this lossy codec

I happened to be standing near the AD when I heard him say to one of his minions, “Make it your responsibility to prepare the box lunches.” This was not fortuitous news. Barely half an hour to lunch and we were apparently going to work through it. Sure, box lunches would arrive and we would zealously snarf them down (when we had a chance) but the best part of lunch (sitting. or, for some, sleeping) would be denied. Who knew what their rational was. The wind blown dust storms which always seems so bad after lunch? The desire to “shoot out” JD? It didn’t matter.

I did mention the wind, right. It’s interesting how easy it becomes to tell everyone apart despite their face being hidden beneath goggles & bandana. While the lunches sat getting cold the crew scrambled in the blowing dirt to rig and prepare for what, in reality, is the biggest stunt of the show so far. So there we are. Hungry. Hot, squinting and spitting at the dirt. I’m contemplating the date and our solidarity on International Worker’s Day. My blood sugar has dropped to dangerous levels. Tempers flair. Stupidity reigns. Suddenly, the music playback for the scene blares (and I mean blares) the Star Spangled Banner. That just took the cake. The humanity!

In the end, a minor miscommunication ruined the shot (apparently) so it all was for not. Serves them right. Of course, I’d rather they have gotten it. The crew will be the ones picking up the slack in the end.

If only I had some semi-reliable signal then perhaps one of these posts might actually make it up. As it is I have time this morning (so it would seem) but we are remote indeed. Tucked far within Canyon de Chelly. Each morning we stakebed our gear 20 minutes down the riverbed (see pic) then we offload into a smaller 4 wheel “gator” and drive down a finger of the canyon. We have park rangers standing by to make sure our massive footprint doesn’t disturb the remains that populate the park. A ranger informed me that only about one third of it’s 38,000 acres has been fully excavated. As the FX guys dug a ditch yesterday deep enough to hold a person I wondered what they would find.
Yes, it’s unfortunate that this may never get posted. We are scheduled to be here through Saturday and then move back to Monument Valley to try to finish what we didn’t get due to the bad weather last week. The morning is young and stunt shots don’t require much from the sound department. A rare moment of peace. The days have been long and hard this week thus far. I’ll take what I can get.
Eventually, the “real” work commences. There is a period of 4-5 hours where some scurrying in somewhat sweltering heat occurs. The nice thing about working in a canyon though, is the narrow window of daylight. The shadow creeps gradually closer to our frame until it is so mind-boggling close it nearly slices the actors head off. Unbelievable.
Finally we scurry out toward the still existing sunlight but luckily we are spared the pain of struggling to build our rig onto driving vehicle. We would only have gotten the sound of a diesel engine. We would have done it but time (and light) was short.

God it’s depressing to write a blog post only to have it disappear into the ethyr. Apparently the wordpress app doesn’t understand the concept of ‘local draft’. Whatever it was I was writing about it sure seemed a string of genius thoughts at the time. Come to think of it, there is something about the act of writing itself that tickles the particular part of my brain most sensitive to genuineness. Much more stimulating than whatever part browsing effects. For now anyway, the solution is writing to my notepad. I’ll copy and paste it in later.

Waiting on weather. Not that it is raining. Though it is threatening to. We actually got rained out two days last week. The desert just doesn’t have the ability to absorb heavy amounts of rain quickly. And, remote as we are, in the middle of a big hunk of nowhere, it just got plain ol’ silly and maybe even dangerous. So, on a show off 128 days with only 2 days off our biggest break may have been due to rain. Oh well, they don’t seem too worried about it.

Hard to muster up good humor on the first day back after a holiday weekend. Ho-hum. Wednesday we head to Arizona. Monument Valley & Cayon de Chelle. Should be pretty anyway.

Ended up trying for the shot several times over the course of the next 4 hours, as the sun played hide and seek on the edge of a giant dark cloud. Finally, the futility of the situation won out.

Posting this now or else it may never make it.

Nearly two weeks in on the ‘Big Show’. I was beginning to doubt the gig would ever allow me the opportunity to dump some verbage on ye. Well, here goes…

Very different show (in many ways). I am actually a ‘cable guy’ as in wrangling and humping a significant ammount of cable around all day. Whereas I was previously trained in a post-cable (“hard line”) era this is like a throwback to the classic time. There’s a technique to wrapping cable (“over-under”) and it is essential.

There are other differences to this show (an espresso machine at craft service, shooting one scene over the course of two days & actually appreciating what is being shot) but It is still too early to know much of what is yet to come.

