CUTAWAYS - Last minute Quick shoot.

Due to the structural problems as mentioned earlier. Today we shot cutways of myself walking through location from behind (so that I looked like nathaniel) I set up the static shot and crew member Alex Coates shot me upon location under my direction. We shot 2 minutes worth of cutaways; shots included pull focuses, static shots, tracking shots (using shoulder rig) and even more establishing loation shots.

To maintain continuity throughout the piece I were not only wearing his coat and hat but very similar clothing to himself - jeans, shoes and such.
The rushes were quickly taken to Editor stella who filled in any spaces within the edit where the cutaways could go. Just in time for the presentations the following day.

Editing Day 1 - Huge structure problems

Today, Editor Stella began the editor.. Soon after starting we had a group meeting with our tutor Debbie, Although the general skeleton of the edit was now in place.. Our tutor suggest that we need to completely change the structure.. This was due to the film taking place in two areas. One static city location and the others being tracking shots. She believed that switching throughout the film between static and trackign scenes prevented the film flowing properly and therefore suggested moving around the scenes.

Stella came up with the idea of using the majority of the static city location as a voice over...which will form over cutaways etc. The only problem with this is that although we have many cutaway clips, I shot only with intention of using them for location cutways and interview cutaways - in other words the shots were mearly tilts, pans and statics but didnt portray movement that the rest of the film does with tracking (talking to camera) shots. This was a scripting error.

I came up with the idea of trying to get the actor again for a few hours to shoot some cutaways of him walking. However he was unavailable on such short notice and therefore I suggested using his coat and hat and shooting cutaways of myself (due to looking more like the actor than the rest of the crew) walking around travelling between scenes and as sound was not required because we would be using these shots over a voice over.

Shoot 2 - Scenes 9 and Flashback

Monday was the final day of the shoot, We met actor Nathaniel and went 45 minutes on the bus to a place called Killamarsh, in which we first shot he flashback sequence. I am very happy with how this went. I pushed the actor so that we could overshoot this scene and achieve lots of different camera angles and cutaways.

We then took a 10 minute walk with the crew to film the final scene of the Pathways, up in the countryside in which we shot the final scene. For this scene we used Clarice's dog Ben who took the role of Gary's dog. I am happy with how this scene turned out and glad the weather kept off!

Day 1 shoot

On friday we shot the majority of the scenes in just under 5 hours. It's been a very successful day. I believe we have achieved the shots required and have now planned an extra day to shoot on the Monday (scene 9 and flashback scene) this is due to the scene scheduled to be shot in Killamarsh around 45 minutes away from where the other scenes are shot (actor was only available until 5pm that day)

Having an extra day to shoot will also allow the actor to come back refreshed and ready to go.
I am very happy with the shots achieved today and the ators performance was great - using only one take in majority of cases.

Bought Shoulder rig. + test.

After recently purchasing a shoulder rig for the walking shots. (It will allow me to achieve steady shots and a sense of flow)

Anyway, I wanted to test it out, this also gave me a chance to see how the actor is in front of the camera. So I arranged a small test shoot with nathaniel prior to shoot day. Below is a video of the test shoot

CLICK LINK BELOW TO SEE THE VIDEO

Nathaniel! - Found a new actor.

Screen Shot from -

"Antigonish" - A film by myself and James Mellors

From my experimental film project we used an actor. His name is Nathaniel and does Performance studies at sheffield Hallam University. Now with looking for a new actor I thought that it would be worth asking him if he'd like to play the role.

Reccy day. Bad weather = test shoot. New actor need?

Today we went out on the schedueled shoot, the rain was horrific which ultimately lead to cancelling the shoot. We used the day to practise through a few scenes in terms of acting, framing - essentially just a practice through everything. Another problem is that the script states out door moving shots using the shoulder rig - the wind was also an issue - this simply would have made the shot too shakey.

Below is a video of running through a few lines with our actor Sammy. Who isnt actually an actor. I feel that we should look for a NEW actor, however time is running out.

click to play video below