The final week

Day 358.
One week to go.
Are you freaking out?
I’m not freaking out.
Everyone just calm down.

With seven days to go before the time’s up, I thought it was a good time to update you all. Just what am I up to exactly? I’ve always let you know how each of the shoots has gone, but what about everything else? What about everything that happens after the shoot, the post-production process?

Well I’m in the thick of that now, trying to finish all twelve films all at once. My days lately have been extremely long. I bounce around between editing, visual effects, colour grading and sound mixing – attempting at the same time to liaise with the composers and sound designers working on the films, seven in total, between Sydney, Singapore and New York.

There’s also a fair amount of work to do organising the screenings in Sydney and Auckland. Just creating the credits for these films is a massive job, there are now so many people involved! I’m paranoid I’m going to leave someone out or turn a Gaffer into a Grip.

As I write this, I’m rendering the final colour grade for the film ‘Hyper-Real’ with one piece of software while exporting the final version of ‘Father’s Day’ with another. Since that ties up my computer for the next half hour or so I figured it would be a good time to fill you all in on this most crazy of weeks.

So what remains to be done? I have a couple more colour grades to finish, three sound mixes to complete, the titles and credits to add in. Hopefully by then I will have received all the sound and music from every which where at which point I must put everything together and spit it all out. I’m looking forward to the spitting it all out bit.

My deadline is Sunday night, at which time I must take the final 12:12 DCP file in my sweaty little hands to Chauvel Cinema so they can ingest and test in time for Thursday’s screening. I’ve never made a DCP file before so one more thing I have to figure out. It’s been a year of figuring things out.

Well, my computer has just finished its tasks, so it’s time to put it back to work. I’m sure I’ll be writing again before the screenings, so I’ll let you know how my last week unfolds.

The films are looking great by the way. I’m really pleased. I think you’re going to dig them. Talk soon.

It's the dozen!

It is with no small amount of relief I can reveal to you that the twelfth and final film for 12:12 has been shot.

The shoot was on Friday, April 27, less than three weeks before our deadline. Cutting a little close, perhaps. I’m pleased to report everything went very well.

Film number twelve is called What Remains and is about three siblings who must decide between honouring their dead mother’s wishes or carrying out their own plans for her remains.

I kept the last one simple, probably wise, under the circumstances. We shot in two locations, the first at a home in Mosman and the second on a cliff-top park in Dover Heights.

We had a cast of three, Eden Falk, Megan Drury and Lâle Teoman who were all fantastic as the brothers and sisters of this little story. They did a great job of bringing out subtle little nuances in the characters of the three siblings.

Also on set was Jonathan Tyler our DoP, Anna Hildebrandt our Producer, Micheline Siou Cam San our long-standing Make-up Artist and Ross Clutton our Sound Recordist. The crew were great, and this was probably the most relaxed shoot of the twelve. Maybe I'm just starting to get into the groove.

Special thanks to Julia and Derek Parker who kindly opened their doors to us for the location of the mother’s house and put up with us turning their house upside down and then up the right way again.

After shooting in Mosman we had to race over to Dover Heights for the second location. We had found a perfect second location nearby to our Mosman location, but the Harbour Trust was going to charge us nearly two grand to shoot there for the afternoon. Ah, no thanks Harbour Trust.

Luckily Waverley Council allows crews  under ten people to shoot for $0. And in the end, I can’t imagine a more perfect spot. We were losing the light for the last shot (as always) but luckily there was a corridor of light on the park as the sun set right between two buildings and we nabbed that. It couldn’t have been more perfect lighting for the scene.

Well that’s all the shooting done!  Now it’s a race to knock all twelve into some kind of shape in time for the Sydney screening on April 16th. If you’re in Sydney, I really hope you can make it. If you haven’t received your invitation yet, please let me know.

Right, now back to work.

Welcome to 11:12

Good news! You can now see a bunch of stills and read a little blurb about each of the eleven films shot so far. A new page has been added to the 12:12 website and I’ll be updating it as the final film materialises out of thin air.
Head on over and check it out. You’re going to want to lick the screen.

www.12shorts12months.com/the-films

Thursday, April 16, 2015

A number of people have asked me what I'm planning to do when I've finished these twelve films. Well, here's the plan: on April 16, a Thursday night, I'm putting on a screening of all twelve films. Back to back. And you pretty much have to be there.

