You will see the importance of the pre production stage from the amount of time we have spent in the planning and preparation for our production.
Production is the actual shooting of the programme, in this case at three locations over two days. As you will see from the budget this is the most expensive stage of the whole process; these two days will cost more than the ten days of pre production.
In order that this stage goes according to plan, and schedule, we still have some paperwork that is concerned with the shooting itself. Nothing must be left to chance; we could lose a large amount of money if anything is allowed to go wrong. Short of major catastrophes, which will be covered by insurance, anything that does go wrong will be due to your lack of paperwork and entirely your fault.
Ace Productions has a problem that is typical of small companies struggling to make a name for themselves and survive in this difficult, and cutthroat, business. If you look back at the final budget sheets you will see that they only charged for ten days of pre production; yet the pre production stage lasted from the arrival of a request by letter on July 8th until now, September 3rd. If they had charged Fashions for You the cost of the whole duration they would have been so far over the client’s budget that they would not have got the programme.
The assumption must be that they were working on other programmes during these three months or doing their part time jobs. Realistically there were many days when nothing happened at all and then a few when everything happened, including a late Friday night and a Saturday! The same is going to happen with the Production stage. There are only two salaried days allocated on September 21st and 22nd, nearly three weeks away, but there is much to do before that.
Production Meetings
The thinking behind a production meeting is to ensure that everything that needs to be dealt with is allocated to a named person, and everybody knows what is happening, and when. Nothing can now be left to chance.
This first production meeting will close the pre production phase and prepare for the production stage. Some people will say that this is actually the last pre production meeting. You may see it this way and want to file it under ‘Pre production’. I will not argue with that because whatever is easiest, and feels right to you, is what you do. Simon and Elaine like to make it the first production meeting, because it is wholly concerned with the two days’ shoot, and they will put the agenda and minutes in the production diary under the ‘Meetings’ section of the ‘Production’ element.
You will have seen throughout this book that although there are only two people involved in this company and they work together and see each other all the time, there are times when they will chat about something and times when they formally call a meeting. This is professionalism. It is very difficult to put accounts of the occasional ‘corridor chats’ in the diary. If it is important – call a meeting!
Have a look at Elaine’s agenda and see if you thought of all the items she wants covered. Perhaps more importantly think whether she has left anything out that you will have to bring it up under AOB.
You will see that the ‘loose ends’ are being tied up. Rather than sit in on the meeting, we will look at the minutes.
Confidentiality Clauses
You can see that nothing is ever simple! Just when you thought that everything was covered and running along happily this happens. Simon now has to sort out the confidentiality problem and look at the PA schedule in terms of hours. He also has to revise the budget.
Confidentiality is a big issue with companies. To take Fashions for You as an example, they spend months working on designs, colours, ranges and so forth in order to make their product competitive and unique. If their competitors find out what they are doing there is a very real chance that they will produce a near identical range less expensively.
Because it is written into their contract of employment, all the employees are sworn to secrecy. A casual ‘we’ve got a lovely shirt in smoke blue for next season’ could mean instant dismissal. The chances of working again in this industry sector will be slim because prospective employers will be told.
Because it is in the contract the employee has committed a breach of contract, which may be considered serious enough for it to result in court action to recover large sums of money in compensation.
It is understood that production companies will abide by the rules of confidentiality, because they need to work and earn money. You won’t get far if you go and tell a rival company what you are working on. It saves a lot of trouble to say ‘we have done similar programmes’ than run through your client list with a prospective client. Sometimes a client will write a confidentiality clause into your contract. This is one method of ensuring you don’t break the rules. Generally there is an accepted mutual trust between client and producer.
What has happened here is that Naomi has realized that Ace Productions are not employing people as staff, but as contractors. This means that to ensure secrecy everyone involved must sign to say that they will not give away any details of the Fashions for You range. It may only be a month before the official launch of next season’s range, but that is long enough for a competitor to counter it with something of his or her own.
Simon has now got to check the wording with the lawyer and then incorporate in the contributor release forms for the girls, and construct a simple ‘Confidentiality Statement’ for the crew, editing personnel, voice-over and audience to sign. Confidentiality is well understood in any business and there should be no problem with the shooting or editing crew signing the form on the day, it is a risk but so minimal that it isn’t worth considering. If the audience don’t want to sign they don’t watch; it is that simple!
Some companies are extremely sensitive about this issue. There have been cases where producers have to give an undertaking that they are not working for a rival company. There have also been cases where production companies have negotiated a ‘retainer fee’, whereby they agree to work exclusively for a particular company in a sector and turn down work from others.
Simon has rung the lawyer and they have come up with an agreed clause: ‘I hereby warrant that I will not pass on any details of the content of this programme to a third party, and will disclose any conflicting interest I may have with a similar company. By signing this contract I understand that I am legally bound to respect the need for confidentiality’.
The confidentiality clause statement will be sent as a separate form with the contracts for the girls and he has also been advised to ensure that anybody involved with the programme, including himself and Elaine, must also sign them.
The lawyer advised Simon to have these photocopied and sent to Naomi for her to keep on file. The reason behind this is that the lawyer feels that if there is a breach of confidentiality the task of tracing its source will be so enormous that Ace Productions really don’t want to get involved in it.
Nobody is going to admit that they were responsible. It could be any of the Fashions for You work force, anyone at the college or any member of the crew. If there is a leak it is better that Fashions for You sort it out themselves.
Simon has now decided that, in view of the extra work involved he will ask for the PA for six hours on the 9th, 13th and 15th of Sept. and then eight hours on both shooting days, both off line and both on line days. This is a total of 66 hours at £5 per hour, totalling £330. The budget allowed for eight days at £40 (£320) and the extra £10 will come from the extra £100 Naomi has promised.
Simon discusses this with Elaine who will contact the agency to get agreement before Simon raises an order to put this in order formally.
Second Production Meeting
The PA has been confirmed and Elaine calls a production meeting for 9 a.m. on the 9th of September. Why did she pick this date and time, when the schedule said the 13th Sept.? You will notice the agenda isn’t in this book, what would you put in it? If you had called this meeting who would be present?
You will have to organize and run your production meetings so why don’t you draw up an agenda, have the meeting and then see what happened at Ace Productions’ meeting. The way to learn is to try to think of everything and then compare it with reality. That way if you make mistakes they won’t cost you anything because you will be able to ‘put it down to experience’.
You will also notice that I haven’t included the minutes. You know what minutes look like now and anyway you had the meeting and didn’t send me a copy of your minutes! Did you draw up the minutes and circulate them to all those present?
That leaves me with the task of explaining what happened at Ace Productions’ meeting so that you can compare it with your own.
The new PA was greeted (was she at your meeting?), this is her first morning and she needs to know what she has to do. Her name is Poppy. People will happily sit around doing nothing all day, if they are being paid for it, so her schedule needs to be sorted out.
