PRODUCTION DIARY - DAY 8 - January 9th, 2011 | Bonython Park & War Memorial Drive.
Crew in attendance: Peter Ninos (Director), David Tang (Cinematographer), Jordan Agutter (Gaffer/Camera Assist), Trent Ninos (First A.D.), Teena Ninos (D.A./Sound Recorder), Billy Ninos (Clapper Loader/Boom Poll) & Paul Larsen (Grip/Runner). Cast in attendance: Adam Schmerl (Jake).
Scenes being filmed: OMEGA Scene 6 & 9. Scene 12 pick ups.
Tonight is our last day of filming in this four day block and also Adam Schmerl's (Jake) last day of filming for OMEGA before moving to Melbourne! Adam is flying out tomorrow and was still willing to work on the film tonight. So a huge thanks to Adam for being such a great sport!
Tonight we're filming the oft-put off car Scenes 6 & 9. But we also had a large chuck of Scene 12 to finish off filming. The sequence is when Jess (Kate) calls Jake and explains about the Agent just as Jake sees the Agent arrive at the Observatory. We filmed the Agent (Frenk) and Professor Jameson's (Devon) coverage yesterday with Adam in the foreground so tonight we'll film Adam's coverage and the entirety of the phone conversation.
First shot up was Jake driving his car and parking in front of the Observatory. Exterior coverage was first, Adam drove up in Trent's car (doing a great job playing Jake's car), turned off the head lights and walked out of shot. The framing was very nice, when I reviewed the footage it looked great, DTang and Jordan set the scene perfectly.
Next up was the shot immediately prior to the one just filmed (gotta love filming out of order). This was Adam driving through the gateway of the rear entrance of Bonython Park standing in for the Stockport Observatory. Over the four days of outdoor shoots we had been lucky so far with power. This was our only shot where we didn't have readily available power so we cracked out Trent's generator. We didn't want to overload it so DTang and Jordon only ran a couple of Dedo lights, it was pretty dark but overall the shot worked.
We moved onto a transition shot of Adam walking along the building, checking in the windows then pulling out his phone as it rang. A quick shot but it draws out the stillness and emptiness of the set. It will be very effective building up the suspense of the impending kidnapping.
Now here was a fun sequence to shoot. We had a very large area at Bonython to work with so we took full advantage of it. The scene called for Jake and Jess to exchange a few hurried words before the Agent drives up for his next target.
Kate was under the weather and unable to attend filming tonight so Teena was good enough to read out Jess's lines with Adam. She was very nervous but after a quick sprint with Adam she did a great job, thanks sis!
We started the shot with Adam was standing against the side wall of the Observatory. The long, curving drive way of this part of the park extended into the distance behind him. Our 1st A.D. Trent hopped into our Agent's car, tore off down the road and, after we started rolling, he slowly drove towards Adam and the camera. It took a couple of takes to get the timing right, Adam had to deliver a whole paragraph of dialogue before noticing the lights of the car so we had Trent go further back down the road and slow down his speed. We rounded out the scene by having Adam pressed up against the wall with Trent tearing off out of the driveway, kicking up dust and gravel. This'll be added after the shots we took of Devon getting kidnapped.
In the end we got it, the shot looked amazing! The car creeping slowly towards our hero, then the bright lights sweeping like a search light across the wall, will definitely be a nerve wracking scene for the audience. Although if anyone yells out "Look out behind you!" to the screen I will lose all faith in humanity.
Woo! Scene 12 done! What an awesome sequence, can't wait to see this one on the big screen!
Interior car scenes up next. We split these sequences up into two set ups. Set up 1 was having the car stationary, with the background blacked out completely. Our large fan was positioned to blow in through the drivers window simulating the car speeding down the road. Now I know these type of faux driving shots may not look as convincing as shooting while actually driving but we needed to be able to control the environment for these few crucial moments. Luckily the scenes worked pretty well - adding Sound FX and the radio voices in post will sell the scene completely.
The stationary shots were lit with a combination of Dedo's and glow sticks (thanks for Billy for supplying heaps of them!). When filming in the dark things we can see great with our eyes tend to fade out on even the best camera. So the glow sticks helped accentuate the light being emanated from the cars dials and the radio. It may have looked like a Tron-car to us, but on film it looked perfect.
We said goodnight to Jordan, great work tonight mate, and started setting up Set up 2. Our final two shots required a smaller, mobile film unit. Adam, DTang and I drove off to film the shot of Jake pulling up at the hospital Jess works at and various interior driving scenes.
The Women's and Children's Hospital was standing in for Jess's hosptial. Adam dropped DTang and I off in front of the hospital and took a run up (or would that be a drive up?). We did a number of takes covering the drive up from both sides - at one point standing in traffic. For the last three takes I suggested we add a pan down from the hospitals highest floor to add some motion to the scene. Adam pulled up, played the emotion of the scene where his character is longing to go in a see his girlfriend, but resolving not to and driving off.
We had a little drama at one point, suddenly to our left we saw in the Memorial Hospital adjacent to the main building a large explosion of (I'm assuming) steam. It was billowing out very fast and looked to be a series breach of some sort. I looked pretty cool provided no one was hurt (I spoke with the hospital the next day and they said no one was, but wouldn't elaborate on what happened).
Final shots for the night, our destination - War Memorial Drive. Anyone familiar with it knows it's a long winding stretch of dark scary road. This is one place you don't want to be walking down in the dead of night, well unless you have an aversion to clean pants.
So, with Adam driving, we ventured further down to the stretch where the street lights were few and far between. We filmed Adam driving, changing the radio station, looking around and just some plates of his head lights beaming down the road as he drove. We may have caught a few street lights in some of the shots but they'll be easy enough to edit around in post.
So that wraps up filming for this week and it also marks the last shot for Adam on OMEGA. Adam worked tirelessly and with complete professionalism throughout the entire shoot. He is a pleasure to work with, listening, taking direction, and offering helpful suggestions and insights at all turns. I know I speak for the whole crew when I say Adam was an invaluable and down right awesome guy to work with!
Thanks to Teena, Trent, Billy & Paul for packing up super fast (as always) while Adam, DTang and I filmed the last shots on the road. A well deserved break from filming for the next two weeks, then hopefully we can wrap up OMEGA with another four days of filming!
Kudos everyone! Thanks to Adam, DTang, Jordon, Trent, Teena, Billy & Paul.
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