Today we wrapped day 2 of God’s Fools, the VCA masters film where I am 2nd AC. I’ve now had a taste of proper camera assisting, and despite the extremely fast-paced shooting and my teething problems in a new role, I can safely say I’m enjoying this. There are a great variety of things to do as a 2nd AC, and this constant workload and variation keeps me going throughout the day. During camera prep a few days ago, I anticipated that exchanging lenses with the 1st AC and preparing the camera would be the most problematic tasks for me as a new AC.. but after two days on set, I’m starting to pre-empt what equipment we’ll need for each camera reset, and I’m getting more of a feel for lens etiquette. The biggest problem I’m currently having is with slating protocol.. how exciting. While it sounds mundane, this slating problem is fairly significant in that I’m never quite sure who I’m meant to be listening to. On some shoots, I’ve seen the 2nd AC physically ask the sound department whether they’re rolling, and then call the shot without any prompts. On other shoots, the 1st AD seems to orchestrate the slating process and tell the AC when to mark it / call it. On God’s Fools, the 1st AD sometimes prompts me, other times it’s the DP, sometimes it’s both the AD and DP, and sometimes no one prompts me. This leads to situations where I’ll decide to take initiative and consequently mark the slate too early, before camera is speeding. Also if I’m putting the slate into frame too early, that’s going to obscure the DP and director’s view of frame.. and I’m not great at judging where I need to put the slate so that it fully fills the frame. I need to divide the focal length by 10 and then further divide by 3 and that’s roughly how many metres away from camera I should be standing.. it takes time (especially on a long lens), and if the DP is still looking at the shot, nothing’s going to be more irritating than a slate getting in the way. So it seems dangerous to put a slate in without a prompt first, but sometimes there isn’t one.. I need to get a better sense of when the slate is expected. Then there’s the fact that slating takes time, and on a fast-paced outdoor shoot that involves trains leaving and arriving from flinders street, timing is everything. I feel like the slate is a shameful object.. it’s this thing that’s fairly necessary, but frustrating to everyone except sound and continuity. I’m starting to learn that when I’m told “just tail-slate it”, 90% of the time this means “we’re not slating it” — except when you’re not prepared to do the tail-slate — then they’ll actually need it and you’ll be caught out.
Then there’s the issue of whether to call first or mark first. At one point I was marking the slate before calling it, so that I could call it while exiting the frame to save time. Then I reverted back to the old method because I was told that marking before calling was difficult to deal with in post-production.. which is fine but it messed my brain for a while so I’d automatically mark the slate before calling it.. again not good. And then there’s camera reports. I record the scene, shot and take number, plus focal length, T-stop, any filters used, any changes to iso or white balance. I note down the number of each RED clip file, plus the roll number that goes up every time a new CF card is used on the camera. The problem is that during shots, I’m updating the slate, and in between shots, I’m moving equipment and helping to prep the camera.. so choosing to fill in the camera reports at any point in time is a tactical decision. On the first day of shooting, I’d be caught out when the DP was ready to shoot, needed a slate and I’d been busy filling in the camera sheet.. not good. Today I figured that not having a slate prevents people from shooting, whereas the camera reports do not — so camera reports, in my mind, are now secondary to having the slate ready to go. When shooting gets especially rapid-fire, this often means that I choose not to dash back to my report sheets during a take, and instead standby with the slate and remember details to record on the report for later. I’ve found that nothing catches you out more than false starts on set.. false starts have forced me to change the way I work so that I’m prepared for slating something and then running in to slate again 10 seconds later. Yesterday I’d slate the shot, start updating the camera report and find myself in a difficult situation when the slate wasn’t immediately ready.
Now, during shooting my workflow goes as follows: Move camera gear, assist with prepping camera for shot. Find continuity person, confirm the scene and shot number. Update the slate to match continuity numbers. Update camera report to match, if there’s time. Slate shot. Pre-emptively update slate in case there’s another take. Fill out the camera report if it’s immediately accessible. Slate next shot, etc, until the next camera reset. Repeat. In most situations, that seems to work well, but sometimes unexpected complications arise due to the location or what’s being shot. (for instance, cutaways are often shot without slate or sound, but must still be logged on camera reports with shot number and clip number. also when the ground is wet, I can’t establish a “base” where I leave my camera reports during a take without them getting wrecked, etc)
Anyway. Complications aside, I’m liking this production. We’ve got a great crew and things keep moving at an intense pace.. it’s definitely hard work but it’s a great learning experience. What stuns me most, after working on God’s Foolsfor two days, is how the hell proper 2nd ACs manage to continually load film mags on top of everything else. wtf.
Interesting perspective, I’ve only been a second AC a couple of times and that was on pretty relaxed shoots.
As far as when to slate, I definitely wouldn’t preempts the AD or DP. It’s the AD’s job to get things rolling and call for slate, or if he’s okay with the DP doing that then take your cues from him too. If the AD is forgetting to call for slate, but you’ve heard that camera and sound are speeding, then you could go ahead and slate.
Camera logs are always a bitch. Just explain the situation to your DP and ask what the priority is: to have perfectly accurate camera logs or not hold up the takes at all? That’s also a judgment call on your part though, depending on the atmosphere on set. If shooting is behind schedule, or you’re losing daylight, then the log is less important than getting the slate up and the take rolling.
[...] a day in the life of, Lowdown, in retrospect) and posts on VCA productions (Strange Things, Trial by Fire, Like a Swan) are all quite honest and involved reflections on different aspects of filmmaking. [...]