I Blinked And It Was Over

'I just need to write this post, just get it over with and
yeah I just need to write it.' - Me for the past week.

This project went so quickly I don't think I've fully recovered from it yet because as soon as we tore down the set I was straight back into Maps and Journey's. Overall this project may have been the most stressful thing I've ever done for a grade and I once overnighted my coursework by courier to an exam board.

Looking back I honestly can't see a lot of good but I think that's because I was completely immersed in what was happening and I didn't have the opportunity to take a step back and look at it for what it was - a group of students learning and practicing a lot of new skills.  I approached this project as if I was in a professional setting, even if I didn't really know what I was doing, but in approaching it that way along the way I forgot that other people also don't really know what they are doing. It became very obvious to me around the time we changed the script that a lot of people just hadn't grasped that the shoot was happening as quickly as it was, like they just hadn't looked the timetable as a whole semester. I remember being rather firm and almost demanding things from people and people were shocked because we 'have loads of time before we shoot' when in fact we were building the set in 2 weeks. Something I learnt very early on in this project was that if I ask for something on a specific day I will most likely not receive it on that day, when we changed the script I started purposely asking for things 2 days earlier than I needed them because I knew they would be up to 2 days late. A bit sneaky but I meant no harm and for the most part it got the job done!

Final shot of the project!

Before the shoot started I was told that everything was under control and that everything was ready for the Monday, we even had a quick tech rehearsal before we left for the weekend. The build was pretty smooth, it took a few more shopping trips than I had originally planned but it was all working out and the best thing - no arguments. None. It was as if as soon as everyone was on a level playing field and were just mucking in to get the job finished everything fell into place. During the pre-production things were tense because you would think you were getting somewhere but then someone wouldn't be in Uni for a day meaning things had to be decided without them, meaning when they came back they would annoyed at certain things not being included; or people would just want different things and weren't willing to compromise. It was just a hard time within the group. Whilst building however everyone just had fun, it was a new experience for everyone so we were all learning together and just having a bit of a laugh.

I've already blogged about the first day of shooting here so check that out if you haven't already and I'll go straight onto the second day.

This day was the most stressful by far and I would like to make something clear the 2 day shoot was my idea. I had to make a decision and at the time it was around a week (?) before the set build was starting and we were starting to cast actors and they needed times. At this point the script was finalised and I was emailing Rosie regarding pay and expenses, I was told we could have 2 actors for 1 day if they are paid for by the University. Now I knew this wasn't enough time and I mentioned that we were considering trying for expenses only but with that came a set of moral obligations - how long can you expect an actor to work without pay? I made the call of 2 days because it made sense. We had a 4 page script and I had spoken to members of the group who agreed that it was a plausible option, the only thing I didn't have to make the decision off was storyboards because they simply weren't made yet.

Staying late on the Tuesday wasn't planned but I also had to make the call off working 2 hours extra (on top of an admittedly long day) or have the unpaid actor have to drive back to Farnham from Southampton to film another 2 scenes. I'm glad we stayed back to finish like we did however if I had known the complexity of the shots earlier on I probably would have tried to stretch it over the Wednesday as well. When I made the call I was making it on the assumption that we only had 2 more shots to do the final shot of the lights changing and a slider shot, I honestly had no idea we were using the dolly and I think it came as a shock to most people as all day we had said we weren't using it.

I did feel a bit out of loop whist on set because in all honestly I didn't understand the storyboard and shot list, I thought it was due to inexperience but a few of us were a bit confused about it so I spent a lot of the day asking questions and the rest of the day pretending I had answers to other peoples questions. Because that's what a producer does - they act like they are the most organised person in the room so much they eventually become the most organised person in the room.

My colour coded production pack - I needed to organise! 

Overall, now I can look back properly, I do think we worked well as a team on the set but I also think the pressure helped in a way? I know that sounds bad but what I have learnt through this project is if you give DFSA  a relaxed environment they'll work in a relaxed way, the same way when I remained calm during pre-production people remained calm with me which was great but they still didn't quicken their work pace which would have a been useful at the time. So whilst it was stressful I think it made for a better workflow which I know is not a mutual feeling across the group.

