Otherwise Pandemonium

Some frames from "Otherwise Pandemonium, a short film I DPed for director Brian McGinn, based on a short story by Nick Hornby.  You can watch it here.



The adaptation was by Alex Wilson and Jeremy Pinkham, Brian and I each did a couple of drafts as well, and then Nick himself very generously workshopped the script when he visited Duke in March.  Alex Perez and Katie Lee played the leads.

 The budget was something under $400, most of it for pizza.  Our gear ranged from extravagant to  inadequate.  The Sony Z1U came from Freewater Films, as did a Lowel 2k softlight, a Rifa, and an exceptionally heavy, unwieldy, sticky, hateful tripod.   We used Andrew Buchanan's M2 35mm adapter and Nikkor lenses.   Josh Gibson at Duke supplied a beautiful Mole Richardson soft kit and an HMI.

 Brian and I quickly found a lot of common ground.  We talked about a lot of films during prep, but "Lost in Translation" and "George Washington" were most relevant to our strategy for tackling interiors and exteriors respectively.  We both admired the use of short telephoto in "Tony Takitani", and that went into the mix as well.  We used almost every angle we shot.  I must credit Brian with giving me sufficient time to light and shoot.  We were always rushed, and I could sense the pressure building as I gelled or blacked windows, maxed out house power on every circuit, and fully gripped all the lights.  But he never pulled the plug on me, and I think it shows.  I have to particularly thank Thomas Whitmire, who did a great job with sound and grip work on the days he could join us, especially in pulling off some very professional dolly moves with completely inadequate equipment.  Anyone out there thinking of using a Focus dolly on Egripment plastic curved track: don't.