Shooting Off The Cuff

The biggest crew I ever worked with was about 200 people. That is a LOT of people. Most I didn't see since I was always in the production trailer, nursing a hangover or pissed off at how slow 200 people are. I may seem like a oksie-folksie guy when you meet me in person BUT, on set, that was..well, I was much of a angry tyrant. I see that now. Not a tyrant, but...I always saw inefficient waste. I argued a lot of things. Much of it had nothing to do with the movie I was shooting at the time (I only been on 2 features). They were things like the use of time (which I suppose could be linked to the feature). People generally didn't listen as to where they should park the trucks or which camera we were using. Or where our lens kit we ordered was. It was intense sometimes because I thought the stress would kill the producer. It killed me just having to coordinate my camera crew (which really wasn't my job but...you can't help that). Most of the time my crew were talking me off the ledge.

So, for those of you who dream of working in big bad studio Hollywood, please etch this in your mind...it is a job. You are employed. They want you to fill out paperwork. Then there's the drudgery of 14 hour days. 12 hour days are considered normal (by the way). I had no idea 8 hours was what normal people did for the longest time. In production good luck with 12 or 14, some have gone even more. And it's all a waste of dumb time. No one wants to deal with dumb time, except teamsters. They get paid regardless of how dumb you are about your time.

That's why I prefer THE least amount of people on set. Which isn't always feasible in a union set up. A well tuned crew, such as the one Clint Eastwood uses regularly is impressive. They (most likely) speak very little and work very fast. The ones you get when starting out, know very little about what's going on (because they don't read their call sheets) or they're just too green and film school arrogant to hustle their asses off on set.

That said, the shoots I put together now are the ones I prefer. I actually got down to just me as camera, lighting and sound. Which is documentary style-ish. Since we were making a narrative film. I loved it! Though I couldn't function as a receptive human being to "directing." when I'm thinking of 100 other things such as sound levels or whatnot. Yes, in a consumer audience, this is a VERY poor example of giving the audience what they paid for. To me...I don't care. It doesn't register like that. And if ANYTHING comes of it, I'm happy. If NOT, I'm not sad.
Also, I shoot on film, which adds another level of paranoia.
If you've ever been around camera technicians, they check, cross check and check again. When an unfortunate accident happens on set with the camera, they are...well, it's amazing how utter destroyed they are because it calls into question their skills and reputation.
In the industry, the stakes are pretty high in dollar amounts. This stress isn't what you should be concerned about. Nor should you ever.
This is a reckless way to work...but...somehow, I prefer it.