Fall of 2003
I'd known Jonathan Johnson for years as an accomplished musician and talented singer/songwriter. I helped produce a music video for his band called Mercy Rain a few years before through my film and video production company.
I also had a feature film script I'd been messing around with for several years. It had gone through several rewrites but had languished on a shelf while I looked for funding in my spare time. It was a low budget family drama designed as a tool to enter the realm of feature film production via the festival circuit.
When I learned Jonathan had a sci-fi short story he had written and since I was looking for material I could more easily produce as a "calling card" film, I asked to read it.
When I read it I was blown away. I knew Jon was talented, but I had no idea he could write material like this. With a double twist surprise ending, I was reminded of classic sci-fi TV shows like the Twilight Zone and Outer Limits. We had the material for a short film.
So, we teamed up and began to adapt Jonathan’s short story to a screenplay in our spare time. The biggest challenge was adapting what amounted to two talking heads into something visually interesting. After all, it was basically a phone conversation between a frayed research scientist and a late-night radio talk show host - in the vein of Art Bell. Dialog was trimmed and we developed support characters representing late-night listeners of the radio show. These characters allowed us to tell the story much more visually and in a unique fashion.
Even though I owned all the equipment we would need, I realized that shooting on Super 16 film wouldn't be cheap. In fact, when we finished shooting Radio Mechanics, I estimated that we would have spent at least $15,000 just on film, lab, and telecine - peanuts in the realm of indie-filmmaking, but a lot of peanuts nonetheless. The Panasonic DVX100 had been out for nearly a year. It looked very promising as an alternative to shooting on film and we could still reserve the option of doing a film-out later if we wished. As luck would have it, Panasonic released an "A" model late in the year with a number of improvements over the original, so I bought one in January of 2004.
Spring 2004
We assembled our production team from friends and associates. The goal was to pool our resources and produce a "no-budget" film with high production values and use it as a calling card to bigger and better projects. The idea was to be able to demonstrate what we could do with no money and instill confidence in what we might be able to do if we did have a budget.
The team consisted of Lance Warlock, Jean Larson, Dennis Roberts, and Joylene Scott - all credited as Associate Producers. Each was able to bring valuable talents and resources to the table. We laid out a schedule, began scouting locations and set up a casting call for the end of June.
June 2004
Joylene set up an interview with the local paper to announce the project, including the upcoming casting call. Free publicity like this can pay dividends in the long run. I also purchased a URL and began constructing a web site for the film.
At the end of June Joylene hosted a "cattle call" at her studio, Dream Alley, on a Saturday. We had a reasonable turnout with a fair amount of talent displayed - and also a few who had no business auditioning. Some was painful. Like American Idol painful. By the end of the day we felt we'd found our leads and confirmed this with callbacks the following week. Principal photography was scheduled to begin July 6.
I had delegated the task of obtaining permits for two locations that were under government jurisdiction. That ball was dropped so I had to pick it and scramble to get the necessary permissions we needed. The agencies also required a million or two in liability insurance which was no surprise except that I didn't have it at the time. Luckily my wife works in the insurance racket so we were able to get the coverage we needed -
just in time. One of the locations in question was a tunnel along a park trail maintained by the county. The other was a desert-like section of the same trail but on property owned by the state department of transportation. Adding to the mix was the need to drive three vehicles (one of which was a large boom truck) probably a mile up the trail on a narrow paved path reserved for bikes and pedestrians only. We acquired the necessary paperwork and insurance on relatively short notice and in the nick of time despite the potential for a lot of bureaucracy. The lesson here is: some things just shouldn't be delegated.
Night 1 - July 6
We converged at a laundry mat in Cashmere, Washington. Associate Producer Dennis Roberts secured the location from one of his clients (like all of our locations) at no charge. Pretty straightforward setups with actress Serena Bowman so it was a good way to start production and get the crew accustomed to working together. No dialogue, just action involving jib and dolly camera moves. We wrap well after 1 AM.
