Behind the Scenes 5: Flashback, Desert Wasteland



Carlos Rubio multi-tasks as DP and MJ's father in this flashback

 Our flashback scene proved to be a creative and smooth endeavor for Desert Wasteland.

 

Today's scene focused on movement shots to creatively portray Melania's childhood memory (played by Taylor Vau).

The challenges we faced were small yet critical; we needed to shoot this scene after the sun went down, but before Taylor's bedtime. We had two crane shots, a slider, and several close-ups to take care of before then.

Taylor Vau playing MJ



 We set up and rehearsed camera and crane movements as quickly as possible as we raced against the setting New Mexico sun.

Our first crane shot proved to be the trickiest as it was a on a dolly. As the dolly moves forward, the camera swipes down from the sky ending close to the ground. Any slightest bit of dirt on concrete will severly affect the shot- the area must be thoroughly swept.

The race of time was the fire that was keeping us moving. We finished all our shots just in time for bed : )

Rubio and Vau rehearse the scene

Levi Hart, editor & AC, sits in for lighting

: )

Behind the Scenes 4: Desert Wasteland

Script supervisor/set decorator Melisa Aragon prepares the set

Assistant Director Ronnie Stepney is ready to go

Day 6 on set of Desert Wasteland: "The 14th take wonder"

Our day consisted of a slider shot ending on a rack focus. This shot proved to be tricky because the timing of the actor's actions and camera movements needed to sync perfectly.

The essense of this scene lies in the sybolism behind the actions of the actors and camera. In this scene MJ (played by Jade Diaz) is giving herself to her boyfriend Steve (Kasey Seats) who later betrays her and destroys her life.

The slider moves across the scene, racking on MJ's actions, ending on a clock-which racks to a shirt that she throws ontop of. Sound confusing? Several rehearsals and shots later (16 total takes) we finally got it right. (Getting the shirt to land just right on the clock proved to be a challenge)

The scene flew by quickly and ended sweetly.

Rehearsals are a beautiful thing, never let them go to waste. : )

"Let's get this goin"

Carlos Rubio prepares the slider

Camera view of slider

Behind the Scenes 3: The Making of Desert Wasteland

Our break-in scene proved to be another challenging, fun set.

In this scene, we had two thiefs (actors Ronnie Stepney and Angelo Sanchez) "break in" M's house. We had originally planned on obtaining sound effects for the breakage of the window...

 But what fun and excitement would that be?! We were determined to film this as real as possible...

Carlos Rubio gluing the glass into place

We wanted to break glass for realism but not necessarily an actual window; we had to rack our brains and inventory for something we could glue to an open window and actually break.

Rubio loads the glue gun

Then it hit us- glass from a picture frame we had. We took the frame apart and hot glued the glass into the frame of the open window. The drawback here, folks, is you only get one shot to get it right. Unless, of course, you happen to have several picture frames at your disposal...

Reflections... are we inside or out?

Our counterstep? Two cameras rolling on both sides of the window breaking shot...

A brilliant idea!

Rubio ready for action

The begining stages of prop making...

Turning blocks of wood into "bricks"

Our next step in preparing the set was to make the props the thiefs were after...

To show that Melania is a trusted drug hustler of the cartel, we decided to make props that resembled "bricks" of drugs.

Levi Hart concentrates as he wraps the wood in duct tape

Fake money was the easy part, now we needed to figure out a way to make inexpensive props that look realistic.

  

Through our extensive research, we came to realize that most seized drug packages appear similar to bricks tapped and sealed up. (Hence the slang term "bricks" for drug packages)

 Our first idea was to get actual bricks and wrap them up in duct tape...Then we realized we had no bricks to tape up.

We began searching our inventory for anything that resembled a box that we could tape up. Fortunately, Rubio found planks of wood that could be cut down to the perfect size.

Duct tape came in real handy on set today

"Am I doing this right?"

We wrapped several blocks of wood with different colored tape. For an added effect of realism, Rubio got a small bag of mixed dark spices and taped it on top of the block of wood. Cutting an X across the taped spices gives the illusion that block of wood is full of the substanance peeking out.

Rubio adds an effect for realism

The finished products (minus the coffee mug)

 The Shoot!

Finally, it was time to shoot.

We began by filming the introduction as many ways as possible before we moved to the actual breaking in shot.

The anticipated moment we all had eagerly been waiting for came and went surprisingly fast. Apparently, our actor (Sanchez) was just as eager as we were!

The built up anticipation served us profoundly. Ahh, the serendipity. : )

Behind the Scenes 2: Desert Wasteland

Here is a behind the scenes look at day 4 of Desert Wasteland:

 

Jade Diaz and Kasey Seats were all smiles for the dating montage

Our third day of shooting was for a dating montage between MJ and Steve (played by Jade Diaz and Kasey Seats) 

 Our challenge today was to effectively show the passage of time in one day of shooting.

