First day of filming. We have a DV camera. Just. A Canon ZR40. Detroit Film Coalition loaned us one for five days for $75. After a night of being plugged in, I can now confirm that the battery doesn’t actually hold any charge so we will have to run it off the mains, even for exteriors. That, however, is the least of our worries. Two of the main actors have flaked out on us in the past two days.

Laura’s friend Mark might be able to play one of the roles but he’s not available weekdays. We don’t seem to have enough extras but only three people came to the audition. I recruited another actress last night at the end of term student film awards for the University of Michigan. (I was one of the judges–it’s a long story and I haven’t blogged it yet but the standard was exceptional.)

DFC (located in a less than savoury part of the Detroit–okay, that’s pretty much any part of Detroit) is closed for the holidays now until January 12th but I’ve arranged to get lights and camera kit back to them on Thursday as a special favour. This means we only have until Thursday to complete our 15 page parody of American Movie.

The crew consists of myself (director/camera), Gordon (a student and writer who is doing sound and lighting), Janet (our production assistant who is partway through a gender change) and John the producer/writer/star. John has a mains adapter for his car so we can run the camera outside otherwise I think we would be… oh, what’s the phrase? Stuffed. Yes. But we’re not. Not yet.

Oh, and to add to the insanity, it’s snowed overnight. Just a light dusting but it’s still falling. The forecast is two to four inches. The temperature outside is 28F (that’s -2C) with a windchill bringing it down to 22F (-5C). Today we’re filming a barbeque scene. I’m looking forward to getting that shot where someone goes to pour a Coke and nothing comes out because it’s frozen.

In other words, same old same oh.