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Shot List Like a Pro: Real Pre-Production Tips for Indie Filmmakers · Indie Film Podcast

0:00
Welcome to any film podcast. This week we're talking about
0:02
pre production preparation for camera teams, which can only
0:05
mean two things, storyboarding and shot listing.
0:08
So we'll be covering things like what information actually
0:11
belongs on a shot. List.
0:13
Does my schedule inform my shot list or does my shot list inform
0:16
my schedule? How detailed does a storyboard
0:19
have to be? Should I hire a professional
0:21
animator to create my storyboard?
0:23
On that note, I'm Vic. And I'm Chuck where 2 Any film
0:26
makers used to thriving on understaffed sets, and we're
0:29
here to walk through everything we've learned staying organized
0:32
during our shoots. That sounds pretty hard staying
0:37
organized on a shoot in general. Yes, and you got to be ahead of
0:41
the game most of the time. It helps to be ahead of the
0:44
game, that way when things pop up it doesn't ruin your day.
0:48
As easily doesn't completely. What is that?
0:53
Disband. Dismantle.
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I can't think of the word I'm trying to think of right now.
0:57
Throw off. Yeah.
1:00
Throw off your day. So Victoria, can you talk about
1:03
how visual planning has saved you on your set?
1:06
Yeah, actually I have a fun story about this one.
1:08
So the very first time that I thought I could get away without
1:11
having a storyboard or a shot list or anything was when I was
1:15
still in school, technically junior high, early video
1:18
classes. And I was positive my teacher
1:20
was just being overdramatic and adding assignments for no
1:23
reason. I figured we could handle the
1:25
shoot without it. Turns out no, no you can't.
1:30
We were doing like a weird scooby-doo knock off.
1:33
So it was. Either way.
1:36
There was no 180 in the whole film is what ended up happening.
1:40
So everyone was running in all sorts of different directions
1:42
when they were being chased by a person, which made things
1:45
incredibly confusing. And I think can occasionally
1:49
work on a scooby-doo cartoon, but for a short film, maybe
1:52
don't. So that was that was a very
1:55
obviously since that lesson has stuck with me many years later,
2:00
Yeah. Well, if it makes you feel any
2:02
better, I've been on sets with people over 20 years old that
2:05
don't have a shot list. So it's kind of important to
2:09
plan your shots. You can't just have a script, a
2:11
camera and some actors and think that you're going to be able to
2:14
cut a movie together. Thanks for cutting my 13 year
2:16
old self some slack. I appreciate you.
2:18
Again, we are micro budget film makers and so this, if you're
2:23
used to working on sets with an assistant director, you know a
2:29
first. Stable assistant director.
2:31
A gaffer and and you're not used to just being like, oh, OK,
2:35
well, I'm directing and running camera and maybe we have a sound
2:39
person if I can find a nephew like you said last week to to
2:43
hold a boom. Pole.
2:45
So that's kind of a level that we're starting at just so that
2:49
everybody's aware. So visual shot planning,
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obviously people have had that experience.
2:55
I would imagine a lot of people have had that experience.
2:58
If you're trying to do something yourself, you're passionate
3:00
about filmmaking, you're going to go out, you're going to shoot
3:03
something and you might figure it out on the day and it's not
3:07
the best way to go. So you learned that lesson very
3:09
young. I did and now you have adjusted.
3:12
I have and I will say I don't always have both.
3:18
I like having a storyboard and a shot list, but I I can get by
3:24
without a storyboard. Makes sense?
3:27
It's not great. I usually like to at least have
3:28
a look book or if I feel better doing it if I'm the
3:32
cinematographer and director, because then I I already kind of
3:37
know what I want my vision to be so I can I can justify skirting
3:42
that corner a little bit. But generally speaking, you need
3:47
one or the other. You cannot get away with without
3:50
either one. Yeah, you got to know what
3:52
you're looking for. And if you are directing and
3:55
running camera, which is an abnormal on an indie film set,
3:58
then you can probably just get with what you're happy with the
4:02
day of. But if you're cinematographer or
4:05
director and you're trying to work together, you might butt
4:08
heads if you haven't been on the location and you're trying to
4:11
get the shot and the director, if they're editing.
4:14
Again, we're working with micro budget film sets.
4:17
So people that are that are working on films that have a
4:21
cinematographer and a director and then they take the film off
4:24
and they send it off for editing.
4:25
That's completely foreign to me. I've never been in that
4:28
situation. It's a very different situation.