Julian’s music arrived this morning (as promised) together with an invoice. The Fashions for You cheque arrived yesterday. The contracts need sorting out for the girls and the Fashions for You staff. The confidentiality clauses need to be drawn up for Simon, Elaine, Poppy and all the crew. The catering has to be organized. The banner, with the Fashions for You logo, has to be collected. Call sheets, camera cards and logs need doing. The clothes have to be collected. Poppy is going to have a busy Thursday and Monday!
Simon handed out the revised schedule (opposite). Does it look like yours, or didn’t you revise it? The programme grows and changes as it goes along. If all this is documented in the production diary you will be able to keep track of it. There is no ‘it will be all right on the night’ at Ace Productions.
Working with a PA
Employing staff, albeit on a part time basis, is a big step for any company. You will remember that, under the health and safety regulations, you have a duty of care with regard to staff welfare. This will include things that you may not have thought of. It is all very well for you to sit in a freezing office with your coat on, but regulations govern the temperature of offices that employees can be expected to work in. Have you got a smoking or non-smoking policy? Employees are entitled to breaks; the intervals between each and the duration of those breaks is laid down. You can sit on the floor and play with your computer; employees can’t, and there are regulations for that too! All this is covered by the fact that employees must be given a safe, healthy, working environment.
Laws are in force regarding what you can expect from your staff and what they can expect from you. Human rights legislation is big business. Everything is covered from abuse to harassment.
You will need delegation and diplomacy skills. Many a misunderstanding has blown into a major confrontation. Major companies have problems because the boss won’t let the staff do anything without being told how to do it first, or checked up on while they are doing it. If you employ someone then you have to trust him or her to do a job without constant interference from you. They may do it differently to you, but does that matter if it is done efficiently and effectively?
Throughout this book I have tried to give you an insight into running a business. There is a world of difference between doing your final project, together with some sort of production diary, on a video course and actually running a successful video production company.
You can see that it hasn’t been easy for Ace Productions. All of reality is here and you could do a lot worse than identify with them and then see if you want to be part of the business (doing camerawork, for example), or actually have the worry of running a business.
Elaine has agreed to bring Poppy up to speed with the programme and run through the production diary with her. They all agree that her first job after that is to organize the sandwiches and make the coffee for lunch!
Simon has made out a confidentiality clause statement and modified the contributor release forms. They are on the computer so Poppy is going to print a statement form for Elaine, Simon and herself and then get the girls’ names out of the production diary and send them each a contract.
She will take the Fashions for You cheque and copy some details onto the first invoice. What details? Why? Not until then will she pay it into the bank. When Simon and Elaine have listened to Julian’s music, and approved it, she will be given a cheque for Julian and she will copy some details from it onto Julian’s invoice before posting it. In which section of the production file will she file his invoice?
The answers to these questions are to do with how a business is run. The Fashions for You cheque is payment for an Ace Productions’ invoice. The invoice is correctly filed in ‘Invoices’. Now it has been paid it needs to have written onto it the date it was paid and the cheque number. Ace Productions also write the paying-in slip number on the invoice. Banks do lose cheques and in a busy production schedule it is easier to go to the production diary for all the information than to sift through paying-in stubs.
What about Julian’s invoice? You didn’t say file it under ‘invoices’ did you? There is a subtle difference here. It is his invoice, but your receipt. You paid out money that will be accounted for on the budget sheet and will be offset against tax. Poppy will file it with all the other receipts in the ‘Receipts’ section. First she will write on it the date it was paid and the cheque number. If Julian claims he hasn’t been paid (post does get lost), she will know where to find the information she needs to cancel the cheque. It is all in the production diary.
Poppy has been employed to do these things. Elaine and Simon are busy with other things. Poppy has been given responsibility. This is making good use of her employment. Elaine may discreetly have a look to see if these two documents have been filed correctly, but if she is going to sit on top of Poppy and tell her how to do things why is she employing her?
Before she goes home until Monday Poppy sorts out the confidentiality clause statements and the contracts for the girls.
You will see that the confidentiality clause statement is very simple. It would stand up in law, if the need arose, and includes a ‘conflicting interest’ clause. This is there to give the person signing it the chance to declare that, for example, they are working part time for the opposition. This would then give Ace Productions the opportunity of excluding that person from taking any part in the production.
Poppy prints three copies, signs one and leaves one each on Simon and Elaine’s desk.
When she comes in on Monday she will have to organize the catering for the shooting day at Fashions for You, the supplier order for the college catering and the two days’ post production catering. There will be a meeting to arrange for Elaine and Mr H to review the voice-over tapes. She will have to arrange to have the banner delivered, and make the arrangements for the clothes from Fashions for You.
Production Planning
It is now Monday 13th September. Elaine went to see Richard on Friday and has selected three voice-over artists that she thinks are suitable. Richard has made up a cassette compilation and she needs the final approval for one of them from Mr Hermandes. Why can’t she make her own mind up?
Poppy has arrived, offered to make them all a cup of coffee and is looking at her ‘to do’ list.
She decides she will see Elaine before she gets busy with her day and ask if she will see Mr H about the clothes and if she has a preferred day or time for the meeting. Then she will work through the rest of the list.
Production planning is all about thinking of everything that needs to be done, or anything that might crop up, and planning to deal with it before it happens. That way everything goes smoothly. You will see that while Poppy was at the meeting on Thursday she wrote down all the things that she was asked to do. She knows that her head is a notoriously stupid place to keep things! People do forget, you can get brain overload and, anyway, isn’t it better to be methodical and professional by having a list of things to do; less stressful for you and impressively efficient. Of course her notes will eventually go into the production diary under ‘Production planning’.
Elaine has agreed to ask Mr H about the arrangements for the clothes, and would like a meeting as soon as possible. Poppy asked why she needed to ask him about the voice-over. The answer was very simple; it is exactly the same as the music track. If the client makes the decision he cannot complain later and want it changed. We have already mentioned that this is a form of ‘insurance’; if you ask the client to agree important things like choice of voice, girls and the music it is his responsibility to pay for any subsequent changes.
An example of thinking about things that might crop up is that Poppy is currently with Simon. She has had an idea. She wants to ask Simon how many people to cater for and if she should ask the college if they could do some sandwiches for the other shooting day and the off line and on line days.
Simon is looking at the budget and modifying it to reflect the extra £100 from Naomi for the extra girl and the extra trouble. He thinks it would be a good idea to ask the college about the other days, but what about tea and coffee? He has allowed £40 for the Fashions for You shoot and £60 for the four days of editing. There will be the three of them and two crew at F for Y, three for off line and four for on line. It can’t do any harm to ask, but don’t spend all the money!
He also asks her to check that the college know there will be ten people directly involved in the college shoot.
Poppy has contacted Mr Hermandes’ secretary and arranged a meeting for 3 p.m. She will contact Naomi to see if she is free, otherwise the tape may need to be left. Poppy doesn’t forget things; she also checked that they have a cassette recorder.