By Preston Herrick - Co-producer, co-director, cinematographer
Tech Note: We shot with the Panasonic DVX100A in 24pa mode. We opted to shoot in "squeeze mode" for a 16:9 aspect. Under the circumstances, we determined this to be more practical than shooting with the anamorphic adaptor. The adaptor would have given us slightly greater resolution, but the trade-off on this project was worth it.
For die-hard DVX fans, the menu settings used were: Detail level: -4; V Detail level: 0; Detail coring: +3; Chroma level: 0; Chroma phase: -4; Color temp: 0; Master Ped: -5; A. Iris level: -2; Gamma: Cine-like D; Knee: Auto; Matrix: Cine-like; Skin Tone Detail: Off; Vertical Detail Freq: Thin; Setup: 0 IRE.
We also used a Chrosziel 4x4 matte box as a standard attachment with an occasional tobacco grad. Top notch German engineering at BMW prices.
Night 2 - July 7
Tunnel dream sequence with actor Big Dan "Chili-dog Man" Johnson. The idea was to set up the biggest light (or lights) we could get at one end of the tunnel, then fill it with fog for a cool, backlit, Bladerunner type shot where we dolly behind Dan as his makes his way "towards the light." Not only was the wind blowing that night but it was stinking cold - unusual for July.
The first order of business was to kill the overhead lights in the tunnel. Easy enough to do by opening the fixtures and loosening the bulbs. Then we set up a theatrical follow spot and fog machine. We had planned on two fog machines but one turned out to be broken. The follow spot worked well for a high powered source but we added some Arri fresnels from our kit to get the right look from the texture of the corrugated tunnel walls. A borrowed 3500 watt portable generator powered everything.
The wind blowing through the tunnel made fog "placement" next to impossible. Parking a truck in the mouth of the tunnel near the backlights help break it a little - but not much. A bazillion takes later we felt we had some material with acceptable smoke movement. A lot less wind and a second fog machine would have made life a lot easier. The end result still looks cool. Another late night.
Night 3 - July 8
This was our desert/military alternate reality/alien abduction sequence that would wrap up shooting with actress Serena Bowman. The Columbia River runs through the Wenatchee valley and a loop trail borders both sides of the river. It's designed for walkers, cyclist, bladers, etc. One very unique and small section has sand dunes and sage brush. From the right angles you'd swear you were out in the middle of a barren desert.
Vehicle access (for park trail maintenance only) was pretty limited and about a mile from our location. We had permission for three vehicles only, one of which included a tired old boom truck. Lighting, generators, and bodies had to go in the others. The paved trail was just wide enough for one vehicle with plenty of blind corners so the going was slow to insure we didn't run over any surprised pedestrians.
When we got to the location, we decided we needed to turn the boom truck around - which meant leaving the pavement. Bad idea, as we promptly got the rear wheels of the truck stuck in the sand. Not a good way to start the night. Some creative shoveling and traction devices got us out of that predicament in relatively short order though.
A small generator and open faced light were hauled to the top of a sand dune for back light. The theatrical follow spot would again be employed for front light (an alien searchlight). An additional unit was mounted on the boom truck bucket to simulate the light from the craft descending on her. Two million candle (battery powered) handheld spots were strategically placed with grips for additional searchlight effect.
While we were setting up, gunshop owner David Quick worked with Serena and an actual M16 style military rifle to handle the weapon in an authentic fashion.
The fog machines came out again to provide "battlefield" smoke and help add to the chaotic look we wanted. A light breeze made smoke "placement" totally unpredictable again. One minute it looked great. The next, it was going the wrong direction. Just one of the challenges of working on a large set with no budget and undersized "tools". The sequence was later enhanced dramatically in post with After Effects.
The boom truck was used to start the take high in the air (handheld POV from alien spacecraft) and then descend on Serena as she runs to the foreground and drops to her knees in the sand, overwhelmed. She was a real trooper (no pun intended) running up and down the sand dune, take after take, until the timing of all the elements came together. It was 2 AM or later before everything was packed up and out of there.
