'The Babysitter' Shoot

On Saturday it came to our shoot date, we had arranged to pick the crew up from Church Square at 1:30. Once I picked the crew up we drove to the location and arrived on set for about 2 o'clock. We began to rearrange furniture and practise shots while we waited for the cast to arrive at 5 o'clock for some food and the shooting was set to begin at 6 after the sun had gone down.

Once everyone had chance to get something to eat and run some lines it was just the sun we were waiting for. Sunset was about 5:45, we made sure to get our establishing shot as the sun was setting to give it that dusk setting. Once we got a few variations of this we moved onto the kitchen scene with our actors Cassie and Terrance. When I first met Terrance I was worried he was going to be quite stiff as he seemed uncomfortable when he fist arrived. After we ran the scene a few times however he fell right into it, which was really nice to see. We set up two cameras, one as a wide and another as a mid shot for Cassie, after multiple takes of this, I sent Abbie in with the shoulder rig to get the close ups and cut aways we needed. I'd say this was once of the more straight forward scenes to shoot, we got everything within about the first hour which was great progress.
After this scene, we moved onto the track and dolly shots, we decided to get these out the way with while we had time as they would be the most strenuous to set up and the longest to shoot. I thought it would be best to group the track and dolly shots together to save time. After this we just started shooting bits a bobs from all over the script until it became very confusing to actors and even me what shot this was and where it would go in the edit. The confusion cost us quite a bit of time, so we moved back to shooting chronologically to keep it as simple as we could for the actors and crew to keep up with each shot.

I felt Cassie gave quite a nice performance though-out and helped sell the character of Rebecca, especially for a character who for the majority of the piece is home alone. We used a similar technique of a multi camera set up when filming the scenes where Rebecca is sat on the sofa. For this scene we had one camera as a wide and another for close-ups on Rebecca, this worked really well and I think will look nice and professional in the edit. We got into a pretty good rhythm from here on out, just taking a shot at a time. Using the slider for the last conversation between Jack and Rebecca was probably the shot we had the most practise with. We used the natural lighting of the red LEDs under the fridge which I think will add a nice atmosphere to the piece. There was many things we needed to get right in this shot, the slider movement had to be smooth and on time, the performance had to be solid to really sell the piece. I was happy with how the shot looked on set and am interested to see it in the edit.

Overall I think the shoot went really well, we covered a lot of our basis with close ups and cutaways. However I do feel we could have got more later on. As the shoot ran on it became apparent to me we didn't have much time and for fear of keeping actors and crew for too long, I felt we began rushing. I think in an ideal world we could have done with doing this shoot over two days to really make sure we had everything we needed. Although with this being the first shoot out of the gate there is an opportunity to go back and get some cutaways of shots we could have maybe done with or improved upon ones we already got.

Storyboards and Shot List for 'The Babysitter'

Over this weekend I worked on my storyboards as we were approaching our shoot date. These were quite different for me as its one of the first pieces I've worked on with dialogue so writing that into the storyboards and planning that out was a new challenge for me. I started with the script and made annotations on that of how I was going to plan out the shots. After this I printed off some storyboard templates to get started, the opening scene was fairly self explanatory.

For the next couple of scenes, I came up with what I thought were some quite interesting shots. I wanted to use the track and dolly to roll towards the fridge so that the fridge door could swing into frame and we could then plant certain things in the audiences head about the restaurant number and the babysitter leaflet. Also when reading the script I felt it was very much Rebecca goes one place talks on the phone, Rebecca goes to another place talks on the phone. So for the scene where she calls the restaurant I thought it would be visually more interesting to have her walk and talk towards the camera on the track and dolly.

One of the things I wanted to include a lot of was close ups, it was important to me that you could read the emotion on the characters face. I decided for the main telephone call between Jack and Rebecca it would add a lot more to the tension to have the camera slowly move in closer towards Rebecca until she finally realises something is wrong here.

Finally for the last section of the piece I thought it would be nice in the last shot, if we could show Jack was lurking in the shadows all within one shot. I decided to start on Rebecca falling to her knees and then the camera would pan round and down to show the bloody bed and child and then to pan up and round to the window to show Jack outside, waiting. 

After I had worked on my storyboards, the next step was a shot list. It was brought up in a production meeting that Abby would create the shot list to help her when it came to filming, once I saw it I felt it was lacking in detail so I made one for my own.

In regards to my shot list, its fairly straight forward. Its just something to help me quickly and efficiently give answers to any questions the crew may have about how we may get a certain shot.

Casting for 'The Babysitter'

Here are some recent casting announcements for our upcoming short named 'The Babysitter'. We have cast our three main leads with one returning character throughout all of the shorts. Jack.

Terrence Betts has been cast as the role of Mr Borden, an accomplished business man divorced from his wife of 10 years. Who share two children a 5 and 7 year old pair of boys. Mr Borden has only recently began to make his self available emotionally, and picks a terrible day for a first date. Terrance seemed to fit the role because of the age bracket and his kind but yet strong presence on screen.

Cassie Fletcher has been cast as the lead of this short, the babysitter herself, Rebecca. Rebecca is in her early 20s and recently gave a stab at becoming a professional babysitter. She's a strong, intelligent woman who hasn't truly figured out what she wants to do in her life yet. With problems at home babysitter seemed like a nice way to get out the house and make some extra money on the side. She  worked for the Borden's before the divorce, but with Mr Borden not now having much of a social life, she jumped at the chance to be working for her favourite family. Cassie seemed great for the role because of her innocent features and because of her genuine and heartfelt reading she did for us.

Jack Hammersley has been cast as the role of Jack. Just from the name he seemed perfect! Jack is the only character to appear in all 4 of our shorts. Jack is a twisted demented character who slowly becomes unhinged during the span of our shorts. Jack seemed perfect because of his large stature and intimidating mannerisms.

