Yesterday's Video Shoot

So yesterday I was on a shoot for a school group project. It is a dystopian future movie called Orwell. My main motivation for aligning myself with this particular project (there were four choices) was the crew. My last group project was very difficult for me because of a lack of organization. I wanted things to be different this time.

I would say that things were easier on this project for me. It was a little better organized than the last project I was on. Though there were still some kinks in the system. We started at 9am were scheduled to get done shooting at 8pm night. It didn't. We weren't done shooting until 12:15 am.

My roles in the project are as gaffer and sound editor. As sound editor I don't have to do anything on set. That's all stuff that will be done in post-production. So all I had to do yesterday (on set) was set up, move, and take down the lighting. I had signed on as gaffer because I felt like I needed to know more about lighting to be a well rounded film maker.

I would say that the main thing I learned about lighting is that I don't want to be a gaffer again. Figuring out how to light a scene and setting it up doesn't appeal to me. The other thing about it I don't like is that too many people step on your toes when you're the gaffer. People start moving lights without consulting you and it gets pretty annoying. What if I just walked up and moved the camera because I didn't like the shot? I don't think that would go over well. So why can other people do that with the lights?

I think what I'm really interested in doing is what I did in the first project -- being a DP (Director of Photography). So hopefully I can be a DP on our next project.