Day 4 - July 10
Saturday morning. We met at the location of our apartment set. It was on the third floor of an old building owned by a photography studio. This floor is above the studio and is abandoned except for a couple of rooms (sets actually) used by the photographer on occasion. The only access? Stairs. We began hauling a truckload of newspapers, magazines, and furniture up to dress our set to an appropriate level of grunge.
We took a break and then met at 3 PM in an alley we scouted to shoot a sequence with actor Patrick Murphy. We basically took over the alley without any permits - or permission for that matter. We just parked our truck at one end and acted like we belonged there. The other end was partially blocked with some construction work. Nevertheless, a disabled person still managed to drive their car from that end and meet us. We weren't inclined to pack everything up and get out of the way so she could pass. Needless to say, she was a little disgruntled to have to back her car out the way she came in.
Most everything was shot handheld off a moving dolly. The alley surface was way too rough to use a solid mount - which even shows in the handheld work but the results are fine as it adds to the edginess of the sequence.
When we finished there we went to our next location which was the "Stillman taking a leak" shot. For this we went to Joylene's studio which is in the basement of a huge furniture store. The layout was right for the shot I envisioned. All we had to do was transform a nasty old boiler room into a nasty old bathroom.
The room is normally locked (from the inside) so we had to find someone at the furniture store who could let us in. Once in the boiler room we lucked out because there was already an old, crusty (and I mean crusty) toilet sitting loose in the corner. We set the toilet exactly where we wanted and with a few plastic milk crates, cleaning supplies and what not we had a weird, nasty looking can for Stillman to hang out in.
This was where we discovered Patrick's sense of humor. I don't think we laughed so hard during the entire shoot as we did here. Check out the outtakes on the DVD.
Tech Note: For the bathroom scene I wanted to create the effect of a failing fluorescent light ballast. To do this I bought two small fluorescent light fixtures at the hardware store - cheap. I ran one through another box I made that had a big momentary pushbutton switch. By having a production assistant push and release the button in a random fashion, on cue, we got a pretty convincing flickering light ballast effect.
We hung the lights just out of frame inside the door opening and used black wrap (heavy black aluminum foil) to cover a large portion of one of the lights for better spill control. One of the two units was powered on continuously to provide a base light level. The second one ran through the control box.
An Arri unit was placed outside a window at the back of the boiler room to shine in towards the camera. Another smaller unit was placed frame right, aimed low, and barn-doored for effect.
A ton of fog completed the effect, providing greater depth and just the right ambiance. This is one of my favorite shots in the film - and it was fun to do!
Night 5 - July 12
We finished dressing the apartment set. I had known the location owner, a portrait photographer, for a number of years. They were very cool to let a group, of mostly strangers, use their property after-hours unsupervised.
It was miserably hot. With open windows in the middle of the night you'd think it would be cooler but that old building held the heat. This location opens our film and sets the tone so everything had to be just right.
Stillman has a line in the film where he describes aliens moving from one reality to the next as easily as we "move from room to room in our cramped little apartments". So, I thought it would be cool to start the film by coming out of darkness in one room and peaking through the door opening into the living space of the Chili-dog man - as if he's being watched, observed. In fact, we carried that idea throughout the film in many of the shots using camera movement and angles.
We used a jib and dolly, sometimes the two together, as well as some handheld work to get the shots we needed here.
Lighting was simple with two practical's, a softbox with eggcrate suspended nearly overhead just out of frame from a C-stand, and a small unit frame right coming from the direction of the "kitchen."
At one point someone had to leave but forgot to make sure the door at street level was locked behind them for security. A short time later when some crew went down to retrieve something, they were met by a merchant patrol rent-a-cop wondering why the door was open and there were people inside. The next thing I know, we have Barney Fife on set, already on his cel phone with one of the property owners who was on a trip 3 hours away - and understandably upset. I got on his phone and smoothed things over best I could, then sent Barney on his way. Not as serious as it might have sounded to the owner, but not good PR either.
