Estimation for Motion Pictures

The ability to estimate can prevent over ordering and also prevent disaster if you don't have enough.

Get two tape measures, one thin 10 foot small enough to carry. The longer should be stiff to reach out and touch something. Don't let it snap back, it will damage it.

What is the span of your fingers?

What is the span of your arms to finger tips? To your nose is 1/2 span of arms.

How tall are you? How high to your waist? Chest? Your knee? Your hand hanging loose? How high can you reach?

How high is the standard door way? How wide? A standard table?

Most house ceilings are 8 feet. Business ceilings 10 feet plus.

How long is your car? How tall? Wide? Measure some others.

How long are floor tiles? How long are sidewalk squares?

Find a repeatable stride. Take 10 paces and carefully measure this distance. Divide the distance in inches by 10. This is your stride. If your stride is 36 inches, your stride is 1 yard. If your stride is 30 inches, 4 paces is 120 inches or 10 feet.(2 paces 5 feet.) A 24 inch stride is 2 feet etc. Practice!

How long is your foot? If it is 10 or 12 inches it is a convenient gauge for smaller distances.

How big is a quart, a gallon, a 50 gallon drum?

How much will a yard of sand cover 1/2 inches deep if it is 9 (3x3) feet by 36 inches in volume? (72 x 9 square feet)

Time by counting. "One thousand one, one thousand two....."

Speed. 60 miles per hour is 88 feet per second. Think about trying to pull an operator out of a shot if the car misses the mark.

1 MPH is almost 1 and 1/2 foot per second.

Use degrees. 360 is a full circle. 90, 60 45 and 30 are often used. Think East 90, South 180, West 270 and North 360 or 0

Think about directions as you are facing as a clock face. 9:00,2:00 etc.

© Copyright 1999-2004 Ron Dexter. All Rights Reserved.