We were split into a team consisting of me Harry and classic character actor Jemel Hibbert, The week before we had thrashed out a simple story and decided how we were going to shoot it, in the process I drew up some (very rough) storyboards to get a shot list so in theory we could walk in and shoot it, my estimate was a couple of hours to get all the footage and a lesson to edit it to perfection.
Simple? Not always so.
The next week we met up ready to begin shooting, to find that we forgot to book a camera (somewhat important for a video) and had to coerce Barrington to help us acquire one. A small stumble but we knew what we were shooting so moved into the classroom to begin the shoot and for 15 minutes or so, we were on fire. We had the opening shot and first question to be featured in the video shot.
Until we get informed that we have a lowly 10 miuntes before we were kicked out of the classroom we were shooting in before we were ousted by another class, we hit up as much of the footage we could record on our camera.
After that we were needed to assist with another apprentices video which required all to make an appearance which cut into our own shooting time and by the time we were finished. We were informed that we had our location for another 15 minutes, in which to complete all of our scenes.
While we may have been able to work under that time constraint due to Harry and Jemel being able to act their parts effortlessly and me having a reference to what to shoot and how. This was until we found out that we only 9 minutes of battery life and 8 minutes of footage left. (we were sharing the SD cards, which we use to record on the cameras, with the rest of the apprentices).
This called for a drastic rewrite and after a brief meeting we decided on changing the latter half of the video to something we could shoot handheld and set about it in the shortest time possible. Although if I'm honest I feel this helped us as knowing we had about 3 tries before the camera would die pushed us to get it right first time. So thanks to some quick thinking and applied skills of camera work comic timing and some great acting we were able to get enough footage that we felt comfortable that the edit would go smoothly. (we even had time to film an extra shot, such was our quick shooting in regards to the pressured time frame).
All in all this was another high pressured shoot with time constraints that again made me feel uncomfortable due to my slightly perfectionist nature. but due to having had some decent planning on the story and having storyboards. As well as being part of a team that had very little arguing and was eager to get on camera and get it shot (shout outs to Harry and Jemel here).
We have came through at the other end with enough footage we will be able to create a rough-cut and later on a finished Video Bio for Harry which is both funny, while showing off our individual abilities and those of working in a team.
THINGS I WOULD DO DIFFERENTLY:
In terms of pre planning the story and the scenes that would be in the video we did very well, where I feel we almost skipped entirely was the acquisition and arrangement of where and how we were going to shoot it. We were a bit complacent and assumed that it would all come together on the day. But as you can tell this didn't quite happen and we were forced into taking decisions that will no doubt crop up in post (such as having limited numbers of takes to choose from, even though they're good enough to make the video good its always nice to have more footage than you need). Things like having cameras and SD cards is definitely something I will insist is figured out BEFORE shoot day as trying to bring in the favour is a pain when you realise your location is going to be taken away from you.
An eye opening and poignant lesson..
MY ROLE IN THE SHOOT:
In our team I took the role of cameraman and a sort-of director, It was my job to get the camerawork down, use the plans we had from the day before (storyboards, notes) to set up the shot to my taste, fill in Jemel as he was absent for the preplanning process and talk through the scene with both Harry and Jemel in how to get it down on film.
I think we as a unit worked really well there was throughout the whole shoot, no disagreements or arguing and all were keen to get on with the idea. I came up with all the shots myself (with discussion and input from the team) but its composition on the day and any additions on what to do and how to do it were discussed by me and the team clearly and quickly so we could move on.
The pressured shoot I feel was dealt with professionally and I kept the actors informed of how long we had and what I thought looked better on camera (as often what looks good on paper, may not be reflected on camera) and we reshot or changed lines accordingly.
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