Day 18/19 plans

Plans are afoot for the last two days of shooting as Barry, one of our leads, is off his crutches and physio'd nearly fighting feet. Sweet. Day 18 will be the last scene in the evacuation centre and 19 we're back on the farm and also an awesomely gruesome sfx set piece. The later will be at The Art Organisation Leicester. We are booked for 20th and 21st May.

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Day 17

The big one!!! Well what can I say. Supendous! Stunning! Fantastic ….Goresome!!!! The zombies invaded Leicester city 17th April 2009 and fun was had by all. There was a bit of pressure on today – firstly we had to get up at half five and secondly we were going to have a mass (gaggle?, flock?) of zombies around the centre of Leicester.

I set up a Facebook group for this and by a few days before we had over a hundred signed up. With extras i usually ask for twice as many as i want as often you have a ratio of no shows. Well .... just under 100 dedicated zombie fans turned up. Couldnt believe it - awesome! And you know what - we loved them all. Social media dont you love and hate it?

After the madness we vacted to Aylestone Meadows and a quick hop and jump across a fence to an industrial estate and the jobs a good one.

Cant believe how lucky we were weather wise - both days it threatened rain early on, which thankfully never came - and also with all the extras - a great atmosphere, a great bunch, a great day.


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Edit

Spending the next 8-9 hours transferring footage from camera to my hard drives. A laborious process but am getting a good workflow going. Heres how it goes in Premiere Pro :

1 play tape through until you find the first usable take
2 rewind to this takes start point
3 select scene detect
4 enter name as scene no and description
5 capture
6 pause at end of scene, deleting section of next scene captured by scene detect
7 go to 1

This seems to me the best capture method. In effect you are saving time in the capture/edit process as you are shot selecting in the capture itself. Saves both time and disk space - and with HDV this is a good thing.

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Day 16

Down on the farm. Jai Grant’s parents have allowed us free roam of their old farm out Ratby way. Its an awesome location and many thanks to them. A big day today especially for Steve Doulton who joins us late into shooting - a hard task coming in to a cast and crew who’ve been working together for so long.

Steve had to go by three so needed to juggle the scenes around with all his stuff first. Have to say I was impressed by Steve. His attitude was at all times professional, and he nailed his lines pretty much bang on every time. A short scene I wrote where he recounts a traumatic event in his recent past relied on the actors skill and boy did he deliver.

Not sure if it was the pressure on the big shoot the next day but there was a touch of friction on the set. Nothing that stopped us nailing shots or spoiled friendships but it was there. But hey – its been a long haul, we’re all tired so shit happens. We moved on and got some fantastic shots due largely due to some free lighting – the sun.


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Days 16 and 17 Booked

The upcoming weekend is going to be glorious. Zombies roaming the hillsides and the city.

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Steven Dolton Cast As Farmer

A late but great entry into the ZU fold is Steve Dolton. A fellow Shooting People member, Steve has numerous theatre credits and shorts to his name. We've got a juicy part for him which is dialogue and emotion rich - something for him to play with. And from seeing his showreel I know he's going to add something special to the project. Bring it on.

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Day 15

Another great day - this time squashed into Firebug Bar basement. Lots of hot and sweaty bodies squeezing together. Nice.

The day went very well and we shot an amazing 7 pages worth. The actors really nailed it and shot off 5 pages of dialog with aplomb. As usual as the day progressed we had to squeeze more in and drop some shots but we got the coverage and all was well.

Paul Ewen got his long awaited day of ZU. A great guy he just turned up and did his cool zombie thing. And on that note - some nice SFX from Gavatron. Splattered the roof and my good self - well i'd survived a year of filming with no blood on me...

Finally heres a picture of the sound guys. The often ignored and maligned department ; Farid and Carl. Even if Carl sneaked off for a quick snooze around lunchtime. Allegedly.

3 days left. THREE DAYS LEFT!!!!!!!

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Actor required for 18th April

Male, 40-60 years old actor required for role of farmer. The feature length ZU is coming to the end of its shoot. Actor required from 8.30 till 5.30 on 18th April near Ratby, Leicestershire. The film is non-funded so payment is not available, but will give the actor a feature credit. Hence ideally we would prefer a local actor. Please respond to info@zombieundead.com.

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Days 13/14

7th and 8th of February saw a weekend of filming - are here's the belated writeup.

I have to say, tiring as it is, how much more you can get done in a weekend. Consecutive days filming keep everyone in the mood and helps actors stay in the zone. Also the sense of comradery increases which helps on the set vibe. I was a tad nervous before the shoot as snow was forecast. With crew coming from Cambridge and snow would have made the shoot a no no. After putting in a serious amount of planning for every day thats the last thing i want.

Day 13 had three scenes. We needed to nail these as it was Rod's last day and i didn't want to inconvenience him get him back the next day just for a few hours. The first was a walk down stairs for the main cast - Rod, Chris, Kris, Ruth, Sandra and Barry. Fot a simple sequence of shots this took far too long. Will we ever learn to pace things out rather than going slow and rushing at the end?

