The Banker's Agent
- Thread starter 4100xpb
- Start date
CAST:
Pascal Belanger as Alan Cornwall
Jake Insley as Max Cornwall
Esther Reich as Julie Cornwall
E. Dantes as the Banker's Agent
CREW
Director: Mark Hollett
Assistant Director: Dylan Thompson
Director of Photography: Baddy Kahsay
Boom Operator: Paul Belanger
Make-up Artist: Amanda Shairp
Stills Photographer: Kathy McCann
BTS Video: Christina Chowaniec
Production Assistant: Charles Cartier
Pascal Belanger as Alan Cornwall
Jake Insley as Max Cornwall
Esther Reich as Julie Cornwall
E. Dantes as the Banker's Agent
CREW
Director: Mark Hollett
Assistant Director: Dylan Thompson
Director of Photography: Baddy Kahsay
Boom Operator: Paul Belanger
Make-up Artist: Amanda Shairp
Stills Photographer: Kathy McCann
BTS Video: Christina Chowaniec
Production Assistant: Charles Cartier
Production Blog, or, Where There’s Smoke...
We were struggling to find an interior location, until my family and I actually moved to a new house two weeks before the shoot. Turned out the place we got was almost perfect. Though that meant the night before shooting I spent three hours cleaning our old apartment, an hour picking up a prop, and another two hours cleaning and prepping the set. Who needs sleep?
Jan 29th, 2011
Production, Day 1.
I got quite a good response to my crew call on craigslist, and knowing how things go on volunteer shoots I overbooked on people figuring one or two would flake out and not show up. Apparently I picked the right people, because everyone showed up, on time no less.
The first half of the morning was minor chaos. I was firing in too many directions at once, and it took an hour before I let Dylan, our AD, get me pointed the right way. I guess this didn’t suit one of our actors, as he had to go ‘give something to a friend,’ walked out and did not return. I was annoyed at him leaving but pissed about him taking the ascot my wife made at 3:00 AM this morning. We found the ascot later, but too late to use in the shoot sadly, as it is a very nice ascot.
We got a substitute in fairly short order, and managed to shoot the whole first scene in an hour and a half. The afternoon went quite smoothly as well, grabbing one short scene and the second big scene. We even wrapped a little early. We did manage to set the smoke alarm off though – I guess you need a bit more distance between 1,000 watts of light and a freshly painted wall when you’re bouncing. There was no visible smoke or burning of any kind, but our makeup artist noticed a funky smell and just after we pulled the lights off, beep beep beep.
Jan 30th, 2011
Production, Day 2.
The morning shoot was on location at a parking garage. The weather was great with the sun coming out, but that meant it was cold. The cast and crew held up well in spite of it. We got all the shots we needed inside the garage, then went to do a few outside. We were almost wrapped there, but just before the last shot the security guard for the lot told us to skedaddle. We grabbed the last shot and then took off. We actually ended up ahead of schedule this morning and were able to grab some extra coverage and take a long lunch.
The afternoon went just as well. We were back at the house in a different room, despite a few contorsionist moments, particularly for our sound guy. We set off the smoke detector again. At least we did it with actual smoke this time.
I can’t give enough credit to the cast and crew. Everyone was upbeat and enthusiastic for the entire shoot, and while I didn’t always listen to it, I got some great guidance from them too. Overall, I’m thrilled with how the shoot went.
Post Production:
File transfer, backup and transcode went surprisingly quick; I was able to do all that the evening of each shoot. As I was scanning through the clips, the first frame of nearly every one of them was a slate. Is it wrong that that gives me a warm fuzzy feeling inside?
February 2nd
Started organizing all the clips today. This took a lot longer than I expected, even though nearly all of our takes, both audio and visual, were properly slated. The idea of trying to do this without proper markers gives me the heebee jeebies. Especially if you were not on location for the shoot. Big props to Dylan, Baddy and Paul for nailing this.
We shot on a Canon 60D, and I am cutting on Vegas Pro 9. I ran a few tests and verified the native 60D files ran like sloth in molasses, so I started looking for (free) alternatives. I tried MPEG Streamclip and Avid DNxHD, which was definitely an improvement, but still bogged down pretty easily. Then based Perrone Ford and some others’ recommendations, I tried out the Matrox VFW codes, converting using Prism Video Converter – I’m glad I did.
Prism is simple and it works. Add your files to the list, tell it what you want the output format and location to be, hit convert. Two hours later, my 20 GB of 60D clips became 60 GB of MPEG2 I-frame .avi’s. The load into Vegas very quickly, the framerate keeps up much better than DNxHD, and the clips look great. For anyone on Vegas who still transcodes and is looking for a workable free solution, I highly recommend this combination.
Goal for tomorrow night: finish sorting the audio files, and do a first pass cut.
