Yesterday we filmed a couple “scenes” for a movie at work so I have the camera at home. Chris is here (home) reading The Tell-Tale Heart and we’re about to go get ingredients for blood, sheets to bloody up, and some latex. We’ll film those aforementioned 2-4 scenes today.
Shopping list:
Started tightening the opening audio/monologue/voice-over and adding subtitles. Even just listening to it while seeing the accompanying video was pretty thrilling. I got about two paragraphs done.
The movie as a whole, for viewing and editing is divided into three parts. The opening, which includes the opening voice-over thingy, credits, and introduction of the main characters as they enter the taqueria. Second, the taqueria. And lastly, the closing montage and voiceover.
I’ll do the opening, the closing, then the middle part which will be broken into a few pieces as well and post them all as they’re finished so I can feel like I’m accomplishing something.
James isn’t available this weekend, so the killer will be played by Chris Lewandowski. I think he can be dark & funny in the same way James would have been. I’m confident that over the next couple months I’ll have the camera enough to finish this one because I’ll be making a lot of movies at work.
So far, when I say I’m doing “editing” I mean I’m trimming all the stuff I’m definitely not going to use and chopping up individual shots. When that’s done, I’ll choose which takes I’m going to use for video and/or audio (I’m pretty confident that many shots will use audio from one take and video from another), trimming them down, and lastly putting them together.
First, I concentrated on the opening and closing shots. Today while waiting to leave for the bus I “finished” that first step of all the shots with just the Mom and two daughters (and some with the waitress).
While waiting at the bus stop for a bus I missed, I divided the script into twelve parts. I’m back at the office because I missed the bus and Nikki’s won’t be home from church until at least 9 PM so I can use this time productively until I catch the bus home to get scolded for missing church.
I’ll create bins (what Final Cut calls folders) for “one,” “two,” etc. and put all my clips & sequences in those folders and start knocking out 1-12. Yeah, I’m becoming more anal all the time when it comes to making movies. This Fall, people at work are going to see a very different guy while we work on all our movies at work. More experience and more confidence will result in a director/camera guy who actually directs.
I am such a dork. During filming, I kept thinking Maria was messing up or mispronouncing her line “no estan cholos” but I just realized while watching it that she was actually correcting my poor grammar and saying “no son cholos.”
I get 10-15 minutes a day to edit. I am still confident I’ll be done in time to keep my slot in the Detroit Film Festival. Whether they’ll still take it or deem it unwatchable will be a different story.
This is the second time I’ve noticed this. The wide-angle lens I use captures more than I can see watching through the view-finder. You can see Belen Sanchez doing her Assistant Director duties in the background (she’s keeping track of what shots we’ve completed). Now, I’m hoping that if she’s visible in any good takes that the audience will just think she’s some girl studying at the next table… you know, an “extra.” Same thing with any shots the Bus Boy is visible in waiting for his cue to enter the shot.
From left to right, we’ve got Reynaldy Molina as the Bus Boy and his two friends played by Josue Hernandez and Uziel Bautista. I hope to use those other two more in the future. Josue was the only actual drama student to show up but he showed up after the Bus Boy part (with lines) had already been assigned. He’s working on a screenplay that sounds awesome. It’s the kind of thing I’d like to write but haven’t the life experience to have a clue where to start or … to go … or … to finish. Perhaps he’d let me direct! I told him as much … “with your screenplay and my camera…” As with all the kids … he gave his all with what little I had for him to do.
I wrote what I thought was a cool play on words “American dream boy” but when I just heard it in Spanish, I realized it doesn’t really translate. It doesn’t mean something different … it just doesn’t mean what it does (to me) in English. The opening audio is 2 minutes 2 seconds right now and I’m sure I can shorten it by removing lots of pauses between words & phrases. I told Sylvia to speak slowly and boy, she really came through! I would never say too much, though… I told her it would be impossible to do it too slowly.
The video I have seems to be a good fit for the length of the audio which clocks in at 00:01:39. I have almost three minutes worth of video to pick from which I’ll continue to trim down. The most time will go to the main “points” of the voice-over: the priest, transvestite and bus boy.
