Archive for October, 2008
Thursday, October 23rd, 2008
Post (-Production) Apocalyptic
Hmmn. Well, all the tapes went to Chris for his editing purposes but already we’ve got problems. Not only do we have the dreaded boom-shadow in the Rainy Day Corporation video but due to some kind of tape error, virtually everything from Nigel’s abduction filming has corrupted. All we have left intact of Nigel actually being grabbed and Verity then haring after is the very first take. Nuts.
We’ll have a look at this and I’m sure it can be edited round but this is a real blow as I know Chris worked hard to get all the timings right with the Nigel-grabbing and the subsequent pursuit. Fingers crossed we can still put something together. (The boom-shadow can be digitally removed in the edit but I’m still annoyed with myself not to have seen it whilst filming!)
On the plus side, the first sketches of the Saxophone Deity webcomic are making their way too me. (If anyone is interested, here is my original Saxophone Deity Comic Script, pre-tweaks and polishes.) Although I still have a few tweaks to suggest, the pictures I got are everything I hoped for and knew that Cookie would come up with the goods! 
(Copyright of Richard Cookson/John Hunter 2008)
As I sit down to write Verity’s blogs, Heather has already begun constructing the web-pages, Cookie is scribbling away at the webcomic and Lucy is digitally spraying Sheffield graffiti. It has really hit home exactly how much the filmed aspects of this project really only are one aspect of a bigger picture. I’m now glad that I decided to leave actually fully scripting the blog entries until much later as there is still a big degree of flexibility in where I put things and how to describe or introduce them from Verity’s point of view.
As the Rainy Day site is such a standalone entity with several different aspects to it, I think it best to try and get it finished first as a milestone that’s then out of the way. Fingers crossed.
Monday, October 13th, 2008
Shoot - Day 3.
Day 3 - in which I end up directing. Unfortunately, director Chris got a new job last week (which is brilliant news, obviously!) but which suddenly meant he couldn’t film tonight. So Mike and I muddled our way through with Mike taking care of the technical aspects while I ‘direct’.
Michael - the Rainy Day Corporation’s ’Warren Chambers’ - arrives up from London and impressed everyone by being raring to go straight after a two and a half hour train journey so we get to business. The Rainy Day Corporate video was originally conceived as several shots of Michael/Warren Chambers touring the building - like a classic ‘West Wing’ walk&talk - but we soon realise that are lights are just too powerful, especially in a white-walled building, so multiple set-ups is taking too long.
After I get all unnecessarily grumpy for a bit (mostly for myself for not being Roger Deakins), we then decide to simplify and just use a simple desk set-up with a series of ominous close-ups. While parodying, a corporate video would have been fun if we’d had more time. I actually think that footage we’ve got will make a nicely sinister (and silly) addition to the other footage styles. Michael does a brilliant job as Warren so we are all happy to make this video all about the performance rather than spectacular cinematography. As I’m writing this now having finished the shooting, I’ve already scribbled down ways to re-write it in the edit using stock footage of ominous clouds and OTT rolling captions.
(EDIT: As those of you who’ve clicked through the story will know, this is exactly what we did and, coupled with Heather’s brilliant music, is one of my favourite parts of the whole project!)
We then take a lot pictures of Michael and the Rainy Day site. In particular the little quiz response photos. The quiz was actually one of the most fun bits to write, coming up with these daft personality profiling questions. We all wondering how many of our audience will select the answers that get Warren’s big welcome!
Vicky and Andy - playing Lecturer Stu - arrive and we set up for the hidden camera footage. (Thanks here to Ed Cartledge for letting us film in his office and to Rob Speranza for letting us collapse in his office in between takes.) Again this is easier to shoot as it was always just meant to be one static shot and allows the performances to really shine. The only problems we have here are that we keep getting the giggles at Andy’s brilliant turn as Stu.
But soon the whole thing is shot. While I have planned a lot of all of the photos I have taken across the entire shoot to go in the blog and various dummy websites, I suddenly start to panic and start snapping extra photos of everyone and everything just in case, while I have all the actors with me.
