The short film “Night Light” will be screening at the TriBeCa Film Festival at the end of April. This will be the second film the director, Mark Mollenkamp, and I have worked on. I’ll be in New York during that time to be present at the screening and support the film. There’s a trailer on the festival’s website and you can see shots from the short film on my demo reel. I’ll try to post entries during the week I’m there.
Project: “Dead Air” – feature film – session 2
PRE-PRODUCTION
After nearly a year, here we are again making the final dash to the finish line. For various reasons, the show wasn’t finished shortly after the stoppage last year. But we’re back and I’m ready to go. For those of you just joining us, when we last left off, the show was two weeks into shooting. For this, what I’m calling “session 2″, we’re shooting six day. We still have two day (or so) left of shooting after this – this is to accommodate actor’s schedules.
So far, we’ve been able to get most of “the band” back together. For my crew, the chief lighting technician and key grip are back as well as one electric who is now the assistant CLT. The camera department is seeing some changes. My first assistant camera is now going to be the operator and because of schedules, we’ll see three 1st ACs and one 2nd that’ll be with us for the run of the show. My dear friend and commercial director, Justin V., volunteered to help on B-camera – hugely beneficial to a show like this. How we got him is humorous (if only to me).
He called me one day after attending a discussion with a leading director and his crew. The talk focused on how director works with his immediate colleagues. Justin is in the process of moving on from commercial work to features and wanted some time on a feature set. Luckily, we were just about to start and I wanted a B-camera operator I could trust. As much as I love operating, having my hands free to focus on the director and the set was liberating. I’m very grateful to Justin for setting in as he did. If he and I only knew what he was in for.
Back to pre-production. I think we went through about six script changes over the three weeks of pre-production. Some changes were logical (corrections to the original script) while others were logistical (changes to locations and accommodation to available resources). What I found interesting is that many of the changes that came up, often made the changed scene stronger or more to the point. Here’s an example, albeit a minor one. We had one scene where the script called for a lamp to be dropped during a scene where one “maniacs” enters a house. There was the risk it breaking make a second take a bit difficult. Instead, the lamp was replaced with the actor’s helmet – he had just been riding a motorcycle when he “turned” upon arriving at the home. The change worked better because it served as a better indicator that that actor had been in that room – important since our hero enters the house at the end of the movie and discovers the helmet. Another example is that the original script has one of the last scenes taking place at a military triage center. The cost of doing that scene right would have been monstrous. It was instead done on the helicopter pad at the top of the building we were shooting at. A big vehicle that flies with the downtown cityscape in the background – how cool is that?!
During pre-production Corbin (the director), the producer (Chris A.), and I worked out the shot list. As you can see from my notes, I love diagrams (see photo below).
↑ ↑ Click to see my script notes for one scene.
I also love 3×5 cards, especially the ones with grids on them. During “Donna on Demand”, I started making floor plans to map out camera placements, camera moves and lighting diagrams on sheets of paper. This time around I wanted to do a little less work but still get the benefit. I still plotted the sets using Illustrator, but instead of printing to 8.5 x 11 sheets of paper and then cutting them into fourths, I printed to 3×5 index cards. I like to buy myself a little something new before big shows. This time around, to carry my collection of 3×5 cards, I bought myself a Levenger 3×5 leather case. (Very sexy in black leather and red threaded trim.) It can hold about 80 of my cards plus business cards, which is good because needed about 50 cards plus blank cards. While not directly useful on set – it was great to carry around (it fits in the back pocket) and helpful when talking to other departments about that’s planned for a scene or as flash cards!
↑ ↑ My new toy.
