Act Three Exeunt
And so ends the third episode of Night Zero, and here’s how it tallies up:
- 52 hours of shooting across 9 dates
- 17 actors and 15 crew members combined
- $9500 expended
- 2,774 photos shot
- 290 frames on 52 pages
- 409 days from first draft to last page
Unlike our previous work on episodes one and two, wherein a single location provided the bulk of the content and repeated visits to that location were the majority of our shoots, episode three required a larger variety of locations and a longer list of shoots. Even though the number of pages spent at the skullhunters house is about the same as in the primary locations in each of the first two episodes, we didn’t have the time or the resources to keep returning to this location to shoot. We had to tackle everything here in one weekend, so that there would be time enough to scout and shoot the rest of the episode as well.
Producing this shoot was not an easy thing to do. The house itself was a property being rented by a quartet of friends (including Ben, who plays Blaze in the episode), who generously agreed to a weekend-long occupation of their home by the Night Zero crew. But while the space itself was as easy as walking in the door, revamping the exterior to be a fortified bunker and the interior to the look of a formerly-modest house taken over by two ruthless thugs… that was a bit more of a challenge. It was then necessary to work the timing of the set construction in with the availability of the cast, all of whom had here-and-there scheduling conflicts for work, school, rehearsals, performances, and the like. The piece of paper that held my scheduling notes became a mad mess of charts and diagrams, mapping actor availabilities with needed character combinations and interior/exterior locations based on time of day and sunlight. It was a mess, and going into that weekend, the madness never let up.
Which isn’t to say the shoot wasn’t a success, or that it wasn’t a fun and educational experience for the team, but it certainly was a nightmare of a weekend. The days were too long, the sun was too hot, the cast and crew overworked and under-rested. With the schedule so hectic, some things got missed (like whether a character was wearing their watch, or how a piece of clothing was worn), some things got mis-placed (the storyboards were a common delinquent), and some things got cut (significant portions of dialogue were sliced and diced just to keep the pace moving). It was a methodical madness, but plenty of good certainly came of it.
Part of the challenge we had on set that led to much of the frustration was the singular notebook with all the storyboards for the scenes. The complete skullhunter house production was broken into seven distinct segments, based on how they would appear in the final comic, but these segments weren’t storyboarded in order and were therefore not in the book in order. I needed the book so I knew what the actors were to do, Eli needed the frames to know what the camera was looking for, and Kelly needed the list of shots to know where we were and how to tweak the schedule to keep us on track. We definitely ran over schedule and I knowingly cut and merged shots on-the-fly to try and simplify the process, but it was apparent through and through that we needed a better way to handle complex shoots. We needed a way to organize all the information about the shots, and a way to share and reformat this information for everybody on the team to get what they need. We didn’t know what that solution was because it hadn’t been invented yet, and although we would move ahead to shoot Claude and the Trio before figuring it out, the insanity of the skullhunters house is unquestionably the catalyst that made clear the need for, and ultimately led to the creation of, the game-changing shot card system.
It was still a good time on set, despite the chaos, and I’m pleased with the results. It was our first extensive work with Christian, playing the role of Edge, and he and Tamara were a great team together, and it was also the first time we’d seen Ben since the warehouse shoot back in Episode One. The weekend was a challenge we faced and overcame, and was the first in a set of increasingly-complex shoots leading up to our end-of-summer extravaganza.
And so, indeed, ends the third episode of Night Zero. Next week kicks off a vignette of a different sort, and I think you’ll really enjoy it.
Eli uses a remote monitor to preview the shot
Tamara takes a call while the shot is set up
Scene instructions with Christian and Tamara
For expediency, I ran a second camera parallel to Eli
Elmo pays a visit to the set
Jana gives some special attention
Eli and Elmo hang out together...
...but also work together
Ben and Elmo on a break
That puppy saw the shoot from all sides