February 3rd
I’m just looking through the list of credits – I still get surprised by the number of people it takes to put together just a six minute film. For the inside scenes we had a total of eight crew members (including myself), with one or two actors on screen at any time. For the outside shots we cut it down to one actor and three crew to keep it more manageable and draw less attention to ourselves. All you one-man bands have my respect. We could have got by with fewer, but it really was great having that many people helping.
Editing wise, I got the first pass done on the first half of t he film. I should have the complete first pass finished up tonight. Then we’ll take next week to tighten it up before sending it out for music and sound.
Feb 4th
Finished the rough cut tonight, and put some notes together for the composer. First pass comes out at 6:25 and change. I know there’s a good 10 seconds of junk in there that still needs to be culled, but there are also no titles or credits yet. Michael Horrigan was helping me with the script on this one, and he really pushed me to cut it down. Good thing he did, or else we would have been closer to 10 minutes on this cut and needed another day of shooting. Goal for next week: Fine cutting, and getting the length down under six minutes.
Mar 1st
Slow and steady progress. Colour correcting is more or less done, I still want to play with it some more to see what else I can do with the grading. Made up a quick poster just to say I have one - when did slickpic start inserting their URL on images? Grrr. Just got word the score is ready - can't wait to check that out tonight. The last week will be on recording the remaining SFX/Foley and finishing the sound editing.
We were struggling to find an interior location, until my family and I actually moved to a new house two weeks before the shoot. Turned out the place we got was almost perfect. Though that meant the night before shooting I spent three hours cleaning our old apartment, an hour picking up a prop, and another two hours cleaning and prepping the set. Who needs sleep?
Jan 29th, 2011
Production, Day 1.
I got quite a good response to my crew call on craigslist, and knowing how things go on volunteer shoots I overbooked on people figuring one or two would flake out and not show up. Apparently I picked the right people, because everyone showed up, on time no less.
The first half of the morning was minor chaos. I was firing in too many directions at once, and it took an hour before I let Dylan, our AD, get me pointed the right way. I guess this didn’t suit one of our actors, as he had to go ‘give something to a friend,’ walked out and did not return. I was annoyed at him leaving but pissed about him taking the ascot my wife made at 3:00 AM this morning. We found the ascot later, but too late to use in the shoot sadly, as it is a very nice ascot.
We got a substitute in fairly short order, and managed to shoot the whole first scene in an hour and a half. The afternoon went quite smoothly as well, grabbing one short scene and the second big scene. We even wrapped a little early. We did manage to set the smoke alarm off though – I guess you need a bit more distance between 1,000 watts of light and a freshly painted wall when you’re bouncing. There was no visible smoke or burning of any kind, but our makeup artist noticed a funky smell and just after we pulled the lights off, beep beep beep.
Jan 30th, 2011
Production, Day 2.
The morning shoot was on location at a parking garage. The weather was great with the sun coming out, but that meant it was cold. The cast and crew held up well in spite of it. We got all the shots we needed inside the garage, then went to do a few outside. We were almost wrapped there, but just before the last shot the security guard for the lot told us to skedaddle. We grabbed the last shot and then took off. We actually ended up ahead of schedule this morning and were able to grab some extra coverage and take a long lunch.
The afternoon went just as well. We were back at the house in a different room, despite a few contorsionist moments, particularly for our sound guy. We set off the smoke detector again. At least we did it with actual smoke this time.
I can’t give enough credit to the cast and crew. Everyone was upbeat and enthusiastic for the entire shoot, and while I didn’t always listen to it, I got some great guidance from them too. Overall, I’m thrilled with how the shoot went.
Post Production:
File transfer, backup and transcode went surprisingly quick; I was able to do all that the evening of each shoot. As I was scanning through the clips, the first frame of nearly every one of them was a slate. Is it wrong that that gives me a warm fuzzy feeling inside?
February 2nd
Started organizing all the clips today. This took a lot longer than I expected, even though nearly all of our takes, both audio and visual, were properly slated. The idea of trying to do this without proper markers gives me the heebee jeebies. Especially if you were not on location for the shoot. Big props to Dylan, Baddy and Paul for nailing this.
We shot on a Canon 60D, and I am cutting on Vegas Pro 9. I ran a few tests and verified the native 60D files ran like sloth in molasses, so I started looking for (free) alternatives. I tried MPEG Streamclip and Avid DNxHD, which was definitely an improvement, but still bogged down pretty easily. Then based Perrone Ford and some others’ recommendations, I tried out the Matrox VFW codes, converting using Prism Video Converter – I’m glad I did.
Prism is simple and it works. Add your files to the list, tell it what you want the output format and location to be, hit convert. Two hours later, my 20 GB of 60D clips became 60 GB of MPEG2 I-frame .avi’s. The load into Vegas very quickly, the framerate keeps up much better than DNxHD, and the clips look great. For anyone on Vegas who still transcodes and is looking for a workable free solution, I highly recommend this combination.
