Production Blog: Picking Up Where We Left Off

    Filming day number two! On this day, we met up to film our next few scenes on the following Saturday. By this time, we still did not have a male to play the boyfriend, so we had to continue filming scenes that only contained Riley and Marissa. I had reminded them the previous day to come wearing the same costumes they wore on the first day of filming to keep consistency. Just as planned, they showed up in those costumes and we were able to pick back up where we left off.

    We started on scene six which is where Riley goes to Marissa's room to console her. For this, we traveled back to the same room where we filmed Marissa's part of scene five. We wanted to make sure we were integrating as many elements of camerawork into our takes as soon as possible. To do this, we decided to use a tracking shot and an over-the-shoulder shot. We started with Riley outside of the closed door and as she walked up to the door and opened it, I followed her in with the camera over her shoulder. This was a bit challenging because I had to keep the camera steady as I followed her, and simultaneously ensure that both she and Marissa were in the frame. Also, to make sure we were considering everyone's ideas of how the scene should be shot, each person not in the scene took turns filming a couple times. We also had to refilm this scene quite a few times to get the right motions of the camera that would follow her in and then back out a bit to show both characters. The areas of the hallway and the bedroom were quite small to work with, so it made it a bit challenging to get a nice wide angle that did not feel cramped. For this, I had to press up as close to the wall of the hallway across from the bedroom as I could while still being able to see what the camera was getting in the shot.

    The next scene we filmed was scene seven where Marissa goes to the bathroom to wipe her face and hears the sirens. We went and found the women's bathroom to start filming. This scene required more takes than any of the previous scenes we had filmed by that time. This was for many reasons. Firstly, before we could even start filming, we noticed that it was pretty messy since there were people actively living there. Because of this, we had to go searching throughout the large station to find the women and ask if they could clean their things since we did not want to intrude and move their personal belongings. There are quite a few women living at the station so it took us a while to find whose stuff was whos and to wait for them to finish whatever they were doing to come clean their things. We even had to wait for one firefighter to finish her round of ping pong! We still wanted the area to look natural so we asked them to leave just a few things out on the counters. When the clutter was removed and the bathroom was ready, we commenced filming. Funnily enough, even though it took us a while to find the fighters to clean their things, while we would start filming, all of a sudden they needed to come in to use the bathroom or grab something from in there. This constant entering and exiting the bathroom was interrupting our shots, and each time we would have to restart. 

    A second reason why this scene took us so many shots was because we wanted it to be an over-the-shoulder shot showing her in the mirror, but we had to make sure the camera would not be seen in the mirror. This took a lot of experimenting with different angles and positions. I also wanted it to be a tracking shot that followed her as she rose from the sink and heard the sirens. This was particularly difficult because we all seemed to have different visions but could not verbally explain them. Me, Mackena, and Riley each took turns with the camera to show how they thought the shot should look. The way I filmed it was agreed on and I shot the scene three or four times for good measure. Lucky for us, while we were talking about how great it would be if the siren in the bathroom went off so we could film it, it started going off! I shot a quick couple of seconds of the siren flashing just in case we could find a spot to add it in when we start editing it together.

    At this time, Riley had just informed us that she had to leave very soon because of a family matter, so we were a bit rushed to film scene eight. We walked around the station trying to decide the best place to start filming her walking from that would not be too far from the station doors. I thought starting from the stairs would look the best, but it would be too far of a walk from there to the door which we did not have enough film time to include. After deciding on a door closer to where she had to walk, we had to then get their dad to operate the station doors since we were not allowed to. Riley quickly took two shots of her walking from the door to the station gates as her dad pressed the button to open them. For this, Mackena and I had to face away from Marissa as she walked so we could film this scene quickly without any pausing for laughter. We reviewed the scene quickly and Riley rushed home. After she left I had to wait in Marissa and Mackena's car for my dad to arrive (who had also gotten lost on the way but would not admit it.)

    He finally showed up and I parted ways with Marissa and Mackena who had so kindly waited with me until he got there.