Calm before the storm...

Wthe the 7 Minutes with Beibhinn shoot done, I can now start freaking out about the next three weeks of shooting, starting with The Ghost Recordist (Or Echo, as Niall would like to call it, I don't know, we might have to have a vote on that)... This is going to be intense. I haven't mentioned yet that we've finally secured Rodrigo Ternevoy as our 'Mikael' after much deliberation. We've also decided that my house is the most viable place to shoot the final two scenes, we were offered another place in Longford, but it's way too far logistically. We need a sound studio, and my bedroom is halfway there, we also need a room that's a blank canvas to use as the oratory, so we're using my mam's room, with her permission, of course. For our exterior, Shane has agreed to let us use his granddad's house on the condition that we don't go filming inside. So, everyone has their scripts, call sheets, contact sheets, shooting schedule, lunch is being made, I just hope I haven't left anything out. We meet in Shane's place at 10am, wish us luck.

In other news, Who's the Mother is up the following week, and it seems they're having trouble procuring an actor too. I haven't seen the final script yet, but it's the least of my worries now, I'm sure they'll send it out soon. Lesley Ann has talked to me about the soundtrack for the film, I though some acoustic guitar music a la Juno would be nice, but we're going to talk more about it in post. James has also been giving me some examples for the Isolation soundtrack, he cited some of the score for Book of Eli, as well as this Dark Ambient stuff as examples. He also talked to me about the atmosphere they were going for. The script has changed a lot since the promo, and they've removed all horror elements of the film, so the sound design will have to change accordingly. It seems like it's actually going to be easier on me, so I'm not worried.

Shooting Beibhinn again

Previously on 7 Minutes with Beibhinn, our hero was shooting a film, and he still is... Okay, not meaning to confuse the narratives here, but this is indeed a continuation of the last post.

   Day 3:   
Shooting the party scene on Thursday was a bit slower to start than the previous two shoots, largely due to the location, which took a lot of looking at maps and calling the producer to find. We arrived, scoped the place out, set up, and found ourselves waiting longer than expected for the actors to arrive. It seems they had trouble finding the place too, good thing this was night shoot. On the plus side, we had time to test out the majority of our shots and have a coffee, and after a quick run through when the actors arrived, we were ready to go.

The first shot, on the balcony, was troublesome for lighting set up. With no way to put a light behind the actors, their dark hair blended into the night sky all too easily. I tried to rectify this by opening the shutter more but it blew out the highlights on their faces. Adding to this was the trouble of positioning; I found that the best place for one of the key lights was outside the window to the left, and the gusty wind meant someone needed to hold the light at all times. The shot did turn out nicely though, the actors stood out well on the dark background (except for their hair), and there were some nice lights in the distance that I could achieve a bokeh effect with if I positioned the camera just right.

For this shot, the trick was lighting the characters properly, but showing no shadows on camera. It took a bit of experimentation, but I eventually got there. I put the lights high, bouncing the back light off the ceiling, and the camera low, which meant getting a good depth of field so as to keep the bottles at the bottom of the shot out of focus.





Despite the delayed start, we finished up just a little after we had anticipated (though I still missed my bus...). The most difficult shot of the day was a tracking shot, where Brian walks into the apartment. Without a proper steadicam or shoulder mount, it was really difficult to keep the camera level for this one.


   Day 4:   
There's not so much to say about this one (there aren't even any pictures!). The day went incredibly quickly, the shots were all static mids and MCUs, using the same lighting plan as the promo. All I really had to do was make sure the composition and exposure was good. The daylight was on our side once again, and things went swimmingly.

So, that about wraps it up for the 7 Minutes with Beibhinn saga. I really learned a lot about the shoot, and am way more confident with a camera than I was when I first went in. I personally think I did a good job too, apart from a colour balancing issue, all my shots were pretty solid. I was glad David was keen on keeping it simple, it meant I wasn't way out of my league.

