Today was the last scheduled shoot of Jack, there are still some scenes left like the boat scene and the musical number (because remember this is a musical) but sadly I have to say today was very challenging.
It has been 5 weeks of non stop production, from Jordan's first music video shoot to today, our normal schedules and patterns (especially sleeping and eating) has changed and yes we're very good friends we've been spending a helluva lot of time together with not much of a break and although I love everyone, including actors and first years, I think we're all a little sick of each other and this showed today in filming.
Shooting didn't have the best start as makeup students have their exhibition tomorrow meaning they could do makeup at college for an hour and Shauna would come on-set to help with when we had to kill the Blacksmith. Makeup was started just after 3 starting with Kane's moustache and Sol's sideburns - oh! That's another thing, Sol miraculously recovered! That's what we're calling it, he can walk without the brace and crutches just not for long and you can tell he's in pain but he asked to film.
Because of the delay in makeup and the fact it needed to be done at college shooting was delayed, like last week it was a 4pm call at Preston Park to start shooting asap but my unit didn't start until after 5. Danniella directed unit 1 which were the Sol pickups from the scenes we filmed without him on Monday, these shots were short in length across 3 scenes; I directed unit 2 with Taylor on camera and we had 3 long scenes, whilst we were finishing our first scene Danniella was finished all of her shots so she took our second scene which was a scene in Prostitute alley with Kane, Ellie and Taisha. By the time we finished our scene they hadn't even started but we could not start our last scene as we needed Kane, Taylor left to go get hay fever tablets, the actors were all getting bored and hungry with supporting artists being asked to come and not being in any shots and there being no food available unlike previous shoots.
Oh yeah, weather was an issue, I mean it wasn't because it was lovely and warm and sunny at times but this was inconsistent with the rainy weather we had in the early shoots.
When we finally got around to filming unit 2's last scene Taylor was not back so I asked Danniella to help me so that the shot was right and what she wanted but when Taylor returned she gave camera operating back to Taylor. I used the shot list but also some shots I wanted such as a tracking shot at the start, I was not able to get them all the shots due to positioning of the body and the characters as well as Sol not being able to move much. We finished filming and started packing up and tidying at 8 (right on time).
This shoot has taught me lots about big scale shoots, using an external location and a period drama. One important thing was that yes it's a big shoot but the worst thing is to have crew stood around doing nothing or not knowing what to do, this leads to people stood around talking not doing anything. Another I learnt is to not try and do it all and ask people to do things like grab a light or ask for an actor. Staying in communication with the liaison is vital, ensuring they know when we are arriving and what is expected when on-set, linked to this is timings and crew calls and how some people will take an 8:30 crew call to mean turning up just before 9 whereas others will believe it means being there 15 minutes early so that they are prepared and ready. A period drama takes a lot of effort. Hair, makeup and costume has to be accurate as well as any props or deco and although we were lucky enough to have a time accurate location anything key to story such as posters needed to be made to look old.
I've thoroughly enjoyed directing second unit, learning how to work with but independent from the Producer/Director and also working with lots of different people, I was lucky enough to work with all main crew at some point over the 4 shoots. I loved how busy it was and that I never stopped on some days, moving from helping set up to organising actors into makeup to making sure everyone knew what was happening, I LOVED IT.
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