One of the first things I did when the 12:12 project began was to book a venue for exactly one year to the day it started. That date was April 16. Nothing like having a 370 seat cinema booked to get you into action.

If you’ll be in Sydney on April 16, it's now time to write that date in the diary with a fat marker. It will be a big night, and I really hope you can be there. I can't wait to show these films to you.

The venue is now confirmed – the Chauvel Cinema, Paddington, home to my previous short film screenings. I’ll be sending more info and instructions soon.

For those of you in Auckland, I’ll be organising a screening there too, for the following week. More details to come.

We live in exciting times.

12:12 gets Hyper-Real

The last two weeks have been a bit of a blur. For some idiotic reason I decided to shoot Hyper-Real five days after wrapping the shoot for The Room of Forgetting.

It meant that while madly building sets for one film I was also casting, location hunting and finding crew for another. As someone said to me “you always knew this year would be crazy”.

Hyper-Real is quite different in tone to the other 12:12 films to date. It’s a pretty hard-hitting tale with a fair dose of violence. But for a reason. In a nutshell Hyper-Real is about the increasing realism of computer gaming violence, and where that might go as it becomes more and more realistic. 12:12 was always about experimenting with different kinds of stories, and this is definitely that.

The story revolves around two boys playing a futuristic Japanese computer game set in a quiet, friendly suburb and follows them as they make their way through it, reinterpreting the game in their own way.
 
The shoot was broken up over two days. The first was spent on the street itself. This we found in Warriewood with the help of friend Keith Cox. It’s a quiet little cul de sac, perfect for the Japanese setting of the game. The rest of the shoot featured interiors, both in Warriewood at Ali and Nick Munting’s lovely home and then in Northbridge at the home of one of our lead actor’s, Callum McManis – whose family kindly opened their doors to us.

The film was shot beautifully by Jonathan Tyler who employed a mix of steadicam and handheld camera-work, tracking the boys’ journey through the game. For the three fight sequences we engaged stunt co-ordinator legend Grant Page who helped to bring the scenes to life. It was a real highlight to watch these scenes unfold with all the impact and intensity I had been hoping for, but with no real idea how to achieve it.

Our two young leads James Fraser and Callum McManis did a spectacular job in roles demanding a range of both emotion and physicality.

Special mention should go to the rest of the cast, Akiya Fukui, Rocky Dean-Shoji and Lia Reutens who performed brilliantly in their very challenging roles.

Thanks also to Dan Loughnan, Vicki Nhieu, Charles Mori, Luke Whitmore, Sarah Hadley, Ben Dugard, Micheline Siou Cam San (once again!) and Kat Low.

I really look forward to sharing this one with you. Sadly we all forgot to take any good photos. We were all a bit caught up in it.

Now, it’s time for me to concentrate on the post production side of things. There is plenty to do.

There’s still one more to shoot, but I’m going to hold off on that one. I like the idea of keeping one right to the end. Who knows, the best idea yet might spring up at the last minute.

And when is the end? April 16th is twelve months to the day that I started this project. So if you’re in Sydney that night, please make sure you keep it free. More details to come.

The Room of Forgetting

If you’ve been thinking you haven’t had a 12:12 update for a while, you’d be right. If you’ve been thinking it’s probably because we haven’t been doing much over the holiday period, you would be very wrong.

We have in fact just shot two more films – taking the count to a giddying eleven.

But let’s take things one shoot at a time. Let’s talk about shoot number ten, The Room of Forgetting – easily the 12:12 film that’s taken the longest time to shoot. The Room of Forgetting was scheduled way back as the second short to go into production. By the time we were finally ready to shoot, eight others had snuck ahead of it.

There’s two reasons for this. The first is because for this one I wanted to try some of the techniques of director Mike Leigh. And he doesn’t just sit down and write a script. Typically he will develop his ‘script’ by workshopping the characters and storyline with his actors, often without a single word ever being written.

For The Room of Forgetting I cast Justin Smith and Melinda Dransfield in the two lead roles and the three of us caught up several times to work the rough idea I had for the short into something more concrete. After a few discussions and improvisation sessions, I went off and wrote a script based on the results.

The second reason this short took so long is simply because we needed to shoot part of the film at a funfair, and the funfair I had in mind is one that pops up occasionally at Bass Hill. Unfortunately we learned it wasn’t due back in Sydney until the very end of 2014. So, we waited.

