Hot Pink Shorts - Day 3 + 4 (Pre-Production + Location Mentor)

Things are really cranking over here! So fast that I've had to get my oil out twice to keep the parts moving. (Interpret that how you'd like.)

On Saturday, we had our first pre-production meeting with our team at OUTtv's offices. It was yours truly, Patty (who's wearing the Assistant Director hat, among other things) and Ryan, our Director of Photography. We talked about some important preliminary stuff: where we were at with the script, casting thoughts, logistics around filming, crew update, equipment needed, etc. At that point on Saturday, we'd yet to lock the script, so that was priority 1.

P and I went to lunch afterward--a little Caribbean food at The Reef on Main--and worked on the script and than did another couple hours of brainstorming later. We finally locked the script on Sunday! There will be little tweaks along the way, but we're truly off and running now.

On Sunday, we met with our Locations Mentor, Mike Cates. It was a great meeting where we discussed:
- scouting locations
- permits needed
- effective scouting strategies
- the need to be flexible and resourceful and not to get sold on one location
- how to protect the place you're shooting at (laying down cardboard or rubberback carpets, tennis balls on the bases of lights, etc)
- the importance of prioritizing when you first start scouting (what is the hardest location to nail down, what is the most important location with the most scenes)
- he told us about the BC Film Commission and said they are an incredible resource for location scouting and have thousands and thousands of digitized photos of locations submitted by filmmakers through the years of locations that have been used or scouted

He was a great guy and very resourceful! Thanks Mike.


We've also been on the hunt for the perfect pug to play Toby and have been in touch with some animal talent agencies. We decided to throw up a post on Craigslist and whatya know?

[Drum roll................. ]

That is where we found our star! We met "Juno" on Tuesday and immediately fell in love. He's "big boned" and we think that adds to the humor that we're going for in the film. Also, Juno is one of our favorite movies and we thought that was a sign. This is coupled with the fact we loved his owner, Peter, and his son Adam. We thought we'd give you a sneak peek at "Toby" here. Juno is a retired show dog and a former Canadian champion. If he could talk, Juno would tell you why he's a champ: his perfect placed ears and perfectly round melon. He did lose a few points because his hind chops aren't as curved as they should be.

We had another production meeting on Tuesday night and met our Camera guy (although he is and will be way more than that). His name is Mic and he's from Australia. He's a super smart guy and is putting our script into a digital 3D storyboard program which makes me so excited I yelp and snort--like Toby--little when I talk about it. Not sure if that is something I can upload here, but hopefully I can share some of that, too. The program he's using is called Frame Forge.

All right, more soon. We've got to check some things off our "To Do" list.