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The Creative Work You do Between Gigs Defines You and Your Company
129 Plays2 years ago
I sit down and talk to Chris Donaldson and Julien Scherliss of Moment.film (www.moment.film) about what it takes to regularly put out great, personal creative work outside of the daily grind of our production lives.
Moment.film, during their first 2 years in business has put out a ton of commercial work for Seattle agencies and beyond but at the same time they've also produced a 10 minute and 20 minute pair of short films and a 10 minute documentary. AND they've paid for it all with profits from their commercial work.
We touch on -
- Being sure to have profit in your company to pay for these creative endeavors
- Why keeping it "lean and mean" can help set you up to be able to pursue outside creative
- What you do and don't get out of these creative forays
- How the creative you do on the side often defines who you are as a company
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Transcript
Introduction to Moment and Co-Founders
00:00:05
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to Crossing the Axis. I'm your host Max Keiser, the CEO of Pipeline Production Management Software.
00:00:17
Speaker
I am here today with two of my very old friends. They're not very old. I didn't mean to say that. They are not very old, but they're very old friends. And they're people that I worked with for many years at our old company Handcrank Films. And their names are Chris Donaldson and Julian Cherless. Welcome, gentlemen. Hey, Max. Hey, how's it going?
00:00:43
Speaker
It's going well. They now are co-conspirators in an endeavor known as Moment. And you can find it at moment.film. And basically, they were able to take all the crap they didn't like about Handcrank.
Moment's Philosophy: Creativity Over Profit
00:01:00
Speaker
and make it into the great company they always dreamed they could be a part of. And it is really cool. I mean, let's look at it. You know, we, Handcrank, we were a full service, like we, or we had all the gear and everything, right? We had everything. We had the vans, we had the cameras, we had all that. You sort of said,
00:01:20
Speaker
No, we don't want all that overhead. We had a lot of staff at one point, you said, no, we want to just be tight and lean. And then most of all, you really said we want to focus on these creative things, whether or not some of them are paying. We want to make
00:01:41
Speaker
creativity and the output of work that is inspiring to us are our sort of first and foremost goal. And by keeping it lean and putting a little bit of the money back into your passion projects, you've been able to do that. You've been doing that moment now is in its second year. Is that right? Two years. Yeah, just over two years. Yeah.
00:02:07
Speaker
Yep, yep. And it seems like it's going pretty well. I would say that it's going, it is going well. And I think Max, you know, you sort of touched on it. You know, tell us when, you know, I hope someone tells us when we get to that nirvana that you mentioned before.
00:02:31
Speaker
But it's something that we're definitely working on. And I think part of what we're really geared towards is, and we were just talking about this the other day, we sat down and really we're looking at the whiteboard and thinking about, okay, can we remind ourselves what our North Star is again? And what does that really look like? And who do we aspire to be as we sort of go down this path?
00:02:56
Speaker
And I think Julian in particular has been a really strong proponent for just really pushing that. So that has definitely been just foundational to sort of how we approach not only the company, but just the business and the community in general.
00:03:17
Speaker
Yeah, I'm not surprised that Julian, you are a big part of that. I think you were one of the people at Handcrank that sort of forced me to stop and say, well, this is great, but why? Why are we doing it? And you were really, I just remember that really being a startling moment for myself. Not that I hadn't thought of the why, but you really
00:03:39
Speaker
You moved it into the sort of pole position as to what we were doing. How's that going from your perspective, Julie, now that you are running the show alongside Chris?
00:03:52
Speaker
I mean, I think it's
Mission-Driven Challenges and Approaches
00:03:53
Speaker
yeah, I mean, it's been great. It's been such a learning experience. I mean, I've never ran a business before. And Chris has been an amazing mentor in that. And also you max to just being at hand crank and seeing how that was ran. And I think a lot of those elements are still inside of our business. I think it's always I think one thing I've just noticed is how how it can be
00:04:20
Speaker
Difficult over time, you have to keep checking in and making sure that you're staying true to what your mission is. And I mean, I think when we started Moment Films, really our mission was to make sure that we were making films that were having a positive impact inside of the world. And that's really what me and Chris talked about when we started the company. We're like, how do we
00:04:39
Speaker
found a production company on that idea that each film we're making has some sort of positive impact. And how do we also make enough money to survive doing that? And it was interesting because we just had a meeting. Yeah, I think the beginning of this week or the end of last week, it all blends together. And we just kind of went through and just put everything on the board again
00:05:07
Speaker
sort of what are our goals for this company and are we still on target for that and what are the things that we feel like we have to have as part of our DNA of our company and what are the things that we sort of would like to have but aren't necessary and it was kind of funny because we came up with all of these things that we felt like we needed to have in our company.
00:05:28
Speaker
Um, and then the one thing that we had that we thought was nice to have was a profit. Um, maybe it's, maybe it's more important than we're making it, but I do feel like we really have ran our company in a way that, um, we've put all of those other things first. Um, and it's definitely allowed us and just being lean and mean as a company has allowed us to really prioritize that. And I think that.
00:05:58
Speaker
I think a lot of our clients have seen that and appreciated it about us. Where did you say you put profit on the list? It was nice to have category. It was actually the only thing in the nice to have category. And when you say profit, I just want to clarify, you're talking about after paying yourselves.