Goal for tomorrow night: finish sorting the audio files, and do a first pass cut.
February 3rd
I’m just looking through the list of credits – I still get surprised by the number of people it takes to put together just a six minute film. For the inside scenes we had a total of eight crew members (including myself), with one or two actors on screen at any time. For the outside shots we cut it down to one actor and three crew to keep it more manageable and draw less attention to ourselves. All you one-man bands have my respect. We could have got by with fewer, but it really was great having that many people helping.
Editing wise, I got the first pass done on the first half of t he film. I should have the complete first pass finished up tonight. Then we’ll take next week to tighten it up before sending it out for music and sound.
Feb 4th
Finished the rough cut tonight, and put some notes together for the composer. First pass comes out at 6:25 and change. I know there’s a good 10 seconds of junk in there that still needs to be culled, but there are also no titles or credits yet. Michael Horrigan was helping me with the script on this one, and he really pushed me to cut it down. Good thing he did, or else we would have been closer to 10 minutes on this cut and needed another day of shooting. Goal for next week: Fine cutting, and getting the length down under six minutes.
Mar 1st
Slow and steady progress. Colour correcting is more or less done, I still want to play with it some more to see what else I can do with the grading. Made up a quick poster just to say I have one - when did slickpic start inserting their URL on images? Grrr. Just got word the score is ready - can't wait to check that out tonight. The last week will be on recording the remaining SFX/Foley and finishing the sound editing.
Last edited:
Hawk Teflon
Veteran
Sorry to hear about that guy flaking! I'm really looking forward to this!
Michael Anthony Horrigan
More Cowbell Pictures
Thanks for the props. 
Not sure how I missed this thread?
I'll take a look at the BTS when I get a chance later. Congrats on seeing this through.
Not sure how I missed this thread?
I'll take a look at the BTS when I get a chance later. Congrats on seeing this through.
Looks like you guys had a lot of fun. Look forward to watching.
Michael Anthony Horrigan
More Cowbell Pictures
Really nice BTS. Great atmosphere to shoot in.
Chris Messineo
Veteran
Cool BTS. The homemade slider looks awesome.
Thanks everyone.
The slider was a creation of our first AD. We were testing it out for him, and ran into some issues that took some jury rigging to keep it shooting. Nothing that crazy glue, gaffer tape and rope couldn't fix. Once we got it tied down it worked great.
Charlie - if you liked the kitchen, I should show you the family room - we basically stuffed three rooms worth of furniture into one.
And as a final note, why didn't anyone tell me dialogue editing was such a PITA? Grr. In good news, I got the file size down to the 60 meg mark, and it seems to hold together well. I'm getting excited to see all the other entries.
The slider was a creation of our first AD. We were testing it out for him, and ran into some issues that took some jury rigging to keep it shooting. Nothing that crazy glue, gaffer tape and rope couldn't fix. Once we got it tied down it worked great.
Charlie - if you liked the kitchen, I should show you the family room - we basically stuffed three rooms worth of furniture into one.
And as a final note, why didn't anyone tell me dialogue editing was such a PITA? Grr. In good news, I got the file size down to the 60 meg mark, and it seems to hold together well. I'm getting excited to see all the other entries.
Zach Olson
Active member
Great atmosphere! I am looking forward to seeing the shots with the slider. =)
Great job in building up the tension. More later.
Chris Messineo
Veteran
This was intriguing. I'm wondering where this story came from. It almost feels like a classic tale (perhaps by Grimm) about a man and his family and the perils of debt. Even the dialogue had a kind of antiquated style to it.
I found it all very interesting, but in the end, I'm not quite sure I understand what happened. Who is the mysterious man, why are their diamonds in the car, and why must he kill himself to honor his debt? Perhaps it was all there and I just missed it.
I'm very curious to see what others make of this.
I found it all very interesting, but in the end, I'm not quite sure I understand what happened. Who is the mysterious man, why are their diamonds in the car, and why must he kill himself to honor his debt? Perhaps it was all there and I just missed it.
I'm very curious to see what others make of this.
Charli
cool little "title"
I'm sorry, but I did not find this interesting at all. It felt very "high schoolish" not only in the acting from ALL the actors, but also the dialogue was incredibly stiff, again like a high school play. I did not like the set, found it stale and uninteresting. I also felt the audio was off. The only highlight that I even liked were two props: 1. Fake diamonds 2. Purple candles.
That's all that stood out for me. This is where I would implore you to find a decent script to direct. Two things will kill your story - audio and story. I'm afraid you failed on both counts. This one missed the mark for me on many levels.
That's all that stood out for me. This is where I would implore you to find a decent script to direct. Two things will kill your story - audio and story. I'm afraid you failed on both counts. This one missed the mark for me on many levels.