It takes some getting used to

Last night was my first time going up in the condor in almost a year. Although I’m not normally too terribly afraid of heights, it does take me a bit to adjust to being in a lift after extensive periods of time spent on terra firma.

We were shooting on a Y-shaped studio lot street, so we used three condors. Mine was the lowest, armed out over the intersection, mimicking various streetlights. This had two advantages. It kept me lower, so there was less adjustment panic, and since I was a few feet below the tops of the facades, I was sheltered from the wind (spring has not yet sprung here in Los Angeles, so it’s still a bit brisk at night, especially up in the air).

The other two condors, at opposite ends of the street, were ‘full stick’ (meaning they were at full extension of 80 feet, almost straight up) and at the mercy of the wind and fog.

At least it didn’t rain, but the billowing clouds did make for some entertaining nighttime viewing:

The operators in the other two condors told me that the wind died down after about an hour, so everyone had an easy night.

Most terrifying night in a condor ever was the night I was armed out over the LA river for an elaborate car chase scene – my base was on one of the bridges and my bucket was full stick, so the distance to ground was about 200 feet. Adding to the terror spawned by an overactive imagination was a windy night and a very ‘bendy’ condor arm (some of the arms flex more than others).

At the end of the night I think I might have kissed the ground.

Filed under: camera, Photos, studio lots, up all night, Work, aviation, chase scene, condor, light, nature, night, outdoors, overactive imagination, production, studio, transportation

Right down to the wire

Monday and Tuesday were out load out days for the movie, which we’d all taken to calling She Dies in the End.   Loadout days are when we drive the truck back to the rental house, unload it, count it and then call all the other departments to find out if they’ve got any of the items we’re missing, usually extension cords.

We then loaded up the gaffer’s personal equipment and drove it to his storage space (in a hailstorm, of course), and after that I figured I was done for the year. A few days to clean up the disgraceful pigsty that I call an apartment, do the laundry, then get packed up for the annual guilt induced pilgrimage back east to overeat and argue.

But Tuesday, as I was on my way home under suddenly clear blue skies (of course, the rain and hail stopped right as we finished), a friend called me and asked if I was available for Wednesday and Friday for another low budget feature that I suppose we should call Teenage Emo Love.

I thought, for a split second, about saying no, then came to my senses. Of course I was available.

So I spent another 14 hours standing in yet another very small house with only one entrance – a small narrow stairway with no handrail (don’t ask me why they took it off).

Lucky for my knees, I ended up mostly being one of the outside people. I stood on the platform they’d constructed for the big HMIs that were aimed into the second story windows and moved lights around.

I’m back today, for their last day of shooting – which is a split (half day and half night), and then I come home, take a nap and then fly out.

Happy Holidays.

Filed under: hazardous, locations, movies, up all night, Work, California, holidays, movie, rain and hail, transportation, weather

It’s the 6th day that gets you

The problem with six day weeks isn’t days one through five. Those days are fine. Long and filled with silliness, but fine.

Nope it’s the 6th day. That’s the shitty day. The day when one hurts as soon as me gets out of bed. The day when one can’t seem to focus or remember much for longer than a few minutes.

Sunday, I got up, shuffled to the kitchen and stared into the fridge for about a minute before I realized that everything inside had gone bad and would need to be thrown out.

I then did laundry, shuffled around aimlessly and then went back to bed.

I’ve started out our last week tired and unable to think – and  this week will most likely be 14 hours every day with 10 hour turnaround every night.

So I come home and make some incoherent notes and then go to bed.

The posts are there, I just haven’t gotten to them yet – When I can, I’ll go back and actually post them. I know it’s ‘blog cheating’, but it’ll still be entertaining, I promise.

I’m off to work after the Monday 10 hour turnaround for the Tuesday 14 hour  day.

Filed under: cranky, locations, movies, up all night, Work

Friday photo

Condor. This time, I’m not in it. I’ve got several drafts that I’ll polish and post on my one day off this week.

Maybe.

Filed under: camera, locations, movies, Photos, up all night, Work, condor, lighting, night, weekend

Friday Photo

Full Moon

Balloon lights – one lit, one not. These are helium balloons with lights inside of them (hence the name) and they do a very good job of imitating moonlight.  You have to keep them away from trees on windy nights, though, or they pop.

Filed under: locations, Photos, up all night, Work, balloon, faking it, full moon, gaming, helium balloons, light, movie, nature, night, set

Friday Photo

Earlier this week, I worked 40 hours in three days, with a five hour turnaround (one show to another, so there’s no minimum) between day two and day three.

Although I knew it was going to hurt, I wasn’t prepared to still be exhausted two days later.  Guess I’m getting old.

So, since I still can’t think and am planning on doing a lot of napping today, here’s a photo:

From a reality show about cooking (hence the restaurant setting). Careful what you say!

Filed under: camera, cranky, Photos, up all night, Work, photo, reality show

I’ll let someone else do the writing for me today

It’s slow (of course), and while I scan the sky for the predicted light rain tomorrow and listen to the screams of panic coming from the streets, I thought I’d share someone else’s writing with you:

http://www.vulture.com/2012/05/how-long-are-the-days-on-a-movie-set-polone.html

This is post, from a producer, about the hours we sometimes work. He interviews several crew members about the hours and the longest day they’ve had.

It’s funny – I’m so used to the long hours that I forget the rest of the world manages to make a living only working 8 hours a day and finds the concept of a routine 12 hour day to be shocking, inhumane even.

