Archive for January, 2008
The Final Day
The final day of principal photography was awesome. Thanks to Lisa at Nights of Neon for the incredible Fortune Teller sign, and much thanks to my excellent cast and crew. Jen came in while editing her film to be my assistant, and Ernest came in off a feature film to run sound (You guys are incredible, by the way!). Rosie was our talented makeup artist, and while it was her first day on set, she fit right in. Nic not only got some great photos of the day, he also helped us out as lookout for our street scenes (shot guerilla style on the streets of LA) and slated a lot of the time.
Marina blew our socks off with her characterization of the Fortune Teller, and Sabrina and Kathi were excellent as always. I’m lucky, we got some great people to work with on this show.
The things I remember about our last day most are:
- This was the first and only day I got to sit down at all. I was given a director’s chair a few years ago, but we’d been using it as our makeup chair. This day, I got to sit in my chair and work with the actors. It was really nice.
- I finally got to get out my steadicam rig and have some real fun with the moving camera. Every other moving shot in the show was on a dolly. But we didn’t have the time or permits to lay down dolly track, so we had to go light and trust that the steadicam would be good enough. It was.
Not everything was perfect, time and daylight were against us, so we lost our natural light for a scene in the building lobby. But we regrouped and brought in lights to nail that scene. The dailies look fantastic, as usual.
Kathi and I will be going into post with Brandon Balin (our crackerjack co-editor)shortly, but I want to thank everyone who has been a part of this show. Thank you all, there’s no way I can put into words how much I appreciate each and every one of you.
A new year, a new adventure
Well, I am pleased as punch to report that we have officially wrapped Season 1 of Couch Cases (save a few exterior shots). After almost 4 months of production (including a couple of hiatuses over the holidays), we are ”in the can” as they say in the biz (silly Hollywood slang!). We had a fun shoot yesterday with Heather and Amy at the Fotune Teller’s getting a reading. The psychic’s room was definitely the most fun set to dress. Patrick got us this cool neon sign from Nights of Neon in Van Nuys, which made the whole room come to life. Well, that and the cool lighting design we worked on together… and the neat props we got from a gracious friend and her mother. It all came together so beautifully in what I hope will be one of the most entertaining and funny scenes of the whole series. Marina was great as the fortune teller, and Sabrina as always as Heather– we definitely had a lot of fun!!
Although I will miss our cast and crew, I am excited to start editing everything together. It’s 2008, a new year, and time for a new phase of our adventure. We’ll be starting on post-production pretty soon, and then we’re headed to SXSW in March to start promoting the show. I’m really excited… it’s my first time at the SXSW film festival, plus my brother and sister live in Austin, so it’ll be fun to hang out with them.
Happy New Year to everyone! Check back for more updates and pictures from our last shoot date.