00:06:20
Speaker
Uh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. I mean, we do need revenue. No, no, that's good. That's good. I just want to make, that's kind of something I like to clarify for all of our listeners who maybe are on the smaller end of the spectrum that profit only counts after you've been paid. It doesn't count if you're taking it home. That's a different thing. So, um, just, and I think we've had, we've had a lot of potential for that to
00:06:44
Speaker
line to get blurred, but I don't think it actually ever really has, which we've just been very fortunate. Since starting the company, we haven't really had any issue with that. We've always had work and we've always had paying clients and we've always been paid. Do you assign yourselves a salary?
00:07:05
Speaker
Chris probably can speak to that more than I can. He definitely... Well, it's sort of interesting, Max, because when we first started, we're getting into sort of the business model here. I mean, we really paid ourselves as crew members on jobs. And then there was also obviously a margin on top of that that went to the company.
00:07:27
Speaker
And so, you know, we really sort of validated our value to each project by the work that we did Julian and I 50 50 across the board but we really split up the work, you know, equally across projects, right, and and paid ourselves as crew members so I would
00:07:45
Speaker
Yeah, it really sort of just kept things super clean. So we would have three days of pre-production, okay, we make this much money. We'd have two shoot days, okay, we're making this much money. We'd have, you know, the post-production. How would you work creative into that?
00:08:02
Speaker
Uh, so creative would work into the in pre-pro, um, and we would definitely have a line item for creative and really put in, put in the time for that. And we treat, you know, we don't treat, we don't, it's funny cause you know, the rest of the, of the line items that you see are basically day rates.
00:08:19
Speaker
Um, but we tend to just charge a chunk, a lump sum for creative. So we'll just say, well, for, you know, well, sure, we'll come up with some creative, but it's going to cost you, you know, 7,500 bucks. Um, and, and then we'll, you know, and then we'll once you sign, and that includes, you know, many different things that can include a variety of different ideas.
00:08:42
Speaker
that can involve scripts, that can involve some loose storyboards, all this stuff to really make the client really feel like this is the direction I really want to go in. Before we then sort of lock off and start the project in pre-pro. Does it always work that way? No, but that is sort of a goal that we aspire to. And then we just really make sure and the budget is so important to really make sure that we're hitting that margin for the company as well.
00:09:12
Speaker
Yeah,
Balancing Financial and Artistic Goals
00:09:13
Speaker
when you talk about profit, when Julian talks about profit, you're exactly right. That's money that is on top of what we pay ourselves so that we can really build. We answer to the company, so the company in many ways has even paid first, but we make sure that we're well compensated as well, but it really is like, okay, we worked for three days on this project, just like one of our
00:09:39
Speaker
other crew members did. Okay, what was our day rate on that? Okay, here's a check. Yep. Well, what's what's amazing is what you go and do with that profit. And and you know, we've talked a bit on the show about how when you have profit, it opens up opportunities and profit is opportunity and profit is is whether it's the opportunity, sometimes for some people, it's the opportunity to buy a piece of gear that they can then capitalize. But that's not exactly what you folks have chosen to do with profit. Can you tell me a bit about that?
00:10:12
Speaker
Julian can speak to this, but I'll just jump in real quickly. When we first started the company, down in the Make Worth Coffee Shop right across the street here, we just really thought about what does our slate look like? What would the perfect world look like to us?
00:10:28
Speaker
And so we divided that circle of work into three pretty distinct parts. One is commercial work that we do for clients that's paid. One is documentary work. And one is narrative work that may not be paid, but we need to do it anyway. And so to adhere to that mission, one of the things we've done is just really allocated, like you mentioned, a percentage of our profits
00:10:55
Speaker
to some of this work that we have financed, that have self-financed. You know, films like Two, films like Maslow, we're working on a documentary right now. These are projects that we really thought, you know what, this is inspiring to us and we're gonna point some of the resources of the company that we've earned over these commercial projects back into this work. And it's proved quite, it's beneficial to us.
00:11:23
Speaker
Yeah, so they're fantastic films. Tooth, I just just finished watching. I loved it. It has a very immediate, very verite feel to it that I just really loved and it has a sort of really beautiful, simple message.
00:11:42
Speaker
and you have done obviously very well with it at festivals. Then the Maslow, completely different film, sort of a sci-fi genre film, and I would just throw it right up there with a Black Mirror-esque inspired feeling behind it, and it is awesome. Both of them are incredibly beautifully lensed by Chris Kozer, and they are
00:12:10
Speaker
they're both just tour de forces in sort of creative output. And then was the Chaz documentary as well? That wasn't paid for, was it? Not from outside people or was it? No.