But, having given ourselves the deadline of one of the possible trains Vicky could catch back to Leeds, we finish and I realise that’s it now. I am eternally grateful to Vicky for being with us on all three days of the shoot. Although I was desperate to write the main part for her, I also increasingly realised across the shoot that I had lumbered her with ‘the straight man’ role against all the other oddballery in the cast. Vicky has done us proud in terms of grounding all the nonsense but I vow to make sure that, when writing Verity’s blog entries, Verity is herself still a fun character.
Having safely sent our leading lady to catch her train, Mike and I send all the others to pub while we think about how it’s all gone. Overall we are very happy, pleased with what we did in the circumstances and also seem to have managed to enjoy ourselves.
So we go to the pub too. That’s a wrap 
Sunday, October 12th, 2008
Shoot - Day 2.
Logistically, a much easier day of shooting. For starters, the first location was my flat which meant my commute was hardly problematic. The desk Verity is sitting at atop her blog (and me at the top of this page) is my desk at the end of my bedroom but turned away from the wall. As you can probably guess by the fact we then took a photo of me sitting at it, I was quite taken with being able to sit and face the room. Mostly because it made me feel like a private eye (even if it just made me look like a big nerd).
As we filmed Verity’s opening monologue ‘to webcam’, it became clear that we were right to cast someone with such a strong, theatrical background. Vicky was able to to happily and excellently deliver the monologue in massive chunks and was a director’s dream for Chris. I wish there were some amusing anecdote that justified my blogging about it but basically I just left Chris, Mike and Vicky to get on with it while I pottered in the kitchen making tea and muffins for everyone.
In the afternoon, we went out to shoot a few ancillary bits and pieces. In particular, Chris wanted to shoot at one of his old Hallam University campuses - now standing empty - as a tribute.
The infamous ‘ooh it’s like Braille for lucky people’ section also changed slightly as we found some random old trolley that decided to shove Mike around for the ‘we weren’t taking it so seriously’ part of Verity’s opening monologue. (EDIT - The shot that is actually in the intro film is Mike genuiniely flying off the trolley after it collided with a kerb. Heather removed me yelling ‘Look out’ in post-production after I had given Mike an extra hearty shove 
)
Again, everything went smoothly and was another sunny day which kept us all in a good mood. After dropping Chris and Vicky off, Mike and I then spent the rest of the afternoon driving round Sheffield taking photos that Lucy will later digitally add graffiti to. I haven’t posted any of these shots here, but if you really want to see 200 odd photos of brick walls, benches, post boxes, churches etc, drop me a line.
Saturday, October 11th, 2008
Shoot - Day 1.
Phew. Well I think that went well. I think. No disasters and it was really nice sitting in the pub with everyone at the end of the day and being pleased with what we’ve done.
Typically, our only outdoor shoot day is also the only day scheduled to rain in what has been a fortnight of clear, crisp sunny days. However, we didn’t get any rain - just some weird ‘tupperware’ coloured sky that instantly put us an hour behind schedule as Director Chris valiantly battled with the camera settings so that it could cope with the strange heavens above us.
But that gave me plenty of time to run lines with the actors which instantly made me feel great about our cast and that we really did have the right ‘Nigel’ and ‘Verity’ for the project.
First off, we got Nigel’s abduction out of the way as it was by far the most complex sequence with Production/Sound assistant Seb and I playing the part of the Nigel-grabbers. Everything went smoothly once we worked out the right starting distances. To begin with Vicky kept actually catching us when we were abducting Nigel and poor old director Chris had trouble keeping up with her. A lesson to you all - don’t try and kidnap any of Vicky’s friends. She will catch you!
I took it as encouraging that one kind soul also tried to interfere with the abduction, demanding to know what we were doing until he saw the camera. And people say heroism is dead 
Beyond that, the only problems were minor. Director Chris was so committed to getting the right shot that we had to stop him wondering into the duck pond and having to retrieve litter from the bin after each take of a shot because the park was so litter-free we had to use what scant items we could bin-snatch. So yeah, our problems were a tidy park and a dedicated director. Hardly the stuff of nightmares!
