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.