Zootropolis Screening

Last night Me and Mikey were presented with a great opportunity without even knowing it. Mikey had mentioned about seeing a showtime for that very evening for the new animated Disney film Zootropolis. This peaked my interest as I knew the film wasn't going to be released until the end of March which is strange for an advanced screening to be so early before the official release.
When we arrived at the cinema the screen was covered in signs which explained that we were not to share any details of the film online or publicly. Before the film began a woman came to the front and exclaimed that we were seeing the movie two months in advanced and she went on to ask who was there with their University, after this at least 80% of the theatre put their hands up. She then introduced the Head of Animation on the film Renato Dos Anjos. He went on to say that him and his team had worked on the film for over 5 years of their lives and that he had worked on other Disney movies such as, Wreck it Ralph and Frozen. He also added that this would be the first time he was seeing the film with an audience. After this the film began.
The film was amazing in my opinion, the animation was beautiful and all I could think while watching it was, how blown away I would have been if I had seen it while I was a child. As I'm still under a review embargo until the film opens, I will just end by saying how funny, clever and charming the movie was. I can't recommend it enough and will defiantly be seeing it again once it comes out. 

Location Reeke for 'The Babysitter'

When looking for a location for 'The Babysitter' we wanted something homely but also had a sense of tension and was visually interesting to look at. John had lined a few places up to look at, one being his home and a friends student accommodation. It was important to me, that the location didn't look like a students. I wanted it to have that grown up feel, so you could imagine a 40 year old man living there.
We tired Johns locations, they were fine, but one was a little on the small side and the other just seemed too plain for our family home. I decided to take John to my house to see how he felt about that. Once we arrived John seemed fairly set on this location to begin with. He was a big fan of the open space and I did think that it would offer us a lot of opportunity with camera angles and movement within such an open plan home.
I've also decided that my room could double up as the children room with a little rearranging and prop decoration. I feel this will be an ideal location for 'The Babysitter' and think it will be easier to arrange such a complex shoot from the comfort of my own home.

Equipment Tests

Today we hired out the studio and equipment to practice various shots for 'The Babysitter'. We ran the entire final conversation between Rebecca and the killer Jack. I had the idea to do this shot on the slider, I thought this would add a nice feeling to the shot. A slow build to reflect Rebecca's slow realisation that she is not alone in the house. 

We ran the scene a few times, a couple of times with me as Rebecca so Abby could practise with someone in the shot and I could direct while reading the lines.

We also ran the scene with John acting as Rebecca, so I could see the action from behind the camera and explain the framing to Abby.

We also practised with the shoulder rig, I had ideas about following a subject up the stairs with the shoulder rig. We tried this with Abby just simply following someone running up the stairs from he top of the stairs, we also tried seeing what the shoulder rig was like following someone up the stairs from behind them. This looked nice but I don't think I have a use for it in The Babysitter but maybe in 'Aren't You Glad You Didn't Turn on the Lights'. Overall the tests went well and I think me and the crew are prepared to shoot this weekend.

Chloe's compilation of our Test Shoots - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OAS6Ad13Kk

Script Development for 'The Babysitter'

Today, I read our very first draft on 'The Babysitter' since I missed quite a lot of the pitching process. I didn't feel too familiar yet with our project, I hoped this would give me a better understanding. I was pleasantly surprised by the script, I felt there was a lot there to work with. However, I did have my issues with it. Mikey had included a news announcer over the radio which I thought seemed a little cheesy and overall a distraction from the over arching plot. I suggested that instead of this we used a radio show spooky hour type concept. Taking inspiration from 'The Twilight Zone' and 'Tales from the Crypt'. I felt instead of distract this would add to the suspense and create more of a creepy undertone to travel through our shorts rather than a over the top news reporter. I also suggested cutting a lot of the earlier dialogue between the parents and Rebecca as I felt a lot of it was expositional dialogue and could be cut.
We recently had our script breakdowns with Mark and a lot of what he said I tried to bring to this script. With the dialogue at the start instead of telling the audience I decided to show them. Something which Mark often spoke about, the script had the parents telling Rebecca to that they had left a restaurant number and to call if there was any problems. I decided to include a collection of notes on the fridge explaining the background of the characters and showing the audience early a not is on there with the restaurant number, so that its left to the audience to put the pieces together.
We will continue to refine the script because I feel this is the most important short to get right. Not only is it the most complex, but I feel this one will set the tone for the rest of the shorts even though it happens last in the timeline. Overall I'm happy with the script and look forward to advising on the others.

Urban Legends Crew

Our crew has now been set and finalised, the people bringing 'Urban legends' to the screen are John Hartill as our Producer. Mikey Barker as our Script Writer. Abby Colcough as our Camera Operator. Jacob Moorfoot as our Sound Operator. Chloe Lowe as our Editor and finally Me, Drew Brockbank as director.
I'm excited to work with this crew for several reasons. Firstly Me, John and Mikey work very well together. I was really happy with the dynamic we had set up working on the kodaks and I hope we move forward with this with the same amount of enthusiasm and hard work. Secondly for the new additions, I've worked once before with Abby on Loc/Doc Drama which wasn't the smoothest of productions so I'm eager to right those wrongs and improve upon what we've previously done together. Also in regards to Chloe, I've always thought she was a talented editor so I look forward to working with her. It will be a different change of pace because I'm so used to working with Mikey as my editor. Me and Mikey have edited a lot of things as a duo before including, Johnston Press and our Think advert. Although it will be nice to give Chloe the space to experiment and maybe do something new with the edit that I wouldn't have thought of.
Overall I am very happy with the crew that has been put in place and hope things run smoothly during this module.