Wednesday Winter Shoot 3

Oh third shoot already, and it's actually quite a special day as we will be shooting a few pick up shots in the morning and then the evening scene will be the opening scene of the movie, so as we clap Scene 1 it will be quite a landmark for us. This Wednesday we are down at West Wittering beach and then a quick stop at the Weald and Downland museum for our final pick up shots at that location.

After these three days are over we are back on new territory as we experience a whole new set of locations in West Stow, Bristol and London.

We will have a short two week break after Wednesday before doing our final stretch and hopefully ending on a high. I still can't get over how great everyone was on Wednesday and the acting on Thursday was brilliant.

For now however it's back to a bit of pre-production and then back to packing the equipment up for tomorrow!

Credit Addition

I have just added the new credits for Roanoke: The Lost Colony from the previous two days shooting. If you worked on Roanoke over the last few days please check the Full Credit part of the site to check your credit is correct (i.e spelling etc). We can only add your credit if we have your release form. If your name is not on the list please get in contact with me here: Contact Form.

If you would like to go directly to the Full Credit Page click here. Regular viewers of this page may have to hit the refresh button.

Oh and on a sperate note, this is the 100th blog post! Yay! Congratulations everyone so far!!

Production Diary Winter 1

If you have yet to see them, there are some production images on the blog below...but below below is an account of the day. - Roanoke: The Lost Colony

this is an account from the bits I was able to see...

7am
Wake up! It's time for the Winter shoots to begin. Dan and Jenna have stayed the night at my house in Fleet ready for preperation of the day. There is a long list to be getting on with, so we begin by going over the shots for the day. Jenna will be in charge of making sure all the extras turn up and are there along with directing them into position on set, Dan to be GlideCam operator and 1st A.D while I act as on set producer and director. The rest of crew is set to arrive at around 9 - 10am so we begin a few other jobs. The camera and other nessesities have been charging over the night so while we all go to sort that out I bring out my list and decide to assign people to jobs....in the end however we all work on the same areas for the most part. Jenna goes off to check up on extras, Dan and I put on our aprons and begin to make lunch for everyone. Today on the menu is buscuits, chicken, ham or cheese rolls and crisps. We manage to make 40 rolls in under 20 minutes....we are thinking of taking up a job in catering. A number of other jobs including the assembly of the props, costumes and equipment take place over the next hour or so.

some of the valient extras and cast keeping warm later in the evening

9am
Sam and Angela arrive having picked up a quick breakfast on there way here, I realise i'm still in my pyjamas and need to sprouse up a little if Angela is going to be taking pictures throughout the day...i mean if I need to look presentable for everyone. We all help pack the cars up and begin our trip down to camp. While, Dan, Sam, Jenna and Angela begin their creation of the unit base I escape off to the high street for some casual shopping, for equipment ofcourse...I manage to to buy 20 pounds worth of batteries for the evening from Woolworths, walk away, realise there the wrong type, get a refund and then go and buy them for alot cheaper at Robert Dyer. I also pick up plates, water and a few other bits and bobs for the day.

Dan prepares and tests the GlideCam for operation

11am
Gary and Goerge have arrived after some terrible delays on the trains due to a de-railment at Waterloo. We're all worried that some extras won't turn up due to this (and the terrible weather forecast) but Jenna reasures our worries and sure enough the first set of extras arrive nearly 45 mins earlier than call time! We continue to set up the set and unit base with the help of our runner for the day Stephanie. Many trips back and forth to the house to pick up equipment. I think George and a few others may have sensibly mentioned that the amount of trips we are making will be a similar event at night on our way home; I ignore this suggestions saying we are camping the night, well.. If I don't learn from mistakes how can I learn.