The Room of Forgetting  is a black comedy about a couple who go to a funfair and stumble across an attraction (“The Room of Forgetting”) where everything that goes on inside is forgotten when you leave. They decide to give it a go and end up telling each other all these things they’ve been keeping from each other throughout their relationship.

The shoot itself took two days. We shot on a Friday night at the Funfair in Bass Hill and the following day in the studio at MetroScreen in Paddington.

At Bass Hill we built the facade of the Room of Forgetting right on the edge of the funfair. Building this facade took most of a week, with the help of Dave Foley and Tony St Leger toiling away in the heat of my backyard. The result was so successful we had to keep turning away punters from the funfair who thought it was a real ride. Much to our amusement, one guy, who was there with his wife and kid even said, ‘Damn, we should have left the kid at home.’

The Friday night shoot went really well and we got some amazing footage of the fair itself. Our only hiccup was the very last shot of the film, which we were just about to shoot when they turned the generators off and all the lights went out. Rupert Brown, our DoP, still managed to light our actors and point the camera in a slightly different direction to get the crucial shot.

The following day we shot at MetroScreen which we dressed to look like the inside of the room using a ring of steel columns and a jumble of exposed electrical cables. Here is where all the couple’s secrets come out, and Justin and Melinda did a fantastic job as the couple who start to realise their relationship isn’t quite what they thought it was.

All in all a really successful shoot, though it was a very tough week and I was relieved when we had it all in the can. I was truly wrapped with the result. Big thanks to Justin and Melinda and Alan Flower who played the old carny who runs the ride.

Thanks also to Rupert Brown, Ant Ong, Dave Foley, Tony St Leger, Micheline Siou Cam San, Gareth Evans, Karl Jenner, Stephen Templer, Kat Low and Bass Hill Funfair’s Dodgem Donna. Thanks to Ant and Tony for taking these great shots of the shoot.

Two shorts shot

It’s definitely shooting season for 12:12. We just shot two more shorts in the space of five days. Films eight and nine are no longer pieces of paper, scripts and storyboards. They are real. For real.

Going Down

The first of the two is a short called Going Down – a black comedy about a legendary voice over artist having a very bad day.

The story is set in a sound studio during a recording session making pre-recorded announcements for an airline. In the room is Terry, the voice over artist (played by Tina Bursill), the client (Cheree Cassidy), the copywriter (Grant Cartwright) and the sound designer (Christian Willis).

We shot at Sound Reservoir in Pyrmont, a studio I know intimately as an advertising creative doing voice over sessions over the years. This was the place I had in mind as I wrote the script, so it was a real boon to be able to shoot there. Huge thanks to everyone at Sound Res, they were incredibly kind in helping to make this happen.

The shoot was a lot of fun, though we packed a lot into a short space of time so the pace was swift to say the least. I was well pleased with what we got and was incredibly impressed with both the cast and the crew.

For this short I worked with DoP Alex Glucina. We’ve been trying to shoot one of these shorts together from the beginning, so it was great to finally get him – and he was brilliant. I also worked with a great Sound Recordist, Jean-Marc Serret, for the first time. He was fantastic.

And I should definitely mention our most regular crew member Micheline Siou Cam San, our very talented Hair and Makeup Artist who’s done consistently excellent work over six of our nine shorts.

The cast, too were fantastic – I really can’t wait to show you this one, they nailed it. Tina Bursill, our lead, stayed on to the bitter end to give us take after take of both hilarious and moving performances. I had a lump in my throat for much of it. I think one of the single most rewarding aspects of making films for me is watching as actors take the words on the page and take them far beyond what is written, to the point where I think to myself, “wow, are those really the words I wrote?”.

Special thanks also to our runner Sean Nunan, and Annetta Velkovski who provided all the delicious catering for the film as her birthday present to me!

Software

The second of the two shorts just shot is Software and this one breaks a new record for turn-around times. I had this idea last Tuesday while I was in pre-production to shoot Going Down and we shot the thing the following Wednesday.

Obviously a great deal has to happen between having an idea and shooting it and it’s a real buzz to realise that's something I never could have pulled off when I started this eight months ago.

One of the reasons I now can is because of the amazing group of people I have around me. A network talented people and incredibly generous people.

Another reason this had to come together so quickly is because a location we had access to was only available until Wednesday. I immediately made contact with Production Designer Vicki Nhieu, DoP Kelvin Saik and Makeup Artist Micheline Siou Cam San and they were all willing and able, so we decided to go for. The location ended up changing but we decided to keep working to that date.

