Printer Perfect

So I met with the lady who runs the Computer lab on Monday and we got the printing worked out. Apparently there wasn’t a problem with the software I was using. There was a problem with the printer charging software. Basically they couldn’t figure out a way to charge me. So they’re gonna let me override the program and print for free as long as I provide my own paper. Which is AWESOME. I was gonna have to pay like $0.10 a page. And with printing 500 pages it was really gonna add up. Now it’s only gonna cost me like $2.50 for the shooting schedule. Needless to say it turned out better than I thought.

Linneae approached me after class yesterday about her role in the film. I’ll email her later today. I talked with Danielle Miller this morning about coming on as a producer. She said she might be interested and to send her a script. I’ll probably do that as soon as I can. Danielle was one of the most productive, reliable, and fun to work with people we had on the LOTD production. I’m gonna do everything in may power to get her on board. There’s a little problem with her work situation though. She graduated last year and now works full time at a bank. So hopefully her schedule won’t be to hard to work around, but I’ll probably have meetings on the weekends anyway.

I started separating all the IHOP scenes from the script. I’ve got to send the scenes, along with a synopsis, to the public relations director of the corporation to get permission to shoot there. I’m gonna go over all the stuff with Valenti before I send it out.

The First Schedule, Laugh, and Designer

So I skipped class again Tuesday night. I just didn’t want to deal with this directing class I’m taking with Chris LaMont. He’s a good guy but he requires a lot and I’m a little stressed out. I’d much rather be working on this project then school stuff. Well I’m really glad I skipped class cause I spent Tuesday night and Wednesday morning working on the schedule, skipped management class again, and finished the schedule. It’s just the first schedule and I’m sure it will change. These things always do. Especially if I make any major changes as I re-write scenes. But I don’t foresee that happening. But for now this means I can start to really talk to the Police, Facman, and Reslife about what exactly I’ll need. We’re looking at a 17-18 day shoot. Right now it’s 17 but we’ll see what the different departments have to say.

I’ve started looking for produces and designers. So far I’ve got one designer. She said that she has lots of experience in costume but is interested in other parts of design. I know her fairly well. Her name’s Linneae Kimball. She’s an Adult re-entry student and has 20 years experience in costuming. So she’s definitely got the job as far as costuming goes. I’m gonna talk to her about being over all production designer because she’s really reliable and knows what she’s doing. I’ve given out a few personal invites to some people. Chad Ohnstad, who produced LOTD with me, and Travis Padour, a student I’ve worked with before. Chad said to send him the script. Travis said he’s not sure if he’s gonna be here next semester. He seemed really reluctant. Which is fine cause it’s going to be a lot of work. He’s in the screenwriting class that I’m auditing and we read the 1st 15 pages of the screenplay. Everyone seemed to like it Travis said he was gonna read the rest. (I sent the 2nd draft to him sometime in January.) So we’ll see what he has to say after he reads the script.

When I made LOTD I got laughed at a lot during pre-production. I got laughed at by companies and establishments that we were trying to get things from. For instance Chad and I went to a hummer dealer ship to see who we had to talk to about getting the rights to use a hummer in our film. They thought we wanted to take a hummer of the lot that day for free, use it for the film, and bring it back. And no matter how much we told them what we wanted to do, that we weren’t filming for a few months, they just didn’t understand. I went to the town hall of Tempe to get permission to film on mill ave for a day. Just a guy sitting against the wall having conversations. This jerk at the city of Tempe was extremely rude and condescending to me and told me I needed a million dollar insurance policy to even start the process for getting permission to film. We ran into situations like that all the time. We just wanted to make a little movie for school and everyone treated us like we thought we were as powerful as Hollywood. The reason I’m writing this is cause I found who has the rights to Take My Breath Away. They laughed at me. Literally laughed at me on the phone, gave me this ridiculous list of things I had to do, and basically told me I couldn’t do it. It was the clearances department at Paramount Pictures. I told Ron Newcomer, a mentor of mine and professor, and he said he knows a company that helps get rights to music and things for small productions. He’s gonna help us out. He told me to write up a list of exactly what I’ll need for the whole film and he’ll contact his contact and see what it’s gonna cost. I probably won’t pull that string for a while now. I wanna make sure I cover everything I need so we just do it once.

Breakdown Complete

So I was able to find some time yesterday to work on the shooting schedule, ok well I didn’t find time, I made time by skipping my management class. Oh well. I just got a B on the first test with out studying…although this is the second time I’ve taken this course. Anyway, back to the movie. So I spent a good part of yesterday in the computer lab in the music building and finished the break down. I started moving the strips around but haven’t really started to get a feel for the schedule. I know I’m gonna shoot all the tunnels stuff at the same time and all the IHOP stuff at the same time. But I knew this writing the script. I’m excited to get in there tomorrow and really start to work out a schedule.

