Another simple visual effect is when you have a character talking to her twin, as in the movie Parent Trap, or in an episode of Drop Dead Diva that Bethany directed, or an episode of Wizards of Waverly Place that Mary Lou directed. You will shoot the plate for the master with a locked-down camera, meaning that there is no movement. Then you shoot the first actor doing the scene, with the camera still in its locked-down position. (The actor will interact with a stand-in, someone who will be replaced visually later.) The VFX supervisor may have to physically take some measurements in the set if the actor being duplicated moves a lot. Be prepared to start and stop the scene and be specific with the coordinator when you want to see both actors simultaneously and when you expect to be in tighter coverage. After completing one side, the actor moves to the other side of the frame in the set, and does the other half of the dialog. Those three takes, all with a locked-down camera, will be married together, or composited, to create the scene. For the OS shots, you’ll use a double with wardrobe and wig. The Patty Duke Show in the 1960s used the same process—sometimes the old and simple ways are the best. You can also use this process whenever you are portraying something in the frame “disappearing”: film the background plate with a locked-down camera, film it with the object in the frame, and then—while still rolling—remove it. The VFX team will composite the three images, creating simple film “magic”!
CGI AND BLUE SCREEN
There are also new ways to do visual and special effects: these are the ones used by Peter Jackson to portray Gollum in the Lord of the Rings trilogy and by James Cameron to portray his Na’vi characters in Avatar. Motioncapture involves having an actor in a Lycra suit play the scene against a blue screen with digital electrodes attached all over his body, which allows a computer to duplicate the body language when the character has morphed into its other-than-human shape. The blue screen is replaced with whatever environment has been designed. (The color of the screen is dictated by other colors needed within the scene. If there’s already lots of blue, then you’ll use a green screen, and vice versa.) According to Dave A. Anselmi, director and producer at Practical Mystic Productions, “It’s best to minimize the amount of blue/green-screen, and/or make sure you work very closely with the VFX supervisor to confirm the feasibility and cost of the shot.” In planning a scene using blue screen, you’ll want to design shots (probably the coverage) that do not use blue screen, just to keep your costs down. The artists and other staff required to create these fantasies can total in the hundreds, but the process for the director of describing the vision and then communicating about it through the process from idea to finished product is basically the same as when shooting any other scene.
There is a natural evolution during such a process because it’s a collaborative effort. Your stunt coordinator, your VFX supervisor, or anyone contributing to the realization of the concept may propose a method to which you respond. You may say, “Hey, that’s a great idea! How can we incorporate that into what we’re doing?” There will be many a discussion around the conference table. One good idea will lead to another.
You will be the one who assesses whether the new idea fits or derails what you’re going for and whose enthusiasm will fire everyone up so that they want to help create something cool, new, or big. Everybody in this business got into it because they love making movies: telling a story visually. They then specialize in various areas of contribution to the finished product, offering their expertise in service of your vision. The continuing evolution of an idea may also happen because the first way you tried to achieve it didn’t work, and you have to think of something better, which is why you rehearse multiple times during prep and refine the gag until it’s ready to shoot.
You will be the one who assesses whether the new idea fits or derails what you’re going for and whose enthusiasm will fire everyone up so that they want to help create something cool, new, or big.
CHOREOGRAPHY
Another specialized area of filmmaking that requires a lot of rehearsal is choreography. Choreography used to be a fairly rare occurrence in TV, until Glee came along. (Every genre rises and falls in popularity with the years; Bonanza and Gunsmoke and The Big Valley were all over TV in the 1960s, but there’s nary a Western to be seen now.) When your script calls for music and dance, you will undergo a similar process in prep as with any other specialized aspect: you will discuss your vision, hire someone (a choreographer) to help you, and rehearse and refine until shooting. It helps a great deal to have some personal background in the arena so you know the vocabulary and can express your vision more clearly. (It’s easier to say, “Let’s see if an arabesque will work here,” than “Can you do that thing where your back leg sticks out and one hand is in the air and you’re on your tippytoes?”) You will attend rehearsals after the choreographer has sketched out the basic concept and communicate your responses and suggestions, in addition to determining what your camera positions will be, based on what you’ve observed. If you have a music background, be specific referring to the precise moment to which you are referring. (“Can he enter two measures or bars later?” or “I need a gesture to punctuate the trumpet sting.”) Also be aware that choreographers work by counting sequentially usually in units of eight (“One, two, three, four, five six, seven eight; Two, two, three, four, five six, seven eight; Three, two, three, four, five six, seven eight” and so on). If you don’t have any background in this area, just make sure that you talk about the feeling and the energy you’re looking for. If you are working to a song, refer to the lyric. If you can find some other excerpt from another film that can be used as a reference point, that’s very helpful. As we talked about in Chapter 4, just as one man’s red is different from another’s, so is one man’s “jazzy” style from another’s. The music element will follow the same process (discuss, rehearse, refine), although it must be chosen before the cast and dancers assemble to rehearse to it. In that arena, you’ll have a composer and a music supervisor to assist you.