Do you remember that Mr Hermandes is not actually the client? He has taken out his own ‘insurance policy’ by making sure Naomi (who is the client) makes the decision about the voice!
The catering manager said that he was catering for 15 on the Wednesday. When asked about the other days he got his calculator out and said that he had arrived at the £60 because he charges £4 per person. Poppy gave him the numbers involved and he added it up to the equivalent of 19 people. That comes to £76 but he was prepared to charge £125 all together provided they collected the sandwiches at 8 a.m. on the other days involved. He said that tea and coffee was no problem because they could borrow two of his urns and he would supply tea and coffee bags and lots of plastic cups.
Simon was very pleased with this. He asked if Poppy could do the collecting and take them on to the venues. More modifications to the budget!
Poppy organized and sent the order and then continued with the rest of her list.
She will be gone by the time Elaine gets back so she will leave a note for her explaining the arrangements for the catering and the banner.
These are busy days for Ace Productions. Production planning is critical to success. Remember ‘planning and preparation make a successful production’!
Camera Scripts
Wednesday September the 15th. There is less than a week to the first day of shooting. Naomi was able to make the meeting, after some discussion it was decided to use George Riley for the voice-over. The clothes are being selected and will be brought to the college by Naomi and Mr H, both of whom want to come to the college shoot. The banner has arrived. The catering is arranged. It is Poppy’s last day before shooting starts.
Today she will work with Elaine on the shooting script, camera cards, call sheets and prepare the camera logs.
A shooting script is an important document that is part of the planning stage. Strictly speaking it should be used for all productions, but the truth is that it is only really of any use with multi-camera productions, such as studio work, and doesn’t really apply to this one.
Once we have the storyboard approved, we can translate it to the shooting script. This is similar to the storyboard but without the pictures. On the left hand side are the shot number and written instructions about the shot using the known abbreviations. The middle of the page is given over to the words that will be spoken, and any instructions for performers. The right hand side will have notes for the sound team about music or effects. At the appropriate point in the script there will be a horizontal line with a slash mark to indicate the cutting point to the next shot.
Whereas the storyboard was a document, generated for the client, that showed the programme in words and pictures, the script is the first of the ‘technical’ documents designed for use by the director and the various teams in the production. Because it is part of the production planning process, and you will inevitably have to produce one for your coursework, I have used an example from a typical production. It is an extract from a drama shot in studio using three cameras.
If you look at the diagram of the script you can see that we are on shot 13 and shot 14 is cued by the words ‘Good holiday?’ At this point we cut to a two-shot of the two performers (Bob and Lucy) and the words spoken are ‘I’ve had better,’ and so on. The camera cuts to the next shot (shot 15 on camera 2), which is a medium close up (MCU) of Lucy, at the slash mark after ‘fault.’ You will also see that Bob ‘Would you like a drink?’ and Lucy ‘What did you want to tell me?’ are in square brackets, this indicates a stage direction which is explained under the script by (simultaneously).
After the medium close up from camera 2 and close up from camera 1 (shots 15 and 16), camera 2 moves to a close up (CU) in shot 17 and camera 1 pulls back to a medium close up (shot 18).
Shot 19 is back to camera 3’s two-shot.
At this stage of the script the only instructions for sound are a bottle opening and drinks being poured over shots 17 to 19 and these appear on the right hand side of the page.
If you are involved in a multi-camera shoot of this type the next stage is to generate camera cards.
From the script the director and the camera team will work out which camera will be responsible for which shot. Individual cameras are not concerned with what the other cameras are doing or what the sound people are doing, all they need is a simple list of which shot numbers they are responsible for and what type of shot it is. We will use an example from another part of the script we have just looked at.
You will see from the diagram that this is a camera card for camera 3, and you can see that the camera has some establishing long shots (LS) at the beginning (shots 1 and 3), then tightens into a two-shot (both performers), to follow the interaction between the two performers (shots 8, 11 and 14). When they stand up, and Lucy walks out, the camera has a movement as it pans right to accommodate the movement of Lucy (shot 21). The camera goes back to its long shot (LS) at shot 26 and has a medium long shot (MLS) of Lucy as its final shot (shot 31).
This camera card will be clipped to camera 3. During run throughs and rehearsals the director may change the shot slightly, or even change the camera! It is wise, therefore, to leave space beside, and underneath, each shot so that the cameraperson can make notes of the changes.
It takes, on average, 8–10 years of training and working as an assistant before you can become a cameraperson. One of the reasons for this is that you need to gain an instinctive feel for a programme, the director’s ideas and the performers’ movements.
You will have been taught what a mid shot (for instance) is. It is only with experience that you can frame it in the most flattering and creative way. Many a director will have to say ‘camera 3 – tighten it a bit’, or ‘camera 3 – loosen it a little’. If the director has to frame all the shots during a run through frustration will set in among performers and crew, time will start getting away and money will start being lost.
It is only when you hear ‘camera 3, that’s great’, or ‘camera 3 – just perfect, again’ that you can say that you have arrived as a camera operator. This instinctive feel for a shot dictates the overall quality of the programme. How often have you thought ‘Great direction – shame about the camera work (sound or lighting).’
Like anything you enjoy you will strive for perfection. There will be those on your course already that you think are great on sound or lighting, or even directing. They probably enjoy it enough to want to make it their career, just as there will be some who really want to do the paperwork and the production planning side that this book is concerned with!
An important part of the production paperwork is to prepare accurate floor plans. For studio work this will involve drawing the various sets onto an accurate plan of the studio area.
Once the set is outlined we can then draw in the position and type of lights that will be used to illuminate that set. The storyboard will give us a rough idea of the position of the actors and the angles of shot each camera will use. Lighting and cameras can now be drawn in to indicate the initial positions the director will use.
These floor plans and lighting plans are drawn up by the director in conjunction with the heads of the scenery and lighting teams. The thinking behind these plans is that studio time and performers are very expensive, the more planning that can be done away from studio the easier and quicker it will be to set up prior to the shoot.
As the director rehearses the actors, camera positions and lighting may need small adjustments, but not a major re-rig. The camera team and lighting team will have time to make small changes and note them on the plans.
I have borrowed a studio plan from a previous Ace Productions’ programme. You will see that the studio plan has got as far as placing part of the set and three of the lights. The camera positions and performer movements are not yet shown.
The difference between studio and location plans is that studio tends to have larger, more complex sets, perhaps a whole ground floor of a house, and very many pre-positioned lights, leading to shots being taken in a linear fashion by many different cameras in different positions; leaving minimal editing to be done later.
The location plans are derived from the plan that was drawn at the recce stage. Location uses small areas where the shooting takes place, the lighting has to be brought in and rigged specially. This means there is a tendency to have a plan for each position that contains all the shots for that position. The position moves and the whole procedure starts again. The shots are gathered by one camera in a non-linear order and then assembled into the correct order at the editing stage.
