Standing Firm : Blog

Today was an interesting day.  Eric was coming to my house to shoot his interview and give the ADR a shot.  It was to see how the whole process would go and to see what I might need to fix/change before we REALLY give it a go.  We shot the interview first and thankfully sound issues were at a minimum.  At one point the lawncare guys at my neighbors house turned on their blowers for a few minutes and we waited but beyond that the audio came in nice and clear.  Eric did a good job.  This was actually the second time we did his interview because last time we rushed and barely got any footage to use and missed talking about a lot of valuable things.  I was glad to have another shot at it, and it’s always fun to remember things from the shoot.  Even bad things can be brought up but now laughed about because they are long gone.  I think you will all enjoy what Eric has to say.

We went upstairs and I walked him through how the process would go for the ADR.  Just to at least have him give it a shot we tried some very simple lines and he found out quickly that it’s much more difficult than it seems.  Placing your lines perfectly in sync is one thing, matching and delivering performance is another altogether.  It will be a challenge for everyone I suspect that has ADR.  God will bring us through though.  He has so far

I must say it was nice to wake up and work on the film while still being at my own home.  It will be nice to stay at home and work on this thing.  I’ve done it all along with the edit but in terms of actually having lots to do, I’ll be able to do it at my house.  Today when Eric arrived I was unashamed greeting him in a t-shirt and pajama pants.  It was the most relaxing shooting time ever!

The amount of ADR to do is minimal considering how much could’ve been done.  I think God really had his hand on us since the scenes we’ve been reshooting have been some of our problem scenes in the audio arena.  We still have one or two that will be a very big challenge for us (and are outside so reshooting is impossible), but with some time and elbow grease you’ll never even know there was changes.  Sound rarely gets the attention it should in films, I’m going to do whatever I can to make sure the audio is the best it possibly can be.

Later on I rushed to the church to quickly try and grab some inserts I need for the film.  There is a scene that takes place in the sanctuary and a conversation that happens in the back of the sanctuary while a play practice is going on.  This means I need the play practice environment recorded and the inserts to sync with the audio track I lay under everything.  Even the conversation needs the environment track laid under it and mixed so the practice going on is still in motion while the talk takes place.  I don’t have lav mics, so doing things wirelessly wasn’t possible.  Also, Maggie wasn’t there (something I didn’t know) so I was only able to get the shots that didn’t include her.  I’ll have to grab those on a random Sunday when she and I have time.  I hooked up a Hyper-cardioid mic to the other Canon XHA1 we have at our disposal to record the audio of the room.  The Rode NT3 was used for all of our indoor recording and has a very rich studio sound to it.  It also picks up more signature of the room (unlike a shotgun) and that came in handy in some instances (like this one).  I was running around with the other Canon XHA1 (without an adapter so I could move quickly and run all over the place) and grabbing my shots quickly.  How I will sync the shots is I pointed Cam B (the one I was running around with) at someone I know before everyone began, ran both cameras, and had him clap 3 times in a row so I could sync the audio later.  Crude but it works!  Welcome to low-budget filmmaking folks!  Everyone who was there besides Katy (playing Maggies mom) had no idea they were going to end up in the film.  Up until about an hour before I didn’t even think things were going to work out!  I’m glad I was able to get my shots no matter how crazy and nutty things really were.

That’s all for now.  Everyone have a Happy Easter!  Never forget our Savior and what He did!

This entry was posted on Friday, April 10th, 2009 at 5:58 pm and is filed under Post-Production, Production. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.