The Nine Isles: Week 8

Greetings, one and all! So… real life intrudes, as it does, so the last week has needed to be readjusted, schedule-wise. That said, it did give us time to prepare weapons for the big fight scene, as well as refreshing the stunties on the choreography. We managed to shoot a quarter of that scene this week, which was quite the experience. Hopefully we’ll be able to convey the raw chaos of combat in our edit.

 Going into next week, we hope to resolve the rest of that scene, and get into the literal street-level scenes.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

The Nine Isles: Week 7

Greetings, one and all! This week saw one of our leads out of state, so we focused on the scenes that didn’t involve him, and may be a bit of a drive…

While the valley sweltered under the high 90’s, the coast was under high winds, and bitingly cold. Clothes that have been too warm were suddenly nowhere near warm enough. Still, we got the shots we needed, and made it out in one piece. After that, we filmed some material in the family home, before picking up some small scenes, and re-shooting a bit that had lighting issues before. However, in the middle of that shoot, it started raining… Have I mentioned that the wall we built for the office were made of cardboard, and are now part of our street scene? Thankfully the team was on the ball, and managed to cover the walls in time. All told, the rain only made us about a half hour late, so not bad.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

The Nine Isles: Week 6

Greetings, one and all! Well, this week has been a wild one. The night last week’s blog went live, we did a late night shoot involving boats, then followed that up with a full day of tavern scenes, all to neatly tie it up with a shoot day involving the Nine Isles other dynamic duo…

Yes, we actually built a boat for that shoot. Not that I’d put it into water, or anything, but still… Looking at these past few updates, I’m actually surprised by the number of sets that have been built, dressed, torn down, and swapped out by a relatively small crew. So this is a tip of the hat to them, and all their hard work.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

The Nine Isles: Week 5

Greetings, one and all! So, this last week was almost exclusively building, specifically the key set of The Raven’s Head tavern, along with the associated, tables, stools, and docksides. On top of the daily construction, we had three build days where the team came to assist.

That said, after all that construction, Monday saw one giant shoot day, where we covered six scenes in one go.

Starting on the dock, we moved into the tavern for the bulk of the scenes. This ended the blog week, but was just the beginning of the very full calendar week of shoots. If all goes well, we hope to pass the scene half-way mark this week.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

The Nine Isles: Week 4

Greetings, one and all! Well, let’s see… This week we scrambled to finish the Office/Library set, before speed shooting all of the scenes using those locations in just two days. After the grueling eleven to thirteen hour shoots in hundred plus degree weather, I had begun to lose sight of what we could ordinarily accomplish. This dash of good shooting made me much more optimistic again.

As you can see, this set hosted a somewhat different character demographic from the previous ones, and also featured some of my favorite character interactions in the shoot thus far. Or, at least the most amusing ones…
Now, all we have to do is build the most important and complex set in the movie, and find the right location for our big final showdown… oh, and all of the other thousands of little things, as well. Here… we… go!

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

The Nine Isles: Week 3

Greetings, one and all! This week has been divided up between two things: The Vault sequence, and building the next sets to shoot in. We had a three day run of Vault shoots, day one was slow, but we picked up speed by day two.

After that, we turned to set building, and planning the next week of shoots… only to receive some unexpected news about an actor, which delayed the shoot schedule somewhat. That said, the unfortunate news did allow us more time to finish the set, which will hopefully be better as a result. It would seem that the crazy life of a filmmaker continues apace.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!