Craziness and Magic, Pt. II

The Retirement Home Throwdown, Day 2:  On Sunday we arrive at the retirement in Woodland Hills.  Lisa and I tried to arrive earlier than the call time of 8am to set up first, but once we got there, the rest of the crew quickly arrived.   Takayo Fischer, who plays Grandma, also arrived early.  She brought a wig in order to make herself look older.  Emily and Shireen arrived shortly thereafter.  

Lucy called and said that she knew someone who has the adaptor that can read the P2 cards, but this woman lives in Marina del Rey.  So after she dropped off the walkies, she drove all the way back to Marina del Rey to pick up the adaptor.  Day 2 and we were in the same stressful and entirely desperate position of figuring out how to download our footage.  Luckily, we had a number of extra P2 cards.  

So we set up production central in one of the rooms in the retirement home, next to the reception area, where we plan to shoot later on.  Shortly thereafter, the residents start to drop by and asked about the shoot and when they could stop by to be the extras.  I find out that at least 12 women had signed up to be extras.  Yay!  I tried to recruit one of the women for a speaking role and she immediately agreed.  Double yay!  I asked Lisa to help her rehearse the lines, because at this point I needed to leave to shoot the first scene of the day:  the confrontation between Jenny, Ma and Grandma.  

The scene among Ma, Grandma and Jenny is a very special scene for me.  To me, it represents three generations of Asian American women, each with their own personalities and histories, and their relationships to one another.   It is hard to describe the magic that happened in that room that day for me, so I won't even try (especially because my brain is completely fried).  All I can say is that to have Takayo, Emily and Shireen in the same scene together was just awesome, and humbling.  What talent!

During a break, Suzi, the most wonderful make-up artist EVER, tells me that downstairs, the elderly women residents who wanted to be extras in this film started fighting over the speaking roles.   Yes, a throwdown at the retirement center!   So the two women who stopped by earlier in the day decided to drop out, because they both got mad at one another.  The one who didn't get the speaking role accused the other of trying to steal the part.  Real life behind the scenes drama!

I check in with Lucy re: P2 cards.  The adaptor that she picked up in Marina del Rey didn't work!!!!  Arggggggg.... So Lucy and Lisa start calling people again, to see who had a laptop we could borrow and/or extra P2 cards.  Finally, the situation became dire.  We were running out of cards and nowhere to download.  Lisa was about to drive to Samy's to pick up 4 additional 8G cards at $50/card.  Yikes!!!   Brian, our DP, came downstairs and looked at the P2 store again (or original solution to the issue).   To our surprise and joy, Brian figured out a way to make it work on the laptop!!!!   WHEW!!!!!  P2 problem solved!

Coming up next... Retirement Home Sex Scene with Grandma...to be continued...

The RED, Editing, Casting

This past weekend I worked on a shoot with Brian and Matt, we shot on the RED. I say WE because I worked in the camera department. I was responsible for downloading the footage, clapped the slate or the claqueta (in spanish, I'm trying to learn all the right terms because I want to make a movie in Argentina!) and pitched in where ever it was needed, but mostly, I stayed by the camera. Mike was the first AC, he's a friend of Jarred's (the sound mixer from Love Song). Mike visited the Love Song set one day, I had a good feeling about him. Working with him on someone else's set was great. He was very familiar with the RED, he works at a rental house and he's seen the workflow a ton of times. He was really nice and explained a lot of the functions of the camera to me. He told me that my job was basically the 2nd AC. I was so happy because coming from him that meant a lot. It's always good to work on a set with Brian and Matt. As usual, Brian was always imparting knowledge, that's why I call him the Master. I met some other nice people that I'm sure Brian will adopt and make part of the family.

The footage was recorded onto a hard drive instead of card. This made shooting a lot smoother because you didn't have to worry about swaping cards as often. There were two drives, one for high speed (which will give you slow motion) and another drive for the normal speed footage. What a concept! One camera, two drives = no frame rate issues!!!!

