requested), and so time has to be spent undoing things, or resisting things that were deemed disposable.
This means that although a 14 week schedule gets expanded to 20 weeks, because 3 weeks have been wasted addressing Producer’s notes too early, or material was skipped over, or a scene was rushed and now needs to be taken back to square one, those 20 weeks have really only been spent doing 17 weeks work. This is what we call a false economy.
What I frequently point out is that if we could just cut these corners with no consequences, then everyone really would edit their low-budget feature in 10 weeks.
Producing by budget
I mentioned this previously, but many inexperienced Producers seem to work out how much they want or can afford to spend in the edit, and then approach the Editor with this number (often 10-12 weeks), without considering how long is actually needed.
All films are different of course. They all present different problems and are made by people with different personalities and preferred ways of working, but it usually takes at least a certain amount of time do the things that the vast majority of films need doing.
Almost every film has dozens of hours of footage, with a script of 90+ pages which needs turning into an Assembly of 100+ minutes. All films have problems which need solving. All Assemblies fail to be the film the Director wanted to make. All films will undergo changes when the Director’s Cut emerges and receives notes. All films will need their pacing fixing once all the problems that can be fixed are fixed.
It is difficult to predict exactly how long a film will take to edit, but there’s usually a pretty good estimate for a minimum.
Ultimately, longer in the edit means a better film. It is really is often as simple as time = quality. The more time you invest into the edit, the better the film will ultimately be.
You don’t just edit a film once. You iterate over and over, refining and improving as you go. Each pass on a film you’re experimenting with both solving problems and creating magic. The more time you have to experiment, the stronger the film will be, because each day you spend on it you will find more solutions, find more graceful ways to achieve something, and discover more redundancies that will risk boring your audience.
Also, editing is usually one of the cheapest stages of making a film in terms of weekly cost. Helpfully though, it’s also a stage when additional time can make a significant and obvious improvement.
Now not all Producers or financiers will care how good the final film is. As long as it’s finished, features the actors they wanted, and can make a decent trailer, then what they need from the project is delivered.
But as filmmakers, all the time, effort, and money invested up to this point is best served by making sure that you spend as much time as you can spare on this crucial stage.
If you want to find out more about the stages most features go through during their 20 (not 10) week edits, check out our breakdown of the 5 Stages of the Edit.