War stories from Michigan

[Greg Crawford]

Last night I went back to the radio station I work at to film a short scene for my flick.I used one of the young looking weekend air personalities to do the part of a young looking beginner at a small market radio station.

I lit the scene and was shooting thought the double glass window, absolutely no camera noise on this shoot.

(I was shooting with my old wind up 16 mm.)

I had might daughter to slate the scene right off camera so we could quickly moving from slating to the shot, since my wind up is only good for 40 seconds.

I was using the companies digital tape record in the studio to record audio it's an audio NLE station, recording audio from the studio mic in the control rooms I did not catch that the "Talent" this young broadcaster turned off the digital tape recorder after the third take, I discovered this when going to take 7. [img]mad.gif[/img] I got three usable takes from 7 to 10. Why so many takes? I could not hear his dialog, I had to trust my wife and shoot more coverage for protection.

Why do people try to be helpful to the point for blowing it! [img]graemlins/devil.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/hmmm.gif[/img] I think I should rent again, "Living in Oblivion!"

Also first time talent are usually so jazzed that start asking directorial questions when I'm setting up the equipment. I hope I did not come off like a j/rk but I told him,

"that the director is not on the set and I'm the Cinematographer, and when he is standing or setting at his mark he is not the actor he is at this point the stand in."

And all the directorial questions will be answered in there proper time.

[Alex]

I can relate to the problem of having to entertain people who are standing around while you try and get ready.

On corporate video shoots it's even worse. They can cry no budget, and after figuring out how to do what they want with no crew help, I then have to figure out how to ignore them while I set up the production.

[Greg Crawford]

On the last wedding video I ever shot, about two years ago now. The business owner hire me and another camera person to shoot a two camera wedding.

We were shooting on Pro-sumer S-VHS cameras that did not have time code. So about 10 min before the wedding I slipped upstairs to the B camera and discreetly slated (clapboard) both cameras.

Before this I told the other guy "Once I start the camera do not stop it for any reason." He must have missed that point [img]graemlins/asl.gif[/img] and as soon as I left turned his camera off, till the Wedding started. Leaving us with a very long [img]mad.gif[/img] and hard editing session.