Friday, Sarah and I were on set of "Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life" an indie film currently being shot on several location in NYC. We were there to film promotional interviews with members of the cast and in particular, the film's star, Mira Sorvino.
The location was in Harlem and the cast and crew were staged in a gymnasium at the Riverside Church, about three blocks from the working set. The actual set was a very small and very warm apartment and considering its size, it was filled with an amazing amount of gear and talent.
From experience, we know that filming or photographing actors, musicians and politicians often involves a whole lot of "Hurry up and wait". Today was no exception.
Call time was 3:15 pm and as usual, we arrived about 30 minutes early, so as not to have to make any excuses about being stuck in traffic. Justine, an associate producer on the film warned us that we would be carrying our gear to several locations and that some of them will be "walk-ups" and she assigned to us a production assistant to not only help move the gear, but also to keep an extra eye on it. Something that you need to be careful with anywhere, but especially on the streets of New York City.
Marissa, our PA, certainly earned her pay that day.
At around 4:00 pm we are instructed to bring our gear to a location a few blocks away, where we could set up for our lights for Mira's interview. This was a small, 2nd floor walk-up apartment that Mira is using as dressing room. Unfortunately, the shoot schedule needed to be constantly revised (That's show-biz) and we were now to shoot one of the cast members back at the church, before she leaves for the day.
One of the film's producers insisted "Leave your lights as there is plenty of natural light in the makeup area." So we ran back to the apartment, grabbed the audio gear and headed back to the church.
The lighting in the makeup areas was fairly dreadful and for anything more than a basketball game, pretty much useless. Sarah and I grabbed some Japanese shoji screens and three of the clip-on lights that had been set up in the makeup area to create a soft light source and background. It looked good on Sarah, it looked good on the talent. Roll camera! On to the next challenge.
Schedule change again and we would taping the film's lead character, Jeremy (Max Beer), in the same room as Mira. "It just needed to look a little different". Thank God for plants and flowers.
The room set aside for the interviews was approximately 8x10 and loaded with furniture and clothing for the set stylist. The walls, a pale, semi-gloss blue and an small air conditioner screamed from the window. Yuck!
Obviously, heat would be a huge consideration and it was important to keep the talent comfortable, especially after a long day of filming. I used a small Lowell Omni light with a Chimera soft box, replacing the 600w halogen with a smaller, cooler 300w bulb. We also used several battery operated Lite-Panel LED lights for any additional kick that was needed. Excellent light quality with nearly zero heat. At the very last second, the AC unit would be silenced.
As this was Mira's last day on the set, the director wanted to squeeze in as much face time as possible and we were informed the day might run long. It did and around 11:45 pm she finally sat down for the interview.
I had a monitor standing by so that she could see herself on camera. A professional with 30 features to her credit will know how she wants to be filmed and sure enough, concerned with the way shadows effect her deep set eyes, she asked me to move the main light an inch or two lower. She looked at the monitor and said, "That's pretty good". I was able to breathe again.
Camera rolled and she gave a fantastic interview. Difficult to believe that she had been on camera for the previous 14 hours. What a pro!
The Crazy Duck Website
No comments:
Post a Comment