A number of shots depict Big Dan, the Chili-dog man, asleep and dreaming in his chair. It was probably 1 AM in the morning and so warm that he actually fell asleep. Dan denies it but we have proof if you look at the outtakes on the DVD.
Like all of our locations, this one was free. To not inconvenience the owner any more than we had already, and to not have to come back later to strike the set - we decided to do it that night when we were finished shooting. That meant hauling all that crap back down three flights of stairs. At 2:30 in the morning it was still miserably hot.
Night 6 - July 14
We started prepping and dressing Stillman's set in the afternoon. I have a friend who manages a funeral home. It's a huge old mansion that included a number of apartments on one floor - presumably for employee's at one time. They were no longer being used and one had some really funky, retro looking furniture in it that was perfect for the look. It meant moving some stuff around but the architecture, colors, furniture, and general decay of the old place fit perfectly for Stillman's hangout. He loaned me a key and gave us free reign of the unused space after hours. It was a little creepy. In one of the apartment closets we found a child size coffin.
That night we finished dressing Stillman's set, lit it, then brought actors Patrick Murphy (Stillman) and Doug Pelton (Nigel) together for the one and only scene of them together in the same room - which takes place at the end of the film. It was miserably hot here too but because of sound recording we couldn't open any windows and the AC wasn't piped into that part of the building.
Night 7 - July 15
We brought Patrick back in to shoot the bulk of his scenes in this location. We started by having him record all his voice over lines - lines we'll hear him say in the film but not on camera. It was as simple as sitting him in a chair with a mic overhead on an arm. We wanted to do it on location though rather than in the studio so that the tone would match.
Bear in mind that everyone on this production was working for free and that everyone involved has day jobs. That means we would shoot after a long day of work. By this time in the schedule, people were tired and a little stressed. So, what do we do the night of shooting some of the most important and crucial scenes? The unthinkable - cut people loose and tell them to go home. That left just four of us plus Patrick to finish the nights' shooting with director Jonathan Johnson slinging the mic boom! Crazy. We just went for it.
On our final shot of the night (or morning?) the sun began to come up. As we were racing to finish, sunlight began to creep past and through the blinds covering the window. If you look closely, you can see it in the film where Stillman hears a noise at the door. In fact, as we were trying to squeeze off this last shot a garbage truck pulled up in the alley just outside the window. The noise was ruining our audio. It seemed like an eternity with the sun creeping higher in the sky. The truck finally picked up the dumpster, dumped it, but then, just sat there. When he finally left, we grabbed the winning take. It was about 6:30 AM by the time we finally got out of there - and not a moment too soon as there seemed to be a weird, creepy vibe about the place. It was time for a few days off.
Tech Note: During one of Stillman's scenes in which he explains alternative realities, randomness and averting chaos, a TV broadcast of a lottery drawing mysteriously appears on the TV in the background.
To create this I first found an Indian Head test pattern on the Internet to use as an "off the air" image on the screen. Then we recorded a state broadcast of the lottery drawing (which they don't televise anymore), and then seriously doctored the footage so as not to be recognizable (yeah, this probably constitutes copyright infringement, and I don't advocate it, but hey, this is guerilla filmmaking). I created TV snow and static and edited it all together.
Then, I authored a DVD that would convincingly break out of the test pattern image on cue and play the lottery sequence. This worked very well on location with a DVD player off camera feeding our little B&W TV. I adjusted the shutter speed of the camera to avoid sync bars in the TV image.
Additionally, we wanted to pull focus throughout the take to draw audience attention progressively from Stillman, to the TV in the background, and a lava lamp in the foreground - all of this to reinforce the ideas Stillman is expressing. Unfortunately, between the depth of field limitations of small gauge video, and the size of the room we weren't able to get as dramatic shifts in focus as I had hoped. Once again, the effect was enhanced dramatically in post with some rotoscope work in After Effects.