Biographical Insightful Things

So lunch with Dan didn’t happen. Dan called and canceled, said he didn’t get a chance to read the script. Which is fine anyway. The meeting was contingent upon weather or not Dan would get a chance to read the script. I started Tuesday, and used yesterday, working on the Character sketches for the film. I’m taking each character in the film and writing a sort of half a page biographical insightful thing. It’s good so that when I go back through draft three to fix some plot holes I can hone down just who my characters are and fix and rearrange their dialogue. Most writers do what I did first and then write the screenplay with a general plot in mind. I wrote the plot with general ideas for the characters and am now kind of back tracking. I’m having a lot of fun because I get to figure out just why these people made the choices they’ve made so far in the screenplay. So far I like this process a lot. I’ve done 7 of the main character. Aric, Matt, Mike, Jeff, Jason, Alaska, and Officer Navarro. I’m gonna try and do 4 or 5 more today. I’ve got 28 to do. I’ve only got about 15 main characters in the story but I want to make sure I know who the info desk guy is. I wanna know where Alaska’s Sorority Sister, Kelly, comes from. I want to know why the RA, Melissa, is so skittish. I’m playing around with the idea of giving these little Biographical Insightful Things to the actors once their cast to help them understand their characters better. Or maybe I’ll just keep them for m e and use them when I’m directing them on the set or helping the actors develop the characters of set.

Talks of Story Boards

I started talking with Dan about storyboarding. He’s gonna read the newest version of the screenplay and we’re gonna probably get together on Sunday to start talking about different visual elements in the film. We wont start storyboarding till march probably. We’re playing around with different options for an artist. I’m terrible and so is he, at least that’s what he says. I have two choices. Drew Mackay who played Afro in LOTD and did all the story boards for that film, or going to the art department and looking for someone who likes to draw. My only hesitation with drew is that his style of drawing is fairly comical and I’d like the story boards to be realistic and not comical in of them selves. I’m also concerned about time commitments in general. It’s going to be hard to schedule the storyboard sessions. Realistically we should meet at least 2 to 3 times a week for a good 2-3 months. But that’s going to be hard to orchestrate.

I’m about 95% done with the breaking down of the current draft and will probably start rearranging the breakdowns into a schedule this afternoon. I’m on page 105 of 111. I love scheduling because it makes the movie look that much easier to make. Although that can be very deceiving. I tried printing a sample sheet at the computer lab where the software is but some error code came up. The lab assistant said she’d try and fix it by Friday. I’ll be sooooooo pissed if I can’t print from this software. The things going to print me about 700-1000 pages in different reports and things. Not to mention I have to make copies of a lot of stuff for cast and crew. Sheesh.

I found out last week that Brandon Hannifin’s agent is telling him not to cut his hair. this frustrates me cause I wont Brandon to play the role but he has to cut his hair. Maybe I can smooth talk him or something.

I still have yet to hear back from a few of the actors I sent scripts too. I’ll email them before I post auditions notices in march.

Take My Posts Away

Sorry it’s been so long since I posted last. I’ve got a lot to due as far as school goes. Trying to get everything ready for my application to the film program and trying to get decent enough grades as well. And the redesign of the AFA isn’t exactly a fast and easy process. But never the less I keep trucking on with stuff for Freshmen. I’m about two weeks behind in my over all schedule. It doesn’t look like Pre-Production will really start until March 1st. It’s not that big of a deal but the more time I have in pre-production the easier the film will be to produce. Oh well. On Wednesday I got a lot done. I finished the new re-type of the screenplay as well as getting about 60% of the way through the Board. I say re-type as apposed to re-write cause I’m not ready to send this new draft out. I still need to go through it and fix things that I had changed halfway through the re-write, like the plot thing with the Police Aide. But I did finish the re-type of everything I’ve written so far. I’ve got 111 pages. I cut 23 pages from the other draft. It really shows. I’m going to start working on the timeline spread sheet thing to help me lock in my Police Aide plot line before I type it into the screenplay.

I spent the better part of Wednesday, who am I kidding, 8.5 hours of Wednesday in the computer lab at school making the board. I got to page 66 of the current re-write with 165 scenes having 192 break downs. Logically you’d think that I’d have 165 break downs, one per scene. But I’m taking into account that I have to shoot some scenes in two locations or at two different times. So I split them into two, even 3 break down sheets. For example I have a scene where Officer Ashton, while driving down the road, answers a call on his radio. Well the police are never gonna let are actor drive down a road and us get the shots of him driving. So we’ll have to do the interior of the vehicle in the parking lot of the police station most likely. But we need the shot of the cruiser driving down the street. So we’ll have an actual police officer drive the cruiser down the street and get a wide shot. These are two different filming events so I need to break down sheets for both scenes. Another reason I’ve got so many break down sheets are montages. I’ve got a few montages in the film and each part of the montage requires a separate break down sheet. I hope to finish the Schedule by November 17th.