Shooting Beibhinn (with a camera, you fiend)

So, the shoot is done, and my work on 7 Minutes with Beibhinn, complete, and I must say, I'm rather proud of myself. It was tough, physically as well as everything else, considering I had got an injection a few days before, and had to hold up the weighty camera and tripod for the majority of the shots, I'll need to rest a bit before my next shoot, but that makes it all the more rewarding. I'll start from the start, this is going to be a long post so, hold on to your hats!

   Day 1 and Day 2:   
I arrived to the bar in a timely fashion, allowing me to get everything ready for the shoot. Stephen and David run a tight ship, so I knew there would be no messing around.

(Well, a little messing around).

We stowed our gear in the backstage area, and I set up the lights, while the rest of the crew set up their respective equipment, and we got to the standard practice of testing out shots with the sound guy as a stand in until the cast show up. And show up they did. We were set up to get the first shots, the small speed dating segments, immediately.

 

 First Lighting set up.

These first few shots were very similar: Static over the shoulder shots on the level with a key, back and fill lights, then a simple reverse of the shot. While the shots were similar, setting them up meant moving the lights to a new location each time, which meant moving all of the plugs, and the tables. I decided it was best to have crew members stand in as subjects while we blocked out the lighting, so the actors wouldn't get restless. My technique for each of these shots was to close the tripod legs, plant it roughly where I wanted it, set the exposure and white balance, then hit record, lift it into position, and signal to David that I was ready for action. The most difficult thing about these shots was keeping the camera from canting to one side, I had to keep an eye on the lines in the shot and use them as anchor points. This would have been made much easier with a proper counterbalance system for the camera, or a shoulder mount.

This shot of the event announcer was a bit more tricky. Besides the actor fumbling with his lines, meaning we need quite a few retakes, he was quite animated while he talked, I had to anticipate and follow his movements. I found it became easier with each take, and the subtle movements gave life to the shot. Afterwards, we filmed a shot of the crowd from his perspective.

Later on,  we did some more shots with camera movement, including the focus pull I mentioned in an earlier post, some quick zooms, a simultaneous zoom out and pan (which required 2 people on the camera), and some detail shots to use as cutaways. After the shoot, we transferred the rushes to Stephen's laptop while we were still in the bar and reviewed some of them. Looking good!

Tune in next time of part 2 of the 7 Minutes with Beibhinn shoot. I was going to put them all in one but this post is long enough as it is!

Twist that focus ring!

The 7 Minutes with Beibhinn crew and I spent the guts of the day testing lighting techniques and one specific pull focus shot for the upcoming shoot. I must say, it's been a helpful workshop. I was a little bit rusty on 3 point lighting, and trying to get two separate sets of people lit up for the one shot is easier said than done, but a bit of practice really helped, and I feel like I understand lighting a bit better now too. I also got to know the camera better. I was already pretty solid on most of the settings, having done my research, but repeating that focus pull shot gave me a feel for the focus ring. We found that using markers on the ring with this particular lens was actually quite unreliable, as it responds differently based on the speed you are moving the ring and yields different results each time, so I held on to the camera for a while after the workshop and got a feel for it. We tried the focus pull a few different ways, and found it worked best if I did it myself, mounted on a tripod, so we decided we'd just go straight for it on the day to cut time.

The Bello Bar

So yesterday I went with the 7 Minutes with Beibhinn Crew to check out their location for the first scene, 'The Bello Bar' in Portobello. It was pretty much a standard recce, we spoke to the manager, took some photos and got a feel for the place. It's quite a big place, there's a main bar area with a sound booth, a lounge, restrooms, kitchen, a band area and a backstage area. Plenty of space for hiding lights and camera movement, electrical outlets everywhere, really, it's an ideal location. Aesthetically, there's a very nice colour palette, and the soft furnishing make it feel intimate despite the space. I'm looking forward to shooting here.

The lounge

 Band area (with blue lights)

 Backstage

Bar area