4:30
Yeah. So making sure that what you
4:33
have edits together well so that you're not setting yourself up
4:36
for failure later on. Yeah.
4:38
And being able to communicate that between the director and
4:41
cinematographer to make sure that everybody's happy with the
4:43
shots. That helps.
4:44
Yeah, so what's what is the storyboard and what is the shot
4:47
list? Victoria, help me out.
4:51
OK, I like to think that a storyboard is the visual
4:56
blueprint for your film, OK? Whereas a shot list is going to
5:01
be a more logistical breakdown of your film, usually in the
5:06
form of a spreadsheet. OK.
5:08
That that would have. That would generally be how I
5:12
would differentiate. That so storyboard then kind of
5:15
like a graphic novel with the script going alongside it.
5:19
Yeah. And then the shot list would
5:21
hopefully be a more condensed version of that because there's
5:25
going to be overlap on the graphic novel, which is still
5:29
the same shot. Sometimes.
5:32
Sometimes, but well, no, actually, I guess you, you make
5:36
a good point. It the, the storyboard's going
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to be longer because let's say you're doing a pretty standard
5:41
over the shoulder for a conversation between two people.
5:43
You're going to have your OTS and your reverse and you're
5:47
going to cut back and forth to those in the storyboard a little
5:50
bit. Whereas for the shot list,
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you're just going to show each one in your storyboard.
5:55
You may show a kid like cutting in tighter, in which case you'd
5:57
want to make sure that in your shot list you mark that you want
6:00
another one where you're cut in a little bit tighter and maybe
6:03
it's not a dirty OTS anymore, it's just a tighter single on
6:06
that individual. Something along those lines.
6:08
Totally fine. But yeah, generally speaking,
6:10
you're right, your storyboard is going to be longer.
6:12
Just shooting 12K and punch in and post on all the angles.
6:15
Yeah, forget all this angle stuff.
6:17
Just shoot one big wide shot, treat it like a play, make sure
6:20
your actors are ready and just go, you know?
6:24
We're we're being facetious, so please don't do that.
6:27
Actually could be kind of a cool concept.
6:29
I don't know. Give it a shot.
6:30
Try it out. This is indie film.
6:31
Get weird. Yeah.
6:33
Or you know, like in my experience, if I get the boom in
6:36
the shot and that's the one that they want to use, you just you
6:37
can't crop in a little bit if you're shooting with enough
6:39
resolution. Actually, that was one thing
6:41
that was recommended to me. I on a shoot once I was going in
6:45
for a pretty tight, just bird's eye shot over somebody who was
6:49
being beaten to a bloody pulp on the ground.
6:52
Nice. And I was like, you can see the
6:55
leg of one of the light stands just like right there.
6:58
It's just the edge of that little foot is in the corner and
7:02
might be Cam. And Gaffer looked at me and he
7:05
was like, we can't move the light, so just crop in a little
7:09
when you're editing. Yeah.
7:10
And I was like, oh, you're right.
7:13
I can just do that, Yeah. If you have a less enough
7:16
resolution now back in when it was 1080P, that's kind of risky
7:20
it. Was but nowadays you can get
7:22
away. If it's not too much you can get
7:24
away with it. Or you could try the the AI
7:27
expand tools and see what happens.
7:30
I don't know if you've gone down a rabbit hole on those on social
7:32
media, but. You can do some cool stuff, but
7:35
that requires that the camera be on sticks and pretty steady, or
7:38
at least that you study the image.
7:40
Same. As the image but.
7:41
It's not moving anywhere a lot. Of the results are absolutely
7:44
horrifying, They are. They are terrible.
7:48
AI has some bad nightmares and I don't love it.
7:51
OK, so for your storyboard itself, obviously yes, you can
7:56
hire an animator for it, right? You could hire or an
7:59
illustrator, a graphic designer, whoever you want.
8:03
I would say that maybe that doesn't need to be a top line
8:07
item for your budget. You know, that would be one of
8:11
the places I would rather cut corners on.
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Not because I don't appreciate those artists and think that
8:16
they do amazing work, but again, I prefer to work off of a shot
8:19
list. And there are some really fun
8:22
sheets and hacks that I've learned for storyboarding, like
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especially if you have access to the locations and your actors or
8:31
at least stand insurance, just bring a camera or your cell
8:36
phone and take some photos. And there's your shot list.
