Halfway through principal Filming

What luck we've had thus far with the filming of Sarah and the Sock Puppet.

We finished filming on Monday and Tuesday and it all went pretty smooth. Yes, it's amazing. And we got some really great stuff. Doubly amazing.

All the cast and crew (14 in all) met at the Director CJ's apartment and we all carpooled out to the location together. When we got to our beach, which was just a few miles past Malibu, we unloaded and set up base camp and started filming. We were a little worried about the weather, because we needed a sunny day in order to film some scenes with shadows in them, but those worries were subdued because we had a hot and sunny day.

Actually, it ended up being a VERY hot and sunny day. We probably went through 6 or 7 palates of water and some crazy amount of sun screen. But despite the harsh conditions (not exactly easy filming on a beach...) we moved along fairly quickly and got pretty much all the shots we needed that day. All the actors were awesome and knocked out each shot with ease. We actually finished early. Success!

For day 2, we carpooled out again and began shooting. This day was a little more difficult because we began filming some of the Sock Puppet scenes. It took a little longer to set up each scene but we wanted to make sure that everything worked and made sense. But it wasn't quite as hot as the first day and everyone worked together to make each scene great. The only problem is we could only have the actors for 12 hours according to their SAG rules, and with the slower moving production, I was a little worried that we wouldn't get everything done that we needed for that day. But, with time coming down to the wire, we got the last scene in and finished the day getting everything within the 12 hour mark.

So now we have two more days of filming left before we take it to editing. These last two days involve a lot of puppet scenes and may be a bit of a challenge, but we should be able to get it all taken care.

It's pretty exciting to be moving along with this project. It is definitely happening and it is going to be great. Stay tuned.

Almost Sarah shoot time

It’s getting close to “go time” for Sarah and the Sock Puppet. Our shooting days are next Monday and Tuesday. It’s been a lot of planning to get to this point and we’re all pretty excited to make it happen.

But I’ll tell you it hasn’t been easy. Reserving the beach that we want to film on, or rather the one we settled on, has been quite an ordeal. And it’s compounded by the fact that the park ranger, who is in charge of the state beaches, is super hard to get a hold of. You have to leave him a voicemail and hope that he will return the call. Then when he does call you he wants to get off the phone as soon as possible. Then we were almost late to get the money to the California Film Commission to get our permit. But despite all odds, we have our location secure and will be filming legally, so hopefully no one will bother us.

And our director CJ has been working with the actors at rehearsals to learn their lines and character so we can hit the ground running when we get to set. I haven’t been working with the actors very much, but CJ says they are going to be awesome. There have been a few challenges with the actors too because of their conflicting schedules. They are doing this pro-bono so we can’t really ask them to rearrange their life for us, but it’s one of those situations where you can’t please everyone. But again, despite all odds, we are moving forward.

We have a meeting tonight to tie up loose ends and the weekend to get all the few last things together. There are still some things we have to settle up. And I have tried hard to think of everything that could go wrong and figure out a way to avoid it happening. If I’m lucky, nothing too serious will blow up in my face.

A Part of the Working Class

Yes, I guess I can officially say that I am one of the exclusive members of society that can say they have a full time job. Quite a feat, if I may say so myself, and it only took me 9 months.

So the job I got is as an Office Production Assistant at a company called Generate. They are formerly a management company, with clients that are mostly stand up comedians, but they also own a production company and that is where I work.

The way I got this job was through a friend that works for the management side of Generate (never know when or how a connection will help). About a month ago they needed an extra hand, so she recommended me and I worked for them for a couple of days. Then they called me and said they wanted me to come in on a regular basis (ie: Full Time) and I started last week.

It's not the most "sexy" job in the Entertainment Industry, but at least it's a step in the right direction. I am basically the low man on the totem pole and do all the stuff that no one else wants to or has time to do around the office. So any time we need to buy something or pick something up I go out on a run. This makes up most of what I do, buying various office supplies and random things that we need at that moment. It's not too bad, at least I get to be out and about for a lot of the day. But there are also other duties, such as making sure the dishes are clean in our kitchen and taking out the trash every night, not the most exciting stuff in the world. However, I do get to put the equipment together for the shoot days and I have been doing some "reconciling of petty cash" where I account for all the money we have spent. So the job is a little bit of doing stuff that is no fun and I don't really learn anything with a little bit of doing cool stuff where I learn about putting a production together.

I've only worked there one week, but I feel like I fit in pretty well. It is nice to have a full time job and it will be nice to have a steady pay check. Plus the people I work with are pretty cool. I am only going to consider this a temporary full time job, as I don't see myself staying here forever. It's just the next step.