Many wise people have said to me, "it doesn't matter how bad your works turn out to be, filmmaking is a process of learning and practising. Just keep going and keep doing what you do, everyone have the license to be cr*p while starting out." That's true......
But I didn't know about it until after I've had my first horrid experience in my first practical student assignment. We had to recreate or imitate a short sequence within a pre-existing film. It's an entertaining story to hear about but definitely not entertaining to live through.
It was a rainy day. We were on the way to location in two cars, one carrying equipments rented from university, the other chauffeuring crew and actors. So there I was, cramped in the car with my friends en route to Bapchild, Sittingbourne. Looking out the window, the mid-winter afternoon seems to be the right amount of gloomy for our shots. Not that we were going to shoot outdoors but it certainly would help if there's lots of windows around the building.
When we arrived, we had to wait for the gates to be opened. Somehow, it took a while for the personnel to attend to it and we were already very late compared to the production schedule I had planned. I was panicking, worried that we won't be able to finish on time for me to be back in time for a play rehearsal.
Finally, we were able to enter and unload our kits. HOWEVER, it was raining in a furious flurry and the equipment car was caught in the muddy grass patch that surrounded the building. We moved everything from car to building but my teammate still had to get his car out of the mud. So while the rest of us set up lights, camera and actors, two of them had a futile attempt of pushing and driving the car out of trouble which ended up getting more stuck than ever. They decided to let the location personnel help them later on and came into the building soaking wet, muddy, and freezing. I watched helplessly as they dried themselves with my puny little hairdryer brought to set for makeup. The heating radiators in the room weren't working, even the rest of us not soaking wet were shivering in our coats.
It was 2 hours past the scheduled time when we started shooting. The working electric sockets in the building was very limited, one for the small hairdryer warming up cast and crew, one for a multi-socket port connected to the camera, key light and fill light. We had to resort to taking turns and using our iPhone torches for backlighting. Our spirits were still high as the two actors were performing well and we were off to a great start.
We had shot one third of the shot list when we decided to take a break. While we were at it, Math went back to the hairdryer station to dry his socks and shoes. Alfie, Ben and I checked the shots on the camera.
Silence.
Replayed shot.
Silence.
Played another shot.
Silence.
"Wait let me try it with my earphones."
Played every other shots.
Dead silence.
"Boys, I think we have a problem......"
Yes, I know. Of course we should've checked the audio recording settings on the camera before we started and the audio meter while we shot. But we didn't. Never mind, at least we spotted it 20 minutes into our shooting progress? Wrong. It took us another 20 minutes to figure out how to change the settings to make it work while everyone got colder and colder in the lifeless building with the wind howling outside threatening to blow our lives out.
That's okay. We went back into work mode as soon as Ben figured it out and redid every shot we had done and some more. We took another break halfway through the shot list so that the actor can have special effects makeup added to the back of his hand. Math and Alfie went out to save the car again. This time, it dislodged and made it out of the mud with help from the location personnel towing it. It did take quite a lot of time to do so and meanwhile, we had a different set of problems in the building.
The makeup clay isn't moulding as it should and the glue isn't sticky as it should be because it was too cold in the building. The hairdryer at its warmest couldn't even get the materials to warm up to the actor's skin. Ruo Xuan looked at me with exasperation and continued to do the best she can with the makeup. The actors, Jacob and Cameron, were shivering and I felt bad for not being able to give them an experience of good actors' welfare in a student production.
Fast forward to when all the break time problems are (sort of) solved and we were back to work. We were pleased that the special effects of the bubbling wound worked and then pleasantly surprised when it fell of Cameron's hand when water was gently poured over it for the scene. We quickly wrapped up the shoot and was on our way back to university, all in good time. I was able to get a quick change of shoes while Ruo Xuan cleaned mud and grass off hers in my room before we were slightly late in attending our rehearsal at 7pm.
It was the most tiring thing I've ever done in uni up until that point. But it wasn't over yet.
10pm in the library, I checked the shots on my laptop. Anguish. I had to suppress myself from throwing a tantrum in the library. The shots were all too bright or inconsistently lit from one shot to another across the whole afternoon we were there. At least that can be fixed in the editing suite. You know what can't be fixed in the editing suite? Continuity. I felt so stupid. We should've checked the continuity of the props. The gloves, the glasses, the wound, the hand of the actor holding the tumbler......
In retrospect, I should've known that everyone's first production EVER never could've turned out perfect. I was embarrassed by my first attempt in a production but proud of my first attempt in post-production where I managed to fix a lot of clumsy problems committed in production. I was deliberating whether or not I should include this video in my portfolio and I think it will help people notice my progress in filmmaking. Never mind all that embarrassment and criticism. I do have the license to be cr*p, don't I?
Watch it here and see if you can notice and ignore the continuity problems :
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