Vultures Eps4: When Jim met Pat (Director’s Diary)

The weeks have quickly flown by, slowly but surely we’ve ploughed our way through the scripts for Vultures episodes 5 & 6. We shot hours of footage, it’s taken weeks but as I begin to flip through the sheets in “my bible” more and more of the pages have a large red line down the side, the line means “it’s done, we got it, move on…”.That’s a line I hear myself saying or I’m thinking constantly throughout the shoot, as we battle the clock against actor or location availablility.

The past few weeks I haven’t been able to read the schedule, it became a foreign language to me as it bounced around and had to be “re-jigged” for one reason or another. Thankfully (and thankslessly) John Morton can read it and then translate it to me several times a day!? Right now, I’m pretty sure I’m not supposed to be anywhere shooting something, so I have time to upload some more behind the scenes shots from episode 4.

The usual spoiler warning applies now, if you haven’t yet watched ‘The Case Of The Poisoned Dates‘ then click here and have your name scratched off my “list of doom”.

I’ve just uploaded a batch of new photos taken when we were shooting the scene where V.P.I detective Jim Vultour (John Morton) meets his harrassed ex-girlfriend’s (Sarah Black played by Niamh Moroney) new boyfriend; patterned-jumper-wearing trad band frontman Pat Cairo (Paddy Dunne). (NERD TRIVIA: This would be Pat Cairo’s first appearance, along with Paddy’s on camera debut. Himself and John have spent over two years writing and developing the show). I was really looking forward to shooting a lovely scene with the two of them meeting as their relevant characters.

This is one of my favourite scenes in episode 4; it’s got some of my favourite lines and reactions and I love the lighting, but the shoot actually took place over two days (MORE NERD TRIVIA). We arrived in Alan Slattery’s (”Sla”) parent’s house early on a Sunday morning. Sla has so many jobs that I’m not sure what to put in brackets after his name, but imagine the list is something like this: “producer, camera operator, editor and a lot of other stuff!? His parents seem only too happy to let us use their house to shoot in. So, we show up every couple of weeks, rearrange their furniture, drink all their tea, eat all their biscuits and then disappear before washing up! (FACT!)

This particular Sunday was no different. We spent the night before shooting the scene in Ryan’s pub, after this shoot in Sla’s parents, we’d be shooting the montage sequence in the park where Jim & Janine stalk Pat & Sarah. After that we’d be back in Ryan’s to finish the brawl.Did you follow that!? That’s what it’s like when I talk to John Morton! Sunday’s are usually our busiest days, it’s the day when everyone is free.

Every Sunday, as we’re taking a tea break, we laugh at ourselves. When you ask most people what they did on Sunday, they don’t have much to reply with. After today my answer would be something like: “On Sunday, I was working on that sitcom thing I told you about. We were shooting a bit where Jim breaks into his ex-girlfriends house to sleep on her couch and when she throws him out he meets her new boyfriend, who wears patterned jumpers, you also get to see his trad band ‘The Cairo City Ramblers’, they’re in the back of the van he jumps out of singing…”. By now I’ve mastered spotting that glazed-over look in people’s eyes. I stop, exchange quick pleasantries and go where-ever John Morton told me I should be, to shoot what he told me we were shooting.

Due to actor availability and, I can’t believe I’m saying it: “van availility”, we shot this scene over two days, weeks apart. On the first day we started with the scene inside the sitting room, quickly moving on to shooting all of the dialogue between Jim, Sarah & Pat at the front door. There’s always a worry of splitting an outdoor scene shoot in half, simple things like the weather can mess it up. But when we returned on the last day of shooting to finish the scene we were delighted to find it wouldn’t be a problem.

The last day of shooting was a very happy and relaxed one. We showed up at Sla’s parent’s house early Sunday morning, it was frosty and cold. As we tried to wake up, we attacked the Slattery tea & biscuit supply, dressing KenMc’s van (VAN ENTHUSIAST’S TRIVIA) with flags and trad instruments. As the sun began to shine and the neighbours awoke, looking out their windows to see where the blast of trad music was coming from, I’m sure they were left wondering “what the hell is going on in the Slattery’s drive-way!?”.

To add to the “session in the back of the van” look; we ran extension cables from the house through the front of the van, to power two multi-coloured floor lights (LIGHTING NERD TRIVIA: supplied by KilkennyMusic.com: we also used the lights to make the Watergate Theatre look like a cinema!) . Add some pints and the bearded-band of merry trad men that are the Cairo City Ramblers; Tommy Dowling, Laurent Murray & Mick Slattery (RANDOM TRIVIA: Mick is Sla’s dad, he has an awesome beard & is possibly the loveliest man ever!). Enter Pat Cairo… in a blaze of trad glory which we had to film several times to get a take where nobody was laughing behind the camera and then a couple of times more so we could all laugh!

