Get Covered
I have notes scribbled in margins all over my shooting schedule reminding me of one thing:
Get coverage.
I know there’s an important reason those notes are there (Past Tyler’s always looking out for Future Tyler) but sometimes, in the heat of the shoot, I neglect the importance of this self-directed wisdom.
I have a tendency toward pragmatism when time allows which is why I storyboard and plan like a madman before getting down to the fleeting business of shooting. What I’ve realized while shooting Refrain however is that my pragmatism has led to me to trim the fat as it were where insert shots are concerned. Maybe this comes from my animation background where if you don’t need it in the final cut, why on Earth would you create it in the first place? So I have wound up planning very few superfluous shots. Superfluous or so they seem at the time when the clock’s against you, your volunteer cast and crew are waiting on you and you’re about to collapse from exhaustion. In reality such inserts become a very valuable asset to the editing process where what you took painstaking measures to plan comes out slightly different when filtered through reality.
Or so I’ve noticed while venturing into the editing process while still activily shooting Refrain… Which is why the “get coverage” messages are scribbled in the margins rather than typed bold face into the schedule itself.
You can never have too much coverage. And you can never have too much footage of that coverage. When something just isn’t playing right in that simple dinner scene between two people and all you’ve got is two sides and a master… You’re left wondering why you didn’t just shoot someone’s fork digging through their meal, just a little more of each person simply chewing, or even a shot of the damn salt shaker would do!
Anyway. This week’s advice from someone with no real credentials to speak of: From Past-Self to Future-Self, do yourself a favour and get coverage.
T