00:12:25
Speaker
No, no, it wasn't. Yeah, that was a social piece that you did early on, just as you guys were getting started. And and that's fantastic in the way that it sort of it tells a bit of a story that actually was pretty cool because it's about this sort of Seattle
00:12:41
Speaker
it was called the CHAS area during the Seattle sort of unrest a few years ago and a couple years ago. And what I loved about it was it was the kind of story that could almost only be told by a group that had literally no bias or interest either way in this situation. And I thought it was just really great that it was able to sort of tell some backstory
00:13:02
Speaker
that wasn't the news or anything. It just sort of told sort of the other half of the story, the kind of story you could only hear if you really put your ear to the ground. And it did a beautiful job of doing that too. So here we have three extraordinarily different films, three very, very creative films, but you're doing it. You're pulling these passion projects off. So,
00:13:27
Speaker
That's amazing because it is so difficult to allot that cash, to take the cash out of your hands and put it into these films. And it's so difficult to take the time and the personal time and energy. Can we talk to us for a second about that? Like, how much time are you spending on each of these films? I mean, it's all relative. Yeah, I mean, I think that
00:13:54
Speaker
We definitely have the benefit of sort of having work come in ebbs and flows. And I mean, a big thing we've been talking about recently is just creating space. I think that's such an important piece. How do you create space inside of your work and how do you make it so that you're not just working 10 hour days every day? Because I think if you do, then you don't really have any time to actually dream about what you could be doing. You're just focused on what you're doing at that moment.
00:14:23
Speaker
And so I think we've really tried to do that, tried to like build these breaks in where it's like, okay, we're doing this big sprint of commercial projects for several months. And then now we have two months off and what are we going to make in that time? Um, and I think, I mean, I think a big part of it is that like, we're really filmmakers at our heart and that's what we love doing. Um, and so we want to make sure that we're expressing that, but I think another piece of it is just that.
00:14:51
Speaker
if you're only doing what people are paying you to do, people are gonna tend to pay you to do what they know you already can do. And so if you get stuck in that where, I mean, I think a lot of filmmakers can relate to this is that they have a portfolio of work and people look at their portfolio of work and they go, okay, this is kind of the level of work that this person does. And this is the sort of genre that they work with them.
00:15:18
Speaker
And then that's all they ever get. Nobody ever hires them for a higher quality job. And so I think that if you're able to invest in yourself and actually
00:15:28
Speaker
spend that money to do projects that really speak to what you're interested in and what you're excited in and get to show off some talent that maybe people aren't paying you to portray, then you can start to get some of those projects that you're really interested in. I feel like it's a huge investment inside of the company. As far as just how many hours it takes,
00:15:52
Speaker
It's hard to say a lot. We definitely try a lot. We definitely try to treat them like we do any other project. You know, we're trying not to like stick them in the margins of our days. It's like, how do we, uh, yeah, it's okay. So, you know, pre-production and yeah, yeah. So like Maslow, I think we probably spent a couple months in pre-production just figuring out all the different elements of it a day or two a week or.
00:16:21
Speaker
Yeah, I'd say that's probably fair a couple months, a day or two a week. And that's, that's a lot. Yeah. And then, I mean, lots of time writing as well, probably took a couple, probably a couple weeks of like solid writing of doing like.
00:16:38
Speaker
And when I say solid writing, I mean, writing is pretty relative. I'd say like one or two hours a day for a couple of weeks to come up with the concept. And then and then we'd had probably a couple of months of like doing revisions and talking over the scripts and just having meetings over it. And then it
Passion Projects and Their Impact
00:16:57
Speaker
was a two day shoot. Oh, wow. Was it a two or three days? It was actually a three and a half day shoot.
00:17:06
Speaker
I wasn't, it was a three and a half day shoot. And it's about, what's the runtime on it? Is it 10 minutes? 20 minutes. Oh, it's 20 minutes. Yeah. Yeah. It was 20 and a half days, 20 minutes, not bad. Pretty good. You got a full feature there at like 12, 12 days of shooting. 12 days. Yeah. And then, you know, it,
00:17:31
Speaker
I was just going to jump in and just say one thing really quickly, and that is, you know, one of the things that Julian and I have been good about is really formalizing that, you know, Julian mentioned, you know, building the space, giving yourself the space to sort of do this exploration and bounce ideas off of each other. It's a great thing because there's two of us, right? And more often, you know, every week we have two days a week where we have writers rooms.
00:17:58
Speaker
And we've got a cadre of people that are invited to these writers rooms twice a week. And we occasionally get three, four, five people in there that are just bouncing ideas off of each other often. It's just Julian and myself. But it's also other people. Maslow had, I think, maybe four or five writers credited to it. And each one of those people really contributed a lot to the project.
00:18:22
Speaker
But we really bake in that time and we're trying to get even better about that to really allow ourselves to say, OK, so what are we doing next? What are we working on now? What is that next thing in our slate? Where do you find the discipline? Because I think that that is where folks can I've heard this dream over and over again and and.
00:18:46
Speaker
And yet, I think sometimes it's not executed on because the discipline is lacking to just say, no, we're doing this. Where do you find that? It's like, you know, it would be the same as asking someone, how do you get out the door to go to the gym? I mean, for you, what's the personal drive that you find that discipline to do it?
00:19:10
Speaker
I can speak to myself I'm sure me and Chris have similar ways, but also different. I mean, I think for me that there's two pieces to and the first pieces that you have to really want to do it. And then the second piece is.
00:19:27
Speaker
just setting time aside for it I think like every single day I try to set an hour aside to write and I just do that every day and so I think getting into the rhythm of that but I think that you know I think a lot of people will ask that question like how do you have the discipline to do that but I think when you actually get down to it I think a lot of people just don't actually want to do it.
00:19:50
Speaker
They say they want to do it, but then when it actually comes down to like, do you want to do this versus doing something else you're interested in, they'd rather do something else they're interested in. And I don't think there's anything wrong. There's nothing wrong with that. They just need to be honest with themselves. I was just thinking about that Seinfeld where Jerry asked George if he wants to have some fun. And George is like, yeah. And Jerry's like, do you really, do you really want to have some fun? And George is like, no, not actually, no.
