On set

I wrote out a production plan which I had not previously done on previous work - but I found this to be really helpful - everyone knew what they were doing and when and it was easy to stick to a time schedule - I had been very in depth with the planning and given 10 minutes for people to say hi, and 10 other minutes to reset up lights and cameras for different shots and scenes.

As the location was my house, specifically my room, I found it easier to set the scene before others arrived and set the lights and my own camera up, as when Georgie and one of the actresses arrived, we would only have to set up Georgie's camera and put the actress in position to read the script or actually start filming her. With the first few takes we found that the tascam wasn't working properly, it was useful to have had this problem and recognise it in the first takes rather than at the end - we eventually realised that you had to press the record button twice to record the audio. Another problem we had was that the room was very narrow to film in, which we couldn't have helped. It wasn't until everyone had left and hours after the shoot I realised we forgot an important angle for the conversation we had planned on the bed, however I suggested to Georgie (who was editing) that if we cut the bit out where we see Lila sit down, we might get away with the audience thinking that she was still standing and, by some chance, the actresses read through the entire script while the camera was on Lila as a close up of her face, so we could use that footage to fill.

I think that forgetting that specific shot type may have been due to the fact it was only myself and Georgie as the crew to operate 2 cameras, sound and lighting as well as direct and follow the script. We tried to get two others to assist on shoot taking the pressure off of my and Georgie, however both were unable for the date and time we would be filming. I learned from this that in future to have a number of crew members to have a specific job to make it easier on myself.

From Caught in the Act our editor Natasha had to import the audio and visuals separately, so for this shoot I bought a clapperboard and named the shots and takes as well as reading them aloud at the start of every clip, which made it easier to match up the audio to the visuals, however when Georgie began matching the clips up that night she found that we hadn't done it for every shot or hadn't filled it in properly for every shot. Again, I think that had we had more crew this wouldn't have been an issue.