Below is Roberto Castro in the robe St. John’s Episcopal Church loaned us and the tip of the beautiful iceberg that is the church behind him.
If you read my old blog about Mexicantown, you’ve seen pictures of the mural in the following clip. I knew from early on I wanted a shot with this mural in it. Featured in the clip are Erik Orozco and Belen Sanchez.
There were takes where they interacted better with each other, smiling and stuff but this is the only take where they didn’t look at the camera!
On the way to work this morning, I realized people far too often ask me the same stupid “why?” question about learning Spanish. I am reminded of a joke:
If you know three languages, you’re trilingual. If you know two languages you’re bilingual. If you only know one language, you’re American.
I don’t like being a stupid American. I also hope to make more money someday. I also enjoy learning things and being able to do new things. These are many of the same reasons I like making movies for fun & profit. I want to make more money with a better job so I can provide for my children better. I want to know a second language so I can pass it – and the desire to learn and increased capacity for success – to my children. I want to be able to communicate with and serve and sell myself and my skills to more people.
Even more so than with filmmaking, the question isn’t why am I doing it – the question is why aren’t you?
I might be able to get one, two or a few shots for The Tell-Tale Heart done this weekend if my “star” is available. There are a couple scenes and other shots of him by himself we could get done. They don’t require any rehearsal… unlike the murder scenes and final freakout with the cops. Two quick shots (though I’ve learned recently, however, that one or two “quick shots” aren’t as quick as one would think):
1. You chopping up the body
2. You hiding it in the floorboards.
Chopping Up The Body:
I’ll have him leaning over into my bathtub. The shower curtain will be blocking what he’s doing. It’ll look like, to the casual observer, he’s fixing something or washing something in the tub. He’ll then turn toward (not facing or looking at) the camera and place a bloody saw on the floor, showing a little blood on his shirt and he’ll be wearing yellow rubber gloves that will also have blood on them. That’s all the “gore” that’s in the movie.
Hiding the Body Parts:
Below is the “movie poster” featuring the trap door the body parts will go in. To the left is the storage space under my stairs where I will be with the camera, taping him putting some rolled up bed sheets (perhaps with some “blood stains” on them) into the crawlspace. If I can fit in the crawlspace with the camera or at least make it steady & safe (clean) down there by itself, I’d love a shot from that angle of him putting a piece or two in there and then closing the trap door.
Other shots he can do by himself with no rehearsal:
3. Sit on my porch and wave to the Old Man who is off screen
4. I’ll be on the porch and you can answer the door (for the cops who are knocking on it)
I’ve got my “star” reading the short story – though he was already familiar with it … I want him “fluent” in it. I’m going to do this a “scene” at a time. There are three locations: my house, the other half of the duplex which will be called “tracy’s house,” and Dan’s house. Dan’s house is actually a house. The other “houses” are halves of the duplex I live in. I guess another “location” is the front yard of the duplex. So … four “locations” to shoot in … that’s how I’ll divide up the shooting schedule. I need to figure out when another full moon is … I’m still irritated about not being able to see the moon last time.
Sylvia’s performance wasn’t 100% because she thought the day we were filming was just a rehearsal and she hadn’t yet looked at the script in depth … only for translating purposes.
I’m hoping editing will fix some of that. I can show Andrea or Maria while she’s talking and do some splicing of dialogue … or … perhaps while she’s talking … I can show flashbacks of some sort … find some young girl and guy to play her and her husband in their youth … show those clips in black and white … something to represent what she’s saying since she only speaks when she’s imparting wisdom of some sort …
Make subtitles for voice overs.
type up the spanish sylvia wrote.
make little text blocks from it in Final cut.
Edit one scene at a time:
Bus Boy
Ending Montage
Transvestite
Priest
OYM
Make subtitles for OYM
Make subtitles for Priest
Make subtitles for Transvestite
Make subtitles for Bus Boy
Edit opening pre-credit sequence
Will transvestite entering taqueria go after credits? I think so…
Divide OYM into 2-3 smaller chunks …
I’ve been asked more than once why I’m doing this. “This” being the movie. My first thought is “why not?” My next thought is … if you’re asking, I don’t think you’d understand an answer if I gave it, but here, I’ll try:
Opening shots of the older sister, younger sister, and Mario the transvestite need to match 2 minutes 41 seconds of dialogue (unless I cut some of the opening voice over audio). At present, there’s 3:33 of video to pair down. Not too bad – most of it is Sylvia flipping through her wedding album.
