Journal Zero

The broad range of film, theater, and production experience that the Night Zero team brings to the table is invaluable to the photocomic’s success, but nothing else like Night Zero exists and therefore we’re still constantly challenged with developing the procedures and techniques to best produce a quality product.

The center of a Night Zero photo shoot is the production schedule, carefully and brilliantly executed by Kelly Ota. Like most films, we do not shoot based on chronology, but based on lights. The schedule is broken down into “SEQUENCES”, which are the various unique lighting setups that encompass the day’s work. The number of sequences depends on the complexity and length of the scene– for a full-day shoot like Sisters, we tend to have between ten and fifteen setups (with the occasional sub-setup for minor changes). Within each sequence is a “SHOT LIST”, which covers all of the shots using that light setup, sorted by which actors appear in them. In this manner we progress through the day, moving the lights as few times as possible and getting the best use of everybody’s time.

After a year and a half of productions, we had a sense of production timing: how long each light setup takes to place and focus, how long each shot setup takes to pose and snap, how long and how often breaks need to be scheduled, and what our standard load-in and load-out times are. Based on this history and our projections, Kelly lines up a timetable with the shoot schedule, and keeps us reminded of when each sequence needs to begin and end. Without her, we’d be nowhere.

One of our oldest challenges in pre-production was finding the most efficient and fruitful way to blend film storyboarding, comicbook page layouts, and HDR photography into a production method that made sense. During the pilot episode, we sampled with a method called “pre-shooting”, wherein the actors (or stand-ins) would go through the motions of the scene while the photographer snapped on-the-fly. The resulting images were reviewed and used to layout the pages in storyboard-style, and then the chosen photos used as templates and their poses/framings re-created during the actual shoot. This method worked well enough when we were able to do it, but tough scheduling and challenging locations showed that to be an inconsistently achievable process.

For most of the past year, our process has been to create hybrid storyboard/layout pages, which worked for shooting but were always a struggle to create. Storyboards are designed for films, where each shot is given a full frame and full attention, much like each of our photographs; however comic page layouts prioritize certain images and shrink down others, and are not restricted in size and shape but have no options for animation or motion. Trying to storyboard directly into a comic page layout was a very challenging task, but once done, provided the production team with the basic frameworks to move forward.

The Sisters shoot was our first try with a brand-new approach to storyboarding, which proved to be a game-changing method for on-set management, organization, and execution: the story cards.

Taking lessons from comic book artists, the abandoned ‘pre-shoot’ idea, and my own experience with storyboarding and page layouts, I put together a new approach to the pre-production of a photographic novel. Rather than trying to visualize the page as a whole, I reviewed the script for “snapshots”– moments in time that I wanted to capture in a frame. For each snapshot, I drew an index card with the shot I wanted to see, and laid them out in order on my desk. In this manner, I was free to arrange “pages” of cards, shuffling their orientation and layout as new cards were added or old ones removed.

Once I was satisfied with the shots created, and comfortable with the number of shots (in relation to the amount of time we’d have to shoot them), I set up a camera rig and snapped a photo of each one, framed exactly to match the camera’s viewport. That gave me a one-to-one photograph for each frame, which created the page layouts that would be used as storyboards. I was drawing the photos as snapshots, so they were all framed as they would be on the camera, and using Photoshop Smart Layers they could be cropped and rotated to match how they’d look on the page. The finished storyboard layouts, as well as the individual card photos, were sent of to Kelly for the creation of the sequence list and shot sheet, all of which then went to Forest to develop maps for each sequence’s light setups (we used six light instruments for this shoot, so mapping the light setups in advance was the only way to move swiftly through the schedule.)

While this was a great way to plan the shoot, the benefits of the story cards in pre-production were nothing compared to having them on set. Each production team member had a copy of the storyboards (page layouts), and Kelly had the stack of original shot cards, numbered with their shot number and grouped by sequence. When a sequence began, she would hand me the stack of cards from that sequence, so I knew exactly what I needed to do. I could show the cards to Eli, so he’d know what the angle and framing should be; I could show the cards to the actors, so they’d know what moment they were in (jumping around in the chronology all day long); and when we were done with that setup, I could hand the cards back to Kelly to go in the “completed” pile and take the next stack. No flipping through pages of storyboards, no guessing on the bleed and positioning of the frame, just simple and flexible “shoot this card”. It was the best thing to happen to Night Zero since Live View, and is already now a standard procedure.

The story cards in pre-production, roughly laid out into pages but easily shuffled to try out new ideas. The sticky flags indicate photos that might use the same lighting setup.