Night 8 - July 20
We began building and dressing the radio control room set for Nigel's scenes. We went back to Joylene's studio for this. She had a large room with some relatively new drywall and a concrete floor with a high ceiling.
The first task was to paint a portion of two walls a tan color. Then, we hung an overhead light for primary illumination. Dale Roth from KW3 Radio provided some old equipment to use in the background of our set.
Night 9 - July 21
We finished dressing the control room by pillaging Joylene's office. Her personal desk was better suited than the one we had so we took it as well as wall art, other decorations, and office supplies. Custom signage by J&R Artworks completed the look.
With the mic hung directly over Doug's head we still had a fair amount of reverb in the room. So, we scrounged up blankets, room dividers, even pillows - for strategic placement to kill the echo. Worked well.
We started the nights' shooting by knocking out Doug's VO lines then worked through most of his other scenes.
Tech Note: For Doug's key light I built a "coop" light (short for chicken coop). This was basically a 1x2" framework of wood with two 300 watt incandescent light bulbs mounted inside that I got from the hardware store. The framework was wrapped in a foil insulating material, also from the hardware store, and vented on top. Worked great!
A piece of white rip-stop nylon (looks like gridcloth) at the bottom of the box provided diffusion and long skirt of black craft felt (both purchased at the fabric store) hung down around the perimeter of the light to control spill. You can see a picture of it in the
behind the scenes pictures on this site.
Three other small units were used to light the background and other details but the overall scheme was very low key.
Night 10 - July 22
We wrapped up the balance of Doug's scenes on the radio control room set. He was scheduled to leave for vacation the next day and we had one scene left to shoot with him. So, we packed up and headed to an architect's office we had pre-arranged to shoot the final apocalyptic scene in.
This location was chosen because the architecture of the window closely matched that of Stillman's room. We needed to be able to set up a blue screen outside the window so that we could insert the appropriate view. The funeral home didn't have that. The office (which was actually an old home) fit the bill and had a deck that ran around the outside.
Before heading over to the location we needed to quickly paint two pieces of foam core with Chromakey paint. Much to our dismay, when we opened the can, the paint had become a gelatinous mass of rusty goo due to old age. We scrambled to find an alternative which came in the form of blue knit fabric - just the right color and large enough to cover both pieces of foam core, in Joylene's collection of stuff.
At the location, we first shot Doug walking to the window, facing the camera. A 1K lighting unit brought up on a dimmer outside provided the initial glow of the explosion. The biggest challenge was illiciting the right facial expression from Doug as he imagined the world vaporizing before his eyes.
Then, we set up our "blue screen" outside the window. The center window divider hides the seam between the two pieces of foam core. In post, this shot was highly modified. I was unable to extract a clean key so the various elements were cut and separated - including Doug. In the final composite, Doug is a "cutout", repositioned, and animated slightly for motion. The window cross pieces were removed and some brickwork added at the edge of the window casing.
The final shot of the night was a close-up of the alien business card - the final shot of the film. We wrapped around 2 AM. Doug must have been exhausted on his vacation.
Day/Night 11 - July 24
Another Saturday morning. With a borrowed key we converged on the second floor of an attorney's office for the boardroom scene. Friends and family members joined us to play corporate underlings around the board room table.
Fairly straightforward stuff. Big Dan played the part of a real estate tycoon in an alternate reality - dollying into and away from him as he lords over the table. When we got there, we realized there wasn't going to be quite enough room to run dolly track parallel to the table with a jib mounted overhead. With some quick thinking and a phone call we had a solution that worked well - even better than our original idea. A skateboard! We simply mounted the camera on a skateboard then pushed and pulled it from one end of the table to the other. It worked great!
We shot a cutaway (you'll notice the portrait of Dan on the wall in the background) then finished with the shot of the two realities colliding - A.R.F. as it's known in the film. Dan switched backed into his comfy PJ's and we shot him from behind as he approaches the doors of the boardroom and they open. The 'ol fog machine helped bridge this shot and the tunnel.
