First Day of Filming and PSA

John and I did our first day of filming yesterday, and it went great!

There is a LOT of work that goes into each second of film.  For the actors, you are on set with a mic 3 inches from your head, lights in your face, camera in front of you, as well as ten other people staring at you and your first responsibility is to ACT NATURALLY.  Oh, yeah, and you probably should say your lines, too.

We went through two scenes yesterday.  Each will probably be 2-3 minutes of actual usable film, but we probably shot a couple hours worth of footage.  We started in the middle of the first scene and filmed that 2-3 times from 10 different angles.  Then, we shot the middle of the next scene from several angles. After that, we shot the beginning of the second scene.  Then it was back to shoot the beginning of the first scene.  Finally we shot the end of the second scene.  At one point, the front door opens, and it's supposed to be dark out, but it's not so they built a cave of blackout screens around the door, so when the door opened, it would be dark. So much movie magic was going on all day.

I've got a few behind-the-scenes pics from the birthday party scene:

Mike (the Editor), Charles (the Cinematographer) and Scott (Director)

 lining up a shot

John (Actor - Marcus), helps Jeremy (Actor - Dylan) pin the tail on the donkey,

as Chris (Actor - Ben), the other party-goers and of course the camera look on.

At far left, Scott (Director) watches the scene from behind the camera.

All in all, it was a great day!  We had tons of fun!  Our only downside brings me to my PSA:

People...whoever you are, whatever you do....
DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE!!


On our way home last night, we were stopped at a light on 321 getting ready to get onto 85, when a drunk driver rear-ended us, backed up, and then continued onto 85, cutting off a ton of people in the process.  Neither one of us was hurt (John slept through the whole thing), and there was only minimal damage to the muffler, but it could have been worse.  For all I know, he hit-and-ran our accident, then made it to the highway and killed someone.  There was a family in a van behind us that got his tag number and waited for the  police with me (THANKS TO THEM!  God puts angels where we need them!), so I at least have his insurance info, but there's nothing they can do about actually punishing the driver.  By the way, I know he was drunk because someone had already called him in to the police as a drunk driver and the cops had been sitting there waiting on him.  Unfortunately, he was so erratic, that they didn't get close enough to get him.

There is just no excuse in the world for drinking and driving.  It's stupid and dangerous to others as well as yourself.  My mom is a drug and alcohol counselor and I'd grown up working at her office that dealt with DUI/DWI offenders regularly, so I know this plea is falling on deaf ears, but I still had to say it.  This time everyone was ok and damage was minimal, but you don't know what will happen when you make the choice to drive drunk.