Personally this project has been eye opening, I learnt new things about film that I didn't know before, I learnt that being strict with things from the start would have saved us a lot of stress. I also found that when I gave specific jobs to people they did get done, not as quick as I would have liked but they got done. However I wish some teams would have communicated more because I simply didn't have the time to go through each team and individually break things down to make sure they got done - that was a trust exercise for the control freak in me, honestly it was terrifying. I also learnt that being the producer of a project does not make you responsible for everyone else's grades, a lot of the time I felt this huge responsibility not only for making a good film but for making sure everyone passes this unit. If I knew someone wasn't blogging I'd drop hints that they really should be doing that, I read unit descriptions out for people, I told people things that I thought would help boost their grade, all in good spirit and I would help people anyway but 'leading' this project made it feel so much more than just helping people, in part I felt responsible. And I shouldn't have.

I worked very hard on this project from the beginning and whilst I tried to stay out of the creative decisions simply because I felt like there needed to be an apolitical opinion making the harder decisions (like not building the House of Commons or building 2 sets instead of 1 or building a kitchen).  But I can honestly say I couldn't have done any better with the knowledge I had at the time, I've changed my workflow so much since this project started and I think in part it's due to this project turning out the way it did. I believe that it helped me become more aware of my job role in the 'real world' and I learnt how to just deal with things and get it done anyway.

I was genuinely worried that this post would be a bit ranty so before I started I made a pro/con list that I kept with me as I wrote:

Pros
- Worked well as a team
- Learned something new
- Worked with actors in a professional setting
- Created a group dynamic

Cons
- When I give you a deadline stick to it because there's probably a reason behind it.
- Not as organised as I would have liked
- 2 day shoot my decision (Not quite but we left casting late due to the late script change)
- I didn't realise film needed a bigger tech rehearsal than  the one I allotted
- Communication
- When I was calm everyone else was also calm which meant to get stuff done I had to stress out
- People didn't research there roles until last minute meaning quite a few last minute decisions

I may come back and write more once I've reflected on this a bit longer but right now I'm leaving it as it is - a break would be nice about now.

Everything.

Photo from Jorn

When researching film roles I've found that most have very specific objectives they have to achieve in order to gain that title, with Producer however there doesn't seem to be a set answer other than - everything. You just oversee everything which in part makes you responsible for everything which is terrifying.  It's just absolutely terrifying when you leave something you've worked so hard on in the hands of other people, no matter how much you trust the other people, you can't help but worry.

That's what I'm experiencing right now just constant worry of things going wrong, seeing people not do their job right and using that as the way of stepping to regain control however I only have that control for the minute I'm talking to the person who isn't doing their job, after that it's right back to feeling, well feeling a bit useless. During the shoot if something seemed to be getting out of hand or going off track I would step in to bring everyone back but mostly everyone was doing their own thing - rather disjointedly for the most part. Yet because everyone was so wrapped up in the their job I took to making notes of things that simply weren't going to work tomorrow because we have a very intense work load. After we wrapped for the day I asked everyone to hang back for a few minutes whilst I gave them a few notes, the majority being around communication.

For a long time whilst producing this piece I didn't think I had to keep talking about the importance of communication because I thought it was common knowledge, however as time has gone on I've realised it really isn't. People and teams I thought were speaking to each other (and for the most time I was being told they were speaking together) just weren't communicating as much as I would have hoped. I thought that all changed 2 weeks ago when I all but demanded that all finalised paperwork/planning be sent to me and everything seemed to match up. But then things started changing, when we got on set we went from high-key to low-key lighting almost immediately meaning that other things then didn't fit so they had to change but because everyone was so hyped up they forgot to talk about it! It was just a bit confusing.

I'm not sure if it was confusing simply because they were using terminology that I still don't fully grasp or everyone was crowded around the camera talking at once but something was off. Not speaking properly to actors, people not fully engaging with their jobs, not listening to their team leader, letting others take over their role etc It's really hard to gauge how severe some of the actions are because this is the first time I've done this. I just hope that explaining my perspective on the shoot at the end of the day was enough to make people realise that tomorrow is going to be hard, doable but hard.

'I'm Gonna Build Me A Wall'

Set build, beginning, middle and end. Photo from Mirella

Is it wrong to be shocked when everything, well mostly everything, goes exactly the way you want it to?