Next was when one of the charcters gets bitten. Myself and Gav had worked on this one before, shots, angles etc. Unfortunatly as we had taken spo long on the first scene we were rather rushed on this one. As i said Rod's departure was imminant and i think this played on my mind. Just about got away with it though, ionically with too many shots while looking back we should have stuck with our planned angles. This is a by product of directing/producing and AD'ing myself. I have no room to manourver - always planning who i have to chase up for the next shot before the current one is even done.

Last scene for the day was the charcters holed up in an office. We seem to have used every room in DMU that was usable and ended up in a wide corridor type sapce. Initially the plan was to have the zombies banging on the doors throughout. However as the doors had windows this seemed to make litle sense - the characters sitting around talking while zombies stared at them. I pushed the zombies back so they arrived later in the scene. This gave the scene more room to breath as the dialogue and not the zombies were the focus.

Day 14 - and we're back in the small room. Lots of zombies in this one and an action scene to boot. See above picture for my good friend Martyn Quinn as one of the zombies. Some great performances from all - zombies and humans alike - made this scene a winner. Time flew by and we needed to lose a corridor scene and move on to yet another toilet. Mike Cimpher came all the way for London for this so we really needed to shoot this today. The toilet ended up covered in blood and my nerves were shreaded at the fear of it not washing off.

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Two Departures

The last two shooting days have seen the final scenes for both Rod Duncan and Sandra Wildebore ( alias Frank and Mary ). Both gave up their free time for the project and invested energy and enthusiasm into the film as well as considerable talent. Many thanks from myself and all behind the ZU project.

By the way you have to check out Rod's novels and his informative blog which centers on the craft of writing.

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Gone Fishing

Heads up to all of you making movies and looking for an inspirational figure. Check out Chris Jones' blog on the making of his short Gone Fishing from proclamation 'I'm gonna make an oscar nominated short!' to its run round the world festivals. Many of you may know Chris from the seminal Guerilla's Guide books and their associated courses. A while back he shouted loud that he was going to make an Oscar nominated short film. You know what - to all intents and purposes he damn well did. Ten shorts made the Oscar shortlist with Gone Fishing amongst them. It didnt make the final 5 through to competition but hell - what an achievement. Chris has achieved an awesome task and is an awesome dude. I for one cant wait to see what he comes up with next - a zombie flick perhaps?

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Perspiration

Just had to cancel Day 15 due to an injury to a cast member - not on set i hasten to add. These kind of things are unavoidable and part of the game. It just got me thinking though - guerrilla film making is a serious test of persistence. No/Low budget film making tests your will power - have you the passion and the belief to continue what may? We've been shooting Zombie Undead for over a year now, a day here and there to fit peoples commitments. Is a serious demand on cast and crews time and a testament to their dedication. As Suzanne Alizart from Em-Media put it to me, paraphrasing Thomas Edison, film making is 99% perspiration, 1% inspiration.

Also its worth quoting Eliot Grove from Raindance who postulated in lo-to-no budget filmmaking that "a clear positive mental attitude .. and passion" were key requirements. Amen to that. With 3-4 days left to shoot we're getting close, damn close. We're gonna make it people.

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Zombies vs Snow

On the eve of Day 13 I'm just waiting for the morning to see whether its snowing. All shots are indoors but have cast and crew coming from Cambridge and London. We've had the worst snow in 20 years here in Blighty and while other countries shake it off Britain comes to a standstill. If trains are off and grit doesnt reach Cambridge villages then its going to be an early rise for nothing, and a lot of ringing round. The most frustrating thing is the amount of planning just one shooting day takes - postponement is damn hard to take. Fingers crossed for sun, sun, sun.

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Day 13 and 14

Here we go. Got a whole weekend booked for te 7th and 8th of February. Still at DMU and after this we have probably 2 days left at the University. Then we need a basement and for the final day we're out in the open air. Hurrah!

This weekends shoot sees the end of several characters and a mass zombie scene. We're getting there folks, we're getting there.

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Man On Fire

I'm flying now, taking off on the editing suite. Started yesterday to edit circular tracking shots around six actors. This was my Reservoir Dogs diner moment. Man its tricky to edit but when it comes together, as it is now, its awesome. Just love the pace and urgency of the scene as the group decide who will stay and who will leave. I'm loving this, just loving it!

Chew? Toby Chew? Charlie fucking Chan.

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Morrissey Zombie

Heres the outstanding Joe as Morrissey Zombie. Being a serious Smiths fan i just had to get Mozza in the film somewhere. Even sacrificed my Meat Is Murder long sleeve tee. Now THATS dedication.

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More Planning

New Year, new round of planning. Oh yes, i have my producer hat on trying to arrange the next shooting dates. Looking at the script I'd say we have 4 more days at DMU. I need to source a basement for the day after this then its the final days shooting outdoors. Looking forward to that one. No lighting set ups. But maybe rain! Who knows. So as i sit and type i'm awaiting responses from cast and crew as to when we can next shoot. Really chomping at the bit here to get going again as the end is in sight. Also Kris is working on a new script which is panning out to be a real corker. This one is going to scare the hell out of you.

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