Jenna directs the many fabulous extras into place for the first shot

1pm
All extras have arrived and Gary has been hard at work with George and number of other crew members to set up the set for the first shot. Fleet Pond have introduced some lovelly new green plastic benches over the weekend to our beach area, unfortunatly these benches wouldn't have been present when the colonists landed, so a few logs, cloths and sheets are used to cover them up, by now all extras have arrived and been dressed by Jenna and Angela, Dan is all set up and testing the equipment, I have given my small brief, and Sam has been driving around collecting some valuable equipment for the day) such as lighter fluid :-D. We say that the first shot will be happening at 2pm as per the schedule, I hear a quiet remark from somewhere that this will never happen, fantastic stuff, I love competition! So far although it has been very stressfull all the crew has done a fantastic job. Unlike the summer where we introduced a Porta-loo for our extras we have decided for the extras to go back and forth from the set to my house down the road, Steph has the lovelly job of doing the toilet runs to start with.

Ready to clap and go, the first shot is all lined up!

3pm
By now I realise I am pretty much still in my PJ's with a fleece over the top and flurecent jacket just incase any cars come racing through the natrue reserve. Dan was succesfully able to label all our equipment, inlcuding our 12 umbrellas with BSDS logos. We have just finished shooting the first shot of the day and the extras have done a fantastic job with it and have really got into the spirit, Jenna did a great job getting everyone into position, we can see Angela snapping away with her new camera, and Sam arrives back to help out on set which is great. Roanoke: The Lost Colony's first shot with the GlideCam seems to have pulled off and everyone crowds round the moniter to take a look at the shot, it seems everyone likes it alot more if they can see exactly what has just been filmed. We continue with a few more shots and then wait for it to get dark. It also begins to rain so everyone crowds under the tents erected on set! A big thank you to our lead actor and the Marsh family for providing the gazibos for cover today.

let's look, let's look, what did we shoot!

5pm
It's begining to get dark so we move onto the dusk shots, Rebecca our make-up artist for the day has just finished an incredible job on the burns of actor Ivor Potter. Dan's dad arrives, he is going to be helping us today with the saftey of any fires and the generator which we will soon need to light up the area as it begins to get dark. The dusk shots go well and now its all waiting for the dark to creep in so we can film the ending fires.

Due to the weather we had a bit of trouble with the tents, but on camera they looked great

and then came the fires! They were spectacular, and more shall be written about the later stage from 6pm onwards soon! watch this space!

Winter Shoot 1!

I'm so tired today, I finally managed to sit down and it suddenly hit me, alot of lifting and lugging around, but there's no time to stop, to work on the next Roanoke shoot day we must go, and it's another night shoot. Angela has sent across a selection of images she took on the Roanoke set on Wednesday and they do look, well, wonderfull! Hopefully everyone in the crew will be able to tell a small story of the day (of which there were quite a few) over the course of the next few days and I certanly must thank everyone who helped out and gave permission for the location and were so understanding to our needs and varying weather conditions.

From making the lunch - packing up for three hours in pitch black the crew were incredible to hang on for so long, and the extras amazing for their stamina and will to continue through the day. The make-up looked awesome and we had generated light, which was fabulous!

All in all it was none other than ore-inspiring!

I hope this rather longer than usual set of images help give an idea of the day for those that couldnt make it! - thanks Angela for these, they're brilliant.

Bertie

Crew, Extras and part of the on location base

bodies rehersing a flashback

setting up a camp fire shot

Crusty tries to help

the camp burns down

...and then some

from 7 - 10pm - the set came down

Wow the first two winter shoots and first night shoot over! There are some very interesting stories to be told, all of which will be, however.....currently it's 7:40 and we have just finished packing up all the equipment, cleaning the majority of it and cleaning the unit base (house), but the main problem is i'm waiting to update the blog with pictures from my computer back in London and at the momment there are traffic ques stretching back all through the M4 and M25 with traffic under 30mphs all the way there....(thanks to realtime-traffic.info for those details)!

If we get back at a..normal...hour i'll update the blog tonight, if not it will have to wait until tomorrow.

Either way a huge thank you to everyone involved in this shoot and i'll be needing to say alot more thank you's than that in due course, it really couldn't have happened without each and every one of you!!!