00:20:22
Speaker
And I think back to Julian's point, one of the things that we do is we really do our, I mean, we build it out just like every other project, right? We do, yeah. And so do you pay yourself? I mean, you mentioned that you paid yourself as if you were people on the project, and I'm sure you pay the people that are, well, that's a good question. On these projects, first of all, what's the budget of Maslow? What's the budget of something like that?
00:20:49
Speaker
So Maslow came in around $13K. And yes, we did pay people. We know our crew. I can't remember the exact count, but we had eight people, I think maybe nine.
00:21:03
Speaker
And that included the talent and we paid everyone. Now did we pay them their full rate? No. We sold them an aspirational vision around, you know, we're trying to do something a little bit different. Every one of those crew members cut us a deal, but it was a deal they were really happy with and a deal that we were really happy with. And I think that that just engendered an energy around the project that carried
00:21:30
Speaker
They carried through the two primary days of shooting and then the two secondary days required much. But you didn't pay yourselves, right? No, that would be a case where we did not pay ourselves. OK, OK, got it. Got it. No, that makes sense. That would be that would be a little circumlocutious. But you didn't get paid on that one. I paid I paid Julian an open steam. Yeah, exactly.
00:21:56
Speaker
So what has been the, so what's been the, you know, tell me some of the upshots of these experiments, you know, it's always everything's an experiment, right? So what's the, what's been the, what's been the upshot thus far? I mean, obviously, we're still kind of new and you just released tooth the other day. Maslow came out six months ago, maybe was it? Halloween, actually. Yeah, Halloween. Yeah. And so, so, so, so what's come of it so far?
00:22:25
Speaker
Do you want to answer that one? Yeah, I mean, so for two, I think that.
00:22:33
Speaker
What we were sort of hoping to get out of it from the beginning or I mean, beyond just kind of making a film and enjoying it was, I mean, part of it is being able to go to festivals and being able to network with different people and talk to other filmmakers. And so I think for Tooth, that was really difficult because it released right in the middle of COVID. And so so many of the things that we got into ended up being digital.
00:22:59
Speaker
And it was a little disappointing to just have all these digital events. And I don't think they'd really quite figured out how to do digital festivals at that point. And then it played at some physical festivals, but they were really far and traveling was a challenge. So the upside of that was it was hard to be like, oh, we can't actually
00:23:21
Speaker
I mean, it's kind of like being a band and coming up with an album and then not being able to tour with it and just sort of sitting there getting like digital plays.
00:23:32
Speaker
And so then I think with Maslow, we were really like, okay, we're only going to submit to festivals that if it gets into them, we're actually going to make the effort and go to the festival. Cause that's really what it's all about. And so I think we submitted to six festivals. Um, we got into our first one, which is Boston sci-fi film festival, which we were really excited about. Is there like a top hundred, um, film freeway festival?
00:23:57
Speaker
and unfortunately they ended up going digital like at the last minute and so yeah what can you do it's yeah what can you do um and now we're waiting on other film festivals but
00:24:09
Speaker
I think sort of the underlying thing, which I've noticed that's been a huge benefit of it is it's sort of just subtle, but, um, it's just kind of like something that you can show people and something that people see and something that they just kind of like an expression of your, of your passion where people like, Oh, you're not just, you know, a commercial company. Like you guys actually like really love this. And I think the more that website, yeah.
00:24:36
Speaker
Cool. Yeah. I mean, I think the more that gets out there, the more that you start to just build connections with those people. And I really feel like it's really subtle, but you start to just notice it in small ways. It's not one of those things that you make a short film and suddenly you get a million calls to do projects for people. I'm sure that happens to some people, but it's sort of just like,
00:24:59
Speaker
you know, you run into people every once in a while, I'm like, Oh, I watched that film. It was awesome. Or, um, Oh, we should talk about doing this. Or we should talk about doing that. And it's an icebreaker with agencies and such, I imagine, you know, and yeah. Chris gets a lot more of that communication than I do. Cause he does a lot more outreach than I do, but he might be able to speak to that.
00:25:21
Speaker
Yeah, you know, I think, Max, it's an interesting question, you know, because I think people are always like, what's the ROI of this of these endeavors, right? And I think it's somewhat at this point, because we're early in the stages of doing it, it's somewhat of a soft ROI. Yeah. And what I
Purpose and Existence of Moment
00:25:36
Speaker
mean, and what I mean by that is we do get lots of feedback from agencies like, you know, agencies that we work with new agencies, this really, really great project, you know, and, you know, we're on their radar, whereas we weren't on their radar before. And so that's, that's super important. And plus,
00:25:51
Speaker
They're starting to consider us for different types of projects that extend beyond just our bread and butter, which happens to be TV 30s at the moment. We're starting to talk to more people about sponsored content and things like that, but it's more long form that really sort of fits the storytelling that we love so much.
00:26:11
Speaker
As Julian says, now you have these pieces which point to long form that if you were only doing 30s and two-minute web commercial for hire stuff, you wouldn't have to show. You would have no ability. There'd be no path. I hate to say it, but you have to build the path for the agencies to see. 100%. They don't imagine it very well. No offense to them, but they don't. Yeah.