8:40
And if you really don't have those, in a pinch, you can even
8:43
use stock photos. So I just, I don't know, I, I'm
8:49
not going to say that's a pointless job because it
8:52
absolutely is not. And especially for a very well
8:55
funded project, is a valuable tool to have makes.
8:59
Sense but. Don't think that that's what you
9:02
need to have to have an effective storyboard.
9:05
Yeah, I would agree with that completely.
9:06
I've never storyboarded anything.
9:09
I don't think we've only spreadsheeted.
9:12
And there's a lot of times though, when you're an indie
9:14
filmmaker, micro budget indie filmmaker, not just indie
9:17
filmmaker, but you can't get into the location ahead of time
9:21
and so you're speculating. And why would you waste all that
9:25
time speculating what it's going to look like when you're going
9:29
to have to adjust when you get into the location anyway?
9:31
Yeah, because it can get real messy real fast.
9:35
So it's a luxury to storyboard, but you do want to have a shot
9:38
list but. You can also just draw stick
9:40
figures too true to get your point across.
9:43
Yeah, just give everyone a different hairdo so you can tell
9:45
them apart and you'll be fine. Rough idea.
9:47
This is what the movie will look like.
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Yeah, Ish. If.
9:50
You know, assuming that we follow the script and don't make
9:52
edits after we film it, Which which?
9:54
Spoiler alert. Does happen all the?
9:56
Time. Nice.
9:57
So talk about a shot list. What is a shot list shot?
10:00
Lists, I feel I feel a little bad speaking too, because I'm
10:04
ridiculous. I have a very large spreadsheet
10:08
template that I use for mine that has just been an
10:12
amalgamation of all the things that I've ever needed to know
10:16
about a shot on a set. And so I just it's it's a lot of
10:22
information to fill out. As a matter of fact, Danny,
10:25
who's on the last couple of episodes with us, was talking
10:28
about being the cinematographer for Dive and he was talking
10:31
about when I sent him my spreadsheet template for the
10:35
Dive shot list for him to put in there.
10:37
He was like, man, I gave up on that thing like halfway through.
10:40
There was a lot of information to put down.
10:43
What's too much? Information like what do you
10:45
have in that list? So it's a lot of the standard
10:48
stuff. The standard stuff probably
10:50
being what the scene is, as well as the angle of the shot, if
10:56
there's any movement, interior, exterior, and any notes that
11:00
you've got about the shot. I also like to include things
11:03
like maybe what lens I'm going to be using, how many people I
11:06
expect to be on camera, any notes about what line it's
11:10
starting from to where it's going, because then I draw in my
11:15
binder that I have for every project about.
11:18
I'm sounding crazier and crazier with every moment here.
11:21
I'm so sorry. What else is?
11:22
What else is in the binder? Just magazine articles and
11:24
clippings. At home addresses of anyone I've
11:28
ever talked to about the film. You know, little things don't
11:30
ever. Lose any information because you
11:32
never know when it's going to become pertinent.
11:35
But it's a lot of detail to have to keep track of and to be fair,
11:40
it can be very off putting sometimes.
11:42
You just, you know, obviously Danny didn't want to go through
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and and fill out all that information and I do not blame
11:50
him one bit. I went through and filled out
11:51
some of the additional information on it, but it helps
11:55
me in a lot of ways that you wouldn't necessarily expect.
11:57
For example, if I know how many people are like expected to be
12:02
in each shot, I can tell whoever's running sound on my
12:06
set beforehand. And then when we're going into
12:09
that shot, they know, oh, I need this many labs set up and ready
12:11
to go. I need this many people, you
12:13
know, on boom or whatever. If my gaffers want to look at
12:17
it, then they know how many people they need to actually
12:19
have lit versus how many people are actually talking.
12:22
It just it kind of helps everybody stay on the same page
12:26
and I like to over plan for the shot list because I want to make
12:32
sure that once I get all the information down, then I can go
12:36
through and rearrange all the shots in the fastest way to
12:40
handle things. So that way I know, OK, what's
12:45
going to be the fewest camera setups, the fewest lens changes,
12:49
the fewest lighting adjustments, the fewest burden on the sound
12:53
team. Like, I probably don't want to
12:55
have one big long take where they're going to have a boom
12:57
pole on their shoulders back-to-back to back, right?
13:01
If I can mix that up a little bit for them to be able to put
13:04
their arms down for a shot, that'd be cool.
13:06
Get a close. Up, Yeah.
13:07
Go back to a wide Yeah. Right on.
13:09
So that makes sense. Little things like that to make
13:11
the whole day run a little smoother.
