Getting "B" Roll that Rocks
BY ROBBY BROWN, TEMPE, ARIZONA, USA - Over that past weekend I had traveled down to Farmington, New Mexico, where I’m from to see my friends, family, and meet my new nephew before we leave for Africa. Of course, there was the usual support and excitement from those in town who knew about the trip. And shock from those who were hearing about it for the first time. “Africa?!?!” Yeah, Africa. It was fun passing out the web addresses for the film blogs and keeping everybody updated when I'd find out we were in the paper. TWICE while I was there.
On the 7-ish hour car ride back to Arizona, I thought about how amazing this will be. We’ve all worked hard and are preparing as much as we can to make the best films we can make. As I would look out the window at the scenery I’d ask myself, “Ok ... so how would you shoot that?” Granted New Mexico looks pretty much nothing like Africa at all. I want to make sure that the B-Roll I shoot looks great and is visually appealing. Zambia is already a beautiful place from what I read, see and hear. So really part of the work is done for me. I’m in full film mode now, I just have to feel the shots. You can take a picture or point a camera at anything but if you really want to capture something meaningful and engage the audience, you have to feel the shot. There’s an immediate connection.
As soon as I drove back into town I went straight to our meeting for the film where we got to read the first 30 pages of the script, each person reading a different part. I couldn't be more excited. It’s just such a great story I didn't want to stop after just 30 pages. There's another 60 pages (I learned each page is a minute of film time and our film is 90 minutes). I'm looking forward to reading and starting to visualize the film. If we can all picture it, different angles and cuts then the actual filming should come a little easier.
This is going to be good.