I finally escaped the torture that is being in front of the camera and was able to direct a scene. It was really fun.

It was a good idea to allocate time for planning the day beforehand because it meant we were able to arrive and immediately get into what we needed to do. There was a bit of rain, and we’d been planning to shoot outside, so there was a bit of a scare that we’d have to replace it with an indoor location which really wouldn’t have worked as well – of course, this is a very real threat on any outdoor shoot, but thankfully one we were able to work around today. Thankfully nothing got damaged and no one broke their arm on the slippery steps. Praise be to OH&S Jesus.

Having someone who’s as proficient with cameras as Bryan to be my camera operator was a huge blessing. We’d roughly storyboarded yesterday, but if there were any changes I wanted made or anything different within the frame, he always knew how to do it, credit to him. Also shoutouts to Luke for being a great clapper guy and general odd job man.

I think everyone’s fairly proficient in most roles by now, so I think the main thing I’m interested in doing is working with proper actors – when it’s group members acting, they’re often reluctant and fairly camera shy – there are exceptions, of course (like Justin, who is a hero), but I think it’s hard to learn that aspect of directing when there are no actual actors around.

I think in the end I was pretty happy with the shots we got. There were some, like the close up of Matt, that I realised we could have let go for longer – for example, he says only one line in his close up, but I would have liked to use the same angle for is line immediately after, but we didn’t shoot it. The main issue was sound. I still don’t really know what I’m doing there, mainly in regards to editing it. I’ll really have to practice working with making the sound smooth and consistent this week.