Elaine is hiring in lighting for her locations. What she and Poppy are going to do now is work out which shots belong to which position so that they can draw a simple position map.
It is normal for location lighting to use very few lights and an experienced location lighting person, looking at a small set for the first time, will have no trouble rigging these very quickly.
With only one camera working from a fixed position the whole operation becomes very much more simple.
The college shoot becomes a little more complex because it is using the theatre and the lights are already rigged. There will be two cameras and a simple set consisting of the catwalk. When Elaine has worked out her camera positions, which she can do from Simon’s recce plan, it will be a simple matter to light it. With any luck the theatre crew will already have positioned them roughly in order that the girls can rehearse!
Location Shooting Script
Time on location is very pressured. You really don’t want to ‘keep trying shots out’ which is why you must plan it out first.
Being on location will mean keeping a very tight control over time. The golden rule with single camera production is to only visit each location once. This might seem very simple but it involves breaking the programme script into a shooting script.
A shooting script details all the shots that are required at each location, no matter where they eventually end up in the programme. In other words the programme is shot in a totally non-linear fashion.
The starting point is to go through the script and pull out each shot that occurs at the same time of day. This is further broken down into which shots are at each location, and this time of day. The next stage is to narrow these shots down to which shots take place at what time with the same performers. We now have an efficient use of time and people. The right people can be gathered at the right location for the right amount of time.
The problem with shooting like this is the need for continuity. With drama programmes the action may take place over weeks, but the shooting takes a matter of hours. The PA will not only need to keep a very close watch on the accuracy of the obvious events like performers ageing, scars healing or ‘daily’ changes of clothing but also the less obvious, often noticed by the viewer, like the time on the clock on the wall never being the same as the wristwatch that can be seen on a performer, or something in the background that should not be there, a blockbuster period drama film recently had a vapour trail from a jet move slowly across the sky!
With the Fashions for You programme, Simon could have booked the crew for a month and worked his way through the shots in a linear order from 1 to the end. Everybody gets involved in shot 1 at the factory, jumps in the car and goes to the college for shot 2, rushes off to the design studio for shot 3 and so on! Not very clever and prohibitively expensive.
The Fashions for You programme is different to the drama example above. What we need here is to go back to the storyboard and pull out all the shots for each location. These will then form the basis of a shooting script for each location. When we have done that we can shuffle them into an order, which means we shoot all the shots required from one camera position before moving on to the next.
What Elaine and Poppy are going to do now is exactly that. If you looked at the sections on recces (pages 92 and 99), you will now see the reason behind Simon’s time saving section on his recce form. Do you remember that he listed all the shots at each location?
Poppy will get the recce forms out of the production diary, copy the shot numbers down for each location and give them to Elaine who, as director, has responsibility for the shot composition. She will decide the order they will be shot and tell Poppy who will construct the location shooting script.
Here is the section of Simon’s recce form for the factory location, complete with the shot numbers. You will remember that Simon put them in as he was familiarizing himself with the shots required at this location. It would have taken Poppy an hour or more to go through the storyboard and do the same thing, wasting time Ace Productions is paying for.
There will be one shooting script for the factory, one for the design office, but two for the college. You will remember that Ace Productions is taking two cameras to cover the catwalk sequence. To avoid both cameras ending up with identical shots, each will have their own type of shot to cover.
This is typical of the difference between location and studio. The location cameras have instructions, rather than camera cards, like ‘concentrate on the close ups’, or ‘you are responsible for all the long shots’. Imagine 24 cameras at a football match all giving the director the same shot! Each camera will have been given instructions as to what area they are responsible for. The director’s job is to pick the most appropriate shot for the action at that moment. Poppy is working on the factory shooting script (opposite).
You can see from this one page that Elaine has set up three camera positions. All the shots relating to one position will be done together, then they will move to a different position.
Elaine will have the storyboard with her to remind herself of the shots. Poppy will have the shooting script to tell Elaine which shot to do next.
I do not need to remind you that this is not the only location shooting script in the world. You may choose to do it all completely differently. What you must do is to ensure that you maximize the time available and minimize the setting up, shooting, moving position and setting up again.
Camera Logs
Logs are the actual record of what was shot, in the precise order it was shot, with details of that shot, which take of that shot it was and which roll of tape it is on. Logs will also often detail whether the take is totally useable, or if only the picture or sound is satisfactory.
There are two logs commonly used, one is the shooting log (a record of what was shot) the other is the edit log (a record of what should be edited to produce the final programme).
The PA will compile the shooting log on location as it occurs. It is a matter for individuals to decide its exact format but a typical one will have the name of the production, the director, the location, the date and, most important, the tape number at the top. Five or more columns will follow this. Within the columns will be the shot number, a shot description, the take number, the start time of the take (this should be the actual time code time if available or the real time from the start of the tape if not), the shot length, and whether the take was useable or not – this is often shortened to OK or NG (no good). If a take is marked NG it helps to know why. NG Cam would mean that the picture is unuseable, but the sound could be OK; NG Sound would mean the picture is useable but the sound isn’t. Apart from these main columns many PAs will have a ‘notes’ column, for instance it may be that a shot that failed might contain a possible cutaway, or some possible ambient sound. Often when a director calls a cut a performer will relax and may provide a useful smile or a demonstrative movement that could be useful at the edit stage.
The second log is the edit log, which we will deal with at the post production stage.
Poppy will find the shooting log template on the computer, modify it for this programme and then print some out. Time is running out and she still has the call sheets to do. It is nearly 3 p.m. on the 15th, Poppy’s last day before the shoot. She will have to go very shortly. She suggests to Elaine that she would like to stay on, in her time, and complete the call sheets. Elaine knows this will take close to two hours and goes to see Simon.
They resolve to accept Poppy’s offer on condition that she lets them buy her supper afterwards. Simon is still checking the budget and suggests to Elaine that they have her for three hours on the morning of the 20th to get everything ready for the shoot. More budget modifications for Simon and a happy Poppy!
People in this business do get quite possessive about their programmes. They are living, moving things. Something that you have created and formed for someone else. It is very easy to get tied into this activity and growth, forgetting the simple things. Simon has had the budget sheets on his computer now for three days; as things change they must be entered. It may only be another £15 for Poppy, but now there is supper as well. Does it come out of subsistence, contingency or will you pay it out of your own pocket? You aren’t making enough money for yourself as it is, are you?
Whether you are shooting in studio or on location, performers and crew need to be called to be at the shoot when required. The call sheet is a document that will detail who is required where and when on a particular day. There is no standard form this should take, you cannot go out and buy a pad of call sheets. Normally the performer or crew will get one call sheet for each day. Only if nothing changes can you put down ‘required for 2 days’.