For the role of ‘Gabe’ I called on Philippe Klaus, one of the actors I met with at the very start of 12:12 in April and asked if he would be interested in the role. Thankfully, he was.

Software is the simplest of the short films to date. It’s a parody, set in the future, of the often nightmarish experience many of us have updating system software.

To create the future look I wanted to poke fun at those clichéd images of a clean, pristine and almost sterilised future – where everything is minimalist, stark and white. Vicki did a great job meeting this brief.

And Philippe was perfect in the role of Gabe as the hapless victim of unforgiving technology. Once again Kelvin and Micheline did a brilliant job.

So. Nine films shot, three left to shoot. The final three shorts are scheduled for early next year, so it’s time now to get stuck into the editing. This year’s shooting schedule has been met – it’s a great feeling. Thanks to the many dozens of amazing people who have helped get us there.

I have to say it will be great to take a break from the relentless cycle of pre-production, production and straight back into pre-production. It’s time now for a little post-production – something I’ve been itching to do for a long time.

Before I fire up the editing software, I might just do a quick system software update...

For the Briefest of Moments

Wham! Film number seven is in the can. Over the hump and on the downhill slope now.

This film was called 'For the Briefest of Moments' about a passing moment between two strangers. It's probably the shortest and simplest of the films to date. Still, it was a mad scramble to get everything ready for the shoot, coming straight off the back of number six. And just because a short is short, doesn't mean you don't still need lots of stuff.

Luckily, everything came together in the last few days – we found our location, we sourced the props and wardrobe and our female lead Kelly Butler came on board.

Big thanks to Production Designer Vicki Nhieu for her work finding our location and dressing it to look amazing.

Kelvin Saik stepped in as our DoP and did a fantastic job capturing some beautiful images.

For this film our two leads, Kelly and Saban Lloyd Berrell both played two different roles. All four of them were brilliant. Micheline Siou Cam San did an amazing job creating completely different looks with hair and makeup and Olivia Keros was invaluable helping to select the wardrobe.

Thanks also to Dave Foley and Sasha Cubrilo who assisted in just about every department.

On to the next. When will it end?!

Film number six. We’re halfway!

There’s a reason you haven’t heard from me.
It’s partly because of a two week holiday, but it’s also because I’ve been in a mad sprint to get four more shorts shot before the end of the year.
A little crazy, but then, this whole year is a little crazy I suppose.

The first of these four shorts we shot on Thursday. This was film number 6, which according to our maths guys is HALFWAY through the shooting stage! Phew. It actually felt like I was halfway about three films ago, but alas no.

This short, ‘The Perfectionist’ was an idea I’ve had for a long time, so it was incredible to see it come to life before my eyes in the artful hands of our two production designers Lesiele Hailame and Maria Cormie.

We decided to build a set for this one, shot as it is in one room. We wanted a very rich and slightly unreal look so we built the room from the ground up. Here are some pics of it coming together.

This was a really fun shoot, not just the building of the set, but having the wonderful Sarah Bishop, our lead, inhabit it. As soon as she stepped onto the shagpile rug, it all came together and we all felt pretty good about things.

Sarah did a terrific job as you will see. I’ve only had a chance to watch a fraction of the rushes, but it looks gorgeous. Our Director of Photography Rupert Brown brought a huge amount to the look, creating beautiful lighting and capturing stunning imagery.

And none of this could have happened without the sure hand of Sue Hind our Producer keeping the project on course. Thanks also to Micheline Siou Cam San our meticulous Make-up Artist and Tony St Leger who was invaluable in getting our set up and keeping everything in its place.

I have to say, it’s one of the greatest satisfactions of this endeavour – having a bunch of talented people come together and collaborate in bringing to life the images and ideas that until that moment live only in your head. Suddenly those ideas are real. The story is playing out, right there in front of you.

Pulling a shoot together in less than a week: one short’s story

Believe it or not, another short is shot.

I landed in Sydney at 9am on Monday morning after wrapping short number four at 9pm the previous evening and went straight into production on short number five.

We needed locations, a Director of Photography, a Sound Recordist, a camera, wardrobe, a car and a mum and two kids. With the help of producer Cassie Collin, we managed to pull all this together just in time for our shoot on Saturday.

The short is called ‘Father’s Day’, an idea dreamed up as I lay in bed on Father’s Day a little over a month ago. It’s an ode to all the dads who have little or no access to their own children. There’s a lot of them out there and it’s a heart-breaking situation with little public awareness.

