Axis StudiosLove, Death + Robots Behind the Scenes
Axis Studios
Netflix
A short film detailing the behind the scenes process for the award-winning Netflix animated drama, Helping Hand, which is part of the Love, Death + Robots series. This film was made by Axis Studios.
We carefully lit the interviews to give them a cinematic look. These were filmed over two days to work around interviewee availability. We also filmed B-Roll of the team working using a slider for engaging cinematic shots.
Let's demystify the process of video production. We estimate this example to cost around £5.5-6.5k because we logged roughly:
2 days of production management which is low as we just covered an activity that was organised by our client. As a ballpark we estimate 1/2 day management per day of shoot and edit. This could be higher for complex projects or lower if you can help with the creative or coordination. This includes scheduling, edit supervision and producing documentation such as risk assessments.
2 day shoot which means there must have been things that could not all be fit into fewer days. Filming is priced at a day rate for crew and equipment so we always aim to film as much as we can on a single day. This is not always possible due to location/participant availability.
Single camera used as one camera is often sufficient but we would suggest additional when there's multiple processes/people that need to be filmed at the same time or if we need to capture multiple angles of the same thing that we can't simply repeat.
We recorded audio as adding a Producer to the shoot to coordinate interviews, vox pops and other audio is a very cost effective way of adding a clear narrative to your films and we are experts at getting relaxed and natural performances.
A slider was used to capture cinematic shots.
Tripod / handheld shots are effective but where the budget allows the inclusion of an additional crew member with cinematic kit like this (eg a slider / crane / drone) can really elevate the production value.
4 days of post production time. Generally the length of post production depends on the volume of footage, number of deliverable versions (eg social cuts) and rounds of revisions budgeted. This was not consecutive days as we leave gaps for client feedback.
No voiceover recorded by us. VO is very effective but requires actor fees as well as scripting, recording and editing time. We only suggest professional VO if there's not a more cost effective way to convey information such as interviews, on screen text or a recording provided by your team.
No animation / graphic design was supplied by us. We can, as we did here, design simple titles or use stock animation as part of the edit process but where possible we suggest budgeting for original animation to elevate and brand any film.