Hey Dan

Last night I used just about everything I know about making a movie plus one or two. Here are some of the things that worked.

Prepare:
The time we spent doing storyboards and rehearsing paid off last night. I must have looked at the storyboards a couple of dozen times as the director of photography. Storyboards are quick sketches of how each scene is going to play out visually. Every time I went to set up a shot, I looked back at those poorly drawn pictures. The actors spent a couple of weeks learning lines and rehearsing dialog. By the time we got to set not only did the know their lines, but the crew spent no time waiting for an actor to figure out what they were doing. This is impressive since most of the actors and crew have never shot a film before.

Be Technical:
Most real problems on a set are technical. For example a mic that is picking up the movement of cloth as an actor walks, lighting conditions change during the shoot, or the camera is picking up colors that are way too orange. All of these have nothing to do with story telling. Knowing how to fix them quickly is good. Knowing how to get the look, sound and visuals that you want, under any these conditions, is better.

Have an Army:
No one can do this alone. Jason showed up last night just to help. I do not think he has ever been on a set before. He is a former Air Force fire fighter. If a 747 crash landed on the set he would know exactly what to do. Movies, not so much. His job was lighting grip. Grips are in charge of getting things where they need to be for each shot. Last night, I must have said ‘hey Jason can you move…’ about a thousand times. This is just one of a handful of people who just showed up to help.

Keep Useful Things Handy
I spent a couple of bucks on things that in other shoots I have found handy. One of them is called a ‘C-47.’ Everyone else knows them as cloths pins. Having some of these help attach gels to light, cables to tripods, and papers to clipboards. Blackwrap (black tin foil), C-47’s (clothes pins), gaffe tape (cloth duct tape), some color gels and a couple of extra cables made a big difference to what we see on screen. Something that will be in my bag of tricks next time is sand bags.

These are the things that I have learned. This is just a 4 minute short, but everything that I can do to make it better I am doing. Next time, I will take more risks and it will be better. I can see that now.