The Daily Reel: What is the ultimate goal of this? Is the site just for your films, or are you looking for other people to join in as well?

Craig Ouellette: The ultimate goal, at the beginning, was to get us off our butts and start making things again. Both of us had been in a bit of a slump, myself with the aftermath of my feature documentary "The Closer She Gets" about my mother's battle with cancer, and Brendon having put a lot of time in on a spec sitcom that has gotten stalled out. Admittedly, we figured the show would be a huge hit and there would be people looking for similar ideas and related material, which would get us some attention and maybe open some doors.

Brendon Fong: The ultimate goal was to piggyback on the success of "On The Lot" and prove we could do just as well, without the resources the actual contestants had. With the professional crews, everything on the actual show looks aesthetically pleasing, but the execution just wasn't there for a lot of the contestants. We're just a couple of guys at the bottom of the food chain trying to prove a good eye is out there...

CO: As of now the website is really for both of us and people we know, (actors, stunt co-ordinators, etc) to showcase our ideas and, hopefully, talent. It could be fun to have other filmmakers involved, but we would definitely have to talk to them first to make sure we all got along and were on the same page.

TDR: Now that you've produced 10 films for it, what has the response been like? Have you heard from anyone in the industry about them?

BF: The response has been positive, although it's difficult to gain an audience that is going to check the site on a weekly basis. It was a major breakthrough when we had people asking why the new ones weren't up yet if we were a day late. While the industry still hasn't seemed to see us waving our arms in the distance, the most positive response has come from the people involved, who have always wanted to be creative, but just didn't have the motivation. More projects seem to be getting off the ground now that we tipped our dominoes over, which is a good feeling...

CO: It's so awesome to take an idea, write/shoot/edit it in a week or two and get it up there.; finally having something to show besides saying "yeah, I got this feature film I'm working on, should be shooting next year... or the next year..." It's been fabulous having people see the work, comment, talk about it. It's really gotten the creative juices flowing. I mean, having something with thousands of people seeing it... that wouldn't have been possible setting up screenings or entering festivals. It's pretty amazing.

As for industry contacts, some of our actors have gotten managers and agents, our host Jared Young has been approached about hosting television shows, and there have been some contacts made. No million dollar development deals yet, but having movies out there is what it's all about. I love making movies, so as long as I'm doing that, I'm happy.

TDR: What have you been doing to promote/distribute the films on the site?

CO: We've spent so much time doing the movies this summer, we haven't done a lot outside of the site to promote them yet. HOME INVASION has been entered into the "Assassin's Creed" contest at www.medialab.ifc.com, so that's a start. Once we finish "season 1", which will be in the next week or two, we're going to make a DVD. We're going to keep going with it, continuing with "season 2", which will likely be slightly longer pieces, maybe even that sitcom Brendan was working on. And once I get a really great real together I'm going to look for directing agents.

BF: Promotion has been difficult... People who watch the films directly on YouTube seldom watch the others on our site, despite the links. Since it's a Web site, the first step was to register with Google, which gave us the number one spot in searches for "Trespassing On The Lot," which was pretty cool. We tried to start a little buzz on Digg, the "On The Lot" and IMDB forums, but those didn't increase traffic as we had planned. Low tech approaches like word of mouth and physical postcards to pass out seemed to draw visitors we didn't personally know, so that was a plus... And we were featured on Thrillist, which increased traffic to the main page...

TDR: The videos clearly tend towards the lo-fi. Is there a sort of philosophy/ethos around the stuff you're producing?

CO: Lo-Fi, as in "low finance"? There is definitely some of that going on. We don't have thousands of dollars for each short, so we're definitely pulling the creativity strings. Also, we didn't want to get bogged down in production issues on three minute shorts. We wanted to tell stories as clearly as we could, and practice that. Focus on our skills as directors and storytellers, and slowly but surely work up to bigger and fancier things. A lot of times, even with short films, people think you have to be as big, fancy, slick, expensive as possible to get noticed, and though there's no excuse for ignoring craft, you don't have to have all that stuff to make a good short. So that philosphy is part of it, that and not a lot of cash!

BF: Writing for these shorts on a tight, weekly schedule, meant adjusting writing styles to look at the more plausible shooting possibilities, so our first shorts were grounded in more realistic situations, simpler locations, etc. And shooting these shorts off little to no budget (which is due more to the lack of money for utilities and rent, rather than a conscious choice), meant calling in a lot of favors from friends, so as we became more comfortable with owing more and more people, the locations seemed to increase. But we've remained shooting with the same low budget equipment we've always gotten by with... C-stand, shmee-stand...

TDR: What happens if "On the Lot" is discontinued?

CO: Unfortunatly, due to the show's less than stellar ratings, it probably won't have a second season, which is too bad for us and other indie-filmmakers because that is an awesome prize to have at the end: $1,000,000 at Dreamworks. Ironically, "On The Lot" may stop, but we're not going to: Season 2 of "Trespassing on the Lot" begins at the end of September. A great big ball of creativity has started rolling down the mountain, and I sure as heck don't intend on stopping it.

To find out more about "Trespassing on the Lot" and view their films, click here.