[Watch the video interview on Youtube here]
Film Courage: J., what’s the cheapest documentary you’ve ever made?
J. Horton, Filmmaker/Youtuber/Podcaster: I want to say free, no money but There’s no such thing as a free documentary because your time’s worth this, you had to pay for the equipment, blah, blah, blah…but anyway I there’s a good number of them that I literally I don’t put anything financially into them other than what I already have and my time.
I own two cameras. I have a small Sony that I did interviews on for a long time. Now I have a Blackmagic 6K Cinema that I do interviews on. My shooting partner in California has a Blackmagic 6K that he shoots on. I have my own sound gear so I do it all.
I have an ongoing subscription to Storyblocks for my supplemental b-roll and then whatever b-roll I shoot on set. Then occasionally I take kind of a journalistic approach with documentaries where I typically don’t pay for interviews. Now occasionally, depending on the person or their status within that genre, I may pay a few hundred dollars or thousand dollars for an interview but very rarely. most of the time I don’t.
It’s just maybe a little travel and that’s about it for the most part.
Film Courage: For sound, what do you use?
J.: I have an Audio-Technica shotgun mic. I think it costs maybe $120 and then I have a set of Sennheiser lavs [lavalier mics] and a Zoom H4. I’ll use that.
Film Courage: How do you write your documentary scripts?
J.: I don’t really write them in a traditional sense. I don’t do a lot of pre-structuring of my documentaries. I’ve started to kind of experiment with that a little more as I’m doing more inserting myself into them and writing more voice over and those parts. That has become a little more of a thing.
For the most part I pick a subject, I write the same questions usually for most of the interviews (usually around 25) and I usually only get to maybe…(Watch the video interview on Youtube here).
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BIO:
Filmmaker, Youtube Creator and Producer of many feature films and documentaries, J. Horton is known for boldly crossing genre boundaries and ‘getting it done.” In addition to his prolific work in the film industry, he’s gained a lot of traction in recent years as a Youtube personality. His Channel The J. Horton is a go to spot for filmmakers wanting to learn more about the business side of filmmaking.
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Camera we use for interviews – https://buff.ly/3rWqrra
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