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Tag: location management

FILM: Doing A Little Bit More… with Signage

I went to a local dog off leash park, and found probably the best location filming announcement ever:

Yup, one for the humans (“park users” / at human eye-level) and one for the dogs (at dog eye-level). Doubt you can read the dog announcement in the wide shot, but it goes like this: “Woof woof woof…”:

The signage is inspired! I mean, why just do you job when you can do you job with a little flare, making the job enjoyable and spreading a smile around to others at the same time? How can one not be more receptive to the disruption of a film set coming to town than by seeing such signage as this!

Way to go, guys. You inspire us in making movies, you inspire us in how we can approach work and school in our lives and make them more enjoyable.

Cheers & a great shoot to you,
Deb

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Deb Patz is the author of “Write! Shoot! Edit! A Complete Guide to Filmmaking for Teens” (new in 2017) and “Film Production Management 101” both published by MWP Books. She’s shot on some interesting locations when in production.

WHERE IS DEB? (upcoming events and appearances)
Feb.17 – Digital Media Youth Expo in North Vancouver, BC
(more events and appearances are being assembled)

LATEST NEWS:
“Write! Shoot! Edit!” was reviewed in:
(1) Montreal Gazette, and many other newspapers across Canada 
(2) SF Crowsnest (in the UK);
(3) Midwest Book Review Library Watch list (on the Theatre/Cinema/TV Shelf)
(4) Donovan’s Bookshelf Recommended Reading / Prime Pick for August (need to search for “Write”)

Location Scout Time Warping

Saw a field of daisies recently and it make me think of location scouting for the movies. Huh?

Every morning the daisies open their petals to the sun. The vast field of green becomes carpeted with sparkling, white miniature flowers. As the day wears on, the tiny flowers turn and face the sun on its path across the sky. In the evening, the flowers once again close up for the night.

So, depending what time of the day you visit, you see the all the flowers facing east, west or closed up. If you were scouting the field as a location, you’d want to see it at the same time of day that you’d intend on filming it, or on the shoot day you might be surprised that the field looks different than planned.

Now, in this particular field, the flower change is rather subtle, but the sun’s position and the shadows could make a difference to usable shot angles.

On a bigger time scale, this field scouted in spring (with flowers) vs a shoot in the summer (with no flowers) would also make a more significant visual difference. No sense in having surprises when you show up for the shoot. You can’t exactly paste the flowers back in… well, without CGI. 🙂

So, when considering locations for filming, consider time-of-day for the projected shoot day. An intersection at rush hour does not look the same as when it’s Sunday morning. A parking lot at the mall during mall opening hours it also totally different after hours.

So, time warp yourself to the shoot day when considering a location. What are you going to see then? The daisies tell us it changes for every hour of the day.

Cheers & a good location scout to you,
Deb

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Deb Patz is the author of “Film Production Management 101” and the upcoming “Write! Shoot! Edit! A Complete Guide to Filmmaking for Teens” both published by MWP Books. She found it hard to choose when daisies to photograph…. there were so many!

WHERE IS DEB? (upcoming events and appearances)
Jun.24 – Book launch party for “Write! Shoot! Edit!” at Chapters Pinetree, Coquitlam, BC
Jul.30-Aug.3 – Panelist – UFVA Conference, Los Angeles, CA