But for the most part we're all still alive and kicking but some interesting things did happen, some of which would have been better without happening....if that makes sence, maybe it doesn't, maybe i'll take a nap before the traffic clears!

All Stations GO

It's been a long time coming and it's really quite suriel that it's about to come around again and we are going back on set to finish Roanoke.

For those who arn't 100% involved in the script or are just interested, this second half of shooting is alot darker in places, more cinematic shots in regards to what one might expect from sets, emotions etc and overall a different feel to it. Now we haven't shot the first half of the movie and now the second, for instance the first shot we ever shot of the movie was the last shot...if that makes sence.

As Dan mentioned below it is also a first in regards to the shooting schedule for Roanoke for night shoots and wet weather shoots. Alot more preperation has been done on my side as producer to make sure that all crew have warmth, cover, and adequete resources avalible to them in order to take them through the night. That is the part i'm rather nervous about, although its hard to tell whether it really is nerves or excitment; quite boring'ly i'm guessing its a form of both.



We have all 6 crew members back with us on Wednesday, but sadly we will be missing out on our two very important members on the Art Department. They have been working very hard (as I have been informed) in creating the sets for the beach at Fleet Pond, i'm looking forward to seeing them very much.

By the way, the great thing about a blog is that your grammer and spelling don't have to be perfect, I just thought i'd point that part out, as it is that part that I particullary enjoy. In a way it's sort of 16th Century, where spelling was how one wanted it to be without a standard practise. In fact I guess I am simply making up the bad grammer and spelling in order to make this blog more authentic to our period piece....hmmm, not sure the courts would take that one.

Tomorrow is all about collecting equipment from various different places, along with 25 folding chairs, which should be fun. On Wednesday night we will be ending when it is dark and therefore we have decided to camp out where the Unit base is in order to make sure all the marque's and tents stay safe through the night. This seems like a brilliant idea until it starts to rain, but I do believe it could be quite alot of fun. Hopefully all the crew will remember to bring a sleeping bag of some form!

This may mean ofcourse that we might not get the Wednesday pictures up on the blog until Thursday afternoon after shooting.

Until tomorrow then!

Good night!

Bertie x

Happy Bertday!!!!

I would just like to take this oppurtunity to wish our director/producer a very happy birthday!!!!

I heard he got lots of lovely presents including some 'RAID' from me (crack and crevice insect killer if your wondering!!!). He spent his lovely birthday sorting out stuff for roanoke! How committed is that!!

And on that note i think we are almost ready now! We've got:
- MARQUEES
- CHAIRS
- A GENERATOR (2.2kw)
- LIGHTS
- EXTENSION CABLES
- HAZARD TAPE (to wrap around things we consider to be a hazzard)
- A STEADY CAM (very exciting)
- TORCHES
- LANTERNS
- UMBRELLAS (and theres alot of them)
- And probably alot of other stuff but i can't remember at the moment

Crew side, we're getting help with a few runners this time around as the amount of extras, equipment and the time of day we are shooting will require a larger team to help it run smoothly, so some new people to chat to!!! (and work professionally alongside), and chat to!!!

This is the biggy for us...first Roanoke night shoot with actors, first time weve needed our own generator, and scenes with fire in them! ooooohhh, its exciting!!!!

See you all for the BIG shoot (those that are involved, and if not then keep in touch coz this blogs gonna be buzzing after next week!!!!)

Nearly One Week To Go

We now have lights, marquees, generators, food, lights, marquees, generators.... well ...we have quite alot sorted, and still a bit to go.

On Monday Dan and I test and built the GlideCam (well Dan built it and read the instructions, i re-arranged the studio into what a marquee may look like with chairs and fake tables)....either way it took about 3 hours to complete and eventually we had a system that was stable and could move the camera around without it jogging when Dan took a leap. We then took it apart again and put it back together within 1 minute 30. Again I say we......but Dan was the master of the machine, I was the master of the budget, walki talki purchase, and smoke machine hire. The GlideCam (GlideCam 2500 Pro as it should be known) uses counterbalance, centre of gravity and alot of weights positioned in a number of ways in order to make sure when you move with your camera the camera glides along.....incredibly they managed to call the Glidecam exactly after what it does, what a coincidence!!!

