An Experience

After 20 years of directing TV and all kinds of people saying “why don’t you make a short?”, this venue was the catalyst I needed.  I cast some fine improvisers and got a great shooter and sound guy.  Camera was a 7-year-old Sony PD-150 courtesy of Higher Ground Productions (much thanks for their edit gear too).

I chose the theme of maturing - because I have yet to.  I had a story outline that I had worked on with Rob & Vanessa (2/3 of my cast) and then took ‘em for a loop when I switched their character’s motivations.  I thought it would take us in new directions, but I think it may have confused them.

I planned a fairly simple shoot at my tiny little home.  Shoot day provided a crippling snowstorm that contributed to a late start.  Because I cast my 7-year-old daughter in it and have two other young kids…. my schedule was tight; after school ’til bedtime.  The audio troubles off the top delayed us even more (apparently PD-150’s are very particular about their audio settings).  Some audio troubles persisted in a few of my early takes but I cut around it.  With the tight schedule and quarters and a pizza break, my biggest regret was that the main scene was last and perhaps rushed.  I was so concerned about getting done on time, I accepted things I should have worked on more with the talent.  We were fighting time and a serious late-day energy drop and I gotta say - my little girl was inspirational.

In the end I knew I didn’t have a killer funny film, but I was ready to settle for charming and hoping my editing skills could pull out a story that made sense.  I didn’t get to even look at the footage until 3 weeks after the shoot because of a busy schedule.  When I got to the editing - it really showed me how distracted I was on the day.  Continuity errors abounded but I know how to cut around and fool the eye.  Overall, despite insecurities, I think it’s a nice little piece… and I wanna do MORE!

Lessons Learned

Let me start by thanking Alex Hatz for his fine work as camera operator, lighting guy, key grip and DOP.  And the very funny performances and dialogue by Sam Ruano and Dave Healey.

It’s important to acknowledge fine work, and they did fine work, so if what ends up on screen at the end of the process is less than fine work, well, then you know who to blame.

So, having directed exactly one (1) play (KtheM, 3 stars from eye, ahem), shot precisely zero (0) films outside of personal travelogues (available at www.daveonacruise.com), this project involved a steep learning curve for me.  For the benefit of anyone else new to the concept of improvised film, here are some of the things I’ve learned.

1. Get experts.  I did, they were great.  I relied very heavily on Alex as well as Sam and Dave (who should really work together a lot…not just because they play together very well, but, come on… Soul Man, Hold On I’m Coming).  There are some fabulous and very funny moments on the metaphorical cutting room floor…well, the trash can of my MacBook.  Some of the shots are really great, and having someone who knows how to frame a shot makes it a lot easier to cut them together later.  Too bad I didn’t have an expert in ….
2. Sound.  I have enlisted some aid in cleaning up what we have, but the expertise Alex brought to the images…well, we didn’t have that with the sound.  Two lav mics plugged directly into the camera have a lot of hiss, and distortion, and pops.  As much as we can clean up we will, but next time (if my wife is willing to let me go through this again) I’ll try and get an expert sound person too.  You begin to see how this film thing gets expensive quickly.
3. Two cameras, not one.  We tried using two, but one was operated by yours truly, and wasn’t nearly as steady as the one operated by Mr. Hatz.  Nor, despite his best advice, was my image as good.  I ended up scrapping all the footage from the second camera, which we stopped using partway through.  As a result…
4. Editing is hard.  Not to give anything away, but the end of the movie wasn’t improvised, so cutting it together was relatively simple (and I hope, effective…I’m new at this).  The beginning segment was short, and didn’t take long, although I was forced, not for the last time, to lose very funny moments simply for the sake of continuity and momentum.

   So the middle becomes the challenge, especially with each actor in over-the-shoulder shots with overlapping dialogue.  It’s a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle, with the dimensions being time, comedy and perspective.   How long can I hold on one actor to keep a good bit intact without becoming boring, or what line from another take, even from another topic within another take, can make a response work?

   Now, none of this would be a problem in a scripted film…those are actually much easier to shoot with one camera since we know pretty much when we can cut from one actor to the other.  But here, the movie lives or dies by the editor’s ability, which leads me back to #1…

5. Get experts.  As I said, if what ends up on the screen is less than fine…you know who to blame: the editor (me).

But here’s the great thing about this, as with all improvised work (and all comedy, frankly): if you laugh at it, it worked, and if you don’t…well…lesson learned.

See you on March 24th.

Diana Galligan’s shoot days are done!

After shooting my two locations, I’m logging the footage tonight. It’s beautiful and wild, with so many twists and turns to the story. The story could go any direction right now because there is so much to work from.

This was like discovering a language of filming improvised scenes. With only an outline of the story, I didn’t know who would speak, nor in what order. I tried to plan the shots to make sure I catch the funny and the character reactions, and crossed my fingers that I’d get it. It was a creative leap of faith.

