I hope this doesn't come off as defensive or nitpicky or anything but if you're going to use Daikomonohashi's work as an example of why a budget isn't needed, then I'm going to have to explain why that isn't a good way to justify why my show doesn't need a budget.
I've watched Daikomonohashi's Ultraman Sorta videos. I can look at them as someone who likes tokusatsu stuff and can appreciate the videos for what they are (fan homages), but I don't feel passionate about them, especially when the audio is so bad and the stories are so simple. I realize you are trying to do as much as you can with what you have, but audiences don't care. You can't put up a sign in your film that says, "There was supposed to be this awesome scene of people laying on the ground injured and the building trashed, but we didn't have budget, so please imagine it". That's not how film-making works. I imagine the general audience to be a harsher critic than I am.
Would I, if I had cash to spare, donate money to improve the production value of Ultraman Sorta? Absolutely, because I can see the potential. I would never say, "You don't need money". That's silly; even decent costumes cost money. Not a lot but it still costs more than $0. If that wasn't true then all cosplay would look awesome.
I think Daikomonohashi and I also have very different goals with what we want to do with our videos and this is where you may be misunderstanding things.
There are many "no-budget" Power Ranger and Kamen Rider fanfilms out there. Most of them are made by people really passionate, but are expecting audiences to just accept something looks bad onscreen. "They'll use their imaginations", they say. I hate that mindset. If you want people to use their imaginations then write books. Film is a visual medium; the audience isn't supposed to use their imagination.
Of the "no-budget" productions you see that look awesome, they actually did cost money. Someone paid for the camera, the editing system, the props, costumes, the special effect programs, etc etc. More than likely even the food.
Maybe the items used were purchased for some other project and re-used for the new project, but still, at some point in time someone who owned it paid money for it. The equipment we're using we didn't need to buy specifically for the show but we still spent money on it. Looking at it that way, I've already invested a couple thousand dollars of my own money into this.
And stuff we spend money on in the first episode will actually get re-used through the show (reducing the budget needed for later episodes), but that won't change we had to spend money on it in order to have access to it.
I've spent a lot of time looking at what others have done to look at what is already out there and understand how they did it. One show I look at often is Insector Sun, which is a Brazillian homage to Kamen Rider. In my opinion it's probably one of the best Kamen Rider homages not created by Japanese, but I always ask myself, "What could they have done if they had more money?" (but I'm sure they spent a fair chunk of change making the costumes).
Another I'm impressed with is France Five; it's clear they spent some money to make it look as good as it did. Perfect Sentai costumes and suitmation sets don't fall off trees. A non-tokusatsu inspired show is Legend of Neil and though it has lots of cheesy effects I imagine they they had more than $1,000 to spend on props and set design (which is why it looks considerably better than other Zelda fan-films).
I want GKaiser to at least look as good. It has to, because it's an original property. The novelty of being a fan version of Power Rangers, Ultraman or Kamen Rider is not going to work. The show has to stand on its own two feet because it will be judged solely on its own merits. And really, it has to stand out.
I don't post here much, but I lurk. I lurk here and other forums, too. I feel that if the die-hardest fans are going to nitpick over something in a low-budget Japanese television show, they're gonna do the same thing with a low-budget American web tv show. There is an expectation for it to be good.
I could make a show that is heavy in dialogue and sparse in action, which is the usual route people take when they try to make low-budget stuff. Or I could do few dialogue and just have some chase and fight scenes, as you have done.
However I don't believe that is what the audience really wants (it definitely isn't what I want). I want to make something people are going to love as much as they do the "real" shows and will look at as a real show.
Comparing my attitude to Michael Bay is, I think, an unjust analysis. Michael Bay is not a screenwriter, he's a director. I do care about character development; I write the screenplays. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXgZKrREmGI"]I'm also familiar with the differences in narrative structure between Japanese and American narratives[/ame].
But I also care about meeting and exceeding the audience's expectations. If I'm going to make an action show then I'm not going to have people talk and run around for ten minutes and then throw in a three minute fight at the end which could have been choreographed 40 years ago. A significant amount of the episode will not be slow zooms of the character basically doing nothing, in order to eat up runtime and make the story drag (commonly done in many no budget films).
I want to do something special that people are going to remember and not see as a pale imitation but a worthy contender. Something they will pass on to their friends. And they need to be awed in the first episode. The most important episode of any series is the very first one because it tells the audience whether they should watch the others.
I know I don't have the budget for wire-fu, which I originally wanted. We'll use camera tricks and post-production instead.
I also don't have cranes, sound stage for building elaborate sets, or other really high end equipment commonly used for producing these type of shows.
I do have a Sony NEX-VG10 camera, rail system, professional light kit, shotgun mike w/ XLR cables, a portable green / blue / black screen, and locations that add production value to the show without costing money. My production crew (not actors) constitutes eight people right now.
Basically, even if the first episode is produced cheaply, it can't look cheap. People who should be the target audience will reject it because it fails to meet expectations. And not looking cheap does cost some money.
I can't control whether people will like the show but I do have control over the show itself. I can improve the odds of the show being successful by ensuring the quality is as high as we can afford.
Lastly, this is not a student film and this absolutely cannot look like a student film. I am sick to death of making crappy student films in assigned group with people who are content with making something that might look good but has no heart and consequently bores people to tears; or might even have a few really crappy shots because no one except me was willing to chip in a few bucks to make the set look believable.
My crew is handpicked by me. The tiniest detail in the production is planned ahead of time. Every shot is storyboarded.
Also, people are always complaining about bad acting in this genre of show. I'm trying my best to cast good actors, but good actors do not work for free. Payment is deferred on this production but that also means their pay comes out of how successful the show is. If the show isn't successful they get nothing, and the show won't be successful if it looks bad. And if looks like garbage on set they are going to walk.
I feel very confident that if I had the budget, we could do a feature film. But I'm not going to get the budget, so we'll do a web series that basically covers everything the film was going to have. The budget needed for the first episode is less than the first episode, but it still costs more money than I have access to. Mostly because we are missing props and costumes that have to be created and used throughout the show (I do not want costumes that basically look like someone walked into Wal-Mart and put on a bunch of stuff straight off the racks. Even if we buy something, it's just to use as a base to construct the prop).
I hope I haven't come across as super defensive; I'm trying to explain my position because I feel you're misunderstanding it. But maybe you'll just need to see the promotional video we make in order to be convinced this isn't what you think it is.