For the majority of this project I feel like I've been pushing an uphill battle where everything and to some extent everyone has been against me. I guess that comes hand in hand with being a producer however sometimes it can't help but feel personal. That's exactly what I avoided for the majority of this project, I didn't want anyone to feel like anything I said to them was a personal attack but in making sure that didn't happen part of me just avoided the confrontation. I can handle things in formal situations such as production meetings but outside of that when someone Facebook messages me asking a question or texts me saying they're going to be late I feel like it's too much of an intimate situation to be blunt with them without sounding like I'm making things personal. Throughout the project, particularly in the beginning I pushed the use of email to avoid this type of thing but after a
while I just had to admit defeat to social media and texting. It came with it's own challenges but it was definitely the better way of communicating to everyone and getting a quick response.

I've done many things wrong during this production and I openly admit that, however I've recently realised that if I say anything with enough credence people will believe me. The same with if I act like nothings wrong people will also believe that nothing is wrong and continue with their work, even if that work is behind schedule.

I guess what I'm trying to say is acting like I knew what I was doing was the best decision I've made so far.

Out of me making decisions of pure instinct we got the script finalised, storyboards finished, set build approved, actors auditioned, set and props ordered, set built and dressed all in time for a tech rehearsal with camera and lights on Friday afternoon. That's the bit that still hasn't quite made sense in my head.

On Tuesday me, Emily and Tom went to buy the main building materials for the set - including a door that fit in Tom's car as long as me and Em were not also in the car so we called Lawrence to pick us up - although my dodgy calculations meant an extra 2 trips to Homebase (again thank you Tom and Lawrence!) we got everything done in 2 days. That's right, built, scraped, papered, 2 coats of paint and flooring down by 5pm Thursday. Come Friday all that was left to do was hang the doors and start dressing.

So yeah I'm still in a state of shock, the call sheets are now drawn up and ready to go all that's left to do is film and then it's over which is kind of insane. I'll have more of an insight into being a producer when everything has finished but now my main thought is this, I thought I was a good producer before I started this project and whilst the vast majority of this project has made me question those skills I'm back to thinking I'm not half bad at this. It's been a learning curve and it's been a hard one but I'm getting there.

Plus right now the budget stands at £99.56 - with only T-shirts left to buy (and possibly a bit of petrol money for the boys) I don't think that's bad going.

I'm OK at this?

Something I'm not proud of is that as a person I am absolutely terrified of failure to the point where it genuinely hinders my learning. One of the downsides to coming into a very technical course without any real technical background was then when it come to practical projects there is always someone better skilled than me at certain things, camera work and lighting included. So I never really tried to do those jobs because there are people who are better at it than me and if my camera work isn't very good then we'll all get marked down because of it.

But the major flaw in that plan is I
never learn how to do those things, this year I am a bit more confident with my work and I'm trying my hand and lighting for instance but in non-Uni based work. I also tried out the Glide-cam. Now this was terrifying to me, thousands of pounds worth of equipment on the end of a stick? Nope, not something I care to think about. It wasn't until I realised that dance training is actually useful in this case that I decided to have go. Dance training has never really came in handy for me since I stopped dancing however having a steady walk and centre of gravity whilst using a steady-cam is actually pretty useful. I wasn't as bad at it as I thought I would be and it was actually really fun.

I'm not saying I'm going to be transferring all my energy into being a cinematographer anytime soon but I'll be willing to give a shot, maybe not on Uni project yet but personal projects? Sure why not.

Filming with the Green Screen in G12

I also used the studio for my Maps and Journeys shoot - shot on a standard tripod, nothing that interesting if I'm being honest but the big studio isn't that scary anymore and I call that progress.

We're Nearly There!

My brainstorming for buy set build materials

So now we have a finalised set design and we start building on Wednesday I started making a list/pricing up everything we need for the set with the intention of going out with Emily tomorrow to buy everything so on Wednesday everything is there ready to go.  I spoke to Chris briefly the other day about sizing and how we came to the conclusion we could use around 8 flats with the set being 12ft by16ft (Actually make that 8ft by 12ft, I didn't realise how big the other was!).

I made the list of the B&Q website and tried to match up measurements to the best of my knowledge, I also looked at other suppliers in farnham but they were all a lot more expensive than B&Q. I also included equipment (everything except nails, I need to speak to Chris again first) but I remembered that a while back some of the class said they had a lot of painting equipment at home so I need to ask them first before I head out and buy everything new, I also need to check to see if the studio has dust sheets available.