Telling a Story to Music
Choose a piece of music. Working from either the music or the lyrics, summarize your story in a paragraph. Mark shots measure by measure (music) or line by line (lyric) that complement your music. Make sure that your story has a beginning, middle, and end. (If you are stumped for a plot, use “Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy finds girl again.” Or use a country and western song that tells a story.) When you are finished, you’ll have the annotated song, the story, and the shot list.
When you watch a movie or TV show, you watch the story as it unfolds and emotionally go along for the ride. And then you remember that nothing is there by chance. Every single thing in the frame is a choice. It’s an awesome responsibility for the director to have. We are fortunate to have such experienced and accomplished crews to back us up, to make suggestions, to work so hard to make our dreams become a reality. If you don’t know much about stunts, or special effects, or any other part of the filmmaking world, you will have people to help you. They’ll be happy to teach you and walk you through it. It’s best to confess your naïveté and solicit their assistance. They will still look to you for the inspiration and the imagination; you’re the one who has the vision. You are still the final arbiter, the voice that says in the beginning, “This is how I imagine it will look,” and who says after it’s shot, “That was wonderful, exactly what I was hoping for. Thank you.”
Insider Info
How Do You Work With Directors?
When working with directors, I feel it’s best to discuss visual effects using some type of visual aid, such as storyboards, concept art, movie references, photos, or anything that visually can be a starting point to talk about ideas. Not all directors have the same amount of experience or comfort with visual effects, so the visual aids help refine ideas and explain limitations that might exist due to budget or schedule. I try to never tell a director that something is impossible, and if time and money were no object then that would be true, but even in a movie like Avatar there a
re compromises due to release dates and resources.
On set, my goal is always to make the VFX process efficient and painless. I believe that the visual effects should never get in the way of actors’ performances or the director’s storytelling. In fact, I perceive my trade as just another tool for the director to tell a good story.
What Do You Want Directors to Know About VFX?
The camera move always affects visual effects in complexity and cost. If shooting the same shot three different ways, as a lock-off, nodal move (pan or tilt), or free move (dolly, Steadicam, or crane), the lock-off will generally be the least expensive and least complex option, a nodal camera the middle option, and a free move the most complex choice. With that said, often a more complicated camera move can also be accomplished economically. For example, if shooting a VFX shot on a dolly, sometimes the beginning of the shot can be a nodal pan or tilt, then once the camera is off the section that is visual effects, it’s possible to do a push-in on the practical portion of the set.
What is Your Advice to Young Directors?
My advice when working with visual effects is to always plan ahead as far in advance as possible and to stick with that plan on the day of shooting. Last-minute changes to visual effects shooting plans can sometimes become costly in postproduction or not give you the desired look that you want. That does not mean that VFX can’t be flexible on set, but always discuss any changes with your on-set VFX supervisor.
My second piece of advice is to express your opinions, constructively, on how you feel a shot could look better. Even if you think that your suggestion might be prohibitive due to time or money, bring it up anyway because another solution might be available to accomplish the same result. Any suggestion is worth listening to, especially if it results in a better-looking VFX shot.
Tony Pirzadeh
Producer/Supervisor, VFX
Stargate Studios
Vocabulary
blue/green screen
breakaway
CGI
composited
courtesy screen
doubled
dry runs
emancipated
gag
half-speed
land
locked-down
moleskin
motion-capture
on the day
plate
principal
rig
shoot out
stand-in
studio teacher
Chapter 13
Running the Set
We all know that directors say, “Action!” and “Cut!” We’ve heard that in cartoons, in movies about movies, and in just the everyday vernacular of American lives. But there are also many other things that directors say as part of the logistics of running the set. Someone has to say the things that indicate to both cast and crew, “What are we all doing now?” Just as there is a vocabulary for actors, there is a vocabulary for directors. And the purpose of it is to keep things on the set running smoothly.
After Bethany’s first directing job, an episode of the 1980s NBC show St. Elsewhere, her boss called her into his office. His name was Bruce Paltrow (Gwyneth’s father) and he had created the show and was the executive producer. He closed the door and proceeded to pace as he angrily dressed her down. He told her she’d done a bad job, and that just because he told her that she was the captain of the ship, it wasn’t so until she actually steered the boat around. Though she was devastated by his criticism, she understood later, when the sting had diminished and he had assigned her another episode to direct, that he had two underlying purposes for this reaction to her initial directing efforts. The first one was, in effect, to say, “Hey, this is a tough business. If you’re going to stay in it, you’d better get tough too.” (More on this in Section Four, when we talk about stress and mental health!) The other reason was to emphasize this concept of not just saying you’re a director, but being one—doing all it takes to inhabit the job. You have to actually steer that ship and make the cast and crew go where you want them to go. And the director’s vocabulary provides a shorthand that everyone understands.
