There's at least one good point about Day 1 on location. Generally everyone on the set comes with high energy and a positive attitude mainly because at that point it still feels like fun & games to most of them. It's up to the director or production manager (If you have one) to channel that energy in the right direction.
On the first day of directing my latest feature, BLOOD REAPER, first-time producer, Mike Steward had us shceduled to film at two different locations that were over 200 miles apart! In the morning we set-up at our first location in Fremont, CA to work on a fairly complicated scene involving 7 actors (all with lines) coming and going in & out of the shot as they loaded gear on the back of a truck. I had to block out all their movements with them so they wouldn't be running into each other as well as helping to create business (actions) for each of them to do. The talent met for the first time that day and hadn't really settled into their roles yet. I also started to get a better idea of the different skill levels of each of our players. Auditions it seems sometimes only tell you so much. Getting the timing down so everyone hit their marks at exactly the right moment for a line took up alot of our valuable time. Miking 7 actors with just one boom gave our sound person a real workout as well. I was sure glad everyone was giving 100% and stayed in a good mood.
This was the kind of staging that normally would have taken much longer then the 3 hours we were given to complete. We knocked it out as fast as humanly possible (not quite on time) and then hit the road. Remember now, our next scene needed to be shot later that same day at a wooded location next to Yosemite National Park, a couple of hundred miles away.
I later learned that one of our novice actors had actually been drinking their "prop" beer during each of the takes. I wondered why they kept glaring into the camera during some of our final shots at that location. By the time we reached the Yosemite area, he (or she) had sobered up. I guess nobody at acting school had ever told the person they're suppose to fake it.
Go To Page: 1 2
