Fiction Adaptation Unit: Production - Day 2

We started off the day with heading into the shed to re-attempt the ward scenes.

It was very, very cold and Mark had to perform in a thin t-shirt and trousers. I did bring out a heater which we had on between takes which kept the shed at a tolerable temperature but Mark was shaking quite a lot.

Besides the cold set up was easier and quicker than yesterday and we cracked on. By about 1pm we had already done 20 shots and were breezing through the shots. We finished the ward scenes by 2pm and had break for lunch.

All that was left to do was film the house scenes and the audio tracks. It turns out that whilst we were filming the ward scenes Danny had come over to see Sophie and Roxanne so I decided to alter the two photos that we would see of the Narrator and Soldier at the end of the film. Originally they were of Narrator and Soldier stood with their arms around each other and one of the both of them with a third person sat at a table but with so many people around I thought I would stage a fake party/social gathering and make it look more natural with the Narrator and Soldier with a group of 'friends'.

The 3rd and 4th photos will be shown in the film. I feel these look pretty realistic and natural like it's an actual party.

After this we filmed two Subconscious scenes that I'd forgotten to do. Luckily these were just a couple of short shots that were done in 20 minutes. The last thing to do was record Adam reading out all of the script's dialogue to use as a clean voice-over. Mike suggested I bring down my duvet to hold around the microphone so the audio would be absorbed and not reverberate around the room and create an unwanted echo. We recorded two read throughs and that was a wrap: finished at 4pm.

With everyone gone I went outside and recorded a buzz track of silence for the ward and then the same thing but inside for the Subconscious audio. I then recorded some foley of footsteps, swallowing water and tapping the key on a keyboard.

Overall I feel the shoot went very well, despite losing my desired filming location for the subconscious I think it was fine for what I did have available to me. Everyone was fantastic and did their jobs well. I struggled a little when describing specific actions and emotions to Mark and Adam: perhaps I need to improve my vocabulary. The shoot did feel pretty professional also: with someone else working on the camera my thoughts were solely on the script, actors and framing. I felt like a proper director. I definitely need to do this more though to improve my communication further; it helped that my crew consisted of mates making it easier to talk to them but I was too passive and diffident. I need to be more assertive and just make a decision regardless of what others say instead of um-ing and ah-ing.

The next step is to edit the footage: 95 clips from today totals to 176 clips shot over the two days. My fears that I may exceed the time limit has increased but I won't know until I put the clips together.