One of our keys components of portraying this time passage was having movement in each shot. We began with a night scene on a sliding rack focus shot.

 

A morning breakfast scene

Stepney, also on sound today, finds a comfortable hidden spot for the shot

Rubio and Brindis set up a passage of time shot

We quickly moved throughout the day with actors changing wardrobe after each shot. Our most difficult shot included a pan showing the passage of time with the actors in different spots. While the actors changed wardrobe, natural shadows and lighting were quickly changing at an alarming rate. We moved as quickly as possible and were able to get our shot. 

MJ and Steve once shared love

The owners of a nearby horse ranch were kind enough to allow us to shoot a few shots there. Unfortunately, our AD Ronnie Stepney is allergic to horses, and had to sit this one out. 

Script Supervisor Melissa Aragon goes over daily notes

All in all, we had a successful day of production- which Camera Hogs crew celebrated with steaks afterwards... : )

Aragon prepares a take close to the ranch horses

 

Behind the Scenes: Desert Wasteland

Here's a peek behind the scenes of Desert Wasteland Day 3:

Joseph Inveire captures sound as the Camera Hogs crew surrounds the car

Our third day began on a bright and early morning on a ranch in the desert.

In this scene, our main character Melania Jovino (aka M.J played by Jade Diaz) is castigated by two men of the cartel, El Jefe and El Ocho(Basil Pena & Richard Beserra).

Levi Hart bounces light onto Jefe as Marilyn Brindis captures a POV shot

Two cameras (Rubio and Brindis) were used to film this scene from different angles inside and outside of the car. The scene begain with Rubio on a crane from atop a sandy hill and Brindis covering shots from inside the car.

Natural light and bounce boards were used to light our actors.

Script supervisor Melissa Aragon attentively watches the scene

The scene flowed smoothly the entire morning, ending with Rubio on a steadycam and Brindis getting static close-ups.

 

 

 

After a nice 5 hour break, the crew was back to work for our second desert scene...This time at night.

 

 

Positioning cars for the shot

Our desert night scene was our toughest scene yet. 

Our first obstacle was figuring a way to effectively light the scene, as we were unable to obtain a quiet and reliable generator that could power sufficient light.

We instead improvised using headlights of cars, a large fire, and very low lens aperatures.

   

Actors rehearse around the fire while cars get into position

By positioning the cars in a half circle around the fire, we were able to capture desirable high contrast lighting to fit this intense scene.

After a long and careful application of makeup, (courtesy of Gary Vau Jr.) actor Kasey Seats is ready to be mangled... "Playing the lead role of Steve is completely different than my other roles," Seats remarked. In this scene Steve gets wiped out by MJ and her cronies. "I like being the bad guy for once."

Actor Kasey Seats gets the beating of a lifetime

Our scene seemed to be flowing nicely until we ran into another obstacle... The cars could not sustain the light for as long as we needed- batteries began dying. We began a system of running cars between takes and jumping the ones that needed it.

What a great crew and cast! We were able to shoot this intensly lit scene thanks to everyone's much appreciated effort and work!

 Camera Hogs gives a huge thanks to everyone that came out and helped work on this set!

Updates!

It has been a few weeks since our last post- as Camera Hogs have been diligently working on our very own production, Desert Wasteland. Here's a sneak peek behind the scenes under production:

Carlos Rubio setting up the steady-cam

 

 

Our first two nights consisted of two party scenes, both exterior night shoots.

A Camera Hogs Moon

To light these night scenes, Rubio devised and

constructed a synthetic moon with a 1K off

an 8X8 bounce board .

 

 

Our AD Ronnie Stepney knows how to get the party started









  

To further light the scene, we built a small camfire  (this also kept our actors and extras warm and happy).



Our own stuff

In addition to the assemblage of activities Camera Hogs has lined up, we are working on projects and films of our own as well.

With the new edition of the Camera Hogs trailer, graciously provided by Carlos Rubio, Camera Hogs is on wheels and ready shoot everything we can.
 
Our big current production is my own, Desert Wasteland- a drama series that encompasses the life of a girl consumed in the vicious world of border-land crime. We've spent most of the month building more equipment for our arsenal (Thanks to Carlos, our equipment-architect), story-boarding, location scouting, casting, rehearsing, more location scouting, more rehearsing, locking down locations etc, etc... (I think you get the point) Hard work always pays off! We are set to shoot three scenes this weekend, plus a scene from Flash Amadeus-by Gary Vau Jr. (Wish us luck!)

We are also currently in the process of producing short promotional videos for Camera Hogs. We have started shooting our first and anticipate the finished product in about a week. Be on the lookout for our first ever Camera Hogs promotional video, coming soon!