In my first location, a firepit I created in the backyard, the camera had only a couple of places it could sit because the backyard is so darn thin. Liz McEachern, Bob McGill and Alex Shroen were sitting outside in -18C around a fire.  I used a master shot, then a few cheated angles which I hope work out, but they look darn good. I used only the fire to light the shot, which was fantastic and blastingly bright. I really like the look of actual fire light flickering their faces.

The second location was easier because it was indoors at my work, Warne Marketing, which my boss graciously agreed to let me use for the weekend. Thanks to Peter Ivaskiv and Nelia Amaro crewing. Both were stepped up after I put up a status message on Facebook, asking for a PA for the shoot. Both went above and beyond, with Peter bringing tools, flashlights and his own camera, even. I think I owe him my first born. Sorry Simon! Nelia brought continuity, location set up,  and a great sense of fun.

Carly Heffernan, Crystal Koskinen, Kevin Matviw, Shaista Latif and Liz McEachern were the actors on that shoot day, and barring a few sound issues the video looks amazing.

The hardest part about shooting improvised video so far has been trying not to laugh out loud, since the mic would pick up my snickering and guffaws. On both locations, I was holding my breath and biting my hand (or mitt when I was outside) to keep the laugher in until I could finally call cut!

Next up is the editing, which I’ll be mixing film shot from Peter’s camera (720b) and mine (1081i) both HD. Okay, it’s Simon’s camera. Thanks to him, too. He didn’t take it to LA with him on his trip.

Production stills…

Fireside with Alex Schroen and Bob McGill in Diana Galligan's improvideo

Crystal Koskinen, Carly Heffernan, Kevin Matviw, Shaista Latif and Liz McEachern in Diana Galligan's improvideo

Kevin Matviw, Liz McEachern and Shaista Latif in Diana Galligan's improvideo

Full Circle

Here’s an example of a beat sheet for an IVP short entitled “Full Circle”…

1) Bruce Hunter was the first person I asked to participate as a director in this project.
2) Unfortunately he was unavailable within my first production schedule.
3) Then the production schedule changed and we lost a few directors.
4) I confirmed Bruce’s participation today as the 12th and final director in IVP #1.
5) Roll credits.

Addendum - 02.25.2009 (the tag)
6) Bruce is now unable to direct; instead he has agreed to host the event.

Reunion

When this project was still in the organizing stages Simon suggested that we write a little bit about our process as we went from planning to editing.  It went by in a flash, but now that I’m looking at our first rough cut, I thought I would try to put down a few notes about our video.

For those that don’t know me I’ll start off by saying that the cast and I first met while working on the Neutrino Video Project several years ago and have been working (and sometimes drinking) together ever since.

~Pre-production~

I originally planned to set aside half of a day for workshopping some ideas and taking the best of them onto set the next day. The cast quickly realized that I was a foolish, power-hungry egomaniac like most directors and made their own plans to shoot the first day instead.

We tossed around a few different ideas for 20-30 minutes but kept coming back to Renee’s concept of 3 friends reuniting via facebook after being apart for years. We saw a few interesting directions we could take that in, although most of them ended up falling by the wayside when the cast started improvising.

~Shooting~

For you nerds out there, I shot everything on a Sony PD150 (great in low light) and got the best light I could from whatever was lying around. The on-camera omni-directional mic served as our only audio pickup and did an okay job most of the time.

Although I was still kind of hungover from my new years debauchery 2 days before and didn’t want to go outside, the cast decided that we needed to have a simple arrival at one of the characters houses and then see where it went from there.

When that was finished and we moved inside, the characters sat down to catch up and we started to figure out who they were. I did a few wide shots on a tripod to start things off and then about 7 handheld takes just roaming from character to character. I didn’t end up using any of the static tripod takes. When the handheld takes were done we had a pretty clear idea of who everyone was and what direction we were going in. I did 1 take in closeup for Dave, Renee and Joe and then we shot in 2 other rooms, escalating the tension towards our predetermined twist (probably one of the first things we’d thought up).

After about 5 hours we’d shot everything but the final scene. We probably spent the most time setting everything up at the dinner table. We decided to come back the next day for the last scene and work on the song one of the characters would sing.

I won’t give away any top secret plot twists but everyone seemed pleased with what we’d done at wrap time the next day.

~Editing~

Although my coverage would have to be described as irresponsible at best, there were no glaring continuity problems outside of the first dinner table scene.  My first assembly came in around 9 minutes and I realized I would have drown a few of our babies for the sake of the story.

Even with this harsh brutality, the darn thing is still running about 7 1/2 minutes so I’m going to have to leave it for a bit to see if there’s any more chopping I can do. I can’t say I really believe in shorts that are over 5 minutes, but if Buster Keaton can do it, well…I’ll have to think it over.

I hope everyone had as much fun as we did.