Eli reviews the storyboards in preparation for the next shot sequence

Director of Photography and the photographer discuss how to frame the shot to match the card

Showing Alix the story card to orient her on where in the story we've jumped to

The sisters were tied up only for the shots where the ropes would appear, for comfort

Alix got regular spray-downs to keep her hair looking wet

The team checks out the camera and live view to confirm the layout of the shot

The complete process: the original story card, the laid out storyboards, and the live view of the actors in position

Occasionally a special angle can help break up a sequence of similar shots, and provide some excitement for the photography crew

Production intern Chris takes manual labor like a champ

Sometimes a special shot will require some special equipment. In this case, a sheet of a acrylic and a kidde pool.

Night Zero uses no green screens or CGI. If we want a photo of water being thrown at the camera, we get a bucket and throw water at the camera.

It’s my great pleasure to bring this brand-new vignette to the Night Zero community, and I hope you’ve been enjoying it. This flash into the past of the Nazarov girls is both groundbreaking and trend-bucking in many ways, which I’m happy to share with you today.

Immediately notable from the production side is the speed with which this vignette came to life. In early April the idea came to do a story about the sisters, and after a number of very different scenarios, the concept began to come together as you see it. Production was fast-tracked amidst a few large Episode Three shoots, a cast assembled from some incredibly talented local actors (who had been long waiting for such an opportunity), and then costumes, props, and a shoot location brought together in swift order.

The vignette is shot at the Galway Arms in the University District, a fabulous dive bar frequented by many of us local theater folk (because of its great happy-hour food and proximity to the Historic University Theater). Shooting began at 8am on a Monday morning so that we could wrap a full day’s work before the bar opened at 4pm. Light kits, cameras, coffee and doughnuts were loaded in, tables and chairs got rearranged for our setup, actors donned dapper costumes, and we jumped right to it. The goal for the seven-hour day (the first of three shoots for this story) was fifty-two photos, totalling fourteen pages (although further editing and trimming in post-production shaved that down to thirteen pages).

The primary motivation behind this story was to explore the relationship between Nadia and Dariya, who (along with their older brother Valentin) supervise and control the entire New City government. They appear on occasion in the serial story to balance the Marion/Claire plotline and provide some background exposition, but the serial arc just isn’t suited to really explore their complex history and difficult relationship. The sisters are deep and developed characters, their actors Jana and Alix talented and enthusiastic, and I wanted an opportunity to really get into their part of the Night Zero world.

From the start, I knew that the vignette should be in the past, to shrug off the weight of the serial story and have a completely clean slate from which to develop. I chose to focus on the weeks following the events of night zero, to explore the struggles faced in the creation and sustainment of this “new city”. The backstory of the post-apocalyptic society is far too detailed to fully explain in the serial story, and even too much for one vignette, but I wanted to lay down a few tidbits about how it all came together: the war against the scratchers, the death of their father Aleksandr, the formation of the Syndicate as a counter-power to the Nazarovs, and the tenuous relationship between the sisters, their brother, their citizens, and the rest of the survivors.

The brainstorming for the story itself inspired to a diversity of delightful and dangerous stories, two of which stand out as the foundations for what ultimately came to fruition. The first concept was a split narrative, to emphasize the contrast between the sisters (Nadia having left the family to avoid her father’s lifestyle, Dariya having been raised by it). On one side of the story, Nadia sits at dinner with Valentin and the two discuss their little sister’s role in the New City and how her youth and personality are both strategic and dangerous. On the other side of the story, Dariya is out on a negotiation that goes sour and takes matters into her own action-packed hands. This was a fun idea and would have been a creative endeavor, playing the back-and-forth of Nadia’s dialogue against Dariya’s blazing guns and swinging fists. However, this story did little to show the sisters’ relationship to each other and how they interact on a personal level, so the concept was set aside (but not forgotten).

The second major story idea put the sisters together and in the thick of it, in a concept that would have flexed our action muscles in challenging and uncharted ways. At the center of the action was a caravan, carrying the sisters, their military escort, and various diplomats and officials, which came under attack. Mobs of scratchers, intense firefights, exploding cars… this one had it all. The obvious technical challenges, however, made this less of a practical production prospect and more of a “what if” scenario, which was shelved (but eventually found its way back to the storyline).

