Archive for the ‘On Location’ Category

A Syndicated Location

Posted: 13th January 2012 by Anthony van Winkle
Categories: "Syndicate", Behind-the-Scenes Photos, On Location
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On the day of the shoot for the Syndicate vignette, and how all the pieces came together to create this final origin story.

The shoot for Syndicate was a long and busy Saturday, tucked in the basement lounge of the Rendezvous bar in Seattle’s Belltown neighborhood. Crew call was our standard 9:00am arrival, with Jana setting up her makeup station while Eric, Justin, and Jason loaded in the light gear. The shooting area was divided into two halves, with the script moving from one to the other and then back again. Our first setup would be the “middle act” in the far room, so all our gear was staged in the near room and we set to work making the space our own. Fortunately there wasn’t too much we needed to alter to create the scene we wanted—we put out a table, pushed some chairs to the side, and took some signs off the wall; but overall, the look we were going for was already there.

To avoid a huge rush of costume and makeup demands at the same time, the cast call was staggered and as our talent arrived and got ready, we began shooting some of the closeups and two-person shots. By 11:30am the whole group was there, and we did our wide shots and group conversation. Wide shots can be tricky in a place like that, not because of the distance of the walls (we have wide lenses to take care of that), but because with low ceilings all of the lighting gear and electric becomes visible. It’s possible to crop the photos to remove the lights, or digitally remove the stands and gear, but as I’ve lamented many times in the past, just having the light visible on camera really screws up the HDR tonemapping process. But we shoot on location, and that’s just part of the price we pay.

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The Curse of the Sunny Day

Posted: 25th November 2011 by Anthony van Winkle
Categories: "Ally", Behind-the-Scenes Photos, On Location, Photography
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On the shoot day for the ‘Ally’ vignette, and why direct sunlight is the worst type of weather for Night Zero’s HDR style.

The shoot day for ‘Ally’ was a unique production for us, and an all-around great experience and achievement for the team. We were back at the abandoned Fisher Flour Mill, our fourth day (of five) this year shooting at that location. Just the previous day we were there with one of our biggest Episode Six productions: thirteen characters, three scratchers, eleven extras, and ten crew members, for an all-day gun battle and scratcher fight. For ‘Ally’, it would be one of our smallest shoots: two characters, two scratchers, and five crew. The major difference, though, was that the Episode Six shoot was on Sunday, meaning the mill property was closed and our gaffer was on set. Ally was shot on a Monday, meaning that the entire property was abuzz with trailer trucks, backhoes, and moving trains, and for lighting we were at the mercy of the weather and a handheld diffusion/reflector disc.

We started with our usual 10:00am crew call, first checking in with the freight supply company whose trucks and trains we’d be evading all day (and grabbing some reflective safety vests from their dock manager). Then it was to base camp, which was conveniently in the same location as it had been the previous day (which itself had been the central location of a different Episode Six shoot a month earlier). Snacks were munched and coffees poured while the cast made their way into costume and makeup, with Kyle finishing first to go shoot his opening walking sequence while Sara’s more elaborate costume, props, and makeup were put together. After a few minutes of test shooting to determine the best camera settings for the morning light, we got to work just after 11:00 and moved swiftly onward. With the opening walk finished, we returned to base camp to fetch Sara and begin the two-character scenes out in the sunlight.

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Sorority Production: Day Two

Posted: 7th October 2011 by Anthony van Winkle
Categories: "Sorority", Behind-the-Scenes Photos, On Location
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On the production of Sorority’s second act, and the challenges faced in the peculiar location where it was shot.

The day of shooting for part two of ‘Sorority’ came three weeks after we shot part one, and it was (in different ways) both easier and more complex. Like part one, we were shooting in a single contained location but still moving freely down hallways, although unlike part one, for part two we’d be shooting the contained portion first and the freehand portion second.

On the more favorable, simpler side, the action was more straight-forward and the lighting less dramatic, so the shots were more forgiving and easier to balance. It was also not the first full-day shoot for the principals, so they were more comfortable working with Night Zero’s unique production process. On the less favorable, more complex side, the location was more than willing to provide some troubles.

Our biggest concern going in, and one reason why we were hesitant to accept the location at first, was that the condominium basement storage area had no outlets. The nearest power source, aside from the moody incandescent lights, was a circuit powering some vending machines around the stairs and one floor up. More crucially, we would not have access to the breaker box, so if we accidentally overloaded the circuit and it tripped, we’d be stuck in the dark and have to cancel the rest of the shoot.
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Sorority Production: Day One

Posted: 2nd September 2011 by Anthony van Winkle
Categories: "Sorority", Behind-the-Scenes Photos, On Location, Photography
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On the first shoot day for the ‘Sorority’ vignette, covering the two sisters’ drama and the hallway escape sequence.

The first act of Sorority (Lucy and Dee) and the interstitial segment (the hallway chase) were shot together on our first day (of two) for the vignette. Based on some of our multi-day and multi-segment shoots in the past, we decided to shoot the days’ work out of chronological order and instead approach from most-difficult to least-difficult work. For the morning, when everybody was fresh and ready to go, we’d take care of the complex and extensive hallway action scene, and in the afternoon, when the cast and crew would be tired from the morning’s work, we’d shoot the relatively sedate and stationary sisters’ scene.
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Battles in the Backyard

Posted: 29th July 2011 by Anthony van Winkle
Categories: "Arena", Behind-the-Scenes Photos, On Location
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On the day of production for the epic outdoor cage-match vignette “Arena”

The production of our just-concluded vignette “Arena” was one of Night Zero’s biggest shooting days, in terms of cast and crew size. Any shoot with so many actors requires a bit of scheduling negotiation, so for our day we divided the script into three segments and shot them in reverse order. First would be the fight of Claude and Jennifer versus the scratcher, then we’d shoot the dialogue portions in the middle, and finally we’d shoot the opening fight between Rex and Bobbie.

Our crew had the standard 9am call, and fortunately the backyard location had direct alley access for a simple load-in. We marked a staging area on the patio, which would be unseen by the cameras, and the team set to work. Jana setup her makeup chair and started work on the cast right away, applying everything from facial scars to zombie faces to rope burns and bruises. Eric and Justin set to work loading in the lighting gear and rigging up our power for the day, while I took care of building the cagematch stage and spectator area.
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Just the Quiet, Not the Storm

Posted: 11th June 2011 by Anthony van Winkle
Categories: "The Things You Take", On Location
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On simplifying the production strategies to produce “The Things You Take” as a simple and relaxed shoot.

This brief tale of love and conflict in the immediate dawn of the zombie apocalypse stems from a concept long discussed in Night Zero design: what of the regular couple, the young lovers who face only bad choices when their world comes crashing down? No action, no zombies, no death or blood or pandemonium… just the two of them, having each other. Jana, the creator and writer of “The Things You Take”, will have a blog post next week to talk about the writing challenges and developments. Today, I’ll talk about the production itself.

One of the specific goals for this vignette, from a production design standpoint, was that it should be easy. Our creative team and production team are one in the same, so all story development is influenced by our production capabilities and for this shoot we wanted to take it easy. For that, we approached each of the three major production points: cast, location, and action.
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