number of spots: 5
titles: What Drives You?! (etc)
product: SyQuest portable drives
director: Tom Donald
production company: Seeler & Miner
producer: George Young
style: location, hand-held
when: December 1997
where: San Francisco Bay area |
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The concept was appealing: follow a wacky bike
messenger all over the Bay area as he bursts into the lives of five different
computer-users, discovers the individual ways they store their works on portable SyQuest
drives, rhapsodizes about how "all this can be held on this" (portable drive,)
and peddles wildly off to the next location.
Then came the reality: In two ten-hour days,
shoot five spots at five interior and five exterior locations scattered around the San
Francisco Bay. That was the challenge director Tom Donald and producer George Young
offered me. Guerilla filmmaking. Drawing on my long-distant documentary days,
I suggested we film 16mm with limited equipment, a tiny crew and the best guys possible:
one gaffer (Greg Davies) one sound man (Andy Wiskes) one assistant cameraman (Dave
Wendlinger) and just two lights, a 1200 HMI par equipped with a Chimera plus a 4x4
keno. For camera I requested an Aaton XTRprod with a custom 7-56mm zoom. For stock,
7277 which would help us juggle lighting opportunities. George added one PA-props
and one makeup. On his side Tom lined up a terrific actor (Mike Sommers,)
five willing computer users including an entire middle-school classroom, and ten locations
spaced so that we could cover the ground in our limited available time.
We were off
to our races. Stop one, a Sausalito houseboat at dawn, where our manic and easily
amused hero bursts in on a photographer who  stores all her pictures on her SyQuest portable drives.
Then to the San Francisco post-production house, 111, where all that video is stored, of
course, on portable SyQuest drives. We continued to Creative Partners where Gary
Acord stores his art, then caught our breath and wrapped for the day. Day two found us racing south of San Jose to a middle school
where willing kids and teachers interrupted their school work for our indefatigable
messenger who soon rides off carrying all their homework -- on their portable SyQuest
drives. More driving to end our day in the San Francisco loft of composer Steve
Shapiro where he stores all that glorious music on his own SyQuest drives.
At each
location, Tom rehearsed his actor and soon-to-be-famous real talent all the while
accommodating his friendly and ever-present clients. During these brief lulls,
gaffer Greg Davies and I grabbed available light, sometimes augmenting it with a touch of
chimera or keno, sometimes just closing blinds to cut down the outside light spilling
in. Working with a top-flight crew, including the ever creative and nimble soundman
Andy Wiskes, we kept to schedule, kept the producer happy, and most important of all
delivered to our clients an immensely satisfying set of films. |
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