Shooting Weekends vs. Consecutive Days

[craigbowman]

I'm DPing a feature at the moment for another producer. He works during the week and can only shoot weekends. Also, most of the actors involved also have day jobs and so I'm actually getting in a lot of regular production myself with commercial clients, (although the shoot is technically still a commercial gig since I'm getting paid, it just doesn't seem like it somehow), during the week and the weekends are focused on this feature.

If this had been a consecutive day feature shoot we'd have already done 20 days worth so far and we're only about 2/3 of the way through principle. One of the things which has been great, is the ability to sit down with the key players and go through the footage in greater detail than just a quick review after the takes on set as well as prepare more thoroughly for the changes in location.

I'd have to say that using time as your ally gives a distinct production boost to the usual lack of a significant budget. I would definately say that people without some kind of decent budget who try to match the pacing and page count of a fully crewed Hollywood feature are doing themselves a disservice by not using the biggest advantage an Indy feature producer can have, TIME.

Yes there are trade offs with actors' schedules etc., but I thought I would throw this out there, since this is my first chance to work on something that wasn't packed into the usual frenetic pace of the consecutive day shoot. You know, which usually has the first week where everyone is keen to be on "a feature set", the second week where we turn into zombies from lack of sleep, and the third week where everyone is ready to kill each other but come hell or high water just want to get the dam thing finished!

I probably wouldn't have taken this project on normally, but after reading a number of Faith Granger's postings on her three year quest, I'd thought there was definate merit in spreading the time out during principle that was worth experiencing first hand.

 

[djkarn105]

I would definately say that people without some kind of decent budget who try to match the pacing and page count of a fully crewed Hollywood feature are doing themselves a disservice by not using the biggest advantage an Indy feature producer can have, TIME.

In Project management there's something called the trade off matrix. Fast, Cheap and Good; pick two. Hollywood has the resources to produce something good quickly, but it's expensive. On an indy, you don't get to pick cheap, it's implied. That leaves your last option as either Fast or Good.

 

[El Director]

I'm not a fan of shooting just on weekends. in the past, I've experienced problems similar to what Sam Rami had on "The Evil Dead", which was shot on weekends and such. Basically, actors got tired of waiting for production to be done and would walk out. That's why a lot of the demons have so much makeup-so you can't tell they aren't the original actors. Granted, this kind of senario really only happens when you're working no-budget and can't pay actors. Personally, I've had better experiences shooting consecutive. It's a lot easier to keep the energy up.

 

[Martay]

There are definitely pros and cons of both. We shot Battle over 20 days 18 principal and 2 2nd Unit Days....we shot it over roughly 7 weeks. However, we did manage to knock out 9 principal days within 2 weeks which helped folks stay focused during a critical section of filming.

-M

 

[Azmyth]

My feature is being shot on weekends, and one any non weekend days when everyone is available. The entire cast and crew have day jobs, so shooting consecutively is not possible.

 

[El Director]

When I shot "Wulf", we all had day jobs too, so we just worked around that. The enitire film was shot between 5pm and midnight. "Leap" was a bit different. Most of my actors were college kids, and we shot during the summer, when they were off. I only had one two actors who were working, so it was pretty easy. It's really just a matter of knowing what pace you work at, when people are available, then just thinking it out.

 

[David G. Smith]

I've shot both ways and I prefer the consecutive days. I just seems to me you build up a momentum that carries you through. You can pack gear configured between days, and keep stuff together better. With the paced out shooting, it seemed to me like there are is too much energy spent, getting stuff back together each weekend. It is like day one again.

However, if that is the way you have to shoot, it looks like you are taking advantage of the schedule to make a better project and that is cool.

On one spaced out project, shot on 16mm, we had to space it out because the Producer/Director was paying for the project over time, and took advantage of the lower weekend rates on rental for the camera and gear and he was paying for film, processing and work printing (yeah it was cut on film) as he went along. BUT, we got into a problem, where we were scheduled for a weekend of all day exteriors for the following weekend, and the Producer/Director bought the film we were using for day exteriors, 7245, a ISO 50 daylight balanced color negative stock. Which arrived on Tuesday prior to the Saturday shot. I got a call late on Thursday night where the Producer/Director called me to tell me that he had to change the schedule for this weekend, because he has secured the use of a record store needed for the story, and HE COULD NOT AFFORD TO GET ANY OTHER FILM. So he begged me to come up with a solution. So I had to end up shooting a record store interior, with an ISO 50, daylight balanced stock and a small kit of tungsten lights (around 3k watts total). I freaked out, of course. I had to push the stock a stop, and shot under the tungsten lights without filtration (CTB on the lights or an 80A filter on the lens), and did all the color correction during printing. I put a white reference, a grey card, with grey scale and for color reference (since I did not have a chip chart), I used a small US flag on the front of every roll for the colorist. Luckily, every shot was usable and I got a nice compliment from the old lab guy, who told the Producer/Director, "Your cameraman knows what he is doing,".

I know that you are probably shooting digital video and this situation may not be an issue for you, but just be aware that shooting a project spaced out can throw you some logistic curves. Of course every film project can do that.

Also, tell the actors, no radical hair cuts!

 

[Ted Spencer]

I've worked on two feature films as an actor that were done weekend warrior-style, and both ended up taking over two years to complete principal photography. As if that wasn't bad enough, both also suffered departures of key cast members. In one case it was a secondary lead, after a great many scenes had been shot. It forced a massive rewrite of the story and consequent delays, reshoots and other brain-melting side effects for the producers. A genuine nightmare...

If I were shooting a feature I don't think I would even consider trying to do it that way. A short film is another matter altogether of course...