So let’s go back to action and cut. “Action” means begin and “cut” means stop. It’s what directors say to actors to start and end a shot (or take.) Simple. And yet … not. The director should be sensitive to the actors’ emotional point of view when beginning the scene and fit the starting command to suit that mood. In other words, don’t shout “ACTION!” when the actors are in a fragile place, and don’t whisper it when they’re about to do some action sequence. Ideally, you, the director, are standing right behind the camera, in the same space as the actors, and therefore the command to begin is appropriate to the physical space and the scene timbre. Though the word “action” is nigh onto Pavlovian for actors in the sense that hearing the word definitely shoots them out of the starting gate, there are other options—especially when rehearsing. As Clint Eastwood does, you could just say, “Go ahead.”
HOW DO YOU START?
Before you can say “action” to begin shooting a shot, you and the actors have to figure out what that action is by rehearsing. Holding sides, which are the script pages for only that day in hand, you ask the actors to just read through the scene, then you get it on its feet by physically moving around the set, and then you continue until you and the actors think the physical blocking is correct. It often helps for you, the director, to stand where the camera is planned to be because the actors will naturally orient themselves toward you. It also helps to put obstacles (like furniture) in their path or put props where you want them to be, in order to facilitate your planned blocking. That way, you don’t have to discuss or validate your prepped blocking as much—a lot of the physicality is done for you without using any words. (The set dresser and the prop assistants will put things where you want them before the actors are invited to set for rehearsal.) The crew (except for the DP, your AD, and the script supervisor) has been taking a coffee break nearby but away from the set, so you can conduct this time with your actors in a private (or closed) rehearsal. When you confirm with your actors that they are comfortable with the blocking (and you are too) you say, “Let’s mark it,” and your 1st AD calls it out over the walkie-talkie. He will say, “Marking rehearsal!” and the crew gathers. You and the actors run through the scene again, and the 2nd assistant cameraperson puts color-coded tape marks on the floor at each stopping place for each actor. When that is over, you say, “Thank you, second team please.” The actors are the first team and their stand-ins are the second team. The actors scatter back to their dressing rooms to finish wardrobe, hair, and makeup, and the stand-ins take their places on the marks that have been set. Now is your opportunity to confer with your DP and talk about the overall approach to the scene. You discuss lighting (as a general topic, like whether it’s a bright morning or a moonless night) and you agree on the angle, movement, and lenses of the first shot. (You’ll use the terminology we discussed in Chapter 8.) The DP may have conferred with you during prep, especially if you’ve predetermined that you wanted to use a special piece of equipment or if the scene requires extraordinary lighting. But now is the time to nail down the particulars. You’ve probably seen footage in DVD extra features of directors, walking backwards, holding their index and middle finger in a “V” shape. That is the director describing the movement of the dolly and what the camera will “see.” See Figure 13-1.
FIGURE 13-1 Bethany (holding sides) is lining up a shot with her DP, John Smith, in front of the digital camera (an Arriflex Alexa) on the set of Brothers & Sisters. (Brothers & Sisters trademarks and copyrighted material have been used with the permission of ABC Studios.)
It often helps for you, the director, to stand where the camera is planned to be because the actors will naturally orient themselves toward you.
Then, while the crew works, you have a little free time—you can go over your script, take care of details and decisions for upcoming scenes, or simply take a coffee break yours
elf!
After the lighting is complete, the camera crews will rehearse the shot with the stand-ins. This is your opportunity to watch the monitor to make sure that the shot will be executed as you had planned. Now you can make adjustments to the shot, freeing you up to be next to the camera during shooting. You will probably be checking the shots of two cameras, rather than one, as that is the norm now in order to facilitate the amount of coverage that is required in a day.
After a few of these rehearsals, the DP will indicate to the AD that the crew is prepared to begin shooting. The actors come to set and you will conduct what is called a stop-and-go rehearsal. You stop when some issue needs addressing, whether it’s a question from an actor or from the dolly grip, the camera operator, or the boom man. Everyone works out the kinks of the execution of the scene and then you’re ready to shoot. You say, “Picture up!” Upon hearing that from you, your AD will call out, “Last looks!” which means the actors will get their final touches. The hair, makeup, and wardrobe assistants will step onto the set to make sure the actors look perfect. When the beauty team departs the set, the AD will say, “Let’s go on a bell.” A bell sounds throughout the stage, and everyone quiets. The AD says, “Roll it, please,” and the sound mixer will turn on his recorder. When the recorder has reached the appropriate speed, the boom operator will announce it by saying “Speeding,” and then the 1st assistant camera operator turns on the camera and says, “Rolling.” At that point, the 2nd assistant camera operator steps in front of the camera and hits the slate. Everyone has seen one—the film business has been using them since the first talkie movie was made. The slate is filmed at the top of each take, giving the editor the pertinent information: scene number, take number, director’s name, and DP’s name. When the slate is “hit,” a sound is made, and the film element and the separately recorded sound element can be synced, or put together. If you are shooting digital, rather than film, the process is the same—there is still a slate, and the sound is still recorded separately. The assistant returns to behind the camera, the operator’s eye is on the eyepiece, the microphone is held overhead by the boom operator. The actors are on their starting marks. And everyone waits, in silent anticipation, for you to say, “Action.”
Directors Tell the Story Page 21