I’m enjoying the notion that our “little horror film” has enough thought put into it to have a defined visual arc to it. Here’s how it worked out. The movie is mostly takes place at a radio station. The look of that radio station is neutral (i.e. not stylized). Over the course of the story, it evolves at key points in the script from static shots on the tripod, to smooth and steady dolly shots, to dolly shots that have the camera floating lightly, to more aggressive dolly shots with more aggressive floaty-cam. When the danger reaches the station, we move to handheld shots either static or on dolly. With all the events outside the station, the look is much more stylized, the camera is handheld by what I’ve termed “handheld 1″ and “handheld 2″. By stylized, I mean either a strong backlight/hard edge light, under fluorescents we’re letting or boosting the green or cyan or green-cyan tone, some scenes are very warm (golden) while others are cold (blue-ish), all of it will be high-contrast, and a contrast to the neutral look of the radio station. When outside of the radio station but not where any of the “infected” are, we used “handheld 1″ which might be static or on dolly, with a little float to the camera and occasionally some in manual zooms which change the frame no more than +/- 10mm. When the “infected” are in the frame, the operation of the camera changes to “handheld 2″ which is a much more aggressive handheld style, occasionally with fast pans, walking shots and the camera gain set to +6dB with a higher shutter speed (usually 1/125 depending on the amount of light I could get into a scene). One last note. I used a net behind the lens for just about all the shots this time around. It was a black, silk net with a tight pattern. The glow effect on very bright edge lit objects or from specular highlights is wonderful.
It is a modest budget so time and resources played a big part in which shutter I could use. I came up with a cheat sheet that let me know quickly what was the fastest shutter I could use given the amount of footcandles I had on. Upon accessing the needs of the scene and the time we had to light it, we’d aim for a certain amount of footcandles and then dial in the shutter based on that.
↑ ↑ My need-footcandles-to-get-cool-shutter-effect cheat sheet.
After numerous discussions to secure an availability date with one of our actor’s representative, it was revealed that he currently has a full beard as part of a role he’s in on another show. A beard, really! Someone didn’t think that was important information to reveal during the preceding calls? It’s not like it’s something that you might not see like a temporary tattoo on your ass! I guess, to quote from a skit from “Kids in the Hall”… “it slipped my mind!”
The phrase that kept creeping up was “our little film”. What makes it humorous is that we have motorcycle stunts, a scene with nearly 100 extras, and a helicopter. Nice.
Early in pre-production as the discussions about the behavior of the “maniacs” was being defined, the term “mythology” was proposed as a short cut for all the behaviors that define them. To expand on that notion of the mythos, I started calling the various elements that make up the overall aesthetic of the show the “construct”. I’m going to explore this idea more in the coming entries.
PRODUCTION:
Here are some pictures from the shoot.
↑ ↑ 1st AC, Nicole, preps the camera (Sony F900R)
↑ → Overhead shot with the TechnoJib – it really was a nice shot.
↑ ← Anthony Ray Parker during his final scenes of the show.
↑ → Corbin leaning on downtown – I love this stuff.
↑ ← Like I said, big flying vehicles and a view of downtown – very cool.
↑ → Top of the world (L > R: Ron, 1st AC / Koji, Operator / me)
↑ ↑ What’s wrong with this picture?!
↑ ← I love this shot.
↑ → The infected Will – you lady killer!
↑ ← Stunts are fun.
↑ → James (2nd AC) having a little fun on the slate and showing he can draw.
↑ ← Dawn starts to rear its ugly head.
↑ → This was a very exciting scene. Let’s just say sexy shots and flying brain matter. Two great tastes that taste great together.
OUR VENDORS - a million thanks for the support you’ve given us.
Camera:
World Wide Digital
Sony F900R / Fujinon 4.5 – 59mm T1.8 & 7.8 – 172mm T1.9 / Astro Test monitor / Panasonic LCD monitor / et al.Grip & Electric:
Luka Grip & Lighting : +1 (818) 565-5580
10-Ton Truck – Lighting package ranged from Maxibrutes to 300W Peppers, Kinos, Lekos, ParCans, 500A Genie.
Moment of Zen:
This one will be a little different – no pictures, just terms. When I met with the CLT and the Key Grip, they talked about another show that they worked on and Josh (CLT) said two things which I found hysterical:
1) Un-gaffable – a show where a gaffer can find no safe quarter
2) He described a particular DP’s lighting approach as “at your feet there were flower petals of shadows“. If I can only work that into a haiku.
Tonight at the Roxy was the CD release party of Sara Mann’s album “End of You”. The night included her performing in concert and showcasing the first music video to kick off the CD. The video is for the title song “End of You”, directed by Guy Julian and shot by yours truly. (You may have already read about the making of the video in an earlier entry.)
Here are some photos from tonight’s event as well as a link to the video.
Click here to watch the video
↓ → The video’s a.k.s. guy – Toby Wallwork & the director – Guy Julian
↓ ↓ My wife (the show’s food stylist, production designer and make-up) with our friend and show’s drummer Miles
I do love the black and white.