00:26:40
Speaker
Yeah, no, for sure. And then and then not just the agencies, but also, you know, potential film financiers and all that stuff, just really sort of creating a creating a calling card for that. The other sort of interesting underlying nuance to the whole thing is just getting projects done.
00:26:55
Speaker
You know, like actually making something that's 20 minutes long and getting that done and getting your, you know, sort of like doing pushups, you know, you're really sort of you're developing that muscle and you're built, you're building it by by making these things. And hopefully they're good. But if they're not, you know, you're you're still just a little bit stronger. I think a lot of people talk about making films. Many people even start filming films. They even may get it in the can, but getting it across the finish line, man, that last five yards.
00:27:25
Speaker
you know, is really difficult. And so just learning how to do that. And then and then and then just releasing it and just going, OK, man, you know, we're releasing the sucker, you bring the credit, you know, some of it, I mean, that's, you know, it's terrifying sometimes to really stuff to the into the wild and to see how it sort of how people react to it. And then lastly, you know, it was it was really, I think, warmth, both Julian and myself, you know, just really
00:27:54
Speaker
you know, working with the team on something that was different and new and fresh, I think really was exciting because everyone, you know, the long days didn't matter. The fact that our craft service table sort of sucked didn't matter. People were just hell bent on making this thing the best thing it could possibly be.
00:28:19
Speaker
And I think that was great because we've worked with a team of people for so long that doing something that was just a little bit off center and different than what we've done in the past, I think really just sparked, like you mentioned, Chris Kozer, who was the DP, you know, extraordinary behind the project. You know, he was just loving it because it's something, you know, it's something that he's wanted to explore for so long. And we sort of created that avenue where we could all sort of explore together.
00:28:49
Speaker
And so at the end of the day, it proved to us, okay, what's next? What's the next thing? It also answers the question that I think I
00:29:02
Speaker
Production companies are really forced to ask themselves the question, why do I exist? Why do we exist here anymore? Especially in the way that the gear has changed, the software has changed, the production company used to exist because otherwise you couldn't get together enough money to buy all the gear you needed to be a production company.
00:29:24
Speaker
You needed about $100,000, $150,000 to make it work with the different NLEs and the cameras and everything, but now with that hurdle largely gone, whether it's you folks obviously work with very expensive equipment and gear, but you rent it all or you mass it and then push it back, but a lot of companies don't.
00:29:47
Speaker
But I think more than ever, you're forced to ask yourself as a company, why are we here? What is our meaning as a production company? And it really seems that you folks have, you're answering that question in spades and that works both for the clients, the agencies and the companies that hire you because it gives them a, well, I know who moment is.
00:30:11
Speaker
And I think that that's very important. I know what they're about, and there's a real shape to that. But it also works, as you said, for the folks that work for you and with you on the line, whether it's at the shoots or whether it's in editing and stuff, and that they know who you are and why you're there. And so I think that's a humongous, I was going to say ancillary benefit, but perhaps it's the primary benefit these days when we're all looking for shape, right?
00:30:42
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. I mean, I think, no, I mean, I think, I think we were, I mean, we've actually been having these discussions recently because we had clients that have chosen to work with us, even though it seems like there's an in-house solution for them or, or they could just go out and hire a team themselves. And we're like, it's made us ask the question, like, why are they working with us? Like, why are they choosing to work with us when, when they could easily hire someone else? And I think,
00:31:11
Speaker
I mean, I think a big piece of it that we've noticed is just our process. I just think we've developed a really good process.
00:31:21
Speaker
that and I think that another thing that we realized that was really a pillar of our company is we're always focused on what the purpose of the project is and that's really I mean the the guiding light through the whole time and I think that it's easy to get lost and like oh how do we make this look cool or how do we you know the cinematography or the spectacle of the whole thing and then
00:31:44
Speaker
When you can kind of strip all that down and you're like, well, what are what is the person actually asking for? And I think we've been really good at keeping that in mind and really making sure that every single step of it is informed by that question. And so I think that.
00:32:01
Speaker
And I think we're good at just managing a lot of creatives and that are working together to all focus on that goal, because I think it's easy as a creative to get lost speaking as a creative. And so when you have a bunch of them working on a project.
00:32:17
Speaker
Um, yeah, it's having, having like a production company that's able to focus on that. And I mean, I think it's good working with clients, but I think it's also been really beneficial just in our personal, in our personal work, just looking at a project and going, well, why are we actually, why are we actually doing this? Um, what's our end goal here? Our end goal is not to just make a pretty movie, but it's to, you know, I mean, there's lots of different reasons, but a lot of them are on social causes.
00:32:46
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, certainly your your commercial work, you know, is tends to lean towards spots and work that is, you know, whether it's, you know, vaccination campaigns for health care stuff or whether it's it's PSA is about driving or or or, you know,
00:33:09
Speaker
calling before you dig. It's a lot of pieces that are about helping people. Either way, I'm not sure if it's chicken or egg, but one way or the other, this aspect that when you guys write, we want to work with anyone who's looking for a change in the world, one idea, one film, one action at a time. From the commercial work, you're really walking that talk.
00:33:38
Speaker
Yeah, and that's I think that's something that we've just tried to, you know, hey, look, it's are all the projects like that? No, but I would say that a majority, a huge majority of them are. Yeah.