13:13
I think the important thing is that some that people have a
13:16
method of organization and the more details that you can keep
13:22
in that organizational method, the better.
13:25
Yeah. And because you're most likely
13:28
going to have to cut shots on the day.
13:32
Oh yeah, especially if you're me.
13:35
I have yet to have a shoot where I get every single shot I
13:39
wanted. I'd.
13:40
Like to hear anybody out there that has had a project where
13:43
they got every single shot that they wanted to get and.
13:47
Still wrapped on time after starting on time, not starting
13:52
early, yeah. It's it's tricky to do and but
13:56
when you do it, it's feels great, yeah.
13:58
Call me, don't call me. Comment on the podcast.
14:03
Yeah, just do a comment leave. A comment, find us on social,
14:06
something like that. We will find a way to publicly
14:09
congratulate you on doing that because it is unheard of and you
14:13
should feel proud of being able to do it.
14:15
It's something I constantly strive for, yes.
14:18
We all do. So starting with that, I think
14:22
the important thing is if you have a crew that you've worked
14:27
with before, you would hopefully understand how many shots that
14:30
you can get in an hour. Yeah.
14:33
And so planning around that and then organizing your setups so
14:38
that it isn't inefficient on the day, so that you're not wasting
14:43
time in between takes and having the actors, you know, kind of
14:48
like lose their headspace in the middle of it.
14:50
And not just the actors, but everybody, although I will say
14:53
sound people, you can kind of start to forget what you're
14:56
doing when people are messing around with lighting equipment
14:58
for 30 minutes. I, I start to get a little bit
15:02
of, get a little lost. You go.
15:04
Browse the Crafty table for a while.
15:05
Forget what you're doing, Snack. On some crackers and things like
15:08
that. But yeah, keeping things
15:10
organized is super important. But if you were working with a
15:12
new crew or if you have experience and experience
15:17
working in with a new crew, it's important to know where you're
15:20
going to be at so that you're not stretching yourself too thin
15:22
on a shoot day. So.
15:23
But. I will say there is something to
15:25
be said about working with the same crew, not just because you.
15:36
What's the best way to hrase this?
15:38
You're you're comfortable with them, you communicate well with
15:40
them. You're all constantly striving
15:42
for better, but you also learn exactly what they're looking for
15:45
and what they're doing and you understand their methodologies a
15:49
little bit better. The first time people work with
15:51
my shot list, they're like, what is happening right now?
15:53
As they do it again and again, they get more comfortable with
15:56
it. They acknowledge they're like,
15:57
Oh no, I see why we're doing it this way.
15:59
And it just becomes normal because for example, your
16:01
brother doesn't do shot listing in a traditional spreadsheet
16:06
way, no. Well, we do a shot list on the
16:08
spreadsheet, but. You don't carry that spreadsheet
16:11
around with you. No, he.
16:12
Just has no cards in his pocket, OK.
16:14
And it's like a cross check as far as making sure that we have
16:17
everything done. It gets an X on it and then it
16:20
gets moved into the finished pile.
16:22
And then if something can be skipped, then it gets looked at
16:26
on the day and he'll do some editing in his head and realize
16:30
that we can skip this if we're running low on time.
16:33
And so it's just kind of trusting him as a director and
16:36
editor to be able to put what we get, the assets that we get on
16:40
the day into the final project efficiently.
16:43
And you just have to do that on an indie set.
16:45
Indie set, you're going to have to make cuts, you know?
16:48
And he can just do that in his head and we trust him.
16:51
But I'll. Be honest with you.
16:53
The first set that I worked on where I saw the note cards was
16:57
Idea Guy. Yeah.
16:58
And that scared the living daylights out of me.
17:00
I could not imagine having your shot list down to note cards and
17:04
hoping you remembered where everything went, what it was,
17:07
what it was in relation to other things.
17:08
How do you have your scripty notes on there?
17:10
What do you. It just sent my really overly
17:14
organized brain into this whole downward spiral.
17:18
And then and then I saw how Florida State, you all executed
17:23
it. You had it down.
17:25
It was it was another art in and of itself.
17:28
And then it still cut together. Well, we didn't miss anything we
17:32
shot. List as a group though, too.
17:34
Yeah. So that's that's helpful.
17:35
It's not. Oh.
17:36
That is true. We don't.