We already had our lead actor on board, Ben Wood, and his enthusiasm for the project made all the difference when I realised he was about the only aspect of the film I did have in place at the start of the week.

So how did we pull it all together? If you’ve got the time, below is a rough breakdown of how it all went down.

Tuesday

This was the day we found our main location. It was a huge relief as this was the trickiest part of the puzzle to solve. We needed a café with very specific features: it had to have window seating, be on a busy road – but with room for us to shoot on, not allow parking in front, have no outdoor seating and of course, look good.

I was starting to think this didn’t actually exist when I drove past The Pig & Pastry in Petersham on the way to dropping off props from our previous shoot. I saw it in the corner of my eye and nearly went off the road. It was absolutely perfect.

Wednesday

The next day returned to The Pig & Pastry. I was so nervous about asking if we could shoot! I couldn’t imagine there would be another café that ticked all those boxes. They had to say yes! And luckily for me, they did.
 
We also got our DP, Aaron McLisky on board on Wednesday. I met with him at his place and we spent a few hours carefully planning out all the shots we needed.

Thursday

On Thursday I visited lead actor Ben Wood and worked out all his  wardrobe and made some finishing touches to the script. Ben’s input here was invaluable, as I've found it so often is with actors. No one interrogates a script like an actor who has to inhabit that role.

Then I called on my friend Eleanor Cyron and her two kids Lily and Sonny who had kindly agreed to play the mother and kids and gave them the low down. Then we raided their wardrobes.

Later in the day Cassie managed to find us our Sound Recordist, Leigh Bramall. It was all coming together.

Friday

What still remained to find was the car – a pretty key prop in the film, as you’ll see. I had seen the perfect car a few blocks from my place parked on the side of the road, but we hadn’t been able to find anything like it to hire or borrow. I left a note under their windscreen wiper offering the owner some cash if we could use the car, but didn’t get a reply.

By Friday I was getting a little concerned. Eventually I found a rental that looked OK (not great, just OK) through a new service Car Next Door – but when I showed to pick it up, it had their stickers all over it.

Back to square one. I was just in the process of organising a friend’s car when my phone rang – it was the owner of the car I had seen on the side of the road. The dream car. And it belonged to a very lovely chap called Christian who said ‘yes’ to letting us use it.

That was a good moment. Much of this process is stressful and frustrating, but this was one of those good moments. As you will see it is the perfect car for the character and the story and should add a distinctive look to the film.

Saturday

And on Saturday we shot. It was a scorcher of a day and we were outside for most of it but it all went really well. The Pig & Pastry were great, Ben Wood was incredible, the crew all did an amazing job and El, Lily and Sonny were absolute stars.

Big thanks to Cassie Collin, Aaron McLisky, Campbell Brown (Camera Operator – and owner!), Leigh Bramall and  Micheline Siou Cam San (Hair & Make-up).

On location in Auckland, New Zealand

I’ve just returned from a nine day trip to Auckland, culminating in a three day shoot that finished on Sunday night.

The film is called Silence about a guy who records and catalogues silences, believing that every silence is different – a tranquil silence, for example, couldn't be more different to an awkward silence.

It was a very intense few days of pre-production and shooting. The 12:12 films so far have varied in size and complexity and this was a big one, requiring a number of actors and several locations – a logistical double whammy. Plus, I didn’t really have a producer, so in the days leading up to the shoot I was running around like a madman being chased by a headless chicken – scouting locations, meeting with crew, doing wardrobe fittings, writing shoot schedules and sourcing props. Lesson: have a producer.

Pulling something of this size off successfully meant calling on the full Winlove massive. This was a big part of the appeal of shooting in Auckland – there’s a bit of a Winlove surplus there. In key roles were the three brothers – Todd as cinematographer, Toby as production designer and Benn as catering. On top of that we had parents and nephews and nieces stepping in on both sides of the camera.

Playing the lead role of Dale was Geoff Allen, an actor I found through the very generous Robyn and Hannah from Auckland Actors. Geoff was brilliant – he nailed the part and was a lot of fun to have along on the shoot. He was absolutely perfect for the role of our eccentric protagonist.

We shot all over Auckland – on a remote lake, on a motorway overpass, at a derelict house, at an Opera theatre and all over the streets of Mt Albert. We roped in several of Todd’s neighbours who were all great sports. It’s amazing how open and generous people can be in these situations.