Apart from the name of the production, the director and the date, the information needed is best thought of by answering a few questions. Who is to go? Where are they to go? How do they get there? What time are they required? Who is the named contact? Is there a contact phone number? What do they do when they get there? What time can they have a break (lunch for example)? What time do they leave? For crew call sheets there may be additional questions to be answered: are there any technical requirements (special make up, props, extra lights, etc)? From these questions it is simple to see that it would help if the call sheet was broken into a ‘diary’ style document showing times against events, like arrive, shoot scenes 3, 52, 12, 9 and 6, lunch, leave. It may help to have a map showing how to get to the location and certainly needs a point of contact should anything go wrong.
It may be that crew and/or performers are called to a daily production meeting early and then all go to the location together. If so this should be shown, but there is still a requirement for ‘what is happening throughout the day’ and a contact person and phone number.
Ace Productions find it simpler to break all of this down into two sheets. One is the call sheet and contains information about the programme, the time and place that the recipient is required, a map showing the location and contact names and telephone numbers.
The second sheet is the day schedule. This is effectively a time sheet showing what will happen and when; breaks are shown as approximate times.
For simplicity everybody gets the same sheets, but there is space at the top for the appropriate name to be entered and any special instructions for that person.
For complicated programmes, with lots of special instructions, a photocopy of each call sheet goes in the production diary; simpler programmes, like this one, have one copy and a list of recipients only.
Poppy has got to originate call sheets for the director, production manager, PA, three crew and twelve performers.
These are the sheets that Ace Productions use. There will be a second schedule sheet for location 2 (the factory) and a third for location 3 (the college). There will be a separate call sheet for tomorrow. You will see that this sheet (page 157) is for the camera operator, his name is at the top of the call sheet with an instruction to meet at Ace Productions at 8 a.m. Where he is required on the schedule his position (camera operator) is underlined. Winston will be posted these two sheets, the afternoon schedule sheet, a map of where Ace Productions is and maps of the location of the design studio and factory.
You may think this is all a bit unnecessary. After all the crew are booked through Bob who has worked for Simon and Elaine a number of times, and they have met Winston before on another production. The performers work for Fashions for You. What’s all the fuss? The fuss is that one day there will be a mix up over who should have been dispatched as camera, or what time, or where they should be. Nobody’s fault really, we are all human and make the odd mistake. Nobody makes mistakes on an Ace Production programme; it costs money, causes frustration, is totally unprofessional and demonstrates a lack in the planning they pride themselves on.
The Day before the Shoot
Some will say that this is the most important day of the whole production. It is the last chance to ensure that everything will go smoothly. Anything missed now will cost money.
Poppy and Elaine are running through the things that must be done today, no one will be in the office tomorrow, or the next day, except for a very brief meeting at 8 a.m. Poppy is making a list of things to do.
You may not agree with everything on her list, or you may feel she has left something out. The way Ace Productions do things is their way of doing things. They know from the time they spent on their course that there are other ways and you may feel the same. What is critical is that everything is covered.
Poppy knows that Ace Productions take a ‘production box’ on location with them. Everything that is needed is filed in this box. They never take the production diary anywhere. It is the only complete record with all the originals. Things like the recce plans, storyboard and scripts are always photocopied.
There is always the worry that people might think you fuss too much by ringing up and checking on something that has already been agreed. Ace Productions would rather be certain than have unforeseen worries on location.
What if somebody at the college had asked someone else to ring and say the rehearsal couldn’t be arranged, but they forget? What if Bob’s cameraperson is ill and he has substituted another? Was the call sheet passed on? So many ‘what ifs’ that it is no wonder professionals never leave anything to chance, particularly if money is involved!
The ‘day before’ is the last chance to check everything. Elaine is running through the storyboard and shooting scripts with the recce plans in front of her. She will also make some notes about what she wants to achieve at tonight’s rehearsal and about what to say at the meeting tomorrow morning.
Equipment Checks
Now is also the time for the technical people to be busy. On your course you will not be in the position of hiring a crew for real money. You will be allocated other course members to do it for you. When Simon was on his course he gave the crew a checklist to follow the day before the shoot; you would be sensible to follow a similar system. Never assume that because something worked the last time you got it out of the cupboard it will work the next time. Things have a very nasty habit of waking up dead! The very best you can do is to make sure that all the equipment you will be taking to the location is working now, you have all the right leads, microphones, lights, spare batteries and a few spare leads. Don’t just get the kit out and look at it; set it up and take a few test shots, lit with the lights you will use and record some sound. I had some students once who got to a location, twelve miles away, only to find three of the lights not working and they had forgotten to pack spare bulbs. It is a mistake you only make once.
This is a typical check form for lighting. Simon used it while he was at college. There would be a similar form for sound and camera. Often the director and PA will have their forms. In the case of the Fashions for You shoot, Ace Productions have a ‘production box’, which has a label inside the top listing the things that will go into it. Poppy has made up her checklist, with Elaine, to ensure that nothing is left out. They know, and perhaps you have yet to discover, there is no embarrassment like the embarrassment that goes with ‘Everybody have an early lunch while I just go all the way back to the office to get the storyboard!’
Simon and Elaine are going to the college to see Sally Beagle. They have a number of confidentiality clauses that Poppy left because she thought it would save time if they could be signed tonight.
If you are going to follow the proper rehearsal route then you must budget for it. It will involve you in a lot of time and may involve more expense than you think. The performers, for example will need paying and feeding.
Some programmes will follow a fixed format; interviews, discussion programmes and weather forecasts would fall into this category and they will follow the same camera positions and shots and the same type of stage layout each time they are made. It is only necessary to make sure everybody on crew knows the basic format and a short, basic rehearsal is carried out in studio prior to shooting.
For drama programmes several rehearsals will be needed. The early rehearsals are often carried out in rented church halls (hence the need to cost it into the budget). The floor will be chalk marked with the positions of walls, doors, windows and so on; there will often be basic props, odd tables and chairs, for example, rather than the ones that will be used in the final programme. The director and performers will use this opportunity to get to know each other as well as running through their lines and movements and the director’s personal interpretation of the plot.
These rehearsals may take days. Gradually the programme will be built up and the shooting script will be refined. Ultimately there will be a final pre-studio rehearsal at which the main technical crew managers will be present to gauge the possible lighting, sound and camera requirements.
All the crew managers will draw up plans, based on what they see, to help with the swift early positioning of the set, lights, microphones and camera positions in studio. Naturally all of these plans are built up as floor plans and will go into the production section of the production diary.
When this early rough set up has been carried out the performers will be introduced to studio. The director will first introduce them to the set and ask them for a dry run, when the watching crew see the actual movements. A stagger through when the camera positions and shot sizes are finalized will follow this. This will translate to the final camera cards and tweaks to the lighting and sound, all documented and filed properly in the production diary, before full rehearsals start.