Following Pat’s entrance we pulled the lights from the van and set up over Jim’s shoulder to shoot the van entering and leaving the driveway. Sla would later work his magic making it all seem as one but that was a wrap on the Vultures Eps4: ‘The Case Of The Poisoned Dates‘.

Rest assured I still have plenty more photos from the shoot to come along and my behind the scenes documentary. With the episode 5 & 6 shoot end now clearly in sight, there’s plenty more to come over the coming weeks and months.

‘Attic’ – Behind the Scenes (Vlog)

It’s been a few weeks since I’ve had the chance to post a vlog, mainly due to that fact that most of the content I’m shooting contains spoilers for upcoming Vultures episodes. I do have a behind the scenes documentary for ‘The Case Of The Poisoned Dates‘ on the way, it still needs a bit of work. But for now, something unrelated to Vultures, well… sort of!?

Over the past few weeks (aside from shooting Vultures), myself, John Morton and David Thompson had the pleasure of working on a short film with the Young Irish Film Makers. All three of us are former members of YIFM and we were delighted to be asked back to star in ‘Attic’. A short film written by David Galster which to the best of my knowledge will premiere sometime in March.

Aside from getting to just do some acting and not worry about anything production-wise, I saw the shoot as an opportunity to improve my filming and editing skills. I ended up with more footage than I expected, it’s always hard to cut things out especially when your addicted to special features and behind the scenes content.

Whilst this may not be the greatest behind the scenes documentary as far as the process of making a short film goes, it does offer an insight into how much fun it is to work with John Morton & David Thompson. Yes, if we’re not getting lost on our way to the shoot location then we’re breaking the world record for “c**ks drawn on a clapper board” or attempting to befriend swans!?

The above video captures our adventures and misadventures over the three day shoot for ‘Attic’, working with the next generation of Kilkenny film makers. I’d like to say thanks to all of the lads, it was a pleasure to work with you and I’m looking forward to seeing the outcome. I just hope we weren’t as big a nightmare as the video makes us out to be!?

Links and things (12th February 2009)

We’ve just finished a morning shoot and have the afternoon off before shooting again tonight, just enough time to write a post with some links to check out;

1. Following on from an intense weekend of shooting, we’ve called a “Vultures series 1 wrap” on Peter McGann, aka V.P.I’s skirt-chasing, boozehound, lawyer Matt McLoughlin. You can read a lovely little post from him here on his blog:

What I am about to write is more than likely going to be seen as a shameless exercise in promoting a series I have a recurring role on, but I can assure you that I am writing this as an independent observer. I do the series for the love of it, and because I want my name to be associated with something of this quality, not because I have aspirations to be the new Simon Pegg… READ MORE

2. Following on from Darragh Doyle’s questionably pro-Pinkertons video a few weeks back, he’s now promoting self-proclaimed “urban street preacher” Jack Street.  Darragh’s recent post highlights Jack Street’s website as “highly professional” and poses the question “Is this the best designed website in Kilkenny?“. He also takes a cheap potshot at Darren Byrne calling him a “cheap sell-out” for “pimping out” the services of Vultures Private Investigations.

3. As if it wasn’t bad enough that Jack Street has discovered the internet, Darragh’s not the only one helping to promote his “services”. Anthony McGuinness is also helping Jack to spread his advert for the television by posting it on his blog. So far, Anthony has not got involved in the dispute between Byrne and Doyle.

4. Most recently, in response to Darragh’s potshot, Darren Byrne has hit back by launching a website that  might just be as stylish as Street’s but of course, without the panache, www.darraghdoylehasnopanache.com.

5. Jack Street has yet to make any official comments about this ongoing feud, this is more than likely due to his email account being under investigation for several different cases of fraud. If I hear anything from the dirty rat I’ll let you know.

Devious Theatre’s Trainspotting: “Choose Life”

The Devious Theatre Company have just released the fourth video clip from our production of Irvine Welsh’s ‘Trainspotting‘ in the Watergate Theatre last June.

Check out the above clip featuring myself as Rentboy and John Morton as Sickboy; the scene begins with the most famous of Trainspotting monologues “Choose Life” followed by an argument with some “shell suits” at a taxi rank as Renton and Sickboy make their way to Johnny Swan’s place for a fix.

You can read all about my experiences during Trainspotting here on a previous blog post. And don’t forget to subscribe to the Devious Theatre Youtube for plenty more video clips to come.

Vultures Eps4: Meeting Janine Drew & Shooting in the Office (Director’s Diary)

We were in the laneways of Kilkenny once again this morning, filming scenes for Vultures episodes 5 & 6 and it always amazes me; the mixture of reactions we get on the street.