Our biggest obstacle was the weather. It was impossibly erratic for the three days we were shooting, changing from blue sky to grey cloud to horizontal rain in the space of minutes. And it was cold. But we forged on and bit by bit we got everything we needed – finishing at 9pm on the last day.

I’ve seen some of the footage since and it looks amazing. I’ll put up some screen grabs of the actual footage shortly.

Big thanks to everyone who was involved.

Film number three in the can

It’s only three days since we shot film number two and we just shot film number three. Madness. It has been a crazy couple of weeks.

Film three is Snap Happy, the one I mentioned about the young woman who goes around taking photos of everything.

We had eleven different locations stretching between Newtown, Paddington and the Opera House, so we had to move at a bit of a clip. We hired a big van which turned out to be smart move number one.

Things weren’t looking so flash at five in the morning when I could hear the rain bucketing down outside. Those are the horrible moments they don’t brief you on at Twelve Short Films In One Year School. But it cleared just in time, and once again worked in our favour as the cloudy morning and the clear afternoon helped to create the impression the story is happening over more than one day.

The biggest drama was finding extras. Sorry if I bombarded you with requests about it, but it really was a mad panic. I had so many people willing to help who just couldn’t or people lined up who then had things come up. I must have asked thirty people individually as well as a couple of all and sundry crop-duster attempts at high altitude.

All day I was checking my phone to see if we had any last minute takers and finally I got two young women only hours before we needed them. Phew! I was walking on air. Then ten minutes later they found out they couldn’t make it.

We kept on anyway. We managed to get away without extras for most of the day. The lovely Lenka from our Café scene kindly volunteered to be our ‘hat lady’ for one shot. And I stepped in front of the camera for another.

But there was one scene where we really needed at least one young woman. And we had not one – except our lead, Florence, and she was busy leading.

We arrived to the location for this scene and I was broken. I’d tried everything and everyone. I couldn’t believe I’d failed – somehow I believed it would just work out, and it hadn’t.

Rupert Brown our Cinematographer and I were lining up the shot when my phone rang. It was Russell Masters from Fanatic Films. I haven’t talked to him in ages. Terrible timing though, I’m on a shoot. Still, I unanswered it, just in case.

“Hi JJ, are you still looking for a young woman for your short film? Michelle, our receptionist might be able to help you out.”

Don’t tell ANYONE this, but I think my eyes welled up a little at that point. I didn’t cry or anything though.

Michelle was free and happy to help out. She jumped in a cab and was on set twenty minutes later. And she was perfect.

So there you go.

Thanks Russell. Thanks Michelle. Thanks everyone who was willing to help but couldn’t. It really is appreciated. Things do work out. Another thing they don’t tell you at Twelve Short Films In One Year School.

___

Big thanks to Florence Noble who was amazing as our lead. And thanks once again to Rupert Brown our Cinematographer who is making a habit of being awesome. Thanks also to Sean Nunan, Lenka Porubska, Max Clavel and Gusto Delicatessen in Five Ways and Matt Walsh and the Lord Raglan.

Shooting ‘Losing Grace’

Night One

Friday night was the first night of our two-night shoot for film two, Losing Grace. It went really well. We had a few bumps along the way, but I think we managed to rise above them all – or at least around them.

Setting up was a pretty hefty operation. We had three separate cameras mounted to the outside of the car, plus two LED light units and video and audio transmitters so we could see and hear what was happening from the crew car.

Our first hitch was not being able to get audio to play back in the crew car – we could see what our actors were doing, but we couldn’t hear. To get around this, we drove around for a while watching the picture in the crew car while trying our hand at lip-reading. Then I jumped into the back of the hero car out of sight and listened to the performances as Rupert Brown (Cinematographer) kept his eye on the picture from the crew car. Also with him were Hayley Anna-Maree checking hair and make-up and Michael Graziano behind the wheel.

We had a few run-ins with the rain too. Because most of our gear was mounted outside the car, every time a few drops fell we had to stop, cover everything and wait until it cleared. We were just lucky it never lasted more than twenty minutes at a time, but it did seem to have wicked timing.

Our two leads, Nicholas Cassim and Adam Brown where excellent in doing their thing in the front seats as Nicholas drover randomly around the inner west. And Jo Briant did a great job dialling in over speaker-phone for her part as Grace’s mother.

Night two

After enjoying a day without a drop of rain, the moment we were about to roll the cameras, the rain began to fall – and continued to drizzle for about half an hour. No wonder so many Australian films are made in the outback. Still, good for the garden.