There was a group of people that were trying to pass legislation making it illegal to work more than 14 hours straight, but I think that’s stalled.

So we continue to work 15, 16, 17+ hours and we’re grateful to have any work at all.

And, for the record, the longest “day” I ever worked was 28 hours. I made enough money to pay for a hotel room across the street (because the production wouldn’t) from the downtown location because I was hallucinating and knew I wouldn’t be able to drive home without causing carnage – the bad kind, not the funny kind.

Filed under: hazardous, life in LA, up all night, Work, hours, long days, working

Hurriedmidweekupdate

Ah, how quickly fortunes change.

Monday morning, I was sitting in the living room drinking coffee while reading the paper and figuring out how I was going to space out my “I need work” calls when the phone rang.

It was the best boy of Doctors in Love, wondering if I could come in right away to cover someone who got sick (not seriously, he’s okay now) and had to go home.

I said yes as I was pulling on my pants and running for the door.

I love working on Doctors in Love. It’s a great crew of wonderful people and one never gets beat up too bad. Because of my late call ( I arrived just after lunch), I worked for six hours and got paid for eight (union rules state that I can’t be paid less than eight hours, even if I work less).

Score!

While I was throwing on pants, I got a call from the best boy of Yet Another Cop Show who wanted to know if I could work Tuesday through Thursday.

More awesome. Another crew of wonderful folks who I really like, and much, much closer to my house than Doctors in Love, which shoots all the way across town. Also, I went from zero days to four days in under half-an-hour.

I was to work the set on Tuesday, and then switch over to the rigging crew Wednesday and Thursday. Which, of course, was fine. Work is good. I love work.

Except that they called wrap at 1 am on Tuesday, and call time for the rigging crew was 6 am this morning. After a discussion with the UPM, they decided to ‘force’* my call, but not too much, as I was told to come in at 8 instead of 6.

Which was fine, except that even though they cut me loose right at wrap (yay for gaffers who end the day in a small setup), that still meant getting in a van to go back to crew parking, driving home, taking a shower (can’t sleep if I’m dirty and smelly), getting to bed, settling down, etc..

I fell asleep at 2ish, and had to wake up at 7 to get to work by 8.

So, not much sleep. Lucky for me, we only worked 10 hours.

Right now, I’m trying to stay awake long enough to update the blog and shower before I pass out.

Oh, and the thumb looks much, much better:

Thumb, a week later

It’s still sore, but not as bad as it was. If I bump it against something, I don’t curl up into a ball and cry. Much.

* Normally, one has to have a certain amount of time between when one is dismissed from work for the day and when one has to report back the next day. This amount of time, called turnaround,  can vary depending upon circumstances, but generally is not less than 10 hours.

Filed under: hazardous, locations, mishaps, movies, Photos, up all night, Work, cut, injury, thumb, Work

Friday Photo

Looking down on a street scene from the condor last night.

Filed under: Photos, studio lots, up all night, Work

Get down, get funky. Or something.

Right after I hauled myself out of bed in the morning, I got a call from the best boy  of Reluctant Porn Star to come in and replace someone who’d called in sick.

They were shooting all the way across town in a roller rink that hasn’t seen a remodel since the Carter administration (perfect for a movie set in the 1970′s). After almost two hours of fighting traffic, I dumped my bags in the truck and started changing gels on the lights we had rigged in the ceiling over the rink.

Roller rinks, in case you’re not familiar, are made of sanded and varnished wood, kind of like a basketball court. Ladders and nice smooth antique wood surfaces don’t really go together very well, so we had to keep layout board (4′ by 8′ sheets of heavy cardboard) under the ladders. Which was fine, except that we had a limited amount of time until the company moved inside and having to move the board does tend to slow one down.

As soon as the shooting crew moved inside, the rink got insanely hot. I guess they decided to rely on the building’s AC instead of renting a stand alone industrial one, which never works when one has close to 200 people inside plus a bunch of really hot lights. The smoke machine didn’t help, either.  The stuff they use to make theatrical smoke is supposed to be harmless, but after a while it makes my chest hurt and my eyes burn.

Some of the extras didn’t really know how to roller skate, and were careening around the rink, out of control – one kept smacking into the wall which didn’t hurt anyone, but another crashed into the dolly and took out one of the camera assistants.  Walking through the crowd of unsteady projectiles while carrying a hot light was an added degree of difficulty for the day. Lucky for me I managed to avoid getting hit.

In addition to the work for the day, we shot a music video for the band who were playing in the scene. One of the things I hate about working on music videos is, well, the music.

It’s not that I don’t like music, it’s that I don’t like hearing the same song over and over and over and over. I’m not sure if it’s worse when it’s a song I like or a song I don’t like.

Our last shot of the night was outside in a parking lot visible form the street, also known as paparazzi Christmas.

As soon as they spotted their thespian prey, they crowded as close as they could to the set without violating trespassing laws. Unfortunately, this made it very difficult for the rest of the crew to do our jobs.

When I’ve got a cart full of equipment, I’d really rather use the sidewalks as walking in the roadway is a hazard, but when there are ‘photographers’ blocking the sidewalk and refusing to move because “it’s public property and you can’t make me”  I go in the street and hope for the best.

Luckily this was late at night on a weeknight.

After wrapping, packing the truck and driving back across town, I got home at 1:30 am. Tomorrow, I have to be at work on Been Done Before at 8:30 am.

Filed under: hazardous, life in LA, locations, long long drives, up all night, Work, basketball court, fighting traffic, heat, paparazzi, roller rink, smoke, theatrical smoke