Miles Nxbxdy - Manic Vol. 1 Short Film
Role: Producer, Director, Cinematographer, Post-Producer/Editor
Miles Nxbxdy approached me and our friend Marie Karcher back in 2021 to produce a short film for an upcoming project called Manic Vol. 1. Miles wanted to create a visualizer for his new album that would be part short film / part music video. At the time, Miles hadn’t recorded the songs, but planted the seed for our first longterm collaboration. The project took nearly 3 years to complete as we all navigated our full-time jobs, funding, and finding time on weekends to meet and advance the creative vision for this project. Released in July 2025, Manic Vol. 1 was our most ambitious collaboration yet and I am excited to finally see this film out in the world.
Scope Breakdown
For a project like this, which operated with an extremely small budget and the help of a small army of friends / family, I wore many hats—overseeing creative, collaborating with a co-producer and co-director, budgeting, logistics, producing, DP/cinematography, and the full range of requirements for post-production editing. I also organized and hosted a rooftop screening/release party for the project.
Video Pre-Production
Creative Development & Direction
Permitting / Location Scouting
Storyboarding / Shot Lists
Production Schedules
Call Sheets
Crew Memos
Budgeting / Expense Management
Release Forms
Scripting
Equipment and Gear Management / Sourcing
Video Production
Gear Preparation / Testing
Director of Photography / Cinematography
8 Days of Production
14 Locations
Load-in/Setup/Breakdown
Video Post-Production
Post-Production Editing
45 Videos for Delivery
Color Correction and Grading
Sound Design
2 TB of Content in Total
8 Versions Before Picture Lock
5 Versions Before Final Cut (V13)
Pre-Production:
Our pre-production for the short film included extensive prep so that things operated smoothly on shoot days. To help move our project along, I worked with a small team to generate a base for all of our materials in Airtable.
We spent six months on pre-production which included formalizing Miles’ creative into a narrative/shooting script, location scouting, mood-boarding, and the creation of our production bible (which was built primarily in Slides and Airtable).
The core documents we relied on for production included a Shot List and Storyboard hybrid, an in-depth production schedule that featured scenes, locations, time of day, interior/exterior, cast needed, crew needed, and status. Additionally there was also cast and crew call sheets that provided integral information for shoot days circulated to everyone involved in advance.
Examples: call sheets and production info sheets for cast and crew
Left: screenshot of @shittyrigs repost of our lighting setup
Right: a snorricam rig used to capture a disorienting shot of Miles walking
Production:
Once we were ready to advance to production, we had roughly 8 shooting days scheduled over three months. Ultimately, we ran into some challenges which resulted in us having to navigate a couple of reshoots, but we still managed to stay within budget by the time we wrapped.
One of the highlights of our DIY production was making it on to the Instagram account @shittyrigs.
For production, we didn’t have a ton of cash to use (as evidenced by our shitty rig) on high end equipment so we ended up utilizing the Canon R5 for the bulk of our production and a DJI Mavic Pro 2 drone, along with an assortment of Canon lenses, cheap LED panels, and lighting provided within rented studio spaces.
Behind the Scenes: frames from a green screen studio shoot and content review
Post-Production:
I love Adobe Premiere Pro :)
Post-Production culminated in 100-120 hours of editing time which included archiving footage and generating proxies, organizing media and building the project, creating an assembly edit which grew into several rough cuts, and then refining with color and mastered audio all within Adobe Premiere Pro for our final cut.
Visual effects sequences were built and created in Adobe After Effects utilizing the roundtrip feature within Premiere Pro.
For revisions on this project we generally opted to do in-person editing sessions as opposed to tools like Vimeo Review or Frame.io
Delivery included:
1 High Res Final Cut
11 Horizontal Cutdowns of each scene
11 Vertical Cutdowns of each scene
12 Vertical Teasers for album singles releases
3 Horizontal Trailers for full short film release
3 Vertical Trailers for full short film release
3 Spotify Canvas’
1 Vertical BTS Edit Breakdown
Color Grades
Video Edit Breakdown:
To help promote the short film we collaborated on this trailer that utilized fast paced sound design, editing, and voice over narrative to draw viewers in immediately.
As part of the promotional campaign for the film, we also created this BTS video that shows the Adobe Premiere timeline featuring each individual video and audio track to give viewers a sense of how the trailer came together.
The edit took about 4 hours to put together on a Sunday afternoon, roughly two weeks before the film’s full release. The process started with us sifting through transcribed video footage of Miles speaking into the void. We pulled soundbites from that content, which was roughly 1 hour of interview footage and used that to help guide the visuals for the trailer.
Once we had our main narrative down, it was time to grab the appropriate b-roll and begin building the edit, configuring where sound design would be appropriate as well as where we should create intentional pacing to let a moment linger for a beat longer.
Marketing Roll Out:
Once the film was locked and the final exports were delivered for use, we began prepping materials for marketing and the roll out of the album/visualizers. The plan called for a steady release of four singles over the course of three months coinciding with the full release of the film and a live screening in Brooklyn, NY. on July 18th, 2025.
The marketing campaign included a mix of different media designed for specific platforms:
Photo shoot for carousel posts on Instagram and teasers on IG stories
Reels created for TikTok and Instagram that are 30 seconds or less
Reels that utilize captions to engage viewers and give them a glimpse into Miles Nxbxdy’s lyrics
Behind the scenes content to showcase process and how visuals were created
Traditional teaser trailers to promote the short film
Individual cut downs of each scene from the film to be deployed to socials after the release of the full short film
Spotify visualizers for sharing songs on socials