Visiting a Set

I had the opportunity to follow along with Joseph Garrard on a production that was filming in St. George this week. I stuck close to Joe, who is a boom operator and mixer with over 30 years of experience.

I always get very excited about working on a set. I never know who I'm going to meet or what I'm going to be a part of. In this case, it was a Jared Hess film. He was fun to watch work and his focus for each shot and attention to what he was doing was interesting. In his film was Sam Rockwell, Jemaine Clement and Amy Ryan. All actors I was familiar with.

I want to sit and chat with them on set, but I never do. I fight that urge because I understand that they are working and should not be bothered. Something like that might get you kicked off of a set. I talk to them if I need to, but otherwise, I keep to myself and stay out of the way.

Joe tried to tell me what he was doing and why in each case. He was great at teaching me about his reasoning behind his choices in mic placement and which mics to use. He also told me many great stories about his experiences over the past 30 years.

Storyboards

As a side note, I was working with a group of friends on a guerrilla film project. I was asked to make some storyboards, and I've always enjoyed that part of the process. So I put some together and wanted to share them.

Location Scouting

After out class about location scouting. I decided to head over to the Holland Building and take a look around at the various locations and rooms that might work for shooting the treatment I wrote up for class on Liberal Arts.

These are the pictures I got on that location scout.

 

As you can see, there are great locations for the chase scene through the building and places to hide from the security guard in my story. There are also classrooms to use for the scene where the teacher reminds the class about its paper due the next day.

4 Page Treatment

Monday night I sat down and wrote up a 4 page treatment for the Bill and Ted style story for the Liberal Arts idea. It was pretty easy to use that formula and apply it to the liberal arts idea.

I started out with the characters Libby and Art in class, finding out that they had neglected their assignment for the end of the semester. They put it off because they didn't want to work together. Art is a jock and Libby is a goth. They were from such different cultural groups that they don't get along.

Through their adventures, they learn about Liberal Arts and ultimately fall in love.

Screenplay and Casting

On Tuesday Brian Strasmann came to our Pre Production class to discuss how to get started with a screenplay idea.

   

I've already taken his Screenwriting class and am familiar with his 4 page treatment handout. So I've already taken my script and gotten the body of it fleshed out. Now I need to go in and polish the idea in a fully realized form. Brian also plans to come sit in on the casting session we are having for the class in a few weeks.

On Thursday Varlow Davenport came to our Pre Production class to discuss casting.



He gave everyone an idea of what it was like being an actor and going to the casting call. Varlow walked us through the process from an actors point of view and then told us what the plan was for the casting call we are to hold for the class.

I just need to get that polish on my script done and I should be ready for the casting call. I'm excited to see who I can find to play the parts I have in mind.