I started looking for the rights to Take My Breath Away by Berlin. I had a great to use the song in a scene. I’m gonna see who has them and how much the rights are gonna crash.

Just a little background on what a break down sheet is: a break down sheet for a scene is what it sounds like. It’s a piece of paper with the following information on it. What scene were shooting, who’s in it, how long it is, where it needs to be filmed, what the location is supposed to be, what props are needed, what costumes are needed, a synopsis of the scene, what page number the scene takes place on, what special effects the scene requires, etc, etc. these are used so to schedule the film shoot. You arrange similar break down sheets together and shoot the scenes all at the same time. Usually these are arranged by location or an actors schedule (if the actors worth it ;))

Nearing the End, Getting on Board

As of Yesterday I was on page 95 of the re-write and Page 114 of the Printed out second draft. So I’m nearing the end. It’s looking like this 3rd draft will be about 110 pages. I’ll finish it up at work tomorrow. I’ve made another drastic decision and decided to drop the surface terrorist plot of the film. I’ll leave it in the subtext so it will come through but the characters will never address it. Instead I’m actually going to add another plot point with the female Police aid steeling computers from the buildings. When the Facman guys took us for a location scout they had told us about it. So it fits in with the true story. It will also give reward to the cops who, doing there job, aren’t rewarded in the current draft. I want to make sure that all the characters actions are understandable and that there is no real villain other than miss conclusion. We’ll see how it goes.

Because the first 50 pages of the screenplay will change very little with this new addition I decided to go ahead and start to Shooting Schedule (Board). I was able to break down 44 scenes. Well really 40 but some scenes got broken into two breakdown sheets. I did this because I know that I’m going to shoot different shots in the scene at different times on different days. For example I’m going to shoot the cop cars driving at different times I’m going to shoot the close ups of the officers driving. The police will never let us have actors drive there police cars around so we’re going to have to do the two things on different days. One day we’ll get the shot of the car driving; probably have an actual police officer drive. And then do the insert of the close up of our actors in the police station parking lot on another day. Anyway I finished about 10%-15% done with the initial break down. I know this because for each scene, except for the situation above, is broken down into one break down sheet. So the screenwriting software tells me that I have 264 scenes so far in this third draft. So that means at least I’m going to have to make 280 break down sheets. Wish me luck

Board and Budget REALLY Begins (not really)

So I’m now on page 91 of the printed out version and on page 71 of the re-write. Yes, so far I’ve cut 20 pages. But they were pages that need to be cut.

I started the Board and Budget yesterday, well, not really. I went over to the computer lab to see if they fixed the bug. I played around with the program, adding locations, adding cast members, etc. really it was a Data Entry Power Hour. After using the program for about an hour I did some experiments with it as far as saving and restarting and stuff. Everything seems to be fixed which excites me. Doing the board and budget is probably one of my favorite parts of the producing process. It’s great when you take this huge daunting task of a 100 page screenplay and break it down into elements so that when you look at you can say “wow, this won’t be hard at all”. Of course that’s not the case but it does look like it.

Drinking with Dan and Timeline Spread Sheets

So Monday didn’t exactly happen the way I had planned. I really wanted to work on the screenplay. I had already made a previous commitment to go out to dinner with Dan and Colin, partly as a business meeting and partly as a celebration for both their birthdays. Colin 22 and Dan 21. We went to this awesome little brewery down the street at around 6:30pm. I expected to be done around 8 and to get to my screenplay. We started drinking and the next thing I new it was 11:00 and we we’re drunk at the hot tub at my apartment complex with Dan, Coin, Molly, Brandon and some of Dan’s friends. Needless to say I didn’t get any work done on the screenplay. Well that’s not entirely true. I did work on it earlier in the day and got a few pages out. But anyway, the night was fun. Colin and I are already good friends but we got to know Dan a lot better, which is good if we want to work together.

I’m nearing the end of this draft and as soon as I’m done I’m going to be doing a few things. The first is the board and budget. The second is character arc breakdowns. So far the weakest thing in the screenplay is the character Arcs. A lot of my characters change very little so I’m going to need to do some re-writes of scenes later on. But the plot is locked and not going to change. The third thing I’m going to do is a re-edit of my timeline reference spread sheet. I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this in here before so I’ll go over it briefly. It’s an excel file that has a time line of the night and in what location each character is in at anytime during the night. It’ll help me with the scene re-writes. So I’ll do the board and budget and really dive into pre-production while doing re-writes probably right up to the day before production starts.