The only problem I'm currently facing is transport, a lot of the class are using the self-directed days to work on their maps and journeys projects meaning that we don't have access to a car, something that's pretty important if we're buying a door. (I'm still trying to find a way of building a door frame instead of buying one, but I'll see how far I get with that). Jonny is holding auditions on Tuesday, meaning a decision will be made in time for Mirella to go out and buy costumes in the following days. I may be living in a bit of a dream world but I would like to have the main set built/wallpapered on the Wednesday in time for a coat of paint on the Thursday, have that dry over night then have a second coat done on the Friday morning so we can start dressing the set on Friday night ready to have final touches done on the Monday morning before we shoot.

Lots of organising once again but there seems to be an end in sight - which I am very grateful for!

It's fine.

As Producer I've found that a lot of my job is writing. Writing risk assessments, timetables, notes, minutes from meetings, emails.... just a lot of writing. Anyway at the start of the project we were all quite laid back about it and then we found out that the script that had been written wasn't plausible to make and wasn't as creative as we thought it was. So the synopsis went from this;

A 1-2 minute advert focusing on the hidden nature of domestic abuse, following a character watching TV in his home, oblivious to the abuse happening in the adjacent room. The advert will focus on the hidden nature of domestic abuse, how it can often go unnoticed and its direct impact on the victim. The goal is to raise awareness on how to spot the signs of domestic abuse, promote helplines, and most importantly encourage people not to ignore the issue when they notice the signs. This will be achieved by utilising skills developed in the professional toolkit units.

To this;

A 2 minute long campaign film focusing on the stigma against male domestic abuse victims. Based on the classic sitcom the campaign will open with the male lead entering the set talking to a friend about how how his partner has been hitting him. At this point you will hear a generic laugh track. This will continue often with his friend quipping in remarks about ‘manning up’ and ‘don’t be a wimp’. The laugh track will continue until the character notices it and address the fact that it’s not a funny subject, at this point the actor will look directly into the camera breaking the fourth wall. Tracking backwards the camera will reveal the set (eg lighting, other cameras sound equipment) showing the audience how the media control our perceptions of abuse alongside the actor who will be speaking about the importance of the stigma being dropped. And now to this;

A 2 minute long campaign film focusing on the stigma against male domestic abuse victims. Based on the classic sitcom the campaign will open with the male lead entering the set talking to a friend about his recent family holiday. Whilst talking the friend will leave the set and go to grab a beer from the kitchen, at this point the camera will zoom in on the male lead as he sits on the sofa. Sounds from the kitchen and object around the room will become more prominent and the character will be very much in his own world. Once the camera is in a close up a bottle will be heard smashing in the kitchen causing the male lead to jump, linking back to the story regarding his wife bottling him on holiday . At this point his friend will come back into the living room where he will be trying to remove a stain from his shirt before asking the male lead if everything is ok. The male lead will then say the smash made him jump to which his friend will reply that it was only a bottle smash. At this point the male lead will look at his hands saying 'Yeah, man up'. And if I have any say in the matter it won't be changing again. After some very tense meetings I finally feel comfortable saying that we will get everything done on time as long as everyone works together as, to be quite frank, we don't have any time left. So far we've had around 7 production meetings (some of which the minutes from the meetings can be found here, here and here). I will say I'm quite comfortable leading meetings of this size as it's something I've done a lot of in the past, so I'd like to say I'm pretty good at it although some people may disagree. In the past week since the idea change around I have found myself becoming stricter with people regarding deadlines and changing ideas simply because when you look at the timetable (found here) you can clearly see that time isn't on our side. We also had a move around with the job roles (found here) to make sure everyone had a job to do during the shoot. In the past few days we've had a script drawn up (here is one of the later drafts of the script) and after meeting with Anne we made some changes as a group to make the script easier to work with on a creative level, the final version of the script will be ready by Tuesday. Once the script is finalised that means the Director/Storyboard Artist can work with the D.O.P on the shot types and storyboards of which I hope to have by Thursday to look over and finalised by Friday so that the Ast. Director can figure out our shoot schedule and the Lighting director can get started on plans for the shoot. I guess what I'm trying to say is, we're getting there. I'm working my way down a checklist from last year and it's working in my favour I mean look - the risk assessment is almost done and everything. Just hang in there, everything is going to be fine.