It’s not even strange to us anymore, to walk around town to our shoot locations. But obviously by the reactions we get there’s still a lot of people who don’t know what we’re doing!? They’re walking around on a Monday morning, it’s probably routine and then they turn a corner to meet us; carrying bundles of equipment and strange props, walking straight past them, with a purpose. A strange group of people, some in strange costumes!? Often, already in character and only adding to the weird situation.

But lately, as we walk around filming, we’re starting to get different reactions. We still get the dazed or confused shoppers, there’ll always be those people scuttingly past us slightly terrified, or gatherings of schoolboys at lunchtime. Unfortunately, I think we’ll always get the idiots shouting abuse or the bar-stool-critics. But lately, most people don’t seem so scared of us. Now, when people see us or turn a corner in a laneway and walk straight onto our “set”, more and more of them seem to know what we’re doing. Complete strangers are now smiling and saying hello, people of every shape, age and size seem happy to have bumped into us. Some people seem geniunely excited to have stumbled across “the vultures!”, people shouting the characters names or quotes and people asking for a cameo: some of them have already spent alot of time developing their character!?

For months we’ve been promoting the show anywhere we could; MySpace, Bebo, Facebook, we’ve blogged, we’ve video blogged, bombarded journalists, done interviews, passed out cards and promo shots, used every opportunity to drop ‘Vultures‘ into the smallest of conversations and it’s great to see people’s reactions to it all and how the word is spreading. I have to say thanks to everyone out there who has helped us out in spreading our message “Watch Vultures”. More and more people are watching, and liking it.

Thanks to everyone who has watched it and told their friends or posted about it on their blog, check out Darren Byrnes’s latest post: “Is Janine Drew The Woman For You?” (Thanks dude). Thanks to all the people who give up their free time to help us out or give us a location to shoot in (in some cases meaning we’ll take over your house and rearrange your furniture!?). It’s really appreciated, especially when we know what it’s like to wait weeks for people to get back to us only to be told “no”. But everytime we’re told “no” or something gets in our way, we find a way around it. Usually thanks to the help of people who may not understand why we do it but know we love doing it.

Everytime we get the reactions on the street, the smiles, or people coming up to talk about the show. Everytime we get feedback, positive or negative, or see somebody helping us out, it makes all of the struggles and the long days worth it. We’re continuing to learn but I can safely say we’re shooting some of the best footage we’ve ever shot and I can’t wait for people to see what the future holds for Vultures.

Once again, if you haven’t watched Vultures then shame on you! If you haven’t yet seen ‘The Case Of The Poisoned Dates‘ then the following may contain spoilers!! Click here.

I’ve just uploaded two new batches of behind the scenes photos from episode 4. Firstly, you’ll find a couple more photos from the scene where Jim Vultour (John Morton) and Dan McGrain (David Thompson) meet Janine Drew (Suzanne O’Brien) for the first time. This scene, the first post-title scene, was initially supposed to be our first day’s shoot. Arriving at the gates of St. Josephs on the Waterford Rd. on a cold grey morning. As soon as we unpacked the gear and began to set up, it began to rain. With the energy and enthusiasm that only a first day shooting brings, we brought out the umbrellas, did a tea run and waited in the hope it would stop. The long wait in the ice cold rain. As it slowly broke our spirits with no hope of it stopping, we were smack bang in the middle of shooting being “rained out” on our first day. We retreated back to the office in the hopes of preparing it for shooting scenes scheduled later that week. A plan which eventually fell through as we were missing furniture due to arrive the next day. On my first day as a director, we didn’t get one shot. It was spirit crushing.

Finally, after a couple of days shooting in the comforts of the office (by comforts I mean; it’s got spinny chairs and the kettle is constantly on), we returned to the Waterford Rd for the re-shoot. It was cold but the sun was shining down on us. The new boom mic had little difficulty catching the dialogue-heavy scene, as traffic sped by behind us. One of the biggest problems we’ve always faced is background noise but now we didn’t have to worry and the weather wasn’t going to be a problem. We quickly moved through different setups for the conversation in the scene, moving on to Janine’s entrance sequence in a wrestler meets X-factor contestant style, by that afternoon we had changed locations to shoot the “Janine Drew – Work Experience” trailer. Primarily using Janine to promote the launch of episode 4, their was a genuine buzz about the “chav”s arrival, I held back on any shots that would spoil any of the visual jokes in the scene including a couple of snaps of “the nuns”: Angela Walsh & Kate St John (Kate has endlessly helped us with costumes and is a legend!). You can check out all my shots from this scene here on my flickr.

