Note: In a move that nobody alive or undead saw coming, today’s production diary was hijacked by our Director/Editor/Zombie Master Lawrence Cass in a swath of blood, gore and colour corrected chase scenes. With chainsaws at full throttle, a fully stocked bomb shelter, several guns of varying head-damaging degrees, and a shiny axe recently acquired from the handy dandy stores of RC Manubhai (Can you buy zombie killing axes at Manubhai?), Lawrence was chomping at the bit for a chance to be heard at the next production diary. ‘No more of this being referred to bullshit!’ He declared. ‘It’s time to hail to the Real King baby.’ And with a flourish of his one handed chainsaw, he proceeded to clean out the zombified town, one disagreeing zombie at a time.
A long time coming
I’ve wanted to make a zombie movie ever since I started enjoying watching them. Being a fan of not just zombie movies, but films in general, going into the processes of penning out a short film project for the Kula Festival was a little more than sorting through the dozens of ideas and visuals that had cluttered my infested brain over the years, and arranging them to suit our short film need.
After we had finalised a script for the short, I chewed it over for about a week or so, just sitting there visualising the whole thing. I wanted to make sure that the look and feel of the project showed some semblance to the films that inspired my friends and I to make it.
This lead the way to an extensive story board that detailed every shot right down to what angle we’re shooting at, or what we want in the back ground. Seeing as how we had a very unique location at our disposal, I also made sure that the shots we used showcased this as best as they could. It really helped that we visited the shoot location before any of this began, and I had taken like 40 pictures of the whole place at various angles specifically for storyboarding, even going as far as to drawing a small isometric map of the area to give the crew an understanding of how the shots will be laid out and where they will be and were the camera was going to be.
We also decided to give the short film a sort of guerrilla/ documentary style, with the shots constantly part of the environments and the action.
Sight and Execution
On the day of shooting we actually went through the movie chronologically, shooting the film scene for scene in line with the storyboard, often doing the same scene over and over to get the multiple cutting angles we were after.
So when it came down to the actual process of editing the film, it was pretty much like putting together a jigsaw puzzle while looking at the picture of it, because the whole film was already drawn out for me.
It all came down to timing the shots and deciding how long this bit lasts or that bit lasts. This was easily done according to the sound track I had laid out for the film, and just the visual style of other movies that I really wanted to incorporate into ours.
…into tiny bloody bits.
I didn’t really let the time constraint of the film project hinder any decisions in terms of lettings shots breath or pacing bits of the film. At first I was putting together what would essentially be a director’s cut of the film, thinking I would go back and edit it down for the copy we’d actually be submitting. But because the guys and I had spent so much time flushing out the script, and then laying out the story boards specifically to the script, at the end of the first edit the film was exactly the length we needed.
Mix this in with opening and ending credits, plus the killer pseudo company titles that Wilson made, we had a running time of exactly 5 minutes, which was the maximum time allowed by the festival rules.
And this was great considering we had left nothing out of the film, and all the shots that we set out to get were achieved, which was not bad for 10 first time film makers.
To further add to the look of the whole project, Wilson and I went over several colour filter choices which we would take screen shots of and flick over to the rest of the crew. In the end we settled on a slight blue/ white washed look for the film, which gave it a nice sense of gloom. It also helped with a few shots where we had lighting issues caused by the different time of the day we took the shots. It’s amazing what a difference the right colour idea has on a finished film, and having such a specific idea in mind, I was glad we were able to achieve it.
Scream if this hurts…
One thing I knew I really wanted to pay particular attention to during the editing was the sound of the film. So often sound is neglected when it involves a visual medium, but having worked as both a video and sound editor in the past, I knew if done right together, it would only add to bringing the scenes to life.
Everything from the atmosphere of the outside environments, to the groaning ambiences of the interior shots, I wanted everything to have its own “living” sound. So that even when the camera passes an object or looks at the scene through a window or a doorway, it felt as though the viewer was right in there seeing and hearing everything first hand.
Aftermath
At the end of it all, the film came out better than I could have imagined it. There are normally so many factors that determine what happens between the conception of a shot and then actually shooting it. But even when planning these shots, we had kept in mind things like equipment constraints, aside from time and budget constraints. And because I was working with close friends and not strangers, I knew exactly what I could expect in terms of acting and such. But I must admit that the team reached expectations and then went even further.
Eight hours of shooting on a budget of eighty dollars, every one worked so well together, never complaining or slacking off. Even when we had to shoot an exhausting scene multiple times, all anyone would ask for was a moment to catch their breath before getting right back into it.
Ultimately at the end of all this hard work on every ones part, all I can hope for is that the audience has as much fun watching our little film as we did making it. And like anyone who truly enjoys creating anything special to them, I hope that we get a chance to do it again even bigger and better.
See you at the 2010 Kula Festival!
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