Much the same happens on location except that the action stops and starts with changing shots, which are shot out of order. The director may use the actual location for rehearsals or, with a complex period drama, may go through the same early procedure of studio rehearsals and hire a hall. The final rehearsals are actual run throughs of the scene that is going to be shot and, because of the requirement of editing the final programme, these are often shot anyway. This leads to several takes of the same scene but may contain useable shots.
This visit to the college will not be a full scale rehearsal, more a look at the set, lighting and girls and allow Elaine to plan out some movements. Neither the design studio, factory nor college are complicated. It is a question of grouping the shots together, making sure everybody knows what they are supposed to do, having a quick run through and then shooting; hence the need to pull out all the shots involving the same performers, at the same location and same time of day, and compiling a shooting schedule.
Elaine and Simon are very pleased with the amount of work that has been done. The set is very professional, the catwalk is a little too long for television but the girls don’t have to use all of it. Simon notices that they have tried very hard with the lighting, and says so, but it has been lit ‘theatre’ which is totally different to the needs of television. Their lighting person will have no problems changing it, so he doesn’t mention it.
The make-up people explain that this is the first time that they have used television style make-up and are a bit worried that the girls look ‘a bit flat’. Sally Beagle has spent time helping them and explaining the difference and Elaine is sure it will not be a problem.
They are very excited about it and ask Elaine if she would like them to help out at Fashions for You tomorrow. It isn’t a course day and they would appreciate the experience. Simon says he can’t pay them, but they agree they only want the experience. Elaine decides she will use two of them.
Confidentiality clauses are explained, handed out and returned. Simon has brought the music cassette with him so that the girls get a feel for the programme and to help them with their movement. They have all met Naomi and Mr H who will be coming on Wednesday and bringing the clothes with them, so the rehearsal starts with the girls wearing their own clothes.
As Elaine watches them walking up and down the catwalk she moves around from one end to the other and then from one side to the other. She is looking for camera positions. She has decided that she will use one camera slightly above the girls at the stage end on the catwalk and the other at knee height at the same side of the catwalk, but at the end. This way she can use a variety of shots in the final programme. She can see that the girls have been practised and rehearsed so often by Sally that they have become a bit less lively than she would have liked. She feels that the reality factor on Wednesday will motivate them. She is pleased with her choice of two cameras, which will cut the need for them to go through the same routines time and again. They thank them all and make sure everybody will be OK for 9 a.m. on Wednesday.
Production Briefing – 21st Sept.
After 11 weeks we have finally arrived at the first day of shooting. Now is the time that Simon and Elaine will find out if all the planning and preparation will be converted into a smooth shoot, with no hidden surprises. Of course they know that something will happen, it always does, but it should not produce a disaster like a lost day of shooting.
It is 7.45 a.m. and while they wait for the two crew to turn up, Elaine is looking at the notes she has made. The idea of this briefing is to meet the crew, familiarize them with today’s locations, using the recce plans, check that they understand the shooting schedule and generally sort out what will happen. They will also be asked to sign the confidentiality clauses.
Ace Productions like to do all of this away from the client. They don’t think it is very professional to have these sorts of briefings in public.
They will have another production briefing tomorrow morning, when they will have another camera operator, and will discuss the college shoot using the recce plans and schedules. It will also give them the opportunity of reviewing the Fashions for You shoot.
Simon, meanwhile, is busy doing final checks of the production box and making sure that everything that is needed has been collected up and is ready to be loaded into the car.
Poppy rings up to say she is at the College and has collected the food and drink. She also has two very excited make-up people complete with their make-up boxes! She will go straight to Fashions for You and they will all meet up in the car park. This is part of the Ace Productions professionalism. Elaine does not like crew, or staff, just turning up on client’s property individually. They all wait until she can gather them up and escort them in as a proper video unit.
The crew have arrived and are briefed. They don’t see any problems. Nigel, on lighting, had seen his special instructions on the call sheet that mentioned the large windows and has brought some conversion filters so that the lights will be balanced for daylight. Winston is a little worried about the space around the drawing boards, but is sure he can get round it. All four of them have worked together before and Nigel remembers Poppy from a shoot they all did a year ago.
Elaine has very quickly formed everybody into a team with a real spirit. This is the reality of people in this business, she thinks, everybody knows the trials, traumas and long hours and that common factor means they all get on really well together. This is why they are all doing the jobs they are. They like the professionalism and conviviality of it all.
Elaine has been making notes during the briefing and these, together with her original notes will go into the production diary in the production section and filed as ‘Briefings’.
It is just after half past eight and they load the cars, have a final check, switch the answer machine on and all go to Fashions for You.
The Shoot – Day 1
There is a common procedure to follow for the shoot. You will see from the shooting schedule that half an hour has been set aside for setting up at position 1. This is followed by 15 minutes of test shots and rehearsals, before the half an hour allowed for the Position 1 shoot. The shot list for Position 1 has been taken from the storyboard, and confirmed on Simon’s recce plan.
The crew then move to position 2 where the whole procedure starts again after a 15 minute break for coffee.
This is a pressured time and the first opportunity to see that all the hard work that has been done is translated into smooth success. As production manager it is Simon’s job to ensure that the crew set up within the time frame. It is also his job to ensure that the shoot stays on schedule. If it goes five or so minutes over at position 1, he won’t be too worried; but if the shoot starts to slip he may have to build in shorter breaks, or consider the possibility of overtime. This will seriously affect the budget.
Elaine, as director will use this set-up time to talk the designers through what will happen and what she wants. She will only involve the position 1 performers, which avoids confusion. She also has to check that the cameras are as close to the final position as possible, giving her just small adjustments to camera height or angle to work out when they start taking the test shots.
The make-up girls are busy flattening out any shiny spots on the performers faces and hands and checking their hair. They have been taught that this is not theatre, and the designers need to look natural. This means a minimum of make-up so that the camera will flatter them, without making it obvious that they are made-up.
Poppy is busy making sure that the shot list and storyboard are available for Elaine, and that she has her clip board with the shooting log sheets, stop watch and pens. She also checks the clapperboard that will be used to mark the individual takes. Rather than a standard chalkboard model, Bob has sent along a new electronic clapperboard which shows the time code times. This will make her life easier when filling in the log sheets.
Nigel has lit the whole area of the four design tables with two blondes and three redheads. They are all converted to daylight with filters and he has used scrims and frost filters to balance the light and avoid hard shadows.
Winston has his camera set up. All the lights are on and set so he asks Poppy to hold up a large white card for him to check the white balance. He asks Elaine if she can see pictures on the monitor that is carefully placed out of eyesight of the performers. He knows that, particularly with amateur performers, there is nothing worse than shooting people who want to watch themselves on the monitor at the same time!
It is just after half past nine, a few minutes later than scheduled, before Winston offers Elaine his first shot. She asks him to raise the camera a little and tighten the shot. She also moves the designer being used a little further back from the drawing board. There is a slight reflection from the metal surround of the drawing board and Nigel quickly fixes it with a little dulling spray.