Speaking of that wedding album, it’s your typical wedding album with plastic covering all the pictures so it reflected horribly in the light.
Ending montage needs to match 1 minute 45 seconds of dialogue. At present, there’s 8 1/2 minutes of video. I was positive in my mind that the ending monologue was longer … If I have to cut some of those kids … my heart’s gonna break… but most of the shots need to match a second or two of dialogue so … everyone should get cut fairly.
And this, I’ve found, is very common among beginning actors … whenever she’s “done” she looks right at me and the camera for approval or feedback. So, it’s really not a habit bad or otherwise – just a beginner’s mistake. I’m learning so much from watching the footage. Everything I could have done better … not even technically, because that stuff has been obvious so far … but … relating to how to coach and direct the actors.
She was really conscious of her expressions and reactions. When she didn’t have to concentrate on her line(s), she really gave a good performance. I’ll bet with time dedicated to practice/rehearsal, she’d really rock. So far, even more so than the other two girls – as far as the expressions and reactions go. I realized all this just as I was thinking that they didn’t ask what they were thinking or feeling … then I noticed how much effort she put into reacting to the bus boy and her “daughter.”
I think I gave more direction for that scene than any other. With all the others it was a matter of getting the dialogue right, with this one it was all about timing and action. Por ejemplo, the younger daughter smacking him and him getting to the corner of the table at the right time.
I can’t believe how much I shot for that scene. It’s about a minute on screen and I have almost 8 minutes of footage!
“crack the whip until they get it right” … I should say as many takes as needed … of course, rehearsals, communication, a more traditional and realistic schedule, etc. would prevent the need for whip cracking or excessive takes.
I’ll direct more. Sounds obvious, I know, but … so many people seemed unfamiliar with their lines (one with good reason) that … we would have been there all day. Everyone was improving as the day went on but … I kept them twice as long as scheduled as it was. We did several takes for every line which is more than I wanted or expected but … next time I’ll make sure that not only will everyone including me be more prepared but that I crack the whip and they do it until they do it right.
Just chose a couple final takes of Robert praying in church. I’m glad I shot a lot of it. Such a simple shot but … and this was my fault … his expression was just wrong for most of it. I never explained what he was thinking/feeling. But it was easy to edit in that it was easy to know what to throw out and what to keep. It will be much harder to choose with Mr. Castro’s performance in church. Gosh, he looks great in that robe. St. John’s Episcopal Church rocks the house for letting us film there AND for lending us the robe. Not that Robert didn’t look beautiful in his dress – kudos to his stylist who apparently sprinted to the finish with his costume.
I sent the screenplay to the guy in charge of the film festival saying that I was worried about some of the performances. He wrote this back:
“I like your script so much that the acting would have to be really bad for me to not want to screen it.”
Also, he said to advertise the time as 11:00 PM.
This falls into two categories:
1. Things I’d do different if I had more time
2. Lessons I learned.
1. Things I’d do different if I had more time
For the first, there were certain things that were, to a large degree, beyond my control because I was racing against a deadline to get a slot in the Detroit Film Festival. I wrote it fast based on my cast and where I thought I could film. These were the lessons I learned from Robert Rodriguez’ book and commentary. “Write based on what you have” just so you can make a movie and practice.
So if I had more time, I’d get “real” volunteers like the kids from Western with an interest, investement and a commitment. As opposed to tackling people at work and begging.
These actors would then rehearse until ready. The camera wouldn’t come out and we wouldn’t go to any location until we were ready.
Needless to say I’d cast and scout based on the screenplay, not write based on who and what I had available. Although, to be fair and honest, if I do other projects in Mexicantown with these and other students, I’ll still do that to an extent. One dream is to film at Howe Military Academy over the summer while the campus and dorms are empty. And … over the Christmas/New Years holidays while there’s snow.
Next time … although I don’t know yet if this is a problem (I haven’t done much editing yet) I’ll rent some sound equipment from the DFC. It’s only $30 a day.