We let everyone else go, then shot a quick insert of Dan's reaction to meeting himself. This proved to be the last straw for a smoke detector in the office. Fortunately, it was not tied into any kind of fire protection for the building. The fire department didn't show up - which was a relief. However, we then discovered that the elevator had stopped working, presumably (at the time) due to the detector going off. It was basically locked out and required a special key to operate. I took a guess and found the key in the receptionist's desk!
Well, we finally got our stuff out of the building but since this was an attorney's office (albeit a friend) I was envisioning a lawsuit over a broken elevator when everyone returned to work the following week. Turned out, they had had problems with the elevator before and it was easily reset, so it really wasn't our fault - just bad timing. Phew!
Later that day we met at Bud's Barber Shop for the bag lady sequence. Mike Anderton stepped up to the plate on short notice to play the part of the barber (and husband of the bag lady in an alternate reality). Bud, the owner of the shop, had originally agreed to play the part and was a more appropriate age, but he got cold feet at the last minute.
Karen Russell played the part like a pro and endured hellish temperatures that afternoon dressed in full bag-lady garb.
That evening, Lance Warlock sacrificed his hair to play the part of an escaped mental patient. We had not been able to come up with the vehicle and actor to play the part of a cop as originally scripted. So, we put signage on an old pickup truck of mine and turned it into a maintenance truck for the Happy Valley Mental Asylum. This was an homage to a program PBS aired several years ago called Welcome to Happy Valley, which chronicled Dr. Jim Goodwin a psychologist, proclaimed by the NY Times as the "Pied Piper of Prozac" and the CBS "Eye to Eye" program as the "Pied Piper of Depression." It caused quite a stir then. The truck turns a lot of heads now.
Anyway, shooting this was hysterical. Lance played the part all too well - with some of the best material in the outtakes. Jonathan, co-director, and Lance's Partner in Unit 12 Productions, played the kidnapped maintenance worker - an appropriate "Hitchcockian" appearance.
Night 12 - July 27
Associate producer Dennis Roberts opened his home to shoot the bedroom scene involving Mike Anderton and Karen Russel sleeping. This was another jib/dolly combo setup which worked surprisingly well considering the small confines of the room and low ceiling.
Night 13 - July 29
Ahhhhhh. Last night of shooting. We first knocked out a couple of pickup shots at Dream Alley Studios - same place we shot the radio control room and bathroom. Joylene had a tiny rehearsal room with a window. So, we painted the area surrounding the window with the same paint as the control room set, we placed the camera inside the room and made the little corridor outside the window the producer's booth.
Dale Roth from KW3 Radio came in and played radio engineer/producer.
Then it was sit and wait. The final 3 shots were to be done at a diner. The owner graciously agreed to come in "early" before preparing for the day. That meant 3 AM! Well, beggars can't be choosers. We showed up at 3, and while waiting for the owner to arrive, parked the Happy Valley truck on the sidewalk and put a generator powered light in the bed up high for our key light. Then shot our short-order cook, actor Josh Fuller, leaving the diner.
Then we went inside and mounted the camera up high on a microwave oven overlooking the grill to get a shot of Josh at the grill. We had some pre-prepared food there and Josh just went through the motions of slinging hash. We added sound FX in post. Two lighting units and some fog provided the right ambiance.
Then we popped outside the side door to get a shot of Josh taking a cigarette break. The truck/light/generator combo on the sidewalk provided our key light again with another unit inside the rear door for backlight. More fog. It's funny, we never saw one cop while we were shooting outside - with the police station a block away. Someone did drive by though and ask if we needed help - thought there had been an accident or something.
We wrapped at 4:30 AM with Jean Larson providing cinnamon rolls. What a relief.
Post production is a whole other story. It makes me tired just thinking about it. Anyone who says filmmaking is easy... has never done it.
A Producer's Diary on The Radio Mechanics