She decides not to record yet and rehearses the designer. She knows all the others are listening and watching and this first designer will be very nervous. It will pass in a minute or two, but there really isn’t any point in recording this embarrassment.
It is nearly five minutes to ten before they are all ready for the first shot. Simon is concerned they are ten minutes over time, but experience says that they will pick it up, as long as everyone moves to set up Position 2 quickly and efficiently. He often shortens the scheduled time needed at the first position; it is a little trick of his to make everybody feel a bit pressured and heighten awareness of the time early in the shoot. He has found that if this pressure isn’t applied early, people can get very complacent at the end of the day, when they are tired, and then the times slip quite badly.
Elaine is going to order the first shot. Because they are not recording separate sound, there is no need to bang the arm of the clapperboard down. Poppy checks that she has written the title, location, roll number, shot number and take number on the board and holds it in front of the designer. Silence is called; Elaine uses a ten-second countdown, the first five of which are spoken out loud with the clapperboard in place. The board is removed and hand signals are used for the final five.
As Elaine anticipated it took a few takes to get the first shot. They had done two or three more shots, when Simon noticed a problem. The banner of the Fashions for You logo wasn’t it place. It was supposed to have been in the background of the medium long shots and long shots. Whose fault this was is difficult to determine. Simon is responsible for the sets, Elaine should have noticed it wasn’t in the pictures and Poppy, as PA, has the responsibility of checking everything! Realizing that they were running late, everybody got a bit tense, this could have upset the performers and, as it does not look good to be squabbling in public, Simon admitted responsibility and they all get on with it.
This is a ‘paperwork’ book so we won’t follow the whole shoot. You will find other books in this ‘Basics’ series that cover production, lighting and sound, which you may find helpful.
We will assume that the Position 1 shots have been completed, the crew has moved to Position 2 and while they have a late, and shortened, tea break we will look at Poppy’s shooting log.
This log is of vital importance. At the end of a two-day shoot there may well be eight or ten rolls of tape, containing upwards of fifty shots with probably two or three takes of each.
On location you shoot for convenience not running order; this means that the useable take 4 of shot 1 may be half way through roll 6, while take 2 of shot 2 is at the end of roll 4.
At the off line edit stage it is essential that you can find the useable shots quickly and assemble them in the right order. Edit time is expensive and you cannot spend all day trying to find the next shot. All tapes are, therefore, logged as they are shot.
The exact position of the shot is measured by time. The preferred method is to use time code that automatically records the time in hours, minutes, seconds and frames onto a separate track of the video recorder. This makes it very easy to put any tape in a machine and read the exact time from the track. The Beta SP Ace Productions are mastering onto has time code, but the VHS that Simon will use for off line doesn’t. He has arranged to have the original time code ‘burnt into’ the picture so that he can see it on the screen. This is known as BITC (burnt in time code).
If time code is not available then you have no choice but to use ‘real time’ involving using a stopwatch to get exact timing from the beginning of each roll of tape. Videotape has a control track, again in hours, minutes, seconds and frames, which can be read by an edit suite. Provided the tape is rewound fully and the control track readout is set to zero, location will be relatively simple. Control track cannot be relied on totally and may be quite a long way out by the end of a roll, particularly if it has been rewound and fast forwarded several times.
Poppy’s job as PA is to complete the log. She will write down the start time of the shot, which is confirmed visually by the clapper board, and at the end of the shot Elaine, as director, will tell her whether that shot was useable or not and make any comments. Poppy will take the finish time off the time code on the clapperboard, and the whole thing starts again for the next shot. These logs can run into hundreds of takes and some PAs use any trick they can to make off line shot location easier. Some will use a different colour pen for shots 1–10, 11–20 and so on. Some will list the shot numbers on a particular sheet across the top. If there are lots of unusable takes some will ‘red box’ the useable one.
If you look at the half filled-in log sheet you will see that Poppy has noted the problem with the banner. It is also easy to see the problems they had with the first shot. Notice too that some of the takes have been marked ‘Cutaway?’. This is because, no matter how much planning you do, sometimes one shot will not look right when joined to the next one. A short relevant shot is then inserted between the two shots to make it look natural. The best example of this is the shots of the crowd at a sporting fixture. When the highlights are shown later it is easy to show a highlight, drop into the crowd and back the next highlight. The crowd has been used as a cutaway.
These six shots took nearly half an hour shooting, but only just over five minutes of tape!
The Shoot – Day 2
The second day’s shoot starts with a production briefing. The three crew and Poppy are there. Yesterday was discussed. It did not go too well. They could not pick up the time lost early on, despite a shortened break and Poppy being left to clear the remains of lunch into black sacks, whilst the crew moved on to set up at the factory. The factory took longer to set up than expected and the result was an overrun of an hour. Simon will have to cost this into the budget. By the end of the day everybody was hot and tired and just wanted to go home.
The discussion moved to today and they looked at the recce, set and catwalk plans. The camera operators couldn’t see a problem, Nigel, on lighting, thought it might take a while to re-rig and plot the lights. The best thing about the day was that the cameras were working from fixed positions and the lighting would be set for the day.
It was agreed that one camera would concentrate on mid shots and close ups of the clothing and the other would stay with long and medium long shots. The basic format would be to keep the cameras running and cover a complete walk in each outfit three times. Simon would then select the bits he wanted at the off line stage. Poppy would have her work cut out because two cameras means two log sheets. The time code on one camera would be slaved to the other giving the same times on each of the different rolls.
Naomi and Mr H would be present and Poppy would look after them, discouraging them from interfering as tactfully as possible. It was hoped that they would not stay all day, but Naomi was obviously worried about her designs and would not want the clothes lying around.
The production box was checked and they left for the college ten minutes late. They arrived to find that Naomi had rung to say she was running a little late and Elaine and Simon couldn’t help but feel a little exasperated. Simon said that if the clothes had not arrived before they were due to shoot, he was billing Naomi for the inevitable overrun.
This is certainly a point for discussion; if the schedule is tightly budgeted, and the client knows it, and the client defaults over something (in this case the clothes) there is a case for explaining it and asking for more money. Any reasonable client would pay, but it is best to be reasonable, rather than demanding, because it may be that they decide not to employ you again. It is a matter for personal judgement whether you take it out of contingency or argue with the client.
As it turns out Elaine is rather glad that Naomi is not here yet. Half the college seems to have turned up to watch, their lighting technician is not getting on with Nigel and the stage crew are arguing about where to put the banner. Diplomacy rather than confrontation seems to be needed. Simon, as production manager, has to sort this one out. He talks to Sally Beagle and suggests that the girls’ class are included in the audience plus no more than ten others. The three make-up girls will be busy, as will four from wardrobe. He is sorry but he cannot include the technical crew. The reason he gives is that this is a sensitive shoot, which needs confidentiality clauses signed, and the client would never agree to this many being used as ‘audience’. Sally fully understands and agrees that it has got a bit out of hand and she will sort it out.
