Filming on LocationEvaluation

By: Marija Djikic

The first impression This was the first time for me to direct and be in charge for the

production of a short film. The experience is unbelievable, allowing creativity to develop, mistakes to be spotted and changes to be made. However, filming did not flow as smoothly as I expected to flow. There were unpredictable issues that had to be solved during filming. On the other hand, I find filming of ‘Redemption Dinner’ as an extremely useful project for my future studies because I cooperated with assistants, actors and future cosmographers. This will be fully explained in further writings.

I also consider of the great importance to be fully prepared when it comes to filming day/s. Luckily, me and my team had everything with us so nothing was missing. The only problem was the lack of food for the crew and the box for the ring broke in several pieces so I had to dig for the new one.

This is the beginning of shooting. The actor presenting David is Bojan Zirovic. The main problem with this shot was lighting. Therefore, I had to improvise with turning one lamp on and positioning the other on bellow the camera. Camera technique was not too demanding, as I was supposed to only ‘pan to the right’ and follow actors movement. Cannon was stabilized on the tripod with no tracking needed. After few trials, the shot end up being successful.

-Bird Angle Problems-

The tripod was too short to film the CU over the shoulder shot of David reading his recipe book. However, the chair allowed me to position both me and the tripod on it, so I can film from the right angle. Once the script was written and props were collected, this problem was not spotted. Even though it sounds silly and unimportant, it is. The chair was not stable so approximately 30 minutes was needed to finish this small part of the whole film.

Imagination is important when it comes to problems of this sort.

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This was the final result.

Again-problem with lighting. The lamp we can see on the right side of the picture was very long it nearly reached the flowers. This created the reflection on the vase that did not look quite professional on the camera. In addition to this, glasses made of small crystals looked unnatural and the combination of all these factors seemed unpromising. The only solution was for the lamp to be pulled up near the ceiling, which was done by placing hairpin in between the two metal nods. With a small fear that the lamp will fall and break a working desk, we managed to film this MCU shot.

This is the second day of filming. As ‘Redemption Dinner’ is monodrama genre, and there is Emma’s point of view, Media Plus production company accepted a proposal to lend helmet rig for filming purposes. This allowed us to film flashbacks without any technical problems. Otherwise, POV shots would look unrealistic. On the other hand, the weight of the helmet rig was over the boundaries and the actor- Anja Radulovic had problems when carrying it. But once everything was finished, the outcome proved to be worth it.