17:37
We don't just send the the script off to the
17:40
cinematographer and say, Hey, you know, create a shot list for
17:43
the day. And it's it's let's create this
17:45
shot list together and for idea guy and then also for Stockton
17:50
to Table Rock the feature film. It was, it was Elliott, myself
17:54
and the cinematographer Danny Clamorous that made the entire
17:59
shot list for it. We did break everything down to
18:01
make sure that there wasn't going to be anything missed.
18:04
And we're not used to working with an AD on set.
18:08
We're not used to working with a script supervisor.
18:11
That's kind of a luxury that we've completely given up on.
18:14
And so when we do get people to help us out on that, it's
18:17
amazing. It's.
18:18
So nice because we. Can offload that, but also
18:21
they're not in charge of editing it.
18:23
So if we give them a checklist, we still have to know what is
18:30
necessary and what can we work around if we don't get on the
18:34
day. And plus, we have to organize it
18:37
in an in an in an efficient way and just having a stack of no
18:41
cards where it's we have to shoot it in this order, then
18:45
it's going to get done. Oh no.
18:46
I'm totally sold on that method now at for like I said, at first
18:50
I was horrified and then by the end of the day I'm I'm sold.
18:54
You have that down. It works beautifully.
18:57
So I think that's sort of a testament to as long as everyone
19:02
is communicating well. And and to your point, you all
19:07
shot list together. So none of the none of those
19:09
note cards had anything weird or foreign that you weren't
19:12
expecting on it. So that probably helps.
19:15
But you put in the time for the pre production, you work
19:17
together, you communicated well as a team and that way you can
19:22
have this nice clean, quick method of just no cards in your
19:26
pocket. Good to go.
19:28
That's awesome. It helps if you don't have a
19:31
script supervisor apparently cause we've never had one so
19:35
well I just. Wonder, do you write notes on
19:38
the back of the card? Like if a few of the takes were
19:40
really, really good? Do you do you ever just do that?
19:42
I don't think my. Brother's ever written anything
19:43
down. I don't think Elliot's ever made
19:45
notes on them. He might.
19:47
Usually it's just like an X out and then a thorough revisiting
19:51
of all the footage during the edit.
19:52
Yeah, So I think that's important.
19:56
That's fair. To be honest, when you're
19:59
dealing with the micro budget indie film set, it's not like
20:02
you get a lot of takes you don't.
20:04
So it's good to do the the film and the actor justice to take
20:11
the time to watch it all rather than just say I want this take,
20:14
I want this take, I want this take, Which I don't know, maybe
20:18
on larger film sets they do that stuff.
20:21
But at the same time, like, I couldn't imagine as a creative
20:24
person offloading that to an editor.
20:27
Here's 35 takes of this one shot.
20:30
You'll get the other 75 when we shoot them tomorrow, yeah.
20:33
But I guess yeah, if you're, you know, not.
20:35
Everyone's a Kubrick, yeah, and. I'm sure Kubrick knew which one
20:37
he wanted so though. To that point, I think your shot
20:42
listing, a lot of that does come down to trusting your actors to
20:47
be really set and solid. Yes, because if they can pick up
20:52
and go from anywhere, you can create the most efficient shot
20:55
list. Whereas if you have to go in
20:58
certain orders in certain places and they just don't understand
21:02
the actual flow of the scene and you're not going to get the
21:04
performance you want out of them unless they've had the other
21:06
moments first, then OK, that's going to stunt your shot listing
21:12
ability. Let's.
21:13
Talk to those very beginning film makers when you start,
21:17
especially if you're working with actors that don't have any
21:21
experience on film sets. Make sure they're off book
21:26
because you're not going to shoot your your short film
21:28
chronologically most likely unless you're doing A1 long take
21:32
if you're doing. A1 are fine, yeah, but.
21:34
Otherwise, most likely efficiency is going to be
21:37
jumping around the scene and if your actors aren't off book and
21:41
they're not prepared for that, it can also cause hiccups in
21:44
your day. It can.
21:45
Get really messy really fast and then you're not going to get it
21:48
in your you know, 3 to 6 takes, right you're going to be 10 to
21:53
12 takes that you can't afford on an indie set and if they're.
21:57
Jumping around, they're going to have to know where their head is
22:00
for each for each part of the the film.
22:02
And if you know one take, they're happy.
22:04
In the next second, they're angry and upset and they don't
22:08
realize it and they. Haven't put in the character
22:09
work to actually build that growth and know where they are,
22:13
where they are emotionally in the moment in that scene.
22:16
Yeah. It's tricky.