Simon decides against diplomacy with the stage crew and tells then where he wants the banner! He then sees the lighting technician and explains that Ace Productions have hired the facility and not the crew, thanks him for his time and trouble and escorts him out of lighting control. Nigel is happy again. There are times when you have to be a diplomat and times when you have to be in charge. If you feel that you cannot assert yourself faced with these typical problems, you must practice until you can. Major disaster will strike, probably resulting in a wasted and very bad tempered day, if you cannot control your own production.
Elaine is talking to the girls and Poppy is getting all the confidentiality forms sorted out. One of the students has a part time job in the packing section of a rival company and is told politely that he cannot be present; two refuse to sign the forms because they can’t see the point. Poppy asks them to leave and they won’t. Simon is called to explain, they still won’t sign so he asks Sally to request them to leave. They are her students, not his, so why interfere?
Finally at just after 10 o’clock everything, except the clothes, is ready. Elaine asks for the music to be started and runs some test shots with the girls. Poppy has been asked to phone Naomi. She is told that Naomi and Mr H left five minutes ago so shouldn’t be more than twenty minutes.
Remember that this book is about a real programme that Ace Productions did a couple of years ago. All this has actually happened, and is not uncommon. No matter how much you plan, if something can go wrong, it will. It is frustrating and upsetting. These things will happen with your programmes. How will you cope? Do you have the diplomacy and communication skills needed? Did you build the budget accurately, including every single thing? Did you consider contingency?
What has happened with this programme is that a young company is desperate to break into a competitive business and needs clients. Simon knew his budget estimate of £10,000 was accurate, then enthusiasm or the need for work, or a bit of both, has forced a situation where they have had to cut nearly £2000 off the budget and are realizing that it can’t be done. It is unlikely that the programme will run at a loss, but already their own salaries have been cut and it may be that they will have to cut them some more.
This is the hard fact of the industry you want to be part of. It may be more sensible to start by working for someone else as crew before you jump into starting your own company.
Elaine breaks everybody for coffee. There is no point in people sitting around doing nothing, and even less in running through the same rehearsals time and again until they are sick of it.
Naomi and Mr H arrive. Naomi wants to show the girls which outfits go together, Elaine suggests she gets one girl dressed first and then while they are shooting she can prepare the second. Finally just over an hour late they start shooting. Simon had anticipated this by effectively scrapping the shot list and giving himself more work at the off line stage. It is cheaper than another day shooting and as long as Poppy has full details of the girl’s name (needed for captions), which outfit (needed for continuity), and accurate time code details on the logs he will sort it out later. Not very professional, but he has made a time decision. If he had stuck to the shooting schedule they would have seriously overrun; if he does nothing the whole thing will fall apart.
After this early bad luck the day goes reasonably smoothly. Elaine has a quick run through some of the shots with Naomi who seems very pleased. Mr H says he was very impressed with everyone. The crew leave at twenty past six agreeing not to tell Bob that they overran by twenty minutes.
Naomi and Elaine seem to be getting on really well, she is already talking about finding some money for the retail outlet video and hopes they can do some updating of the programme sometime. It is looking as if it was all worthwhile. The four girls got to choose two of the current season’s outfits each and Naomi particularly wanted Elaine and Poppy to have a shirt and some slacks. Simon is thinking of the production budget he will have to deal with tomorrow.
Re-Shoots
Re-shoots in a studio programme tend to be called pick-up shots. This is because the very nature of studio is to run whole scenes from one end to another. There should be absolutely minimal editing in studio. As long as everything is going well the director will not stop the action if some small thing goes wrong. The PA will mark it on the log, and at the end of that scene just that one shot will be ‘picked up’ or re-shot.
Re-shoots on location are taken care of by stopping the action and reshooting the shot as another ‘take’. If it is that simple why do we need to worry about re-shoots?
There are two reasons for major re-shoots involving anything from a whole scene to a whole day of extra shooting. The first is ‘operator error’. What should happen is when the picture is shot, the camera operator checks that the record light is on, while sound monitors the quality and level on headphones. In studio it is the tape operator who checks that the machine is recording and the sound operators who listen to the sound on loudspeakers. There are occasions when things go wrong. Just because there is a picture on a monitor it does not mean that the picture is being recorded. Just because the sound is OK in sound control it doesn’t mean the record level has been turned up on the video recorder.
The whole point of test shots is to check the whole system is working. You record a little bit of anything and play it back to check. When a shot has been recorded on location, or a scene in studio, you should review the last few seconds and check it is OK. If you get to the end of an hour or so and find there was no tape in the machine you will look pretty silly!
The second reason is director error. It is one of the director’s jobs to check the content of the picture on the monitor. They should notice a shadow from a microphone, or somebody walking about in the background. The worst example of this, as I mentioned earlier, was a period drama that had a vapour trail, complete with jet aircraft, slowly passing overhead. It was not noticed until the edit stage, too late to do anything other than call the whole crew and performers back, rebuild the set in a far off country and shoot the whole day again! Apart from the expense, the schedule would not allow it, so it stayed in.
Major re-shoots are only necessary if one of the production personnel or crew have failed. This essentially puts it squarely in your court and you pay!
Final Production Meeting
It is the day after the shoot. Elaine and Simon are having a final production meeting. Everything that happened on both days is discussed. The notes will go into the production diary. The first two important points are ‘What went right, and why’ and ‘What went wrong, and why?’. It is from these points that they will improve their experience and get better next time. It is a debriefing session.
Once that has been sorted out they will look at what they did about the things that went wrong, and what they could have done differently. What would you have done about the awful start to the college day? Would you have allowed rehearsal time for the design and factory locations? When? Would you have allowed two days’ shoot at Fashions for You? How would you have paid for it? Was the PA sensibly and profitably employed? Remember they didn’t use her for any of the pre-production, and needed extra time during production. Was the crew directed properly? Could you have handled the problem with the banner on day 1? What would you have done, and why?
Once all this has been sorted out Elaine has to bring the production diary up to date and Simon (and you!) will have to finalize the production budget.
You will see that things are not as bad as we thought. Poppy cost £90 more than expected, but £80 of that is transferred from not using her for pre production. The cast was more because of the extra girl. The crew cost more because of the overtime on day 1, but the graphics, props, tape and phone cost less. Simon knew the subsistence would go up when they offered to take Poppy out to supper!
Simon has come out of production £277 more than budget, but he saved £77 on pre production; so far, Ace Productions are £200 over budget.
Nobody remembered to ask Naomi if the second invoice could now be submitted, and the bills will start to come in soon. Perhaps Elaine will find time to ring Mr H and check that it will be OK.
Tomorrow is the start of post production and Simon has to get the BITC copies organized.
