STARPOINT VIDEOS DAY 1

We had our first day of shooting for the Starpoint mountain videos on Saturday, May 28th. I took Friday off of work to make sure I had everything ready to go and storyboard a few scenes. I had one part of the costume to finish and found out to late that I didn't have anymore fasteners. I thought about going to Wal-Mart that night to get some more but decided against it. I was up by 6:30am Saturday and left the house about 7:30. It was gray and rainy and didn't look to good but I was still in high spirits. Some famous projects got rained on their first day so I wasn't going to let it stop us.
Did some location spotting in Iowa City. I've been trying to find some tunnels to shoot in but no luck. I did find a really good spot by the Iowa River to go to when we need it. Wal-Mart didn't have the fasteners, lucky I didn't go over Friday night, so I had to wait until Hobby Lobby opened at 9:00. I got them and was at PATV about 15 minutes late.
Per and I did some planning while I put the fasteners on the armor. Suzy called and was on her way, she'd been putting some curls in her hair, when Al showed up. We made our plan for the day and did a final costume fitting on Suzy then headed out to a farm a few miles north of Iowa City.
The farm we went to was great and we were joined by Josh, our camera man, and Al's friend who owned the farm. It was sprinkling lightly but the camera was really top notch so were were still able to film. We shot a few tracking shots of Suzy first. One of them was her walking along a path of dead trees directly to the camera and then attacking it with her sword. I walked along with her out of frame giving her some direction as we went. I had written this short promo with Gallif talking about all that she has lost and wondering why she survived through everything. It looked nto the woods to shoot a combat scene. It involved Gallif going through the woods and knowing she's being followed. The bandit attacks and stabs her in the shoulder, she spins and drops him than kills him. I had it story boarded and we shot it as is plus a few extra shots. I was open to lots of different ideas and Josh, the camera man, came up with a few suggestions and we tried a few handheld shots.
I had Al playing the bandit cause he is very tall and I thought he would look menacing attacking Suzy. Originally, after she downed him, I had her moving the hood off his face with the sword. We were shooting that and Al suddenly moved so the sword tipped nicked his chin. OUCH. Suzy felt bad but Al took it pretty good. It didn't bleed, just a bruise as if he'd been shaving, so there wasn't anything to worry about.
We shot one scene, after she kills bandit, where she is looking around and holding the blood drenched sword in front of her. It looked fantastic. Suzy really made that character come alive at that moment. It gave her a lot of depth and was clear that she didn't like having to kill. We improvised a scene then of her cleaning the sword and walking away. It was a very solemn shot and as she went all you could hear was the branches snapping as she went past. We weren't planning on doing any sound recording and didn't take a boom mic with us but I hope the camera's mic was picking it up.
We finished up for the day, soaking wet but feeling great after that. I was ready to keep going but Al was against that so I took his advice. We did find a spot for the next shooting, a combat scene with skeletons. It would be heavy FX scene and it would be best to do it on a day with lots of sunlight.
Drove back to PATV with Suzy and she was really excited about the day. I was glad she felt good and was ready to keep going and shoot again.
I gave her some of the script that I've written and asked her to see of her sister would play one of the three parts. There was a woman working on Al's video and he is going to see if she would take on the third. I really think the three of them together would work great.
Per and I did about an hour of planning after that and I made a rough schedule of the rest of the shoot aiming for one, maybe two days a month. I want to make it as easy as possible on everybody. I'm keeping in mind that they are all volunteering on this project. The target date for finishing it is August.

MAY:
Finalize Costume
Combat Scene 1 (EXT)
JUNE:
Finalize Script
Finalize Cast
Combat Scene 2 (skeletons) (EXT)
Tunnel Scene (night?) (EXT)
JULY
Set Design
Rehearsal
Character
Scenes (EXT & INT)
AUGUST
Shooting (2 days?) (INT)
Pick ups (EXT & INT)