Production - Shotlist & Camera Cards: Diary Room (Test Shoot)

As per any shoot day, I am creating a dedicated shotlist and camera plan for the day. The diary room test is going to be one of the most important parts of this evolution, as they are the scenes that capture the meaning of this story. Therefore, understanding the right camera positions was going to be vital in order for this message to be conveyed correctly. I had come up a plan for the test which follows a similar pattern to the one used in my reference material "The Red Bull Racing Story: 2005-2012".


This reference material has been instrumental in how I planned these scenes as I feel they give a tone very similar to the one I am trying to create. The camera positions along with the lighting mean this scene is both visually pleasing and powerful to the viewer. Therefore, my plans follow a similar one to that of this video, but after our test this week, we may somewhat adapt these plans if we find issues on our recce/ test shoot.

I can see one of our biggest challenges being the space available to use. The workshop we are filming at is a lot smaller than the room used in the Red Bull video. This means that in our test shoot we will need to adapt plans around this. The lighting could also be a potential issue as we do not have much prior experience with the lights we plan to use. This could mean we spend more time setting up the lights than needed, but this is the point of a test shoot.

This test shoot will also allow me to relax into the role of the contributor and the footage will enable me to understand if I need to change anything going forward. We had already experienced issues in our past shoot dates, but typically the actuality sequences were natural and felt as they should. George will also be tested as a producer as he now fully understands what he needs to be doing on shoot dates. In essence, he takes over my role and assists the camera team. He will also be an active voice in the documentary in this scene, so his tone when speaking needs to be correct.

We are thankful to have the help of Connor for this test shoot, meaning we are not stretched for camera operators and George can properly focus on his job. That is an error both George and I realised after the license shoot date, he cannot be on a camera in any circumstances. This realisation has led George to contact a number of first years and we have 8-9 people who are interested in helping on occasions. This will not be needed for the majority of shoots, but in situations when I am driving on the track, we will need a number of cameras trackside to get all of the correct angles. We appreciate the offer of first-year students help as this will allow us all to focus on our main roles.

Overall, this test shoot is going to allow us to learn about how we conduct ourselves in these vitally important diary room sequences. I am very aware that changes will most likely need to be made to my original plans, but this is why we are doing a test shoot, as it allows any problems to be highlighted now. Below is the plan for this test shoot as well as the equipment I intend to use. As this is a test, I am interested in experimenting with new ideas, if suggested by the crew. This will allow this shoot to be a real team effort and create the best scene possible. We are happy to have planned so many locations and camera tests along with test shoots before our actual scenes. Not having one for our license day scene meant we ran into issues we could have resolved by doing a test. Going forward we have learnt from those mistakes and this test is one thing we have added because of our previous mistakes. It shows we are learning quickly from our mistakes to ensure our final project is exactly how I envision it.

Diary Room Shotlist:
Camera 1: Panasonic DVX 200 on Tripod - Main shot M/S
Camera 2: Sony AX53 on Track & Dolly
Camera 3: Panasonic G7 capturing close ups

REMEMBER TO TAKE PHOTOS FOR BLOG & CREW STILLS

DIARY ROOM

1. EST Shot of the garage (For BTS/Extended cut)
2. Car parking up M/S (For BTS/Extended cut)
3. Alex walking through garage door W/S
4. Alex looking around the cars M/S (For BTS/Extended cut)
5. Alex sitting down on seat M/S
6. Main Camera M/S [Alex LOF]
7. Dolly Camera MW/S [Alex LOF]
8. C/U of hands 
9. UC/U of eyes
10. C/U of face
11. C/U Alex looking through photos
12. C/U of items that Alex holds