Welcome to my final blog post from this wonderful internship! I’ve spent the last month and a half doing some of the most exciting work ever, and it was incredibly formative, inspiring, and invigorating.
I suppose I will just dive right into the events of this week. Monday was the big film shoot day! We’d been prepping for it for the past few days (including the weekend), and it was really exciting to finally shoot. While it was only a one day shoot, we crammed a lot of content into the limited time that we had and I was very impressed by what was accomplished. Greg LaSalle and I arrived at work at 6:30am to begin prep for the day. This included turning on the generator, lights, Vicon capture system, and starting up the PC’s. Breakfast was not catered as the majority of the client crew would not arrive until 11:00am, but bagels, cream cheese, etc were provided. I spent the following two hours tidying up the stage, until the systems were all warmed up and ready to go. At this time, I got in a motion capture suit as a stand-in for the actors who would be coming in later. This was so we could run through every scene and ensure all the assets as well as the virtual camera (see earlier posts) were all functioning properly so there would be no issues when the real shoot began later in the day. I worked as a stand-in until lunch which was served around 1:00pm. All of the assets, v-cam, and witness cameras worked just as expected which was a good sign!
After lunch, I stripped my suit and got to work as a cable wrangler for the v-cam operator, which is what I would be doing for the rest of the day. This was actually a really good job to have on set because I had the chance to work along side the director and actors and really glean some insight into their jobs. We shot for a full 8-hours, and didn’t wrap until about 10:00pm. I was fully engaged, however, and could not believe how quickly the day blew by.
Greg and I took the day off on Tuesday because we had been at the studio for over 16 hours the previous day (not too unusual for a big film shoot such as that). That day, we helped his friends move apartments (so much for a day off) and we visited the Hollywood sign as well as the Smoke House steakhouse which is, yes, another La La Land location!
On Wednesday, I spent most of the day cleaning up from the Monday shoot. I worked with the stage supervisor, Thomas Williams, to move platforms and set pieces, put away props, and pull tape off the floor (pulling gaffers tape off of carpet was not the highlight, haha).
On Thursday and Friday, I worked with Thomas to inventory old Vicon capture cameras (over 160 of them) t o be rented out to other facilities who may have better use for them. Finally, I completed exit paperwork and surveys to reflect on my time at DD and offer HR feedback for improving the work life at the studio overall.
Now that this incredible opportunity has come to a conclusion, I wanted to take a moment to thank just some of the wonderful people who helped make this happen:
Host and Mentor – Greg LaSalle
Pinhead – Sarah Holbrooke
Digital Domain – Greg LaSalle, Scott Meadows, Thomas Williams, Ruel Smith, Christian Deanda, and Julian Butters, as well as Oliver, Jen, Sarah, Gio, Lonnie, and Percy.
Greg and I after a Wednesday night run in Venice with the running club!
I’m so tickled at how happy both of you are. Jaden, you hit a jackpot. Bravo to the folks who manipulated that slot machine to work out so well for both Jaden and Greg.