Other interesting accounts:

A photo shoot. To officially capture T.L.R & T in all their glory, on horses in front of a blue screen & with a boom operator swinging a long pole over them…wait, what? That’s right, the genius of corporate Dismay decided they needed to lock down the image of our heroes to be sure no one else stole a shot of them first. The boom? Isn’t it obvious? Anyway, we were asked to loan out a spare pole/zeppelin setup for the shoot. I prepped it (and even combed out the furry sock). First we were told the picture boom op was to be our resident cowboy advisor for the movie, a really nice guy who, without exception, blesses his lunch with his hat over his heart every day. He was nixed. Then it was to be our ‘heavyset ranger’ stand-in. He got nixed. Then they gave it to Jeff, our boom op. this seemed best and I thought increased the chance of it getting shluffed off on me. T’was not to be. In nearly the last minute (and each time the news of the change reached us ‘did you hear about the change for the boom op?’. Finally, (for ‘paperwork reasons’) they went with J.D.’s sound guy, Keenen. In an utterly surreal moment, I was briefly the stand-in for the boom op for the photo shoot.

If you don’t appreciate the subtlety of that humorous situation perhaps this other ditty will get you. The justification for all this hard-wiring is the quality over wireless (“man!”). It’s like a vinyl over digital argument to me. But hey, I collect records & 8tracks so how can I argue. Anyway, late in the day yesterday we were getting close to finishing so I had begun to wrap the boom cable back (in hopes of the last shot being MOS). Well, we ended up needing to roll on it and Jeff, in an act of utter pity for me) suggested we just fly with the wireless for this shot. Great, I thought. I’ll wrap the cable back to the cart(100′). So we finish that shot and find that the last shot of the day (the ‘martini’ as its called) was a shot of piss in a bucket (literally). Well, Lee & Jeff decide this requires a level of fidelity not possible via wireless. So back out goes the hard line for one shot of piss in a pail. Man, did it sound good!

Put the lid on another show, leaving a little early for downtime to prepare for next one right around the bend. This show was alright. Good peeps on the whole crew. Next one will be a major shift. Hardly any family faces. I’ll be cabling instead of booming. $215m budget instead of $2m. Abq instead of Santa Fe. Doubt I will even be allowed to take pictures on set. I’ll try to keep the tales of my exploits happening but I really don’t know what to expect.

Here are a few more pix from my final days on ‘code name: geronimo’. Lots of interesting structures around the old prison. Not sure which are original and which were added over the last ten years of movie production.

Day 6 already. Back in the field. A week ago I had just returned from a trip to KC with a trunk full of 60 year old tape recordings from Afghanistan. Today I am on location faking Afghanistan in New Mexico.

Days later we are in the old prison in Santa Fe, for the duration of the show. Lots of gunfire. Be it known that blanks are loud & very dangerous. This prison is the site of the worst prison riot in US history. meanwhile, the news reported this horrific prison fire in Hondurus.
I haven’t had much free time on this show as I’ve been busy booming but I did take some pictures. Hopefully they tell the story.

Snow was in the forecast but most of the day passed mildly. It wasn’t until just before evening that giant flakes began to fall. And fall. And fall. It wasn’t as cold as day one but it was a blizzard. Our location, near the fly fishing spot, is up a winding valley along route 63 north of Pecos. By wrap the snow had begun to stick and it the roads were getting icy. My precarious parking job from the morning left me with little other option than to abandon it for the night and catch a ride.

Day 4 was an easier day (I’ve begun to detect a pattern (bad day, good day, bad day, good day) with most of the work inside an old rustic cabin. The weather was sunny, at least while the sun’s trajectory crossed the small window of the valley, slipping away by 3 o’clock. The transo guys got my car free while I scurried around doing my regiment of 2 peoples work. The motions are getting smoother as Bayard (the mixer) and I fall into a groove. Battery, jam, wire. Point stick, suck up sound.

Today (noon call time – I’m writing this at a cafe before I go in), if my pattern is correct might be a rough day. Let’s hope I’m wrong.

Deep and extended apologies to all my faithful readers. Most, I’m sure, have given up hope of ever picking up the thread of my unraveled life (I, as well…). Nevertheless by days end, considering I actually get this posted, the yarn will ineligibly woven into the world’s web forever.

What crazed adventures stole me from my narrative duty? In a word, “life”. Mostly in the form of a small humanoid creature. Oddly though, work as well. Yes, meanwhile(as they say) I have been gainfully employed (mostly) on a feature film in Santa Fe. I say mostly in reference to the 3 weeks when the show was shut down because the funding necessary for us to shoot apparently “disappeared”. How does that happen? The mind reels. In the interim we were promised a return to work no less than 8 times. Needless to say, the previously upbeat mood of the crew on what had been up to that point a dream of a show took something of a hit. Alas, ‘never trust a producer’ is the prime directive of film work.