Strategic Growth and Future Aspirations
00:33:51
Speaker
And, you know, you've aligned yourself with other team, other agencies and so forth. Exactly. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Who really, really sort of.
00:34:00
Speaker
You sing the same song we do. Exactly. And one of the one of the things that I would just say that's allowed us to sort of really be a little bit more selective around that and really sort of adhere to our mission more thoroughly is really just keeping, you know, this is something I would just for any anybody who's out there thinking about starting a production company or any company for that matter, you know, just really keeping the overhead low.
00:34:27
Speaker
And Julian said lean and mean. Just keep that as low as possible so that you can really have the time and the space to explore those projects that although they may not pay the most initially, really do sort of pay out in the long term, especially from your own personal satisfaction standpoint. I'm just really feeling satisfied around the work that we're doing. So do you have employees?
00:34:58
Speaker
Um, so we, we, so we're a team of three now. We just hired our, our first employee, uh, Liam Bateman, uh, this January. And so we were, you know, we're, we're, we're, we're growing slowly, but, um, you know, carefully, but he says this, he, he brings a real, I think that Julian and I are really good at the storytelling part and also the filming part.
00:35:23
Speaker
But what Liam brings is sort of the visual element on sort of the graphic side and really helping us sort of expand into things like we just did a fundraising film for the Pickford Film Center and, you know, helping us really. Oh, my God. Yeah, it's amazing. I'm on I'm on the Pickford board. I can say that it is beautiful. It is ridiculous. You guys killed it.
00:35:47
Speaker
And so Liam was really charged with doing a lot of the post-production VFX work of putting, you know, classic films on this. We shot a mix of practical and then, you know, post-work to put film images on the sides of buildings. And so Liam has brought a real sensibility around just design.
00:36:07
Speaker
that has been really fulfilling for both of us and sort of, I think, our game tremendously. But when you're trying to be that lean, how do you make that decision to hire an employee? Because I know that doesn't come lightly. So it's a financial decision, right? And so you've really got to look at, like, where are you? How much capital reserve you have?
00:36:31
Speaker
Where are you and your profit percentage after projected taxes? What does that number look like? And if it looks like it's, we're looking at a 10 to 15% number. If you're hitting that number, then that is usually a sign that you can take that next step in growing.
00:36:57
Speaker
And, you know, so there is a calculus behind it, but it's also to a large degree. So yes, it's a math problem, but it's also, you also look at it and think, you know what, if we have this person who fits so well with our, fits in so well with our company,
00:37:13
Speaker
we know that we can go out and do even better work. And so there's a gut instinct too that isn't always just based on the pure ones and zeros, but it's also just sort of instinctual around, okay, this person brings a sensibility to the work and also does things like manage hard drives and some of the dirty work too. They can really free up Julian and I to go out and explore some of these more opportunities that are out there. So it's,
00:37:43
Speaker
I was just going to say from my perspective, I mean, it's always a hard decision whether you kind of buy the new shoes to grow into or if you're kind of like waiting for your feet to grow. Because I feel like there's weird, I don't think that's a real analogy.
00:38:06
Speaker
I'm buying it. I'm buying it. But I mean, I think I've definitely noticed that in my life and you definitely have to be smart with it. But I think me and Chris are always having those conversations. And I mean, I think for me, a lot of it just comes down to like what what do you want to be doing on on the day to day? And how do you how do you keep moving towards what your goals and ambitions are? And if there's something holding you back from that, is there is there a way to
00:38:36
Speaker
to get that out of the way. And I think a big one is like, we know that to grow going forward
00:38:45
Speaker
we have to like step back more. And so, I mean, I think a big thing is just looking at what are those, what are those responsibilities that you have every day that maybe someone else can step in and do just as well as you to free you up to do something else. And so I feel like we always have to be looking at that. Are we, are we getting like so much in the weeds individually that we're not actually looking forward at all?
00:39:09
Speaker
Yeah, and I mean, it's remarkable. We're not actually really talking about really small numbers here. I mean, where are you on the revenue, annual revenue scale at this point? So we started out, so we're in our second year, and our second year numbers were approaching just around a $600,000. That's amazing.
00:39:32
Speaker
So it's still modest in the grand scheme of things, but because we have been so careful around the, there's that top line revenue number, right? But then that bottom line is where it really makes all the difference. And because we've been so judicious around that and been able to point that towards some of these personal projects and then pay ourselves on top of it, we think it's been a pretty good
00:40:01
Speaker
pretty good first, you know, I should say second year. I was just going to say, is that trend going to continue? Because I think that was that was that was 50% growth over the year before.
00:40:17
Speaker
I would say we don't know because it's sort of funny going back to going back to Julian's original, you know, when we put everything up on the board and then profit was sort of a secondary thing. Yeah. That makes me blanch a little bit as sort of the business person of the like, I'm the one that's in QuickBooks, right? And so I'm the one that's sort of looking at those numbers. But on the other hand, it really does sort of
00:40:42
Speaker
If you can do it right and you can be patient, I think is really a key around it. I think that really identifying what your values are and living up to those will in the end feed, feed, feed the ledger in the way that you're hoping it will.
00:41:00
Speaker
And it sounds to me, if your model really is staying pretty small like that, you don't need to have stratospheric growth. At those numbers, you can operate in the 600 to a million zone for a very long time and be very content, I would imagine. Yeah.