I really like the camera and the workflow. It was so easy to download and easy to view the footage. I took my assignment very seriously, in my opinion, I had one of the most important jobs on the set. Based on my prior experience w/the HVX, the person who was in charge of downloading my footage (Frederick) had one of the most important jobs - if there was a screw up and something got erased then all the hard work we all put in would be out the window. I digress; I want to shoot my next project on the RED and use the super speed lenses. We used the normal speed lenses on Love Song because Indie Rental only has 5 sets of the super speed (they were all rented), the normal speed lenses worked well but the super speed would have been better particularly during the night scenes.

I'm about halfway done labeling and organizing my footage. Matt surprised me today with a rough cut of the end of the film. He set the footage to Mazzy Star's Fade Into You - ofcourse, now I have that song in my head and I want it, Matt decided to change the song because he didn't want me to get attached to it and he wanted me to see that the possibilities are endless. The scene is just beautiful.



Onahoua and David have so much chemistry, they look great together and they are so talented. As I watched the footage I was turned to mush, my eyes got watery and my heartbeat was super fast. Matt always tells me that shooting is fun, then you look at it and that's great, but when you watch your work edited and set to music, that feeling is just priceless, he's absolutely right. I had so many emotions running through me, it's been one of the most gratifying experiences of the process.



I'm so proud of this project, I can't believe we've come so far. I met with Christine and Laura today and we discussed our upcoming battles with post and trying to get the feature done in time to submit to festivals for next year. I have one day to shoot the opening of the film and get establishing shots, Christine has 2-3 days and she's shooting in late August. Stay tuned for the new cast of Christine's film; Ma and Grandma are going to be super fierce - wait 'till you hear who'll be playing them... Let's hope Christine doesn't keep us in suspense much longer before she makes the announcement.



xoxo,

Lucy

ps
yes, Matt the Cinematographer is the Editor, I am the Assistant Editor - That's how it's done in IndieWood!

Greetings Folks & Welcome to 2008

I’m very excited at the possibilities this year holds for me. Love Song will finally see the light of day. I’m so excited about that, I’ve lived with these characters for so long and it will be such a relief to FINALLY bring them to life. My actors are AMAZING and I deeply love and appreciate their contribution. Onahoua Rodriguez, David Villar, Justin Klosky, Daniella Alonso and Mari Marks are wonderful people and I am so blessed that they are still with me despite the length of time it’s taken.

During the last round of production I made a lot changes to the script. Changes that were not in the best interest of the story. After the first round of production, I went through a period of hibernation. I’ve seen Christine and Laura three times since November. Most of that time was spent getting my energy back and enjoying the Thanksgiving and Christmas Holidays.

In early December I re-read the script and IT SUCKED. I went back to the version that I intended on shooting and changed one of the scenes that took place in Dustin’s office. That scene now takes place at Shane and Dustin’s house. The day we had the office, I was not able to shoot my scenes and we were not going to be able to go back to that location. I guess things happen for a reason because the story is where I need it to be and having that scene take place in the house makes more sense.

Our production guru Brian Sorbo gave me a great piece of advice. He told me that “You never get to go back to your projects...time pushes on relentlessly. What you do now you live with for the rest of your life, so it is imperative that you speak with your true voice. You must live your life and create your projects from your heart. Nothing else will survive. The things that you do from your heart will feed you throughout your life.” He’s right. I will carry this with me forever because it’s so true.

I got swept up in the momentum of certain situations and I lost sight and sound of my voice. With so many people telling you so many different ways to do something you sometimes forget to ask yourself how to get it done. You should listen to the advice of others but you must trust your instincts and follow your heart and mind. The best way to sum it up is to heed Polonius' advice to his son Laertes in Hamlet; “This above all: to thine own self be true”.

I am also super excited because I heard the song that The Fabulous Miss Wendy wants me to shoot a video for. In exchange for using her song in my film, I told her I’d shoot a video for one of the songs on her upcoming album. The song is called “Jailbait”. I’ll let you know when it’s on iTunes. I sent her two treatments and I’ll see which one she likes. Jenna Edwards is going to produce that for me. Jenna and I want to shoot 3-4 videos for bands we know and use that to generate work directing and producing music videos.

I did not make any resolutions this year, except to keep on working towards my goals.

I hope 2008 proves to be a successful year for all. Onward & Upwards

xoxo,

Lucy