Also, I’d break up the scenes and locations. I might take a couple or few days off work. I wouldn’t try to do all this in 2-4 hours. Altogether, I crammed all this shooting into about six hours or less.
I would cast ahead of time for all parts. Two smaller parts and a two larger parts weren’t cast until that morning. When I cast them, three or four kids hadn’t shown up yet so I based it on looks or whatever reason I could find to do it quickly. I hated doing that. Without an audition or anything but I had no time left at 10:00 AM on Saturday. Later, a boy showed up who was a writer/actor and I wished I’d had him to pick from at 10 if for no other reason than to help him out.
I really rushed myself for several reasons including trying to accommodate the actors who were from my job that I wanted to get done soon and get the anxious and excited kids to work who were patiently waiting.
2. Lessons I learned.
Lesson #1: Actors can’t read my mind. I know the characters and need to explain them in the screenplay. Their personalities and demeanors might not be obvious through the dialogue. This I learned the hard way.
Lesson #2: Take the camera when scouting so I can see what the light will be like.
Lesson #3: I do not know enough Spanish.
Lesson #4: As compulsive and anal as I was about the shot list … I still really need to fine-tune that process. I need to get that book again from the library that tells how to prepare the script for shooting.
Lesson #5: When preparing the shot list and the order scenes will be filmed, I need to take notes on props. For example, I was ready to shoot one scene and realized I couldn’t because there was no food on the table so we had to do another scene while we waited for the taqueria to prepare it. Then, I was going to do another scene (earlier in the script) and was about to clear the table when I realized I still hadn’t shot a different scene that would need all the stuff on the table. You can’t pay too much attention to even the smallest details!
I know I’ll think of more …
Continuing #5 … if you look carefully (well, maybe even not so carefully) you’ll see stuff appear and disappear off the table A LOT. So, don’t bother mentioning any inconsistencies or goofs when it comes to that. Oh, my goodness… that may … MAY be the most maddening part of watching it for me personally. But … it also might not be.
I thought my best chance to get in the film festival was based on the “preference for time slots will be given to films that fit the night’s musical theme” rule. So I went for Latin night, promised to film in Mexicantown, and hoped I could find some latinos and latinas who could speak Spanish.
My first try was a good looking latin guy who was (in all fairness, it was his legal counsel, not him) scared off by some of the content. I was introduced to the actress who plays the Mom and is fluent in Spanish. Nearby her cubicle at work was her daughter who said, “Hey, Andrea is Spanish.” Neither the daughter nor Andrea really knew Spanish (neither did the “good looking latin guy”) but I was confident they could read & memorize the lines.
Based on my cast of a Mom and two girls who could play her daughters and a guy (not yet scared off) who could play a priest, I started writing. I then recruited someone willing to dress as a woman for my transvestite – by this time I’d come up with another “Spanish” idea … making it a tribute to Pedro Almodavor.
Some other volunteers rounded out my dream cast (having more actors no matter who they were) and all that was left was to film it.
I thought it was going to be just that easy.
This morning, me and my cast of two went to the Computer Science building on the University of Michigan’s North Campus to film a segment for our “History of Cash Registers” video. We filmed in front of the ENIAC which “acted” as an early, giant cash register. The display case was a lot smaller than I was led to believe, so it was a tight fit but it just might still work.
We also got some contact information at the Natural Science Museum for taping in front of one of their huge displays. However, if they say “no” we already taped the display itself (I did it for a storyboard before we asked) and my actress’ husband has his own green screen for whatever reason so we can tape in front of that and I can put them in front of the display I already taped.
Also, we found this totally awesome Roman revival gazebo we can film an ancient Rome segment in front of.
Sylvia has yet to do her voice-overs which are the bookends to this movie. We’ve shot the opening credits, and the “middle” but we need her beginning and end. Her voice is going to be the heart and soul of this movie.
She was so nervous today but she was an absolute trooper. Below is her and her daughter, Jessica, who was originally going to play her on-screen daughter as well.
But I’m going home so I can see my kids before they go to bed.
But not before I show you Robert Barnette … the previous line is the mother telling the priest, “I was just telling my youngest daughter she should find a nice boy in church.”