Tomorrow Dan, Jenna and I are going back to the coast for a reccee on the beach and Weald and Downland. We are shooting back there on November 1st so checking out the best place to erect a marquee and other things....such as where to get the best shot! It's getting rather exciting how close we are to shooting, just hope it all goes to plan.

We've had some wonderful feedback by people form this blog about donating marquees and further equipment so thank you to everyone and I will get in contact soon in reply to your e-mails if i haven't already!

We'll make sure we take a few pictures on the day tomorrow!

Jenna is a bit scared to make a blog entry, something about something, but we have had around 170 extras apply to be on the set of Roanoke for the first two days alone, how wonderful is that! Sadly we can't accommodate for everyone however it's flattering for the interest.


On a final note we are now Directors on YouTube which allows us to upload larger videos, and have our logo branded and channels for independent film! Expect a few previous productions to be shown soon!

Should get some sleep before i drive to the coast tomorrow,

love,
Bertie

OH! and I had a great meeting with Adam from fleet pond today and everything looks set to go well in regards to that aspect! For those who are not aware Fleet = Roanoke in terms of the script!

right then! bye!

Alfie takes the stage!!!

Our newest little member of the cast, Alfie Bullard seems to already be getting the frills of stardom at only 3 weeks old, after appearing on stage in a 'best dressed' competition.

Okay, it was for halloween and did happen to be at a holiday caravan park but all the same i see it as an important step for the young prodigy. If he's already winning awards at just 3 weeks then the oscars seem a fair bet for his future, coz by the way he did win!!! although i'll leave out the fact that everyone got a prize, it's all getting too political aye! But he had the biggest cheer! And to win a halloween dress competetion wearing a babygrow with a pumpkin on shows true class. He hardly made an effort and still walked it! He even slept during the whole thing! Awe-Inspiring.

I wasnt actually there but my dad recorded it on camera and you can see it below. oh, thats his dad with him btw!!

We're all still here - honest!!

Hello again!
I noticed that at the moment Bertie is the only one of us making new blog entries so I thought I would add my own!

One of the reasons things have slowed down blogwise is that as we are not shooting at the moment, there is not much to report, apart from Bertie's updates on locations and schedules. As he is the one making these entries, we have nothing to add!

I spoke to Bertie the other day, and at the moment it seems as though we are as prepared as we can be for the winter, except getting hold of a few more props and things, and making sure we have all the extras we need (Jenna you can argue this if they are already sorted!) if you are interested e-mail Jenna at extras4film@yahoo.co.uk as mentioned below.

At the moment I am typing up a callsheet for the first day of the winter shoot, which allows the cast and crew to know when to arrive, what scenes we will be shooting, and what will be needed. I will also be creating provisional callsheets for days 2 and 3 of the winter shoot (or days 12 and 13 of the whole shoot!), but these may change depending what we get done, though hopefully they won't change much!

As I said before, we will have a lot more to say once shooting gets underway again, but as Bertie is still sorting out a few pre-winter things I'm sure he will keep posting!

The rest of us will just have to wait!!

Bye for now!
Sam

Times

Sorted out the schedule for each of the first three days of shooting today. There are going to be around 20 days from day 3 -4 so I deal with them later, which is great scheduling by me, hehe :-D

As it stands it looks like we'll be shooting from

12 - 7pm - Day 1 - 25th October - Fleet Pond
9:30 - 5pm - Day 2 - 26th October - Fleet Woods
1pm - 8pm - Day 3 - Weald and Downland and The Coast

Having to organise a large budget breakdown now from torches - marquees to keep everyone dry, suposedly people don't like to stand around in the wet, which is lucky, becuase nor do I!

Have a few things for the blog planned for next week which should be really cool, along with something extra for when we start shooting again. I've also heard rumour Dan has a little suprise lined up for us over the next few days, it's very exciting news indeed!

