F1 Production

So what started as me trying to get ahead of this blogs by making my first couple postings before the screening has turned into wanting to wrap up the blogs on my F1 experience about 4 weeks after wrapping up with my F2 experience. I'll be sure to elaborate on the time needed to make my F2, but for now I want to reflect on my F1.

Production! (it's my major!)

Any who, I was first up on the chopping block. 01F1 type stuff. We weren't going to have a full 13 hour day, and the interior would only be available for about 8 hours. In a last minute re-arrangement in the schedule, we'd change from filming the interior at the beginning to the ladder half both because of the forecasted rain in the afternoon and so that we can make the most of the daylight at the start of the day since the sun was starting to set earlier (thanks to daylight savings less than a week ago). I believe the official work day would go from 7 AM to 7 PM, so we got there late.

Since neither the director, lead, nor PA had a car, we all had to rely on our Boom Operator Anissa to get to set. And she did just that, we were the ones who failed, we all left our respective apartments/dorms later than expected and it was raining. When we got to set, Eddie was there waiting for us like a good AD would. We were also waiting on Barbie (who was being dropped off) and Ray who was bringing some of the heavy gear. So here we are, about 15 minutes behind by the time everyone is there, and it is still raining. With no chance of rescheduling, we just had to start. Crew set up Camera and Boom under the overhang of the antique store while I spoke to Armesto and Eddie about the plan for the first shot which involved using Ray's car.

Now it wasn't raining hard or even regularly, but it was fine light and constant. We set quickly and delayed filming the first shot as much as we could in hopes the rain would work in our favor, but it didn't. I forgot who noticed or came up with the idea, but we grabbed on of the tables from the outside of the antique store and had it be lifted and hang above Barbie and the camera (thankfully, it was a low angle shot).

Eventually the rain kind of stopped, and we were able to carry on with filming without carrying a table. At some point, one of our instructors arrived on set to see how we were doing. He began to focus on giving Barbie some pointers or advice (I wasn't entirely sure), the idea is though I didn't really know what to do since we were ready to go for the next set up but couldn't because he was talking to our DP, so I felt odd interrupting the learning experience. As soon at that discussion ended though we tried to catch up with the schedule.

Perhaps the other big obstacle for me in the first half of the day was breaking the Urn. Earlier I had explained that I initially wanted to film exterior in the second half of the day, since that would give us the maximum attempts possible for breaking the Urn in case something went wrong. I had planned to buy just 2 Urns, so we had 2 tries but with the change of filming earlier, 2 would no longer work since we would have to save 1 Urn for the second half of the day effectively making it so we had just 1 attempt, so I bought a 3rd Urn for insurance. Still though it did not change the nerves I had about breaking one of the only props we had. If it for some reason didn't break it'd get scratched up, or maybe it doesn't land center frame, or even is out of focus, but also maybe it just doesn't look like it was tossed up after the person holding it "fell", or consider this, the ceramic shards maybe hit the camera or even someone on the crew. There was a lot going on in my head, and then I told Armesto to drop it.

There was a silence that followed that showed me first hand that the break would cause a reaction in the audience. No one wanted to break the silence. The crash was violent, and there laid the ceramic, cat liter, chalk, and pepper. It was a cut on picture and we were moving on.

Following we had probably the most emotionally difficult shot of the film, the one that I specifically met up with Armesto the day before to discuss. It was Armesto looking down and picking up the pieces. I decided for it to be a closed off set, and had non-essential crew take a break behind a corner where it would give me, Barbie, and Armesto privacy. We filmed two takes before moving onto the close ups on the hands.

Around 10 AM, the store owner Barry came to unlock the store, so by the time we were finishing up outside, we had some of the crew start moving equipment inside. Moving inside introduced a new challenge on top of still being behind, the interior space was now slightly different from the last time we were there and some of the narrow walk were now blocked. We always knew filming inside that particular location would be challenging given the limited space and fragile items that surrounded us, but we made it work. Big shout out to Anissa for not knocking anything over with the boom pole.

After about an hour inside we had to break for lunch, which is where Eddie and I worked to figure out how to make up our lost time. We decided to combine shots, re-arrange the setup schedule, and plan ahead for when lunch would end. We also had to be mindful of not changing too much since our supporting actress, Jennifer, would be arriving at a set time. As life would have it though, she arrived earlier than expected which is nice, but created a sense of pressure knowing that someone else was seeing us behind schedule. When the time came, we moved on to getting Jennifer's coverage first since she had to the more limited schedule. Her being the pro that she is was ready to go and had wonderful ideas on the day in terms of how she interacted with the space. It was lovely getting to see the two actors realizing the scene that has been in my head for the previous 2 months.

Since filming dialogue with the two actors went by really quickly we suddenly were caught up and even a little ahead, so we had the chance to re-film a previous setup that was cut short due to our lunch break. This time I had a better idea and verbalization for what I wanted in terms of the angle and lighting. We were also able to film a mini-moment with a whip-tilt that would help to enhance the tone of the filmmaking. It was something I had done a quick test of leading up to the shoot, but still something that needed a specific speed and angle to achieve. Now I had been very particular with Barbie about what I wanted, and salute her for giving her all with everything including repeating the whip tilts tens of time. In a particularly memorable moment, I was gauging that she was being cautious of the speed of the tilt to potentially avoid any damage to the camera or accidently knocking something over, so I came up with a brilliant piece of direction. I told Barbie "to pretend that Dango (her cat) had just rolled over on the floor and that she needed to whip down as quick as she could to make sure to get it on video," and it worked. I saw it as a practical benefit of getting to know your crew, and being able to curate direction and goals based off of what they know.

Around 6:00 PM, Barry had arrived at the store to see how it was going. As we were getting some of our final shots, I was pitching to Eddie about getting some additional shots, but he mentioned that in a conversation with Barry, that Barry had the perception that filming would wrap around 6:00 PM (when the store normally closes, even though on our location paperwork we had the place until 8:00 PM. It was a particularly awkward situation; he wasn't kicking us out or anything, but he was hanging around and watching from afar to remind us of his presence. Suddenly desire for wants shifted more to a desire of needs, so we wouldn't max out our time at the location and to maintain a good relationship with Barry for any potential future films that would either film at the location or a future location with Barry as the location owner. So after we got the last of the shots we needed, we officially called a wrap on 01F1, and began the tedious process of company wrapping all our gear from the very tight space. I believe we fully wrapped around 7:00 PM, and Barry didn't seem too bothered by it.

And like that I had just wrapped my very first production with FSU Film, and the first of five projects I would be filming that week.

On Wednesday, I did my job at securing paperwork, food, and time as a producer for Barbie's set which was fun. On Thursday I was on Boom duty for Eddie's super tight 6 hour production schedule. On Saturday, I had perhaps the most fun on set gaffing for Anissa's large scale Italian romance with all kinds of setups, lighting needs, and locations. Followed by a pretty chill Sunday as DoP for Ray's set. I would write more about each, but I really want to catch up on the blogs, so please accept these photos: