So we know what the finalists who are already in preproduction are doing … but what about those still to arrive in Queenstown? Over to Rajneel to fill us in …

02/01/2010

So typical of my luck.

Here I am, just two days from journeying to Queenstown, and I’ve been hit by one of the worst cases of stomach flu I’ve ever experienced.  Like some bathroom-Pagan, I’ve spent more time paying homage to the porcelain god than I’ve spent adequately preparing myself for my upcoming challenge.  Some may pass this off as ‘nerves’, but I couldn’t imagine a diva soprano going through this before every performance!

Our friendly neighborhood YBBC has asked me to do a quick blog post on the prep for my film and I can tell you that since the finalist announcement, it’s been all systems go.  I have no illusions here – I think my short will be the most logistically difficult and head-scratchingly overwhelming task when it comes to getting a viable short film done in 2 days of photography.  Typically of me, I’ve overshot the mark and promised something that is both daunting to me and also, potentially, stupidly ambitious.

I’m always a nervous wreck during preproduction because I have no tangible elements with which to build my film – no idea of what locations have to offer, what art department can whip up for me nor the limitations of the shoot.  It becomes impossible not to worry or stress that something won’t be exactly as you need it to be, on the day, to make the story work.

The last two weeks have been spent generating all kinds of documents – casting brief, director’s brief, locations lists and so forth.  I’ve discovered that Lake Unknown is a Department of Conservation Impact Area and may be difficult to access, so I’ve spent hours on Google Earth looking for alternate locations to double for it.  Taking nothing for granted, I’ve worked out three or four alternate strategies for shooting given any host of worst-case scenarios and I’ve researched notable issues that may come with field-shooting on RED ONE cameras.  I’ve also received a tentative confirmation on my lead actor – a very talented guy whom I wrote the actual part for – as well as hoping that we can sort out the piece of music I’d like to use for the film, but currently nothing has been confirmed, everything is up in the air and I have yet to actually START preproduction and meet up with my talented production team down south, including the fantastic Production Manager, Jill Soper who has been fielding my unending questions with good humor and earnest candor.

Fortunately a very early (6:00am!) meeting with Barrie Osborne last Friday helped alleviate some of my concerns and he was gracious enough to give me a lot of insight and possibilities on how to prepare for the next two weeks.  Barrie seemed remarkably unfazed by the task ahead of me … but then again, when you were the production manager of Apocalypse Now and producer of Lord of the Rings, a tiny little film like this would barely make you blink I’d wager!

The next course of action is three-fold:

1) start packing my bags

2) get some sleep and get over this nasty bug

3) finish off my animatic – something very necessary since Blank Spaces is a dialogue-less piece and so the more visual cues I can generate, the easier it will be to communicate my ideas and find solutions to the multitude of problems this film will face.

Wish me luck and hopefully you’ll hear from me again soon!

Rajneel