Trick of the Dark- shoot 6

Here it is boys and girls, the last one, the final TOTD shoot, and what a scene to end on, the romance scene between Scott and Susie. I was originally referring to it as a sex scene but this really is over selling it, its basically just two people in a sleeping bag kissing and the rest is implied. The scene itself was once again in the cave and the reason I was shooting this scene was to give Alex more of a motive to attack Scott in the final cave scene because without this Alex is angry but its unclear what tipped him over and to be honest from an audience perspective it seems a little bit much, but with the addition of this and with Alex seeing the romance of the two and getting jealous he has a reason to react as his does when you couple it with them being trapped and tensions rising from this.

There weren't many production still taken on this day so Im using this rather nice one of Brad I took in the cave as a place holder as this is technically him producing on set. Back to the shoot, I went in with my shotlist but not storyboards, this was a conscious decision because my storyboards weren't made with the cave space we had in mind and as such they were less accurate to what I wanted to shoot than my shotlist was. With this in mind we reconstructed the set from the shoot we did in the cave just over a week ago and then set up an LED to mimic the cave opening as we did in previous scenes. We then got the actors in position and I levelled with them that this was my first time shooting anything even remotely intimate, to which they said it was a first for them too. This was actually useful because it meant there was no expectation from anyone to get this right first time an it relieved some of the awkward nature of the scene. In terms of coverage, we shot quite a few angles and distances in a relatively short amount of time, from memory we shot two wides, a selection of two shots as well as some over-shoulders before we started working on some shots that included movement. In terms of direction I do feel I was awkward at first, but after a few takes and seeing how comfortable the two actors were with each other I got into my stride a little bit and creativity from everyone on set started to flow, I got a bit more adventurous with shots and got much more comfortable with what I was asking the actors to do.

 Andrew was on sound for this scene and we found that the best pace for him to do this was on the ledge of a rock shelf in the cave which he climbed up to and planted himself in, this was ideal as it meant he was directly above the actors a could get the best sound without interfering with the shot because he was always above the camera but close enough that the sound was crisp and clear. In terms of camera work, for about half we were on a tripod and then the other Liam shot handheld due to limited space, however, this did not affect the shot in any way, he was always shooting from a stable position so the shots were in no way shaky beyond use or anything on that line. We also shot a few of the shots on the slider which proved to be a bit of a pain because the tension on it had been turned up before we picked the equipment up so the slider track was a little stiff which meant at times there was undesired camera shake as a result, but all in all this didn't prove too problematic, it just meant we had to do extra takes.

Like I say, I haven't received the production stills as of yet so here's a spider web in the cave with dew on which I liked the look of. After getting the shots from my shotlist we deliberated for a while about whether this was the time to call it a wrap or not, after a while we decided there were shots we could get which added to the other scenes, namely the scene where Alex is decided his action as he fixates on the knife while they sleep near him. So we got a shot of Susie turning over in the night to cuddle Scott and we also got a regular static of the two sleeping together for coverage, these were easy basic shots but I do feel they will prove useful so in this sense it was worth me and Liam talking over whether we should shoot more because we had the time and resources so it made sense to try and make more in case we needed it, it is a bonus in a way that the shots turned out so nice. However, all things must end, this shoot and the film in general are no different and with that it was wrapped and we set off back to the car and ultimately to the edit suite to make this film happen. It had certainly been a journey to shoot this film and it proved to be both challenging and fun at most points along the way. I will leave with this parting image of the crew walking along Blackhall beach one last time to return the equipment.

I would like to also just say that I had an amazing crew on this and I don't know if we could have pulled it off if we didn't have such a skilled and hard working group all pulling in the same direction, while this was my film because I wrote and directed it, it is just as much theirs because they made it happen as much if not more than I did and I am grateful for each of them. If the shoot went as well as I feel it did, we will have a good film on our hands and everyone should be proud of what we made.