Yesterday e-bay became very usefull for Tape Stock, LSD screens for moniters, torchs, and....hmm what was the other thing....well something else. It's amazing the price difference and how much easier it makes on the budget. I'm tending to go for the Buy It Now buttons but make sure you check out the postage costs! If your the owner of some 3x3 metre gazibos with sides then don't hesitate to get in touch, although currently Germany looks like the best bet for those!

We're back :-D

Wow, nearly a whole week without an update. It’s not so much that nothing has been going on, but you always get this dead patch near to the start of shooting where it’s very busy but at the same time it’s all nitty bitty stuff and not much to talk about.

Jenna has been working hard in regards to extras, and if you are interested in coming to extra and you live near Fleet, Cambridge, London or Chichester then I believe there may be the odd space still available, however don’t hold me to that! E-mail extras4film@yahoo.co.uk

I have now secured the budget for the Winter shoot, along with a small amount of insurance money should it all go terribly wrong and we need to run over the odd day. I am investing in a few “EZ-Ups” to help deflect the rain and wind off the extras, a number of powerful lanterns and torches for the nighttime scenes and a smaller LCD screen for easier use of the GlideCam© (as shown below).

We have had some wonderful responses from many people in regards to the trailer, which is great news, but at the same time we need to keep the energy and standard high for the winter shoot in order to make sure any production values we had, stay.

Over the next few days I will be re-working the birds eye view storyboards to make sure it is all feasible, ordering the camera stock (Ebay is a fantastic place for cheap but quality stock) and creating the time schedules and call sheets (in accordance with Sam) for the Fleet (25th, 26th) and Chichester (1st November) days.

I’m looking forward to the shoot days, not only to continue and finish the principle production of the film, but in order to update the website with a lot more pictures, smaller videos and shananagans form the days filming. Although its been great keeping up to date news wise on the blog, its sad we can only report on the odd reccee and paper work. That’s our mistake for doing so much research in the pre-production stage.

Just 15 days to go, and I will let you know about everything that we’re doing in the final, frantic stages before shooting. Not only is this the first winter shoot we’re about to attempt for this period drama, but it is also the first night shoot, so we need heaters, lights, rain cover, electricity and more! As a matter of fact I bought a really weird impulse buy on ebay, a 41 LED UV torch, not quite sure why but it was under 5 pounds in total and I’m intrigued at how powerful it will be.

Let you know how its all going tomorrow,
It’s good to be back on the blog,
Bertie

My Phone Bill will be Huge

So i'm quite annoyed by the other morning when my nice long blog decided to fail on me, not quite sure how it happened, but either way my passage on what has been going on and what was about to happen has since been lost.

Great news in regards to our impromptu recce, I have been able to negotiate a deal with the Golden Hinde for a 6 hour shoot one weekeend, so although the dates will have to change (and hence the title of this blog with the calling of everyone) it is going to add so much to the final film in terms of shots and quality, so a big thank you to the lady (Kate) at the Golden Hinde.

Now I was due to start the birds eye view of the storyboard yesterday however I have two folders with the information for this part in, and I decided to leave one at home, I took the Green and Blue folder out with me instead of the Green and Red, hmmmm.

Instead of planning the the birds eye view I decided to finish the pre-production off in regards to the Transport and Equipment needed per shoot. We now have a very snazy GlideCam avalible to us. For those who do not know what this is, think of a large body suit, add an arm....i'll put a picture in below....





















(just for the record, this is an image from Google Images and is not our equipment or anyone we know)

We are "nearly" (touch wood) all set in regards to final dates from the provisional dates set out. I believe we have 2 locations to fully confirm, otherwise things look to be as originally posted.

Today I will be working on the birds eye view along with calling up all the actors and crew in regards to the changes of dates.....

All the best,

Bertie

A failed update

I got an error message after writing a really long blog message! It decided to delete the whole thing, not nice.

I have to pop out and start work on the Camera Angles for Roanoke now, when i get back tonight i'll re-write it after my temper has gone back down.

Bertie