00:41:18
Speaker
Yeah, but I think we do also both Julian and myself do have sort of these big dreams too, like we would love to do a feature film, right? And so what does that mean? And sort of how do we build ourselves for that long game? Because that is a long game. And so how do we really sort of make sure that we've got the legs and the stamina and the endurance and ultimately the joy in the process
00:41:43
Speaker
really enjoying the day to day. Back to Julian's point about sort of making sure we can, you know, we can focus on the stuff that really makes us happy as much as possible. It's not always going to be 100 percent, but let's say it's 80 percent. And that other 20 percent you can now shovel off to someone else. You know, that I think that builds builds the engine that will sort of make make these other bigger projects possible. That's why does why does the feature film still hold so much allure?
00:42:14
Speaker
That's interesting. And it's a great, it's a great question. I think for me personally, and they, you know, I think it's probably true of Julian as well. It just is sort of, you know, it's a watermark for, for it's been it's been a watermark for so long as as to, you know, what it means to be a filmmaker. Now, obviously, that has morphed over the last 510 years dramatically.
00:42:42
Speaker
And there's so many people doing it in so many different ways. And you might even argue quite successfully, mind you, that making a feature film is a fool's errand, especially from the financial side. But if you look at it just from a storytelling side, I do think that that long form really gives the space to sort of take that next step in our evolution. And so it's something that we're looking at and it's something that we want to do.
00:43:12
Speaker
And, and that's, you know, that's sort of, you haven't made a feature. Is that right? I mean, you've written, you've written and sold a number of scripts. You've, you've put together a lot of packages, but have you not actually made a feature yet? I never have. No. Okay. And Julian, I can't remember. I only made one feature and I was 12 years old. Wow. You came out of the gate hot, but then it kind of cooled down.
00:43:40
Speaker
real fast after that. And it hasn't held up, unfortunately. Yeah, I mean, I think from my perspective, a feature is just, I mean, I got the chance to work on a feature a couple of years ago for a Friends film. And there's something just about the immersion of the whole thing that is just amazing to be a part of as a filmmaker. I mean, I really think that,
00:44:08
Speaker
being a filmmaker, so much of it is about, I mean, there's two like amazing pieces of it, which is first going on the shoot and just being in a big community of filmmakers that are all working together to create this thing. And then the second piece is getting to watch it with everyone at the end. And that's why I think the whole festival circuit is so awesome.
00:44:31
Speaker
to be there in a room full of people that are all watching it. And you're really getting to see the audience reaction and see what worked and what didn't work. And it's just such a gratifying experience. And so I feel like on a feature, you get 30 to 60 days of just being around other filmmakers and doing what you love. And so I feel like just that process is so exciting.
00:44:55
Speaker
Yeah, well, we have to wrap up here, but I do want to say that from my perspective, a lot of it falls off the tree of, you know, when I talked to Tony Fogam from All is Well.
00:45:10
Speaker
And this conversation reminds me a lot of that one. He talked about getting paid for creative and how important that was. And that was something that I think, Chris, you really brought to the table for the first time over at Handcrank. And I remember you said, we need to get paid for creative. And I thought, yeah, that'd be nice. And hopefully the Easter Bunny will bring me a nice Easter thing. And I can hang out with Santa Claus this Christmas and get drunk.
00:45:35
Speaker
Cause it was that much of a fairy tale to me, but you really made it a priority and we built up getting paid for creative very slowly, very little bits in the beginning, a hundred dollars online item, $500. And suddenly it was a thousand dollars. And then before we knew it, it was $10,000 getting paid for creative on something, you know, just working something out, getting paid that money. And to me,
00:45:59
Speaker
A lot of this is ancillary and follows down that line of just putting creative on the table for the client, for yourselves, for posterity on the table as an important item in the whole world of what
00:46:18
Speaker
we do. And you could look at a feature as just being two hours of getting to express yourself creatively and either getting paid for it on the front end or the back end, whatever, hopefully one or the other. But it's kind of the ultimate holy grail of getting paid for creative and or getting to express that creative and I suppose not going into tremendous amounts of debt.
00:46:42
Speaker
But it is about
Creativity as a Core Value
00:46:44
Speaker
making that creative really important. And I think Moment is just a shining example of you're investing to be able to get paid for that creative. You're investing back into developing.
00:46:59
Speaker
the creative so that it's worth something to others and they see the value of that. I think that's the beauty of what you're doing is that taking of the profit, investing it back into pure creative so that you can express yourselves as pure creatives, as pure as we ever are. But you're able to invest it back in there to give it value so that other people can see the value so then they can invest in it. So if anyone's getting close to doing a feature, it's you guys.
00:47:25
Speaker
I mean, this is the path, I think, and it's a great path for our listeners to follow because you hear it all the time, but it takes the discipline. It takes the discipline. It takes the investment of your time on the sweat that you do on other projects of your time and your money, and it takes the vision. It's amazing that you're doing it, and it really is a beautiful thing, and congratulations because
00:47:51
Speaker
I mean, look at just two years and you've already got these three films and then you've also got all this great commercial work and of course some great client relationships where they see what's going on and they like it. So it's a great one for folks to try to model after what you're doing because it's a great model.
