Thursday, 31 January 2013

Shoot Day!


The day before our shoot we tried our best to make sure that everyone in our cast had got permission to leave the the school. We tried to take over by making sure that the staff knew whom we needed and that they would have to miss lessons. My group and I made sure that we had everything on the list ticked off, to sort out  what we had and what we didn't. If we didn't then we made sure that we got it that night. We rang the pub, The William Bray, which is where we were filming to make sure that they were ready for us and just to finalise everything with them. That was all OK and they were ready for us. We all started to get very excited.

I felt very excited on the morning of the shoot day! We had been planning this for so long. I was excited about putting our plan into action. At the same time I felt very nervous though just in case something did happen to go wrong or we didn't  have something but I thought that was normal because I personally think you should feel slightly nervous.
We were fairly prepared for the shoot, we just had to set up the kitchen very slightly but most of it was all done. We had to heat up the soup as Mike, one of the cast members, had to eat it so we had to prepare that. We also had to make sure that we had the poison and the envelopes which would carry the poison. The kitchen was all ready set up but we had to decide where we wanted to put the cameras and where we would get the best shots from.
We were filming in a restaurant so the set was already done except for the few things which we added. We had to change a few things around slightly but that was all successful. We then went outside the restaurant and used the outside furniture. We created a cafe look by preparing coffees and got the actors to fill two of the tables. This made it look busy as we shot it in a corner.  This worked a lot better than we planned. The set was perfect.
I played camera girl for a while and checked continuity at parts. I also helped decide where our actors should stand and whether it looked good or not. All four of us in our group had a go at filming as we thought that putting all of our thoughts together, it would produce better work. 
I thought the role which I played best was putting the actors in to place as I liked moving them around so that I could see where they looked best. 
We didn't actually have any problems on the shoot day. The only little problem we had was making sure that all of the teacher’s realsied that our actor’s wouldn't be in their lessons. This wasn't a problem though. We just emailed them and it was all-fine. 
I think that the kitchen scene was the most successful. It was a real restaurant kitchen so it was the perfect setting. We had a lot of chefs in the kitchen, one who was acting and three who were actually working in the restaurant. They were preparing food and washing up and it looked so realistic for our sequence, which was so good. 
I wish the changeovers had gone better but that is my only criticisms. We would have liked to have had a motorbike doing one of the changeovers but we could not do this as we had trouble renting a bike and other people let us down. This was fine though as we resolved the situation. 
I enjoyed filming in the restaurant, as it was nice to have a break from school but it also made it more realistic to the filming point of view. It felt like we were on a proper set. This wasn't the only reason though! It was fun to be in a different setting and seeing what it's really like to film in a different place which you aren't familiar with. I really enjoyed this because we were slightly worried that it may not look right or go according to plan and it worked out fine in the end. 
I am looking forward to seeing if all of the changeovers worked and making sure that they all match up. I hope that it will look good and make sense to the audience of what is going on. When we watched the clips from the day of filming it made us all very excited to crack on and edit.
I think that our team worked very well together. We were friends before but by doing this we have been brought closer to one another. This was a good bonding exercise. We all spread out the rolls and made sure that everyone took part in doing something. 
I learn't that we may need to be even more organised because it is always better to be more organised rather than less. We would make sure that all the teachers know who isn't going to be in their lessons and that all of the actors knew when they were needed and for how long before the actual shoot. We would make sure that they would know what to wear and make sure that everything was prepared before. 

Wednesday, 16 January 2013

Final Preparing


Today is the day before our shoot and we have been going crazy making sure that everything is in place for tomorrow. We have had to make sure that everyone that we have asked to take part can do it and that their teachers are allowing them. We orgransied their leave out and we have been making sure that their access has been granted. It has been very stressful as we have quite a large cast and we didn’t realise how hard it was to organise everyone. We have also had to make sure that the restaurant, The William Bray, is ready for us. We have rung them to confirm that everything is all right. We have checked that we have got all of the props that are needed. We needed to make sure that we had more than one pill pot just in case one breaks for example or something else happens. We have made sure we have got a lot of envelopes to carry the poison in just in case something happens to one of them. I think we are fairly organised it just seems very stressful at times but we will get there in the end. 

Tuesday, 8 January 2013

Shooting Schedule


Shooting Schedule

Filming Times : 9.00am – 9.40am.

   Adams House 
a.    Letter box shot – 1,2,4,5
b.    Window shot – 3


Filming Times: 9.50am – 1pm

 Shots at William Bray.
a. All shots of the cafĂ© outside –7,8,9,10
b. All shots of inside the kitchen –21,22,23,24,25
c. All shots of inside the restaurant –16,17,18,26,27,28,29,30,31.
d. All shots of back alley at WB-19, 20

    Filming Times 1.15 -1.40

 Shots on the roads on way to WB - 6,12,14

 Filming Times 2.10pm-4pm 

Guildford shots of street.
 a. People walking along a street – 11, 13, 14,



Wednesday, 2 January 2013

Final Cast List

We have managed to sort out who we want to take part in our tittle sequence. This has been a slight hassle as we have to take them out of school for the day. We have asked them early as then they can ask permission and have given early warning so that they can make sure they get all of the work done. When deciding who we wanted in our tittle sequence we had a look at the cast list and we did struggle to meet all the demands.
For the passovers we have decided to use younger looking boys instead of middle aged men. The reason for this was that we couldn't get hold of middle age men but we also thought that it would look better with boys as then it has the stereotypical meaning that they are up to no good.

Cast list:

Maxim Baldry - Waiter at cafe, extra in restaurant, takes place in a passover.
Theo Bhat - Takes place in a passover, extra in restaurant.
Adam Grant - Driver, takes place in passover.
Habeeb Fasasi - Chef
Hendrik Speelams - Waiter
Kitty Birks - Extra in restaurant
Paul Chesterfield - Extra in restaurant, Takes place in passover.