Shoot day 1: Voltaire - Spooky not scary, NYC
It’s midnight after a long first day shoot. It’s safe to say that we jumped in at the deep end starting the day off with Voltaire, the night hotel and a noisy hotel lobby…
The Night Hotel was our first location. A new venue opened up about a year ago and described as ‘Gothic Gotham’ It’s a vision in black tiled shininess and posed all sorts of interesting conundrums about how you light a man wearing black in a black room. The solution was to move around the bespoke designer furniture and put him in a white leather chair.
Voltaire was eloquent and completely professional – hey this guy has done this before right, and it showed. One of the key challenges was actually hearing Voltaire uninterrupted. The person that we hired the room turned out to have the most penetrating ‘you have a nice day sir’ voice that cut through the distance from elsewhere in the hotel. Voltaire seemed to ride the interruptions like a pro and kept his focus caffeine sharp.
Here’s a wee clip of him from NBC news, he was brought in to speak about ‘Goth murder madness’ on a shocking piece of reportage which describes Goth as a ‘gang sweeping the nation’.
He was a true gent and came back in the evening so that we could shoot an exterior of the hotel and him with it. Shooting the night hotel in the day just didn’t have the same resonance and we got to meet his 9 year old son Mars. It’s safe to say that Voltaire is no introvert and we had to contend with his spirited Saturday night fever style dancing to Dexy’s Midnight Runners as we attempted a moody, stationary portrait shot.
We spent the afternoon heading way up town to Morningside heights to meet up with Heath / Storm who is going to be dj-ing on the cruise. It’s can be a very odd experience meeting people for the first time when you have spent a lot of time talking to them on the phone or seeing them on video. It’s like meeting someone off the TV, kind of, you feel like you know them but it’s really only the beginning. Storm comes across as a very gentle guy and did a lovely considered interview. He is a tall guy (6 foot 6) and wears 6-inch red vinyl platform shoes when he dresses as a Goth girl. For our day interview he was dressed in a black t shirt and jeans and I am really looking forward to seeing his transformation on board ship as he goes from Heath to Storm.
Following him with a camera crew up the street to go and buy a $30 suitcase was certainly interesting. Much of my film is controlled, static and I like the action to happen in front of the camera rather than following the action, so hand held is a new and unknown territory to me. I started off in photography / painting so like creating stillness and have to get into my head about how to interpret movement on film. Being controlling as I can be about how the film looks can make for good-looking material but can hinder spontaneity. In the end a combination of approached got us the material we were looking for and it was back down town.
A days filming under our belts we met up with Christine from IFC for fabulous cocktails and food at the Hudson. The jet lag was really kicking in so we called it an early night.
The Night Hotel was our first location. A new venue opened up about a year ago and described as ‘Gothic Gotham’ It’s a vision in black tiled shininess and posed all sorts of interesting conundrums about how you light a man wearing black in a black room. The solution was to move around the bespoke designer furniture and put him in a white leather chair.
Voltaire was eloquent and completely professional – hey this guy has done this before right, and it showed. One of the key challenges was actually hearing Voltaire uninterrupted. The person that we hired the room turned out to have the most penetrating ‘you have a nice day sir’ voice that cut through the distance from elsewhere in the hotel. Voltaire seemed to ride the interruptions like a pro and kept his focus caffeine sharp.
Here’s a wee clip of him from NBC news, he was brought in to speak about ‘Goth murder madness’ on a shocking piece of reportage which describes Goth as a ‘gang sweeping the nation’.
He was a true gent and came back in the evening so that we could shoot an exterior of the hotel and him with it. Shooting the night hotel in the day just didn’t have the same resonance and we got to meet his 9 year old son Mars. It’s safe to say that Voltaire is no introvert and we had to contend with his spirited Saturday night fever style dancing to Dexy’s Midnight Runners as we attempted a moody, stationary portrait shot.
We spent the afternoon heading way up town to Morningside heights to meet up with Heath / Storm who is going to be dj-ing on the cruise. It’s can be a very odd experience meeting people for the first time when you have spent a lot of time talking to them on the phone or seeing them on video. It’s like meeting someone off the TV, kind of, you feel like you know them but it’s really only the beginning. Storm comes across as a very gentle guy and did a lovely considered interview. He is a tall guy (6 foot 6) and wears 6-inch red vinyl platform shoes when he dresses as a Goth girl. For our day interview he was dressed in a black t shirt and jeans and I am really looking forward to seeing his transformation on board ship as he goes from Heath to Storm.
Following him with a camera crew up the street to go and buy a $30 suitcase was certainly interesting. Much of my film is controlled, static and I like the action to happen in front of the camera rather than following the action, so hand held is a new and unknown territory to me. I started off in photography / painting so like creating stillness and have to get into my head about how to interpret movement on film. Being controlling as I can be about how the film looks can make for good-looking material but can hinder spontaneity. In the end a combination of approached got us the material we were looking for and it was back down town.
A days filming under our belts we met up with Christine from IFC for fabulous cocktails and food at the Hudson. The jet lag was really kicking in so we called it an early night.
posted by Jeanie at
9:11 PM
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