22:17
It's tricky. There's a lot of, there's a lot
22:18
of hiccups. What do you do for organization?
22:21
Or what software would you recommend for organization?
22:24
Oh, there are actually a couple of good ones.
22:25
So I used to love Celtics CELTX. That was my absolute favorite.
22:31
I used it all through college and even a little after, and it
22:35
was always just amazing and phenomenal.
22:37
At the time, it was also one of the very few options that
22:40
existed. So now you also have things like
22:42
Studio Binder, which is really great.
22:44
But then I mean the template I use now is just a Google Sheet
22:47
that I've made Google. Sheets, yeah.
22:49
Google Sheets are great. I use Google Sheets Notion.
22:52
Is wonderful as well. It's a great way to stay
22:55
organized for things. I also like using I also like
22:58
using Slack, which anyone who also works in corporate America
23:01
is going to be really upset about, but is true because you
23:04
can upload all these documents, you can annotate everything in
23:07
there. You can create different groups
23:08
and channels for talking about specific things.
23:12
It's a really good way to keep everyone on the same page and
23:15
then also have some cloud storage for your shot list
23:18
because it is important to make sure you not only have a printed
23:23
copy of your shot list if you're not using note cards, but you
23:26
also have a digital copy of it and have it available people.
23:30
Will need it if. They will I.
23:33
Do prefer to have it on my phone when I'm running boom if I need
23:37
to look at something to be able to look at the script because
23:40
it's in my pocket, I can usually you know free up a hand because
23:43
though it's the one running the gain knob anyway.
23:45
But if I need to cross check something because as a as a
23:48
sound operator, I do need to know where we're going to be and
23:51
I need to know what everybody's lines are so that I can get the
23:54
boom in the right spot. So it is good to have all that
23:57
stuff digitally available and printed.
24:00
Yeah, if you can get it, if you have certain people that want to
24:02
make notes, because it's if you do have a scripty, which I heard
24:04
is pretty nice. It was.
24:05
Really nice I really love it when I can get a scripty because
24:08
on dive that was so wonderful there were just all these
24:11
detailed notes about every single take and how well they
24:15
went and all the ones that were done were like did the
24:18
strikethrough text on it. So I I knew it was done and
24:21
anything where we had to stop early was highlighted in a
24:23
different color. It was just, it's just great
24:25
shout. Out to Sam, shout out.
24:27
To Sam, and though I will also say shout out to Christy as well
24:30
because Christy's done some amazing scripty work for me in
24:32
the past. Right on too.
24:34
So yeah, not. Haven't had them on set very
24:36
often so they. Are wonderful I.
24:39
Am jealous. How do you normally organize
24:41
them? I'm going to say with Lower
24:43
Gentry studio shoots, we tend to go out, we start wide and then
24:50
just move in on each scene. I try to do that whenever I can,
24:56
OK? Because generally that means
24:58
less lighting changes. Yeah.
25:05
The only way that I would change that if there's something very
25:08
specific that I would have to make an adjustment for.
25:11
Like in dive, I knew I needed a shot of the car pulling in at
25:15
sunset, like a little bit before sunset.
25:18
So I knew no matter what we're doing inside, we have to go
25:21
outside and get that shot. And then the other exteriors had
25:24
to be at night. Usually I like to do the more
25:27
challenging, especially if it's winter and it's cold out and you
25:31
got to be shooting outside. I like to do that stuff first.
25:34
Yeah. Get it out of the way, get it
25:36
knocked out, then come inside and let everyone be warm for the
25:39
rest of the time. Because after a 12 hour shoot
25:41
day, the last thing you want to do is go outside and freeze your
25:43
butt off hoping to get these shots that you're already
25:46
exhausted from a long day for. Yeah.
25:48
Makes sense. So so inclement weather
25:51
inclement. Weather will affect your shot.
25:53
There's. Yeah, that make that makes
25:54
complete sense, but. So you guys all we'll start wide
25:58
going tighter. Do you have a preference on
26:00
interior, exterior or is it just whatever is needed and most
26:03
efficient in the moment? I think.
26:05
It's efficiency just with your situation, because exteriors are
26:08
going to be, you know, you're going to want to try to be out
26:12
golden hour ish or you don't want to be out when it's in the
26:15
middle of the broad daylight and the sun's pounding down on you
26:17
and noon sun. Because you're going to have to
26:19
put up all sorts of diffusion and and negative fills to to
26:24
make it look decent to try to. Clean that up a little bit or
26:27
it'll be the middle of the night and you're somewhere with no
26:29
generators. So yeah, better hope that your
26:31
shot list is tight because your batteries are only going to last
26:34
so long. Yeah, and it is pitch black.
