It's less than a week until we start shooting The Flight of the Flamingo so I figured I'd kick-off a new production diary (the long awaited sequel to the original production diary).
I've spent much of this week casting and arranging a schedule with actors. One of the difficult things with the crowdfunding was that it was hard to get (or offer) firm commitments from actors whilst we were still unsure whether we'd meet our funding goal and be able to go ahead with the production. Now that we have the money, it's perfectly easy to get actors attached, it's just that with such short notice there are bound to be schedule clashes. STILL I've now cast 80% of the roles, including all the principal ones, and I reckon we've put together a pretty damn good cast. I'll update you more on the various actors and various characters in later production blogs.
Locations have proved my Achilles heel in the past and they are, once again, proving a little difficult. I'm having quite a lot more help this time round which is great and we've got a few different places locked down. That said: there are a few crucial locations I've yet to secure and it's really vital that I manage to get them sorted in the next few days so that we can focus on shooting as soon as that's started. I have the location for our opening day's shooting, which is great, but I've got to sort out a whole bunch of extras for that scene, so we'll have to see where that goes. Ideally I'd like to get about 20 people, but it's going to be a case of how many people (mainly my friends) we can get to turn up for free because paying out 28 sets of travel expenses in one day is going to be extremely pricey.
One of the last problems that I'm dealing with is a little script one. I've been aware (people right here pointed it out to me) that the ending is going to be polarising. A couple of actors have read the script and asked me if it's missing pages at the end, because they feel like something's unresolved. And a few other people have, hand's down, told me that I can't end it as bleakly as I have done. I'm going to take a look at that final scene. Obviously, I wrote an ending that I, personally, like but, if it doesn't work for other people, then I'm willing to change it. I have a feeling, however, that when we come to shoot that scene, the impact, as it's currently written, will be pretty intense. Who knows?
My chores for the next few days involve locking stuff down: cast and crew, locations, extras, props, costumes...etc. These are all the fiddly bits of production that I'd much rather delegate to someone else but, for the time being, I'm going to be overseeing them. I've developed a minor obsession with Google Documents spreadsheets, which are great when you can't be near the cast and crew every day. Hopefully that's going to give us a solid, flexible base from which to build a more detailed production schedule.
I have a few general questions to pose to readers of this diary: In addition to the sound recordist that we are paying for the shoot, someone has offered to be a sound assistant for free- does this seem like a really helpful role? How much do you recommend, for a 12 day shoot, shelling out for a MUA? I usually use students but I won't be able to get anyone to commit for that length of time on nothing but expenses. And are there any British actors between 45 and 70 (outside of the really, really famous ones) who you like? Maybe someone you've seen in an indie but haven't seen that much elsewhere.
And are there any British actors between 45 and 70 (outside of the really, really famous ones) who you like? Maybe someone you've seen in an indie but haven't seen that much elsewhere.
Over and out.
That's, almost, a generation and a half difference there, Nick. I know it's PC, today, to refer to both sexes as actors, so are you looking to cast female or male? Who is this character? Can you give us an idea?
Good Luck! I'm excited to subscribe to your production log.
That's, almost, a generation and a half difference there, Nick. I know it's PC, today, to refer to both sexes as actors, so are you looking to cast female or male? Who is this character? Can you give us an idea?
Ah, yes, should've been more specific. He's a man, he's the father of a 20 year old so I figured the age range could be pretty wide (they're a posh family). Other than that I don't have many specifics. He's quite a dry, witty character- bit of a silver fox, very successful and on the ball.
Hope that helps (I must learn to be more specific with my casting)
You're going to have the time of your life. Shooting a short film is incredibly fun, but the added intensity of shooting a feature is exhilarating! Whatever the filmmaking version of "break a leg" is, do that!
You're going to have the time of your life. Shooting a short film is incredibly fun, but the added intensity of shooting a feature is exhilarating! Whatever the filmmaking version of "break a leg" is, do that!
I believe it's 'fracture your skull'.
Yep, I'm certainly getting the 'exhilaration' thing coming through- I just hope this doesn't turn into nervous panic over the weekend
Oh, and it was Phil's birthday today so Happy Birthday Phil!
We're three days into production now, so I thought I could spare some time for an update.
Our first day was a logistically tricky party shoot but it worked out really nicely and was one of the smoothest shoot days I've had. We shot it all handheld, following our lead character through the party first and then picking off the shots for reverse close ups with the different interactions.
On day two we reshot the scene that we did in the promotional video but in a different location and with one different actor. We also did some more scenes at the same location with those actors, and that all went pretty nicely although I stupidly forgot a prop, so we're going to have to shoot some pick-ups there next week. You can see some BTS photos from that day's shooting here.
Today's stuff was good again. We had fewer script pages scheduled for today so more time to play with and, perhaps, we were a little slack in the morning and didn't quite get all we needed done with an actress before she had to depart. But after that we got the majority of the shots that we wanted and spent some of the afternoon as a compact (4 person) guerilla shooting crew out on the streets of London, getting some amazing looking shots of our lead actor as he travels around the city. Once again you can check out BTS photos here.
All things considered it's going pretty well and the footage we've (well, Phil) shot looks amazing. We'll keep you updates as we go along but we're shooting outside London tomorrow and then some pivotal scenes on Friday so it's going to be a busy end to the week!
But the lady in the last shot seems to have looked at the camera. Hope you have another take.
That woman literally turns round for a fraction of a second whilst she's waiting to cross the road (it's a long shot anyway) and I think she's actually just checking the traffic and vaguely notices the camera. Either way, she's only looking in that direction for a split second (which Phil has captured wonderfully in that screenshot!).
And are there any British actors between 45 and 70 (outside of the really, really famous ones) who you like? Maybe someone you've seen in an indie but haven't seen that much elsewhere.
Over and out.
Maybe a Scottish accent won't do. Even if that's so, maybe he's good at affecting different accents.
I got nothing else off the top of my head. I'm sure I'll be searching the brainbanks for more actors I might have seen in indie shorts etc. But I immediately thought of Robert Harrison just because ever since I saw...
...I haven't forgotten being wowed by his powerful and very able performance. I still would like to see him in more roles.
Holy crap, looking at his IMDb page I see that he was in Valhalla Rising. Cool flick. I wonder who Roger was. I might have to rewatch that just to try to pick him out. Nice.
Seriously, it's a mystery to me. I know the number-games you play, adjusting this and that setting, off-setting that one with this one. I have a rudimentary understanding of what goes on behind the camera, cinematography-wise. But I just don't get it.
How do you make the image look that good?! This early footage looks really nice. Great job, Phil.
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