Quickie run up to Casa de Bruno last night to shoot the next scene for Prey. It was a rather weird timing thing, as the shooting was originally planned for daytime but got bumped to evening because of the back-to-school timing.
It was Tony & Kristi and me. Solo scene with Kristi, very emotional. Also the first sync sound scene, so I brought up the microphone and the boom pole, and really the whole monitor rig.

Tony set up the camera, but because of the closeness of the wide angle lens and the weird overhead angle, it made Kristi look like a midget. I suggested that he get the ladder and move back a bit to take off some of the distortion, and it ended up with an even better framing which fit the psychological mood of what was happening in a sweet happy-accident kind of way.

The shock absorber on the boom pole was destroyed. The rubber mounts had deteriorated, so I spent a little bit of time attempting to repair the damage with some elastic cord I had picked up at Hancock Fabrics. Then struck the realization that I didn't have the adapter to go from my microphone to Tony's camera, and the slowly dawning memory that it had been destroyed by he-who-shall-remain-nameless on the last day of shooting Hunter, and I never bothered to replace it.
Luckily there was a Radio Shack close by, and despite some "help" from one of the sales ponies, we were able to get the needed adaptouflage, and were back in business.

Set up and uncoiled the mic/headphone cable. No sound in the headphones. And no time to figure it out, so we had to shoot raw, and I had to trust my instincts. I know there were some takes that had boom noise, but hopefully it was kept to a minimum.

The weirdness was that because it was just the three of us, it was oddly intimate, like shooting a nude scene, but emotionally nude rather than physically. And Kristi rocked. She gave up a raw emotional breakdown that was truly uncomfortable to watch and very powerful. It was a weirdly good feeling: uncomfortable at the voyeuristic nature of it, but a the same time knowing that this was getting on camera, and that that power would be getting added to the movie.

A couple of minutes of footage and it was all over. We broke everything down and returned it to the holding pen. T & K left for karaoke, and I went home to some fluffy pet cuddle time and conversation with Sasha about her first day back in class. Would that it had been the other way 'round, but I digress.

So far I've been pretty happy with the way this shoot is turning out. There are technical hurdles that are needing to be overcome: fer instance, the being able to hear the audio whist being recorded is something that is hugely important and has yet to be addressed. But I've been really happy with the lighting so far (the china balls are really nice), and I'm pretty confident that I can keep up a level of prettiness that will make this movie stand out from the herd. Combine that with the talent that we have going for us on this shoot, and I think we have a real chance of getting some recognition.

BTW, Hunter (our previous short) is being shown at a micro-budget film festival.