Unfortunately, Director Chris had worked out a nice shot with a lovely Autumnal tree in the background but we couldn’t film near it as we were concerned about catching the children in the nearby swing-sets in the shot. Also, I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed this, but children can be quite loud.
This became a bit of a recurring theme through the day as children seemed to wait until they were near us filming before they did that ‘fall over for no reason’ trick and then instantly wail unstoppably in the hope that their parents would realise ice cream was the only thing that could stop the pain. Parents would gesture then apologetically scoot their child a foot or two further away from us as if this somehow made the screaming inaudible. It was loud enough in the open air so I must praise Director Chris for not going deaf as he heard it all through the boom headphones!
But, it was a public park on a Saturday, after all! I think we did very well and made sure that we didn’t interfere with anyone else’s day off either!
At the end of the day we all went to the pub and sat around happy with what we’d filmed. I think our actors were terrific and our crew professional. As producer Mike dropped me off (in the big, scary van) we were very pleased and relieved with how the day had gone.
I was also really grateful for Mike’s lovely other half Lucy who only came down to help in the morning but spent the whole day with us and also took lots of photos. I’ve put some of the pictures here.
One shoot day down - two to go.
Friday, October 10th, 2008
The night before…
Well, I’ve written several post-it notes to myself not to forget things tomorrow as Mike and Lucy will be picking me up at about 8am. I have several big bags full of food for everyone…oh, and the camera stock! Hopefully we’ll be fine
Mike came round earlier to drop off the van. ‘Tis a beast! Less a van and more a winnebago that we spent about half an hour trying to park in one of the awkward, tiny parking spots near my flat and getting several curtain twitchings from some of my elderly neighbours as our laughter and gear-grinding reached their windows.
Here’s a shot of the monster with regular sized cars nearby for perspective (and for the van to intimidate).
1030pm. Mike just texted. Did we lock the van? Having just scooted outside to double check, I take the fact that the van was still there, safe and secure (and petrifyingly large) as a good omen.
Good night.
Wednesday, October 8th, 2008
We have a ‘Nigel’!
Phew. Internet blog, please may I introduce Chris Wilkinson who you may come to know as ‘Nigel’ if you look at certain websites in the future. I have just had a brilliant phone conversation with Chris following a chat with his agent at Otto Management. Not only is Chris exactly what I was looking for in the role, he also really seemed to get what we were trying to do here having read the brief and the scripts.
What caught my eye on Chris’ CV amongst other things was that he had played Inspector Goole in ‘An Inspector Calls’. Not only is that my favourite play, but it is that sort of knowing performance that I think would be right for Nigel - a sense that the character is aware of more than he is letting on.
Speaking to Chris also allayed my fears that I was asking a distinguished actor to walk around a park in broad daylight wearing a ‘the end is nigh’ sandwich board. I sometimes forget that actors can actually enjoy this sort of thing.
I am actually really looking forward to this now. Heather has also been a rock and keeps reminding me that this is a pilot, a promo and also my first go at producing. It’s also a very unexpected medium so I have to give myself a chance to learn as there are not that many successful models that I can study to learn from at this point.
Mostly though, I am just hoping it doesn’t rain while we’re trying to film.
Monday, October 6th, 2008
End of Pre-Production Days
Hmmn. Well, we’re shooting this Saturday, Sunday and Monday and I still don’t have a Nigel. I have been speaking to the very nice people at Otto Management having selected two possible actors who I liked the look of but, due to various technical difficulties, the scripts don’t seem to be reaching the actors to gauge their interest. Fingers crossed they actually get to read it.
On other fronts, I now seem ridiculously worried about catering rather than the scripts being rubbish or not having a male lead. I had to be persuaded not to relocate the shoot from Crookes Valley Park to the Sheffield Botanical Gardens simply because the public toilets were closer but it’s these sort of comfort issues that are keeping me awake now.
I am actually happy with the scripts now and think that Chris and the actors will be able to create a very live and fresh set of interview footage clips. I wish that I had the money to get everyone together in a space for a day of rehearsal. But then I know Chris has exactly what he wants in his head from our meetings and recce round the park and maybe the spontaneity of the actors performances on the day will make sure this stuff doesn’t feel staged.