After these two ideas came the basic premise from which the finished story stemmed: the two sisters, together, in the post-war period, trying to broker a peace between their society and those outside it. The early version had a much more dialogue-centric balance, with the sisters arriving at the speakeasy as diplomats, Dariya and Drake sparring with their finely-honed arguments. Like in the first concept, this storyline was to devolve from discussion to violence (in contradiction to the sisters’ hopes for a peaceful future), but this early draft had a more structured and dialogue-heavy “let’s sit at the table and debate” kind of mood. Interesting to read, but ultimately a little slow for what I wanted to produce.

At that point, I revisited the previous idea of the caravan attack and the car bombs, and found that to be a perfect setup for a quicker, high-stakes game of cat and mouse between the sisters and the forces outside their walls. No longer were they meeting Drake on equal terms—they were now hostages, ambushed and kidnapped yet still trying to make their case. Dariya was always to be the diplomat (because of her familiarity with her father’s work), while Nadia’s involvement fluctuated from draft to draft (you’ll see more of her in the coming pages, so I won’t spoil that right now). It was known early on that Drake and Aleksandr had a working relationship before night zero, but one relatively late change to the script was the clarification of that history and the explicit point that Drake has known the sisters personally for quite some time. This shift helped bring their two extreme viewpoints more to the center, and made a somewhat flat, strictly-evil Drake into a more rounded character with justifiable animosity and objections to what the Nazarovs were doing with Seattle.

So what we end up with, then, is a snapshot of the creation of the New City, the conflicts in the relationship between the Nazarov sisters, and some other fun and exciting stuff that I won’t spoil for you. The girls aren’t out of it yet, and things are about to get tough. Stay tuned.

The Nazarov sisters together again, for their first shoot in almost a year

Doug readies himself for the day's shoot with some delicious breakfast snacks

The Galway Arms (5257 University Way) couldn't be a better looking or more hospitable place to shoot

The three cast members who are also professional improvisers at Jet City Improv and/or Unexpected Productions

The serial story arc requires Nadia to be stern and detached in front of her messengers, while the vignette allows her to show her more emotional side

Starting the sisters at a disadvantage immediately raised the stakes of the story, regardless that we know the sisters somehow survive

The cast was charming and upbeat, despite the tension of the story

Nothing brings enemies together like a little lunch break

A serious moment for Dariya, while the camera finds the perfect frame

Makeup touches, hair wetting, and pants holding aren't in the script, but they sure are important

The wonderful Bruce Weech ponders his character's motivations and affinity for pinball

It's always nice being able to mix veteran and new talent into the Night Zero project

It just wouldn't be Night Zero if a beautiful woman didn't cause a little chaos

Red, White, and Dead attendees: your Night Zero photos are here!

Last week, the Seattle zombie community brought in the holidays with a tremendous undead groan, the shuffle of rotting feet echoing throughout the Fremont neighborhood. It was the first annual “Red, White, and Dead” celebration, organized by the Fremont Outdoor Movies, Seattle Zombie Walk, and of course, the team here at Night Zero.

It was a hot summer Friday, and most people had holiday because of the 4th landing on the weekend. We started setting up the twin movie lots well before noon, in preparation for an event we couldn’t possibly be prepared for. Even though the official event didn’t begin until 6:00pm, there were zombies showing up as early as 3:00, excited and ready to go. By five, there were over a thousand people in line. The queue for registration ran for four city blocks.

Why registration? For the glory. There were many facets to the July 3rd festivities in addition to the zombie walks, including the Night Zero makeup, photo  and survival safety booths, horror writer S.G. Browne, a Michael Jackson tribute Thriller dance, and at the end of the night, Shaun of the Dead projected onto two giant screens, but the biggest and most ambitious part of all was our ultimate goal: to break the Guinness World Record for largest zombie gathering.

There were two Guinness Records on the book, an “official” record (which requires a documented and certified tally) and an “unofficial” record, which is approximated based on photo and video evidence. The official recordholder was Monroeville Mall in Pennsylvania, with 1,341 documented zombies. The unofficial record holder is Grand Rapids, Michigan, with an estimated 3370 zombies. For our event, we had a dozen lanes of registration lines for first count, and preprinted nametags for a second count.

And how did we do? The registration lists, supervised by two signed notaries, tally up at 3,848 zombies. The nametag tally totals 4,277 zombies. Unofficial estimates from the news media suggest that we had upwards of 6,000 attendees throughout the day. But no matter how you look at it, one thing is undisputed: Seattle is the World Record holder, and probably will be for some time.

In addition to the hundreds of photos taken at the Night Zero booth, there are thousands of photos on Flickr from the event, and a good time can be had just browsing them all. Below are some of our favorites.