00:48:14
Speaker
I think that word creative is really interesting. Yeah. Thank you so much, Max. I think that word creative is interesting because for us, it's got a sort of sacred quality to it because it really is like everything else. You mentioned it. Everyone has a phone in their, I mean, a camera in their pocket, right? All that is being commoditized and the price of it is really being driven down where I think
00:48:43
Speaker
agencies and the people we work with and our crews and why Julian and I love working together is because we put a lot of value in that creative process and really figuring out, going back to the very beginning of this whole conversation, the why behind what we're doing.
00:49:05
Speaker
and identifying that in a way that is inspiring for us, I think is...
00:49:13
Speaker
It's just it's critical. So, yeah, so for for for people who are out there, you know, sort of thinking about, you know, are we just like pointing a camera, you know, just just fulfilling somewhat, you know, fulfilling someone's prescription of what this should look like, you know, hang in there and really think about how you can build that that sort of creative spark within yourself, because that's the piece that people are going to want. And I think people need to know that it can work. I really do. Absolutely. I remember
00:49:42
Speaker
So many times being like it can't work. It just doesn't work that way, but it does. It does work that way and it can work and you guys are showing it off. Julian, any last thoughts? I mean, I feel like.
00:49:55
Speaker
We generally just feel really lucky. Yeah, it's gratitude, man. It's gratitude. Yeah. No, 100%. Absolutely. Well, you have a studio now, right? You have a studio. You don't go to the office anymore. Chris, I saw that post for you. I changed the name of my office. How's that going for you? He wrote a post saying, I changed the name of my office to a studio. And now life is better. Or is it better?
00:50:21
Speaker
Yeah. Does Julian get to go to the studio too? I still go to the office. Yeah. Julian doesn't even read any of my post, Max, and it breaks my heart. But I have sort of just changed my perspective around instead of saying I'm going to the office, I do say I'm going to the studio because the studio is a place where you actually create stuff as opposed to having to do things.
00:50:47
Speaker
And I think that mind shift for me has been a real healthy one. And it's sort of engendered. You talk about how do you have the discipline. It really does become something that you just sort of blend into your day. What am I making today? How am I going to make a difference today? And if you can sort of go ahead.
00:51:06
Speaker
I was just going to say, if you can intertwine those two things, it is a thing of beauty. But to Julian's point, it is also, we're really lucky to be able to have the partners that we have and have the people that we work with that we have that make it possible for 100%. How would you compare it? And it came across my mind. But Chris, you just made me think of it when you said, I do these posts.
00:51:35
Speaker
You and I, of course, always used to have, oh, we gotta, we gotta, you know, advertise more. We gotta do more social media, social media, social media. And it's, it's fine, but it's very draining. It can be very draining and you, you feel like you're kind of broadcasting and it kind of can leave you feeling kind of empty and hollow, but.
00:51:54
Speaker
That's one way to spend your time and money, but look, how, how would you compare that with the way you're spending your time and money with just the creative and also how would you compare the, you know, the end goal you're trying to do is when you do the posts and talk to everybody is trying to say, Hey, look at us. Look what we're doing. You know, check it out. We're come, come be a part of what we're doing. Creative kind of does that too, though, doesn't it?
00:52:15
Speaker
Yeah, it does. And I think what's interesting from my perspective is it relates, you know, we're also getting more disciplined about social and what that means, because I think Julian and I have both fallen down the rabbit hole and YouTube acts where we're just like, Oh, my God, the dread of having to post something. Well, it's a lot more interesting if you're posting about a journey that's interesting. And so just being able to talk a little bit about our process and
00:52:40
Speaker
you know, and what we believe in and talk a little bit about the people that we work with and all that, you know, all of it. I think that whether people read it or not, that's a different story. But it keeps, you know, it's much more interesting for us. And so I think that that has reinvigorated it, at least from my perspective. Julian, I don't know if you want to add into that. No, yeah, I mean, definitely. I feel like
00:53:10
Speaker
figuring out, I mean, doing these like branding exercises and everything and just figuring out what our voices and how we want to be seen. I mean, I think it's really important to be able to broadcast yourself and I think if you're able to broadcast yourself in an authentic way.
00:53:27
Speaker
then it feels really good because it feels like you're actually being seen for who you are. I think my apprehension around social media is when you broadcast yourself not in an authentic way and then you end up getting misunderstood. And so I feel like we're constantly trying to do that. How are we?
00:53:45
Speaker
how are we not just like boasting on social media about what we're doing, but actually including people and trying to have a conversation there. And we're still learning to do that better. That's right. 100%. That's what this podcast is all about too, man. That's exactly it. And it has been a very fulfilling
00:54:04
Speaker
journey as well, and also that's what making our pipeline software that helps people find their profits so they can do great stuff like what you folks who are pipeline users from the very beginning Julian actually helped design many of the components that we have in there.
00:54:21
Speaker
and worked with us on it. So as we wrap up, thank you guys again so much, Chris and Julian. Moment.film is where you can see their work. It's a beautiful website. It's a beautiful journey. You can really get, you might need about an hour to sit down and really take it in, but it won't be time lost. Go check it out.
00:54:43
Speaker
And then when you're done doing that, go over to VideoPipeline.io and give that a spin. That's our software for project management. And we hope you will. And we thank you for listening. And thank you guys again for coming on. Max, thank you. Really appreciate it. Right on. All right. Well, we will see you next week. Thanks very much. And we're out.