You’ll also find a second batch of new photos from shoots in the Abbey Business Centre as the V.P.I Office. There’s a mixture of shots from different scenes in there, some days are so hectic that I forget to pick up my camera but for those days I remembered to take some photos I played around with the pre-set colour temperatures, often avoiding the proper one resulting in a strange variation of colour between my shots and how the scene looks in the episode. My memory of these shoots is a bit of a blur, as we bounced around the episode timeline depending on actor availability. I can say we drank a lot of tea, we shot the last scene first and I think we successfully tested new lighting set-ups and angles; shooting a scene in the office with more characters present than ever before, pages of dialogue and characters moving around the small room as people come and go. One of my favourite moments in this scene has to be Inspector Leeson (Paul Young) flashing his badge at Vultour, Janine and McGrain (see above).

We’re past the half way mark shooting episodes 5 & 6. It’s hard to believe it, slowly but surely we’re calling a “Vultures series 1 wrap” on individual actors. I’m not sure what it will be like once we’ve finished shooting. I do know that I’ll have literally hundreds of photos and hours of behind the scenes footage to get through. We continue to learn, hopefully we’ll continue to take things up a notch as the series draws to a close and hopefully you’ll continue to enjoy it (and spread the word!).

Vultures Eps4: The Park Scene (Directors Diary)

With Vultures episode 4 now online I can finally begin to release my behind-the-scenes photos and talk about the shoot. If you haven’t watched ‘Vultures: The Case Of The Poisoned Dates‘ yet then click here to avoid spoilers!

First up, my shots from the park scene with Inspector Leeson (Paul Young), his deadly-Russian mail-order bride Tatiana (Edwina Whearty) and V.P.I detectives Niall Tennyson (Sean Hackett) and Dan McGrain (David Thompson).

We arrived early outside the Castle Park on a Monday morning in December. Following an insane weekend of filming in Ryan’s pub, we were all clearly tired but buzzing from the weekend and ready to go. The sun was shining but it was still bitterly cold. As we waited for the park to open, the early morning traffic stretched back up the road beside us. Cars filled with grumpy people about to be late for work; staring out their frosty windows at a bunch of weirdos in costumes, smiling and laughing with bundles of equipment in our hands. We drank take-away tea and watched in awe as a squirrel came over the park wall and showed no fear as it scurried across the road through the standing traffic. Squirrels continued to distract us all morning.

We got into the park and aware that we were working against a tight schedule we began the shoot, the sun was flaring over the hill providing some really awesome lighting for the stalking sequence. We moved quickly on to the tree sequence, all the while being slightly distracted by squirrels as they played around us. Fresh supplies of tea arrived and as Paul attempted to climb the tree and Tatiana attempted to pull him down, we shot from above using an extended tripod (”no fancy stuff!”), moving onto handheld coverage of him being flung to the ground and crawling away. The grass was frozen and frosty, everyone had wet feet and Paul was crawling on his hands and knees… more tea! The shoot continued, Paul let out endless hilarious cries in terror, everyone tried not to laugh too much, the squirrels ignored us and scurried around.

We moved on to a wide shot as McGrain and Tennyson attempted to save Leeson, the colours in the park and sky looked awesome, and we still couldn’t ignore watching squirrels. Next came the running shots and we were into the scuffle and “the boob lift”. The park was getting busy with joggers and people walking their dogs. It must have been strange, to be in the park on a frosty Monday morning and come across seven guys with camera equipment, circling a Russian looking girl in a large fur coat, loudly discussing something called a “boob-lift”.

Against the clock I quickly snapped some character portraits of Tatiana Leeson. The park is an awesome place to shoot, especially on a sunny day, plenty of light and awesome colours. With the fight scene shot, we moved on to the dialogue between Tennyson and McGrain. The sun had slowly moved around behind the trees and there was awesome colours on the fallen leaves, creating a lovely warm glow to the scene, despite how bloody cold it was.

You can check out all my behind the scenes shots from the Park scene here on my flickr account and there’s plenty more photos from episode 4 to come.

Random Fact: Vultures have been known to eat dead squirrels.

Lad! by Meaningless Movies

The latest short from Meaningless Movies. It’s nothing short of genius! WATCH IT!

Vultures ‘The Case Of The Poisoned Dates’

Vultures episode 4: ‘The Case Of The Poisoned Dates’ is now online! Check it out!

My directorial debut and it was a truly awesome experience. I have to say a huge thanks to John Morton, Paddy Dunne and Alan Slattery for giving me the opportunity and for all their support throughout. I also have to say a huge thanks to the cast and crew for all their hard work and making it “a truly awesome experience!” (Yes, I quoted myself!)

I’ll blog more about the production over the next few weeks as I begin to release my behind-the-scenes photos and more. Any other bloggers out there, if you enjoy the show then please help us by posting it on your blog! You can get the embedding code here.

For now, please sit back and enjoy Vultures ‘The Case Of The Poisoned Dates‘. And I’d really love to hear peoples thoughts and feedback.