 

[Ted Spencer]

If it takes two years, then no. I wouldn't do it that way, either

Neither of the producers of the films I referenced thought it would take anywhere near that long. They both estimated about six months. But as I'm sure you know, sh*t has a tendency to happen. Especially if you give it enough time...

IIRC, Faith Granger's "Deuce Of Spades" feature has also taken about two years, and she's just about done now.

 

[Ted Spencer]

Considering that a low-budget feature can be shot reasonably well in 3-4 weeks or so, it seems to me that that's the right way to go. It might or might not be consecutive weeks either - spreading them out over a couple of months might be fine too, and could ease some of the burnout factor.

But having been through the weekend-warrior feature experience (and now that I think about it, there was a *third* one I had a small role in that also took a couple of years) I think it's a very slippery slope.

 

[Ted Spencer]

Glad it's worked out for you. Well done...

 

[Martay]

...we ended up having to move a few things around (but that happens in all sorts of shoots) and scheduling issues made us have to skip a weekend here and there, but we still finished in the number of shooting days I had originally scheduled.

An organized production should certainly not need additional shoot days even when it doesn't work 5 day weeks and shoots mostly weekends. We were delayed as you mention and had to wait 2 weeks to get our final 2 days of Principal in because of a location issue which made it worth our while to delay shooting.

We still did 1 day less of Principal Photography than planned and even 1 day less of 2nd Unit shooting as well.

The danger we did run into was that it's finally a bit colder in GA than when we began, so we had slightly uncomfortable actors who had to "tough it out" a little when it came to exterior shooting on the last weekend. But it wasn't too bad (says the producer who kept his jacket on).

The commitment to efficiency must be there or it can get out of hand and spread out over months or even years. I've seen many a project that has happened on as well.

-M

 

[Azmyth]

I think my main worry about shooting on weekends only, is due to the travel distance for some of my actors I may wind up casting. We plan to try to use as many locals as possible (if they are good), but I'm fairly sure we'll wind up having to cast outside of the local area for some of the parts in order to get some decent actors. The bad part about this is, and shooting on weekends.. is the travel for those actors. If we shot consecutively they could just stay in the area until we were done. But, since we will mostly shoot on weekends, it will require them to drive down for each shoot. I'm sure most won't have too much issue with is, especially if we compensate them for the gas money.. but driving 2 hrs or whatever it winds up being every weekend, might get old for some. Myself included.

 

[Martay]

... but driving 2 hrs or whatever it winds up being every weekend, might get old for some. Myself included.

I also worry about the safety of that for actors.

We did one day outside the ATL area on our shoot. Fort Valley which is 2 hours to drive there.

I did offer to transport my cast myself for that day (rented a van) with the caveat that they'd have to stay the full day if they did otherwise I'd reimburse their travel with a Gas stipend if they wanted the freedom of driving themselves.

We needed 4 principals and 2 of them rode with me and the director as they were pretty much needed all day.

The other 2 decided to drive themselves as they were not needed the full day.

It wasn't a long day for the 2 who drove themselves but if the other 2 had not opted to travel with us, they would have been driving back after an arduous shoot day (instead, just I was doing that...but I'm more comfortable with it myself as I have done so often and am used to it) which would have worried me. All told the day was still only a 15 hour day (travel included) but I would not have wanted to put the crew and cast in that situation more than that one time.

So, be sure that you make realistic goals in terms of a shoot day so that you don't fatigue the folks who are travelling. The last thing you want is an accident for your cast (or crew).

-M

 

[Azmyth]

I also worry about the safety of that for actors.

We did one day outside the ATL area on our shoot. Fort Valley which is 2 hours to drive there.

I did offer to transport my cast myself for that day (rented a van) with the caveat that they'd have to stay the full day if they did otherwise I'd reimburse their travel with a Gas stipend if they wanted the freedom of driving themselves.

We needed 4 principals and 2 of them rode with me and the director as they were pretty much needed all day.

The other 2 decided to drive themselves as they were not needed the full day.

It wasn't a long day for the 2 who drove themselves but if the other 2 had not opted to travel with us, they would have been driving back after an arduous shoot day (instead, just I was doing that...but I'm more comfortable with it myself as I have done so often and am used to it) which would have worried me. All told the day was still only a 15 hour day (travel included) but I would not have wanted to put the crew and cast in that situation more than that one time.

So, be sure that you make realistic goals in terms of a shoot day so that you don't fatigue the folks who are travelling. The last thing you want is an accident for your cast (or crew).

-M

Right, this is another thing I thought about. I mean I'd love to have some of the talented actors from Atlanta work on my project, and there's been more people from ATL sending in info than from anywhere else. That actually have acting experience. MOST of the roles, except for the very main characters would only have about 1-2 days of shooting. The main characters of course would need to be present for much more. I just wanted everyone to be very apparent of what they are getting into before they start saying they want to be involved.

 

[j1clark@ucsd.edu]

I'm not a fan of shooting just on weekends. in the past, I've experienced problems similar to what Sam Rami had on "The Evil Dead", which was shot on weekends and such. Basically, actors got tired of waiting for production to be done and would walk out. That's why a lot of the demons have so much makeup-so you can't tell they aren't the original actors. Granted, this kind of senario really only happens when you're working no-budget and can't pay actors. Personally, I've had better experiences shooting consecutive. It's a lot easier to keep the energy up.

According to David Lynch, it took him several years to finally shoot everything he wanted for his first feature, "Eraserhead"(1977). The lead male actor had to maintain the same hair do, for many of those years... as well as be around for whenever filming could take place.

As he describes it, he would shoot when he got enough money to get the equipment...

I want to know how he got that sort of dedication???