So here we are, the final two weeks of this funny little, slightly cursed picture. Shooting in the shell of an abandoned mall in ‘slightly less quaint than Santa Fe’ Albuquerque. At least it beats the heat. Perhaps something interesting will happen worth documenting (or perhaps my cozy little blog will insulate us from the assaults of reality and wrap us in obscurity).

The long, bumping van ride reminds me of the Peruvian hiway into the jungle. The pothole devastated road required the driver to continually veer to & fro in a vain attempt to align his path over the dwindling minority remaining of the road. It didn’t seem to help. Perhaps it was some technique he had developed to fling our momentum out horizontally in some way dampening our constant vertical thrust. The ride was a long enough that going slow wasn’t an option. At some point we passed a cnstruction crew, repairing the road one hole at a time. The futility of their effort didn’t stop us from spontaneously leaning out the window & cheering them on maniacally. The “road” was lined with fires that went deep into the jungle and rose high into the sky, obscuring the sun with lightening filled clouds. Ominous & foreboding.

But New Mexico is a long way from Peru. We’re four out of five days in on a shoot in nw nm filming in the alien landscape of the Bisti Badlands. Millions of years have eroded this once underwater dinosaur graveyard into the anomalous forms called ‘hoodoos’. Stunning and (cough, cough) dusty. Giant dust devils spontaneously appear and disappear, leaving destruction in their wake. Amazing and absurd, this process of movie making. Hard to imagine the place surviving our impact.

It figures that I would jinx myself by starting to blog. Before yesterday was over I got a call from the guys on set in desperate need of some crucial components. I gathered it up and took a van to set some 12 miles down the road (according to the driver). Upon arrival, not seeing any actors, camera or my fellow sound brethren, I wandered around aimlessly until the familiar voice of a PA called out, “Brett, I’ve got a snowmobile for you.”.
You see, this shot required a car careening through the woods and with the adition of another 8″‘s or so on Sunday night there was probably a good 18-20″ on the ground. So, the snowmobile driver and I hopped on and

Spare time is so easy to waste I neglect to use it properly. So here is a post, dear readers – confirming the continuity of my existence in this electronic hinterland. At dinner the other night my friend who hosts this site chastised me for neglecting my documatorial duties and so I must unburdon myself by spewing forth some kind of narrative.

It’s the monday beginning week three on ‘Knockout’. We’ve been shooting a lot up in Los Alamos and today is no different. Thanks to the massive 8″ dump of snow yesterday I was late to an already pushed call (thankfully) of 2 hrs. On arrival I frenetically rushed to get the ‘pod car’ (pictured) wired and all the various acoustical gear together. These days with driving footage involved rigging the car first thing and then not seeing it again until lunch (Dennis & Eddie (mixer & boom) were riding in one of the two follow vans – no room for me). So here I am (again) holding down the camera truck – reading, surfing & blogging (finally).

I filled in as boom op for Jeff today (as well as last Friday). All in all I think it went pretty great. I had a good time doing it anyway. There’s something really thereputic about it – it’s probably the physical dicipline & focus. My regular job on the other hand is all about sloth & work on the peripheri. Ugh. Not really looking forward to going back to it… For certain, booming is high pressure. Still, even though I was nervous laying in bed last night, a kind of deep calm came over me in the midst of the day. Maybe it’s just a matter of getting comfortable; of getting to the point where you trust the decisions your brain makes. That’s a good feeling.
Jeff says booming is like acting. Much of the time you’re out there with the actors & I guess it’s true, you’re performing. I certainly feel that way – it takes a great deal of effort to pull off. A lot of knowledge & experience as well as finess & grace.
Anyway, there were probably some things I could have done better (better choices I could have made for position, better comunication with the camera crew, etc) but still, I made very few mistakes (dipping into frame, casting a shadow) & for the most part I think I successfully passed myself off as a boom operator.

