How do you go about creating a film that’s going to succeed on a low budget? It’s a question of interest to a lot of writers and filmmakers in Britain, given the climate we’re operating in.

Warp Film, known first for making the Shane Meadows film Dead Man’s Shoes, are a good way into their Warp X project, turning round seven features at budgets of £400-£750,000 each. Their approach centres on a four week shooting period, use of local resources, and the economies of scale that can be introduced by getting a number of films up and running within a short period. Warp being an offshoot of Warp Records (Aphex Twin, and my current favourites Battles, etc), favourable deals are being struck on music too. Plus, through judicious relationships with regional screen agencies, those small budgets can effectively be stretched further. Most importantly, Warp have a partnership with distributors Momentum, ensuring that the films will get marketing and distribution – there’s no point in making a film otherwise, and in the UK only 60% of films get distribution, though admittedly some of the others were only ever intended for DVD release. The nuts and bolts of the Momentum arrangement takes the form of a profit participation deal; 50% of the money made goes back to the financiers, and the other half is split between the film’s creative team and a fund for future projects. It’s a credible model, and is about to bear fruit with Donkey Punch (thriller) and A Complete History of My Sexual Failures (documentary) being premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.

All very well, but that still doesn’t tell us HOW to create a low budget project, though it does give some pointers. Screenwriting trainer Phil Parker says a lot of the key is in the story you want to tell…but not every writer is geared up for the world of low budget cinema: in the 1990s £30 million was spent on screenplays by Britain’s leading television writers without a single film being made, essentially because the writers didn’t understand the distinctions between television and film. Television encourages writers to think in terms of ongoing stories with returning characters: film is all about the highest of stakes, from which people may never return. And successful British films are often about people seeking validation, whether the Sheffield lads in Full Monty, or the characters in East is East, Bend It Like Beckham, or Bridget Jones. Writing a story that follows in the footsteps of those examples costs no more than writing any other story, and it’s likewise no more expensive to write and perform an emotionally powerful scene than one that merely moves the story from A to B.

Arvind David helped set up Slingshot Films having studied what Indigent were doing in New York, making films with budgets of up to $250,000. He’s a smart guy who’s done a lot of research, discovering for instance that the presence of a star name makes no difference to the performance of a film with a budget of up to $6 million. And he’s got a strong sense of what he’s looking for in the projects he wants to develop: stories that have an element of uniqueness through splicing genres together, or ones that address a particular niche. One project Arvind was potentially interested in came about through recognising the size of the Countryside Alliance lobby, and tailoring a story for them – not necessarily pro or anti, but one that addressed their concerns.

One thing’s for sure: there are 100 films being made a year in Britain now, and for yours to stand out, it needs to be a truly distinctive piece of work. And that starts with something that costs nothing in the short term: applying creativity to your concepts for the story.