Springing Ahead

We ended the last day of shooting before Spring Break with the lovely tradition of Daylight Savings.  Several of us were baffled all day, but we got through it nevertheless.  Never was there a sweeter moment then arriving home after that full, productive weekend.

Then, a whole fabulous week to relax and think of nothing at all, especially TMC.  Sadly, it is now over but I must say that it was certainly much needed and much enjoyed.

The weekly Progress Report has skipped a week, and will appear in the blog tomorrow!  How Lovely!

-B.

Awesome Night

Tonight was an amazing night.  Though it was long and tiring, everything clicked just right and the results were phenomenal.  Not only that, but we really bonded as a crew.

Thanks to Daylight Savings Time, I'm still awake at 3:30am, with a crew call tomorrow morning at 10:30am, and I'm completely okay with it.

There's just too much to write about, that I can't even write anything else.

Reports and Gold Stars

So I recently realized that all along, as we are strolling (okay, maybe that isn't an accurate description) through production, I have been failing to produce Daily Production Reports.  If I weren't so valuable, I'd fire myself (Not really, cause I need these credits to graduate).

Anyway, I spent about 2 hours yesterday struggling to create some decent-looking tables on my brand spanking new homemade Production Report.  I based it off of some samples that I got from Liam (MEP professor, he used to be an AD).   I tailored it specifically to TMC, because we are working with all digital footage so the terminology can be slightly different.

My report includes all the basic production info (title, start date, day of shooting, director, estimated finish date), as well as a script record (how far much we've done, what we did on this particular day, and what's left to complete), a list of all the scenes and locations for that particular day, times throughout the day for crew call, first shot, meal, and wrap (that's for you, Zach), a running count of how many setups we shoot, and finally, a tally of the footage captured (in minutes & bytes).  I also have a space for notes, such as "we dropped scene 14 today and will pick it up our next day at this location."

I wish I had been doing this from the beginning, but you live and you learn.

On another note, this weekend I finally made up my list of "gold stars."  Often on set, if a crew member performs exceptionally or comes up an excellent time-saving solution, I will award them a gold star.  Unfortunately, when I finally went shopping for actual stars, I couldn't find those awesome foil stars (you know what I'm talking about) anywhere and I had to settle for some cheap multi-colored stars that keep falling off the paper. Well, I made up my list and it caused quite a stir on Saturday when everyone realized that Kelly is outperforming everyone else.  I tried to explain that it's not a competition, that you're only competing against yourself.  To no avail.  So, from then on it became the race of the stars to a free breakfast courtesy of Brianne.  20 stars gets you a free breakfast!  I'm still waiting for the day that I don't have to tell Aaron (sound) to get connected once and can award him with the promised three stars.

In all seriousness, though, I am so proud of everyone to have contributed to making our way through HALF of production so far!  Enjoy your weekend off next week!

-B.

Progress Report

We have completed:

-38 5/8 (out of 103)

-16 shootings days (out of 35)

-86 scenes (out of 158)

A Somewhat Sad Post

Every weekend, while 95% of the Quinnipiac student body is sitting on their futons eating take-out and watching a movie on a Sunday afternoon, we are out making one.

Every day that I am working on this movie (and that is really every day), I think about how proud I am of what we are all doing, and what we have done so far.   But it is not without costs and sacrifices.  

I've lost sleep, resulting in a faulty immune system.  I barely have the time or energy to wash my face at night.

My health isn't the only thing that is deteriorating for this movie.  I am starting to feel strain on my relationships (I know I'm not the only one).  It seems like I'm always disappointing my friends, who have to make plans at least a week in advance.  

My schoolwork is suffering slightly.  I won't even get into my mental health.

Sometimes I get scared that if I choose to go down this road, my life will always be like this.  Then I remember that unlike the professionals, we are shooting 10, 12, 15 hour days, while juggling classes, midterms, papers and projects.  And then, once again, I am proud of how far we have come.  Despite all of the difficulties and "opportunities" that we deal with every weekend, I would still rather be making a movie then just sitting around watching one.