Boyoboy. Just when I thought the week would pass relatively uneventfully, a major upheaval occurred midway through Friday(uh, last Friday). The mixer, the guy who hired me for this gig, got canned. There were, apparently, some technical issues with the sound he was sending to post. We knew this of course but we weren’t aware of the extent of the problem. As recent as Friday morning I was sending emails to post in a continued effort to troubleshoot what the heck we were doing that was causing such issues. Funny timing, I suppose. Anyway, it made for dark, dark Friday & especially the wrap, where, instead of loading the sound carts onto the camera truck as always, we pulled all the sound gear off the truck & loaded it onto a selerate truck. Made for quite a scene with the crew. Despite the fact that it was made clear that the boom & I were to stay, I couldn’t help feeling bad. Just leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth. Now I’m wondering if we’ll be back to square one with the guys in post.

Tried to get this post up while it was still “news” but the weekend was crazy busy & the week is worse. Anyway, on the fourth day with the new mixer the transition has been relatively smooth. Relatively.

If course, by mid-afternoon the wires have somehow degraded (sweaty actors, etc…) and have now gone all “rustly.” God I hate that. Anyway, I’ll be booming tomorrow & Monday (god willing) as Jeff is taking a couple days off. Should be a nice change of pace. Still, the future in this business, is entirely unpredictable.

4:am wakeup, stretch (yoga), eat & prepare for the day
5:am leave Santa fe for abq
6:am eat breakfast at basecamp before 6:30 call time
7:30 Outside the Sandi Bar in corallas getting ready for the first shot. Shooting here all day.
8:12 The first shot is off. Kind of an odd day – Spanish dialogue for the duration.
9:30 crafty calls…thank god for crafty.
12:00 nearly lunch already. Time flies when you are reading. (Great article in current Fortean Times on William S. Burroughs.) This is one of those days that earns the cable guy both the hatred & the envey of the crew. Sure, I worked a little; placed a plant mic or two, wired up an actor, replaced a battery in a transmitter pack & handed out some headsets. Those are momentary bursts of activity that are surrounded by long periods of waiting. It’s dangerous business – if something isn’t ready when we start to roll & I’ve been sitting around…it doesn’t look good.
2:pm after lunch rewired the talent & wd-40′d the squeeky door – ready for the first shot after lunch.
3:30 thunder. Sure, we’re shooting inside but there’s alll kinds of electic stuff outside (lights, generators, etc) not to mention our sound carts. We’re hiding under popup tents, anticipating wetness.
5:30 Not much rain after all. Back to sitting around waiting while they film a large turtle (tortoise?) named Otis.
7:30 wander around looking for a place to nap (as expected, 4 hrs sleep has caught up with me). Manage to close eyes for a few minutes. Wander around some more, eventually ending up my craft service (go figure) looking for something to medicate me from all the crap I’ve eaten. While talking to a local neighbor who has set out to watch all the hoopla, he points me away from the tums (“it’s got aluminum in it!”) and hooks me up with some aloe vera juice. Nice guy, if a little out on the fringe & perhaps slightly paranoid. Well, who knows…
8:30 we’re wrapped
10:00 I’m home
11:00 sleep

6:00am start all over again

Not really my first post since that one was lost due to a technical glitch (beware iPhone wordpress app users). The gist of it was that the first day was a bitch with as many curve balls as could be thrown at a sound crew (500 extras, prop mic wired into real house PA, dialogue spread all over a gymnasium). I ended up needing to dial in the 30 band EQ built into the gym PA because whoever set it up was either an idiot or a moron. Needless to say, when the next pep rally happens they may wonder why the system isn’t feeding back anymore.

So that was Friday & we immediately had a much needed weekend. Today is Tuesday & the sound crew is started to catch our stride. NOT feeling an immenent fear of being fired anymore. We have spent the second half of the day back at the Q studios (where a lot of Book of Eli was shot) so it is nice to a) be in a familiar locale & b)be inside in the AC. By the way, did I mention it’s been nearly 100′ F in Albuquerque? Sheesh it’s been hot. We won’t be shooting on the stage a whole lot but it will be a welcome break when it happens (& gives me a glimmer of hope when contemplating the next 5 months).

The funny story about today happened when a baby was brought in for the scene. The (real) mother told me the baby had been born June 29 (the day before Griffin). That fact brought even further into relief the stark contrast between the scenes portrayal of a mother & newborn & the reality I experience at home. Perhaps it took me all these years to realize tv isn’t real. Huh, go figure.