As soon as the rain stopped we ripped into it and made pretty steady progress for the rest of the night.

One of the highlights was applying the special FX make-up for our leads who get themselves into a bit of trouble along the way. This was expertly administered by Micheline Siou Cam San. It’s always fun to see what can be done with a bit of industry-grade ketchup.

We ended the night with a few key scenes featuring Chloe Bayliss who played the eponymous Grace in the film. And she nailed it.

All up , it was a great shoot. Thanks to everyone involved. I'm looking forward to seeing it all come together in the edit.

Storyboarding for ‘Snap Happy’

While preparing to shoot Losing Grace over the weekend, we've also been prepping for film number three, shooting only a couple of days later.

This is Snap Happy and it's quite a different kind of film. It has no dialogue and is a much more  visually told story. There's also quite a few (simple) special effects shots in it and because of this I've had to do a lot of storyboarding.

Working on several films simultaneously has been really interesting in that I've found my process for developing each film has been completely different – because every film is idea is different. Storyboarding is something I've laboured over for Snap Happy but haven't even considered for Losing Grace, which instead has required extensive script re-writes.

I'll be sure to share more with about Snap Happy as it comes into being next week.

Rehearsing ‘Losing Grace’

We had a great rehearsal last night for Losing Grace, the film we’re shooting tomorrow and Sunday nights (September 5 and 7).

It was our third rehearsal and this time we took our two leads out onto the road to get used to performing while driving around. It made such a difference. And what a buzz to see the characters and script come to life.

Rehearsing this way was particularly helpful for Nicholas Cassim (pictured left) who has to drive around while delivering Oscars level performances.

Both Nicholas and our other lead, Adam Brown (right), did a great job.  We even had Jo Briant, who plays the role of Grace's mother in the film, ring up in character and deliver her lines over speakerphone to test that was all working.

Looking forward to the shoot tomorrow night. Fingers crossed the weather is good to us!

One Car, One Night

We ran a camera and audio test last night for our next short Losing Grace. It went really well. I’ve put together a little clip of some of the footage we shot to give you a taster. I’m really pleased with the results.

And it will only get better, we will eliminate the jiggle you'll see on one of the cameras and shape the light even more.

Losing Grace is a film about a father driving around one night trying to find his teenage daughter who hasn’t come home from the night before. Helping him find her is Tye, one of her high school friends.

The entire film is set inside the car as these two very different people work together to find Grace.

We will be shooting the film over two nights with three cameras – two mounted on the side windows and one mounted on the bonnet. Shooting simultaneously with three cameras means that once we're set up we can just leave them going and concentrate on getting great performances from our two leads, Nicholas Cassim and Adam Brown.

We’ll be shooting for real next week with these guys in the car – not the two blow-ins you see here.

Headed for the hills

This week finds me on a remote hilltop in New Zealand’s north, far from pesky 'civilisation'. As I write I can hear the bleat of lonely sheep drifting in over my pan-flute compilation. 

I’ve snuck away for a week to try to finish a bunch of scripts. If I can pull that off, the production phase can begin in earnest. The cosy, solitary writing stage is coming to an end, and the crazy scramble to actually shoot stuff will soon begin.

This is the time I'll be calling upon many of those kind offers from people to get involved. It's the really collaborative part of the process, where scripts get tested, roles get cast, crews gets crewed and “action!” gets said a lot.

For a few quiet days, however, it's complete isolation for me as I try to finish eight very different scripts.

Perhaps it’s time for a little taster of what’s in the pipeline...

The script I’ve just been working on follows a teenage girl’s father and her boyfriend, forced to spend a night together as they drive around looking for her after she doesn’t return home the night before. It explores the idea that just because you’re older than someone, doesn’t make you’ wiser.

What else, let’s see… another script is about a man who collects recordings of silences – believing that every silence has a different quality.

There’s one about a girl who finds that whenever she takes a photo of something, she removes it from the world.

And then there’s another about a meek, retired man who, on impulse, attacks a priceless painting in a civic art gallery. And doesn't know why.

There are others of course, but there have to be some secrets in our relationship.

I’d love to know if any of these take your fancy. Let me know.

And stay tuned, I may be begging for your help in the coming few months.

Many little steps

I think it’s high time for an update, don’t you?

There’s no one major thing to report, just a lot of little developments.

