Tuesday 20th Feb | Shoot Day #2

Laura's schedule:

What happened on the day?

On this day we were shooting scene 17 & 16, with the characters Annie, Dean, Marie & Jordan Hamsay.

• We stuck to the schedule in the morning and arrived at the location at the set time. Upon arrival we found out that the LED lights, that we were due to have the day before but couldn't, were now available to us. We decided the best thing was for us to get them as they are lot better than the tungstens and they would look a lot better. Once George had arrived with Christine, remade the decision to send him and Jemma to go and get the lights from the studio. Whilst they were gone, myself, Nisserin and Drey set up the cameras and sound ready for scene 17. Due to their being a lot of cast, they were able to sit and chat while eating and drinking.
• The weather wasn't the best for this shoot day, so Nisserin came up with the idea to but bin bags around the tripod feet and around the camera itself so it wouldn't get wet in between takes. The other camera was going to be in shot so we couldn't put a bin bag around it, however we did make sure it was out of the rain when not being used. 
• When the cast were dressed, I started to block the scene with them as I knew it would be fairly complicated. I started by talking to each cast member individually going through what they will be doing, and then I talked to them as a group to make sure they were all on the same page. 
• I did find this task quite stressful and fairly overwhelming as there were a lot of actors to direct, but everyone seemed to listen well and understand what I wanted. This meant that I felt confident that each actor would perform to the best of their ability and they knew what they were meant to be doing.
• The cameras were in place, and at the same time the lights arrived. We decided not to use them for this scene as we were using the outdoor light, so George and Jemma got changed into their t-shirts straight away. During the shoot I stood beside Nisserin's camera outside, but the actors that were inside weren't able to hear me shout action. I had Laura stand in the study next to the scene location, and as I shouted action after using the clapper board, she would shout it simultaneously as she could hear through the window.
• This system worked well as everyone, both outside and inside, could hear when we were starting to shoot the scene, meaning we had everyone's attention and the set was quiet when it needed to be.
• Due to this scene being quite complicated we did quite a few run throughs in order to make sure everyone understood what they were doing and when their cues were. It deemed quite stressful at times due to the amount of people, and the different ideas and opinions that were being sad, but it worked eventually and looked really nice on both cameras. We then started shooting on the LS and the crew camera. Once this was done and looked good on both cameras, we started a camera reset to start shooting Annie & Dean by the door with Marie.
• It was at this time that the producer spontaneously decided to have a break to warm everyone up due to the cold weather that we had to stand in during the take. This wasn't a bad idea as the actors may have needed a little warm up before shooting the next scene, however it was only a short one. It would've been a good idea, however, for her or someone to tell myself and Nisserin that, that was the plan as we were waiting around for the actors after the camera reset was finished.
• I had told the producer that we were ready for the next take, but after waiting a little longer she gathered everyone together so we could get on and shoot the rest of the scene.
• Once the shot of Annie & Dean outside of the door was shot and I was happy, we moved the camera inside to shoot Marie outside of the door. We did this take a few times and I was happy with all of the footage we had got, so we wrapped Scene 17. Before lunch, Nisserin had the idea to shoot the GV of the crew and Jordan Hamsay walking past the window in Scene 16, so David could leave before lunch if needed.
• The camera had been set up previously which was really helpful as it was in the place we needed it to be in. We spent some time figuring the duration between each crew member as they walk past, and after a few experimental shots we had one that we could use. We then stopped for lunch.
• AFTER LUNCH
• Nisserin and Drey started to set up the cameras and the lighting we needed for scene 16. Whilst they were doing that, myself and Jemma took Greg into the living room and we recorded some of his dialogue for scene 16. The only appearance Dean has in scene 16 is his voice saying "what?" from the kitchen. I had Greg saying a mixture of different 'whats' until I was happy with the selection. We only recorded this through the zoom as we didn't need to see his visual saying it. Doing this meant that Greg could go home early and we could get on with prepping scene 16.
• We ran into a slight problem with the shot sizes we had previously planned. When taking pictures for the shot list and storyboard we used a canon camera, however the panasonics are bigger than the canon's meaning the shot sizes weren't exactly what we had planned them to be. We had to fix this by switching the two shots around so Camera A was on a MS instead of a LS and Camera B was on a LS instead of a MS.
• Once the lighting and cameras were in placed, I blocked the short scene with Christine. She understood what I wanted it to look like straight away, so it made filming this scene a lot more straight forward then perhaps the last scene was. After a few run-throughs we started to shoot the scene and once I was happy with all of the footage, we started to get some GV's of Arnold on the table. Then we wrapped for the day, which turned out to be earlier than the schedule said.
• One downside when filming this scene was I felt there were too many people on set, so I was unable to stand next to one of the cameras, that we were using, during the shooting of the scene. This is because we had a light being held next to one of the cameras, and the producer was stood next to the other. Ideally I would've liked to be where the producer was stood but as I didn't want to cause any problems or arguments I stood in between where I could see Christine's acting clearly.

Notes:

One big comparison I felt made things a lot easier for todays shoot week was the lighting equipment. By using the LED's it decreased a lot of the set up time that we used with the tungstens the day before. Due to scene 17 being quite a big and complicated scene, I feel like a lot of stress had built up for some crew members and it showed through filming scene 16. I made sure to keep my stress hidden as I didn't want to put off the actor I was working with, along with the other crew. However, I do feel as if some crew members didn't hide their stress and personal feelings, by talking about it with actors in the room, which might have affected the shooting of that scene. For example; during the scene I forgot about the way Annie is supposed to react to Arnold being in the dining room. I had forgotten this as I was focusing on making sure the actor was happy and myself and the DOP were communicating effectively. This is something I want to reshoot tomorrow if we get the time as I think it'll be worth it when it comes to the editing.

Overall, this day could've gone a little better with crew members keeping their personal emotions to themselves, but I do think the footage we shot will look good in the edit.