26:36
Exactly so. Outdoor stuff obviously time of
26:39
day is is taken into account and then if we have complete control
26:43
over the environment, usually it's it's established the wide
26:47
yeah it is as much as we can of the scene in the wide even if we
26:51
don't use it yeah you edit you film to have options in the edit
26:55
I. Love to do that lower.
26:56
Gentry Studios, same thing. We film for options in the edit
26:59
and then we go. We'll usually just focus on A2
27:04
shot, but we'll do 1 actor at a time, so medium close on one
27:08
actor, switch sides, medium close on the other actor, and
27:11
then get any inserts but that. Minimizes your lighting setups,
27:15
true, which is perfect. I will say that is one other
27:18
thing that I guess I do that I don't know if a lot of other
27:22
people do this. I call it a coverage map where I
27:26
have my binder for the project that has all my stalker photos
27:30
of everyone, obviously, and it has the full script in those
27:35
little plastic sheet protectors. And then I'll take a Visa VI
27:40
think is how they print out the marker, the wet erase, not dry
27:43
erase, but the wet erase, wet erase.
27:45
OK. Yeah, I'll take those.
27:47
And I'll just draw lines marking off what each shot covers, All
27:53
right? So they're color-coded to what
27:55
shot they are. OK.
27:57
And then that way when I am looking at it at a glance, I see
28:02
what shots cover what parts of the scene.
28:06
And if there's a shot that I have to cut, I make sure I still
28:09
have other coverage just at a glance.
28:11
And then I know I can get rid of that particular shot because I
28:14
haven't covered from X number of other shots, so.
28:17
Yeah. You have basically just a whole
28:19
bunch of colors in lines going past the words.
28:23
Yeah. And so if you have a four
28:24
streaking colors going past this actors line, you know that you
28:28
have four shots that are going to cover that section of the
28:30
script. Exactly so.
28:32
If you see overlap there, then that's the one that you would go
28:35
to last, I would imagine on a setup and because you know that
28:38
you can cut it. Yeah.
28:39
So you're filming based on your bracketing around the script or
28:42
if. We're just running low on time
28:43
and I know we're already behind time.
28:45
Even just when it would come up next on the shot list because I
28:49
put put them in order of when I want to shoot them.
28:51
I'll just toss it. I'll just say we're going to
28:53
have to skip it. We can always come back to it
28:55
later if we end up magically getting more time, but we're
28:57
just going to have to cut it for now because we got to move
29:00
along. We're losing time, Yeah.
29:02
And I do say, I do want to say that I think it's important for
29:05
quality of work to have a shot list that is minimalist but also
29:11
ambitious at the same time so that you can be flexible.
29:15
That way you can get what you need to get and you can get
29:18
everybody in and out of there in an efficient time frame.
29:21
But also, if things are going really smoothly and you don't
29:25
run into a lot of bumps in the road, it's good to have a couple
29:28
of really awesome shots that can make your project look better
29:33
than what it would be otherwise. Yeah.
29:35
That's sort of take it up that that artistic notch a little bit
29:38
and also let's your cinematographer and your camera
29:40
team play a little bit more, right.
29:43
Or if you know that you're getting exactly what you need
29:45
from your A Cam and you actually have AB Cam, let your B Cam go
29:49
play. Let them go find something that
29:51
makes them excited. Like give me a shot that makes
29:56
you happy you found it. Something like that, Something
29:58
you like. Yeah.
29:59
That's cool, that's cool. And when you have a difficult
30:02
shot, do you usually do that first or last?
30:05
I try to knock those out as early as possible.
30:09
Sometimes it depends. Yeah, sometimes it depends.
30:12
For for dive, there was one tracking shot we really wanted.
30:16
The problem was it was supposed to be in the evening.
30:18
We were starting before sunset and it was facing the bar
30:22
windows and we didn't have a way to properly, I guess screen or
30:27
condition or diffuse or whatever those windows to disguise what
30:33
time of day it was. So we had to wait until it was
30:35
closer to evening time to actually shoot that direction.
30:39
So we didn't get to do that one first, which inevitably meant we
30:42
didn't get to do that shot. But you had a back up plan.
