Final thoughts on the challenges and lessons of shooting the “Sisters” vignette

The journey of the Sisters production has been a long and challenging adventure, now come to an end. Next week we return from summer break to our regularly scheduled serial comic.

Each of the three Sisters shoots had a different combination of cast members and a different production aide on hand, but there was a great deal of consistency from one day to the next which I feel helped keep the cast and crew focused and comfortable. Each day started with a 7:30am crew call, to meet out front of the Galway Arms and unload all the production materials onto the patio. Two of the three days were metered parking on the street outside the Galway, so additional time was given for drivers to find off-street parking where they would be safe for the entire shoot.

Each camera arrives in its own bag, complete with extra batteries, lenses, memory cards, and maintenance equipment. Two full tripods, a mini-tripod, and (for this shoot) various ladders for rigging are all brought in by the photographers. Our typical shoot is done with a three- or four-point light kit, but due to the size of the space we were filling and the greater number of actors in each shot, Sisters was produced with six-point lighting: three totas for washes and general fills, and three omnis for focused actor lighting. More important than either lights or cameras, each shoot began with loading in a few dozen doughnuts and a large supply of fresh coffee for the cast and crew.

The core vehicle for transporting the wide range of tools is the production trunk, which is typically a large black footlocker that can house most everything needed for any shoot. For Sisters we were keeping a low footprint, so a smaller plastic tub was the substitute production trunk, and it housed all manner of thing: the shot cards and copies of the storyboards and script, a first aid kit and paper towels, props (including rope, a cocktail glass, guns and holsters, and keys), heavy leather work gloves (for handling the hot lights), and extension cords. Makeup previously traveled in its own rubber tub and costumes freely on hangers and in the production trunk, but as the scale of the Sisters shoot grew we decided to invest in a high-quality makeup train case and a rolling costume rack, both of which were loaded in for the third (and largest) shoot.

At 8:00am each day, a bartender from the Galway Arms would arrive and let us into the space. Without them this vignette would not have been possible, and I am grateful to all of them who gave up an entire day to help us out. Next time you’re in the University District of Seattle, stop in for a drink and say thanks for us. The Galway is a great bar, which is why it made such a great shooting space. We cleared out a half-dozen tables and plenty more chairs and benches to make room for the camera and production equipment, but everything you see in the vignette is the actual look of the space. Having the areas semi-divided by the various partitions and half-walls made for some great blocking and allowed us to have scratchers and characters in the same space without a constant bloodbath. Black curtains and a naturally dark bar allowed us to shoot a nighttime story all day long during the middle of summer. For the third shoot’s action sequences, a large box fan was also loaded in to blow the actors’ hair in motion (while they held still for HDR photography), but was ultimately used throughout the day to counteract the scorching heat outside and the sweltering lights inside.

Shooting with scratchers is always a challenge, but we’ve learned a lot in the last two years and did pretty well for ourselves in Sisters. The first step is to know exactly when they’ll be needed, to avoid the trouble of getting an actor into full sticky makeup, to the point where they cannot move or touch anything, and then having them wait around until their shots come up. Switching to the shot card system made this a very feasible task, and Kelly’s schedule work on location ensured that we minimized the amount of sticky-time and maximized what we got from it. The second step is to know how and when they’ll be seen, so that makeup can be applied to the important (visible) areas and avoided where it’ll never show up. Storyboarding with a pencil and paper cannot give 100% accuracy to a camera’s lens perspective and distortion, so there still occur times where a photograph, even though framed exactly like its storyboard, yields a very different angle. That being the case, though, we made good utilization of our makeup effects and kept our waste as low as possible.

Costuming the military squad was a pleasure and a challenge, because we wanted them to be professional (as opposed to civilians who happened to like wearing camo), but still give a nod to our roots with a distinctly ‘comic-book’ look. Our knowledgeable photographer Eli provided much of the consultation for the military garb and armament, and began by choosing the atypical MultiCam pattern of camouflage, which is an authentic but less common style of the US military. The rifleman and sharpshooter were shifted more towards “realistic” costuming with their heavier gear, while the shotgunner and machine gunner were given tanktops and a more stylized “comicy” appearance (without losing their military authenticity). Yevgeniy falls right in the middle, wearing a standard-issue shirt instead of either full body gear or a battle-impractical tanktop.

The costumes and arms of the military are complimented by their spot-on effects, which emphasizes how there’s more to makeup than just gunshots and zombies. Using photos from James Bond and Rambo as reference, their makeup was designed to blend with their characters but signify the struggle they endured to arrive on camera. That struggle began in the early iterations of the Sisters vignette with an ambushed caravan and deadly scratcher attack, and exists now as a full-fledged short story that I’m considering for inclusion in Night Zero: Volume Two. If you still haven’t picked up Volume One, it’s available in our store for just fourteen dollars.

Next week we return to the story of Marion and Claire (remember them?), the warehouse fires, and the possible destruction of the New City. Heroes and villains abound as new twists and intrigue are revealed in Night Zero episode three: House Calls.