[Konvas] OFF topic... and how was YOUR day?

[fauxfilm at aol.com]

Just thought I'd share a bit about my day, maybe it will make others feel good in comparison....



Location shoot today... in typical Alabama August fashion, the weather is usually unpredictible and almost always unbearable....



We were shooting a :30 political commercial for a Mayoral candidate. The scene was a staged ribbon-cutting, as if for a new business.



We set up in almost triple-digit heat at our exterior location... at the party are myself and two crew members, camera, lenses, sticks, mic boom, Porta-Jib, dolly, track, computer, teleprompter, 1200w Arrisun HMI, 1200w Strand HMI, one 800w Joker-Bug, the ballasts for all the HMIs, 4x4 bounce, 6x6 butterfly, 4x4 Hollywood frame, miles of cable and gobs of C-stands..... and a variety of other equipment just laying around in haphazard fashion since we were trying to throw the setup together very quickly. I'm usually neat, but in this instance it looked like a grip truck exploded in Fred Sanford's junkyard.



Add to that the talent (the principal, the candidate) and about 15 extras... props that included signage, a potted plant, a broom, window washing stuff, ribbon, and giant scissors. 



It's a single-shot spot, all without edits in one complicated dolly/crane camera move.



We block it all... choreograph all the extras (two of which unexpectedly brought small children). Get all the bugs worked out (did I mention the 100-degree heat on an asphalt parking-lot location?). Rehearse the talent. Rehearse the dolly and crane moves. Rehearse the focus-puller. Check the sound. Do a couple of full-camera rehearsals. Pull trigger on a couple of takes, both bad. Bust one take (my fault). Am just about to pull trigger on the third take when......




I feel a raindrop. Out of a clear blue sky.




Within 45 seconds the sky went from blue to black, and the one raindrop turned into torrents. Plus instant 35 knot winds that blew my quarter-stop Matthews rag away... I chase it at full-tilt run before it finally landed plastered against the side of a Burger King window 300 yards down the street.



And you've never seen three guys strike a set so fast in your life.



Shoot busted, rescheduled for tomorrow. 



So that was my day... hope yours was better.




T2


_______________________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
http://fantasticplastic.com



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://konvas.org/pipermail/cinema_konvas.org/attachments/20080807/4e8bb161/attachment.html