Day Labor film blog

After a great weekend of filming, “Day Labor” has wrapped principal photography!

Saturday, we built out a cubicle set at Atlantic Station Studios (now Creative Studios of Atlanta). As expected, the first couple hours were spent manhandling partition walls, arranging knick-knacks and office clutter (with Nancy’s eye for detail), and figuring out angles. We almost put Wayne in the wrong suit…whew. Once the cameras started rolling, everything was magic. We had time to try a few different things, and make sure there was plenty of coverage (thanks Ron for your editing input). The giant tin of popcorn proved that props make the best craft services: next shoot it’s all caramel and cheese corn. After lunch, we changed the set around to shoot from reverse angle. And then we were done. It’s great working with a bunch of pros…all the technical issues are quickly resolved, and I only have to worry about getting the shots. More unglamourous breakdown, loading, and cleanup, but we were all out of there by 4:30 — ahead of schedule!

Sunday started out cold and a little late (including me), in the parking lot. There were some barely averted continuity issues (thankfully Valerie was on top of that), but soon enough we had everyone in wardrobe, the blocking worked out, and the shots started getting checked off the list. A bit of poor planning on my part led to no lunch, then some lunch, then a lot of lunch (Varsity chili dogs and onion rings… greasy and yummy, but definitely tempting fate).

We moved inside the beautiful office (thanks Ferris for letting us shoot there), and got some excellent production value out of the conference room. Some of our first time actors got to experience the hurry-up-and-wait “fun” of a movie set, but J P had everyone trying to stifle laughter as he delivered his marvelously managerial presentation.

That scene finished right on schedule (scary), which left only the break room.

My first moment of panic, when I lost my carefully packed away prop coffee cup that we’d saved from Saturday’s shoot. I had planned to establish Juan drinking the coffee in the break room, and then back at his desk. However, Wayne came up with a much funnier “bagel” shot. Plus there was fake coffee, powdered donuts, and highly suggestive dialogue. Zelda was a very good sport as the object of Wes’ “affection”; thankfully this is not a real workplace or we’d all be getting sued.

Wrapped.

So, finally it was time for a catered — and much too big — dinner. Really tasty, lots of leftovers for everyone, and a good chance to relax and chat now that filming was complete.

Once again, a big thanks to all the cast and crew for all you time, talent, skill, and hard work! I can’t wait to see what we’ve made…

This past weekend’s shoots were a great success! We filmed the beginning and ending on Saturday, and on Sunday we went fishing. Many thanks to our DP Allen Facemire for making the footage look fabulous, and to all the cast and crew for their hard work. A special thanks to all the actual day laborers who filled in our scenes with their highly realistic portrayals of day laborers.

So now we’ll take the month of November to prepare for the office shots.