After starting the week back at the stage in Albuquerque the company has moved up to the old prison in Santa Fe for the final few days of shooting. Creepy & cold though it may be, the 5 minute drive from home makes it an optimum way to phase out of show mode and back into “normal existence.” On top of that, M.M. has arrived on set, adding to an already stellar cast. Though the prison is normally a gloomy place, the set that’s been created here is amazing. Like a flea market / museum of the future. I feel right at home…

Everyone seems to be feeling good and enjoying our last few days. Some wrap gifts even got handed out today; a cool t-shirt & a silver arm band with a braille message, “stay on the path.”. Pretty damn cool (you’ll have to see the movie to find out the signigance of that). Also, someone put together a ‘gag reel’ that combined footage never meant for the big screen (actors joking around etc.) & some of the special effects. It looks beautiful. Sure to be cool flick &, no doubt, do well at the box office when it opens in theaters next January. What a wild ride it has been…

Hopefully, I’ll have a chance to write more extensively in the coming weeks, though about what I know not.

After an utterly lovely day yesterday (blue sky & no wind) we’re back in the mess today. Sustained winds of 25-35 & gusts up to 45(uh, more on that below). But those are just numbers. They should make a dirt index to describe this. Tucked away in David’s increasingly valuable pop’n'work tent provides some protection but still somehow the tent acts as a kind of sieve, only letting through the finest particulate matter. Perfect for breathing in (cough, cough).

By lunch today we had only, just barely pulled off one shot. Fortunately, it was a keeper. Very complex shot and, luckily, the sound was great as well. Very lucky indeed because after lunch the winds picked up even more (65 mph gusts?) and the day was called before we could shoot a second take. Pretty unbelievable if that’s the shot they use considering the complexity of it and number of people involved in pulling it off. David even said that it might be the first time he’s gotten it right on the first take. Crazy.

I heard several people say it was the worst they had ever seen it on set. In the end I think it came down to safety. Some folks were worried about the house coming down. Parts of the outside were indeed flying off. The pictures I took somehow don’t capture the intense grittiness of the atmosphere.

A little discombobulated as I write this. Before I try to dig out a story from last weeks end I will try to explain the forces that brought about my current state.

In case you were unaware, we had to work on Saturday. Gratefully though, sound (among others) got wrapped early and I was back in Santa fe by 5. No rest for the weary though as the house in Golden still needed the final clean. So that was Saturday’s activities. Ended up finally unpacking the vehicles around 7pm. After packing I was back on the road down to ruidosa by 9 (7am call in the morning) finally arriving at the hotel around 1am. After this it gets more blurry. Right before closing my eyes I recalled that tonight was when clocks were to be moved forward. Unfortunately, the automatic clock setting on my phone had been screwing up ever since I got to ruidosa. After struggling in my confusion I settled and went to sleep. It wasn’t until after my alarm had woken me from a brief night’s sleep and I was showered and awake that I came to realize that somehow I had woken up an hot earlier than I needed. Thus, insted of 4 hours of sleep I got only 3. Good grief. Oh well. At least I had time to hit the starbucks across the street. And it’s raining anyway. Who knows what we’ll be able to shoot…the rain & wet everything don’t really match the post-apocolyptic windblown dust storms of our previous shots. Standing by…

Five hours later and the crew is desperately trying to turn rain soaked everything into dust & dirt blown. Great big fan blowing dirt everywhere. Just when we get it the rain starts up again. We eventually pull a couple shots off and are let out early. We’ll pay for it later…

Another ridiculous commute from
Riodosa to “the highway of death” (somewhere near White Sands). This time though mostly cloud covered though the forecast was windy. We had wind but the clouds made a short day of it by annhiliating our dry lake bed / miragey scene.

Still, sound was in action and I was instrumental. A big wide shot with no chance for boom and the whipping wind demanded a serious lav mic’ing with a totally gacked up wind cover. It was ok. I’ve broken my stride with “D” & wiring M.K. Is no sweat because she is laid back and has been wired a million times from her work on that 70′s show.

All things considered, we were able to ‘dig it out’ and ended up capturing decent sound for a 20-30 mph wind storm.

A little exploring around Ruidosa last night and an early turn in at a much nicer hotel. I don’t actually recall falling asleep but I suspect I was able to get a adaquate nights sleep for once, despite a 5:30am call for a bus pickup at the hotel. Not sure how long that ride was. At some point we land at White Sands National Monument, eat & are treated to an orientation lecture to inform us what kinds of activities will get us kicked out of the park (almost anything but breathing).

(later on)

Well, another banner day for the sound crew. Although we were transpo’d all over hell & high water (that morning drive took 1.5 hrs) and pulled out the sound cart, jammed up the slates & the cameras & had the boom all rash to go, no actual usable audio was put to tape. Sometimes the shot just doesn’t have sound and sometimes there is just too much noisy machinery around to get anything usable. A waste of a day but still, a paycheck.

Still, I snapped some good pix.