30:45
Yes, it. Worked at that coverage, but it
30:48
was a pretty shot. It was Danny's idea and it was a
30:50
really good shot. And now the world will never see
30:53
that magic and that, that makes me a little sad.
30:54
Yeah, it's a bummer, but stuff like that happens in filming all
30:57
the time. And I agree with you that it's
30:59
good to try to get those complicated shots out first and
31:02
understand how much flexibility you have in your shot list so
31:06
that you can cut things later on, because those complicated
31:09
shots inevitably will encroach on your shooting day.
31:12
But hopefully you can get some other shots knocked out quicker,
31:16
you know, down that shot list. But you want everybody's energy
31:19
and excitement to be at their highest level on your shoot day.
31:23
And usually that's first thing when everybody arrives.
31:26
And, and I will also say if you can get into the location and
31:32
practice with the camera, not necessarily concerned with the
31:36
lighting setup, but just get at least get the blocking down and
31:40
rehearsed with the actors. It will speed things up
31:44
immensely. I'm I'm thinking on our short
31:46
film idea guy that we shot, it had a complicated movement of
31:52
the camera. It was just a pushing in and out
31:54
on some tracks. But we also had the actors that
31:57
were supposed to hit queues at certain times and we spent a
32:00
good without. Talking to each other.
32:02
There weren't lines, No. It was a silent film, yes.
32:05
So they had, so they. Had to queue each other other
32:08
ways. Yes, and it was.
32:10
Well, we were shouting kind of and out.
32:13
The director was shouting from behind the camera and for a few.
32:15
Of them for a few. Of them, but it was, it was a
32:17
tricky 1 and we spent a good couple few hours just rehearsing
32:21
it one day, which it's good that we did because we would not have
32:25
finished the shoot that day had we not rehearsed the complicated
32:27
shot, no. That was definitely a must do.
32:30
So don't underestimate how slow moving shots can be on.
32:35
Shoot day. Complicated.
32:36
Yeah, unless you're shooting on a Canon with autofocus and you
32:40
just roll right there. I'm kidding.
32:42
I'm kidding. Please don't trust autofocus.
32:46
Just stabilize it, autofocus, just track the person, whatever.
32:50
It's going to be fine. We're treating it.
32:51
Like a Law and Order episode Go Yeah.
32:54
That's it. That's just or just do
32:56
everything like it's a law and order episode, whatever, it'll
32:59
come together. Just follow people, record and
33:01
put a couple labs on, but it's going to be fine.
33:04
It's. Perfect.
33:04
It's what everybody wants. Anything else that we should
33:06
cover I feel. Like those are the biggest
33:08
things as far as staying organized.
33:10
Most importantly, hands down, pre production comes back to you
33:16
tenfold. It's not just the whole an ounce
33:19
of prevention is worth a pound of cure thing.
33:21
I would say it's more than that every single minute that you put
33:25
in. Yes, it's £2 one and 1/4 ounce 2
33:29
lbs. Let me get.
33:30
The formula. But every single minute you put
33:33
into pre production, to planning, to communicating well,
33:36
to making sure everyone's on the same page, to blocking, to
33:39
taking photos, to everything all the time you put in, there is
33:43
just more time you're going to save on your actual shoot day
33:46
when you literally do not get a moment to spare.
33:49
It's always worth it and. Making sure that you share as
33:51
much of that with cast and crew so that your shoulders, you
33:55
know, aren't overburdened in a moment of of catastrophe and
34:01
there are other people there to help pick up the slack.
34:03
Because otherwise I hate it when something happens with sound and
34:08
the entire set grinds to a halt because I'm having an equipment
34:12
issue. Which you know, that type of
34:14
stuff happens, but but when it's problem solving things because
34:18
you run into a whatever this pillar in this location is
34:23
blocking the shot that we wanted, we have to figure this
34:25
out. If you're if it's just the
34:27
cinematographer trying to figure that out or it's just the
34:30
director trying to figure that out, you're not going to have as
34:32
many eyes on the problems and you're not going to have as many
34:36
viable solutions presented to. You, all of these people are on
34:40
your set for a reason. They're creative, they're
34:42
intelligent, and they're talented.
34:43
Let them all work together and bring those skill sets.
34:46
Yes, hands down do it. Except for the untalented ones.
34:49
Don't let them open their mouth. Ever.
34:54
That nephew that comes in running boom operate.
34:56
One little nephew. Coming in to do sound all right?
35:00
Anything else? Think justice succinct.
35:02
Goodbye, succinct. Farewell, bye.
35:04
Bye.