"Life on the Film Set" Podcast
A podcast about how to work on a film set and be great at it.
With Nick Payne and George Artin.
Made by humans without the use of AI
Episodes
Ep. 1 "Life on the Film Set" is back
5th November 2026 | 24 minutes
"Life on the Film Set" is back. It's been a hot minute, but we're back. In this episode we do a quick re-cap on the key lessons from last season and what we've been up to since then. We introduce this new season with a new format... special guests and we talk about why we've chosen these guests in particular.
Ep. 2 The Director is a Leader
12th November 2026 | James Stewart Keene / Director | 59 minutes
What happens when you're directing a film and things start to go wrong with the people that are working for you? In this episode we talk to director James Stewart Keene about what we learnt about leadership directing his first short film and how those lessons have shaped how he's set up his new team for his feature film "Sherbrooke Down: Valley of Tears".
Ep. 3 Personal Wellbeing on Set
19th November 2026 | Ben Steel / Screen Well | 57 minutes
In this episode we interview the founder of Screen Well, Ben Steel about the very important topic of mental health and wellbeing on film sets. Ben shares with us practical strategies for going on set and looking after yourself. We also talk about what to do when you're concerned about the wellbeing of someone else on set.
Ep. 4 People Focused Sets
26th November 2026 | Yolandi Franken / Producer | 55 minutes
We often think about producers as being the "money men" and only caring about the bottom line of a film. However, this doesn't need to be the case. Producers who create sets that take into account the wellbeing of people create better work. In this episode producer Yolandi Franken talks about the value of people focused sets and gives advice on how to talk to producers about thing you need to work at your best.
Ep. 5 Shorter Days are Cheaper
3rd December 2026 | Ben Allan / Cinematographer | 80 minutes
Ben Allan is a renowned, Australian cinematographer as well as being an "accidental" producer. During COVID he produced and shot the film "Dark Noise" with a small crew and strict COVID rules. One rule was to strictly limit shooting to eight hour days. When he redid his schedule and budget around these shorter days he unexpectedly found that the change was saving money. Ben talks about this change and the other performance benefits he experienced of working with a happy, well rested crew.
Ep. 6 Does the Film Industry Need Change
10th December 2026
In our final episode we talk about everything we've heard this season and what that tells us about the future of the film industry in Australia. We ask the question: "does the film industry need to change?", and discuss how each of us can play a role in making change happen.
Ep. 1 Welcome to "Life on the Film Set"
14th July 2024 | 17 minutes
Introducing Nick Payne and George Artin, two passionate filmmakers and friends, connected through working on many film projects together. In this podcast, they introduce themselves and talk about what the "Life on the Film Set" podcast is about, and why they're doing it.
Ep. 2 Leading and Following
14th July 2024 | 42 minutes
Working on a film set fundamentally involves interacting and cooperating with other people. So how do you effectively lead and follow? In this episode we talk about using "intent" as a way of directing others and communicating what you intend to do. We also touch on how to have "hard" conversations with others.
Ep. 3 Getting work flowing
28th July 2024 | 43 minutes
Film sets are busy places with lots of things going on at once. How do you organise a film set to ensure that all this different work flows together to achieve the making of a film? When is the right time to muck in and help others and when is it better to give people space to do their own job?
Ep. 4 Fuelling innovation on set
11th August 2024 | 55 minutes
We all want to make films that are as good as they can be and that impact and inspire our audiences. But so often we find ourselves rushing and compromising our art instead of giving everything the care and attention it deserves. So how do you set up the environment on set to create the environment for innovation to occur? Hint... it's fuelling people for collaboration.
Ep. 5 Estimating work
25th August 2024 | 52 minutes
Have you ever been given a call sheet and thought to yourself "they must be dreaming"? How many times have you felt yourself compromising your work in order to meet a schedule that's plainly ridiculous?! In this episode we talk about some techniques for estimating and planning work in order to create more realistic plans resulting in better work being created.
Ep. 6 Building culture
8th September 2024 | 49 minutes
You might think the experience and skills of important crew members determine the success of a film project. But how many times have you been on a set with a super capable crew who just can't work together? And have you been on a set with an inexperienced crew who performed beyond their capability because of their ability to work together with each other? This is the realm of "culture". In this episode we talk about how to create culture in order to maximise your chances of creating a film that is great.
Hosts
Nick Payne
From shooting silent Super 8 in high school through to Super VHS in the 90’s film was always rooted in Nick’s brain. Eventually it disturbed him so much that he quit his corporate job and started working on film sets.
In doing so he realised that the stuff he used to teach about in his old world — namely leadership, project management, and team building — was super relevant to how film sets are organised and optimised for greatness. With not much bugging from George he decided to make this podcast to help and inspire others.
George Artin
He used to be a mechanic before running a coffee shop. He’s now the world’s funnest Assistant Camera-person. George embodies our values and always goes out of his way to help and teach others on set.
George brings a wealth of real-world experience and stories about how to be great when working on a film set.
The season 2 team
These guys went out of there way to make our second season happen.
So our heartfelt thanks goes out to…
- Tina A Wake our producer @tinaawake11
- Martin Yeung manning the cameras making sure we look good @flamecommedia
- Dominic Kersch our sound recordist @domkerschsound
- Mark Keiller our camera assistant @markkeiller
- Joseph Blandford our other camera assistant @joetakesvideo
- Taddeh Vartanians for helping out on set with whatever needed doing @taddehvartanians
The season 1 team
We’ve been blessed with an amazing team giving their time to help make this podcast a reality.
So our heartfelt thanks goes out to…
- Ian Tamawidjaja our cinematographer making us look great @ian.tama_dp
- Ella Richards our assistant camera-person @ellastone.dop
- David Do our sound recordist @davidsbizarreaudio
- Joseph Hopkins our graphic designer @joehootly
- Jolin Jiang for composing our theme music @jolinjiangmusic
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