The first film is still being edited, but nearing completion. I have to tell you this is a tricky little film to get working. Having an idea with multiple characters whose faces you never see was always going to be tricky (he says with hindsight) and it’s really in the edit that you start to see where your idea works and doesn’t.

I did a rough first edit and then left it for a few weeks to get some perspective on it, and now I’m busily doing a radical second edit, making it all much shorter and more succint. I’m feeling much better about it now. I’ll keep you posted on how that goes. In the meantime, below are some stills from the shoot to tide you over.

Working on the first film has really helped to get my post production workflow established. I believe in the business they call it the pipeline. Well I’ve been laying crazy pipe. I’m now set up to to edit, grade and apply VFX to footage shot at cinema quality resolutions and beyond. It’s amazing what we can do now with today’s technology. I’m sure that to attempt what I’m doing ten years ago would have required a high-end post production facility and dozens of minions. And personal assistants. And baristas.

I’ve also being doing plenty of writing – working on about five other scripts getting them ready to start sharing with producers, actors, cinematographers and crew. I’m putting together little documents for each of them with story outlines, script, visual references, shooting styles and art direction ideas (thumbnails pictured above). These will be really useful when it’s time to convince incredibly talented people to get involved.

And film number two is slowly getting off the ground. I’m finalising the cast now and have had some sessions with Rupert Brown, the film’s Director of Photography working out how we can make it look a million dollars while only costing three.

For this film I will be workshopping the characters and script with the lead actors over a number of sessions before we shoot. I’m really looking forward to trying this approach.

So that’s where I’m at. Sadly I’m going to have to go back to the workforce for three weeks to keep the instant noodles on the table, but I’ll still be moving forward with 12:12 over that time, you’ll see.

More updates soon.

Bam! A wrap on the first shoot

Well. There we have it. The first shoot is done. It’s in the can and the can is good.

The film follows ten characters over one Friday night, though we don’t see any of their faces. We had eight ‘hand models’ take the ten leading roles. They were all fantastic, without exception. They were Danny Eastwood, Karen Ney, Nick Blair, Neil Walshe, Basir Salleh, Hayley Basham, Alysha Farry and our producer Esta Lau.

In terms of crew, we kept it very lean and everyone worked extremely hard for the duration of the shoot which wrapped five minutes before midnight. I can’t thank our DoP Rupert Brown, Producer Esta Lau and Art Department Andrew Bell enough.

Our DoP (Director of Photography) Rupert Brown was kind enough to let us shoot the entire film in and around his apartment. This we dressed in numerous ways to represent the ten different locations depicted in the film. Thanks to his expertise and the skills of our one man Art Department, Andrew Bell we were able to turn a corner of the apartment into a restaurant, another into an office and another into a nightclub and so on.

When we tried to turn the kitchen into a bar however, we were thwarted. No matter what we dressed it with, and how convincing the lighting, our bar top (the kitchen bench) just kept turning it into a bad scene from daytime TV. After many attempts we decided to abandon our efforts and have our character reclining on his balcony instead of propped up at the bar. Within minutes of setting up the balcony shot, we knew this was the way to go, and it turned out to be one of my favourite shots in the film.

The trickiest part of the shoot was the logistical nightmare I had unwittingly created for myself with the series of mobile phones that feature in the film. The story required them all to be interconnected and I think I underestimated just how complex this would be, especially while trying to deal with the usual demands of directing a shoot. We got there in the end and that’s the main thing. But there were a couple of moments where my brain was about to walk out on me.

Now the editing process begins. I’ll share a couple of shots from the film shortly.

The first shoot commences

I've been meaning to write sooner to let you know about our first shoot, but I've been so consumed by it I haven't thought to stop and take the time to give you an update. Well that time is now. The morning of the shoot. I thought I'd get a quick post out before it all happens. A before, followed by an after.

This first short is very contained, with no faces or dialogue, just hands and phones (you can see most of the cast above). We're shooting in one location, but dressing it to look like ten!

It's been a very busy week or two for me. What appears to be a nice little idea has actually demanded a great deal of meticulous preparation. It's a bit of a jigsaw puzzle, and every piece has to align perfectly. More on that later!

Our crew is very small. Rupert Brown is our DoP (Director of Photography), Esta Lau is Producer and Andrew Bell is our one man Art Department. On top of that we have seven generous part-time hand models coming in to lend a hand. Quite literally.

I should probably be getting along now. I'm sure I'll be do a more detailed post afterwards. See you on the other side.