So next week we’re off for a 3 day shoot in Austria. It’s been busy busy this week prepping for it, so I thought I’d scribble down what has actually been involved from a Production Manager’s point of view here at Tympani Productions (i.e. me)!
Firstly, once everything has been been confirmed and the contributors are all happy and the location has been approved we have to make sure that we’ve got a crew to take. We confirm with our director, camera man and production assistant that they’re all still able to go (and a soundy if we’re taking one) so that we can then book the flights in their names. In this case the location is a long way from the airport so we’re travelling over 1st thing Tuesday morning, with the aim to arrive sometime late afternoon in order to recce (essentially previewing) the location before we start shooting the following day.
Once the flights are booked it was now time to find a suitable hotel. This proved quite tricky for this particular shoot thanks to the fact that we’re off to a small town in Northern Austria and we’re booking less than a week in advance….after much ‘google-ing’ and checks on the old Trip Advisor, I eventually found what looks like to be a decent good value 3* close to the town centre AND the location (criteria that we always try to match when booking location accomodation – us crew need somewhere to get a decent meal down us after a hard day shooting and we don’t want to have to drive too far in the morning to get to the location!)
With hotel and flights booked, next we need to deal with the car parking and car hire. I search for the best deals on airport parking at Heathrow and end up (due to a special offer) being able to park in the Short Stay car park which is always a bonus with all the camera equipment. If any equipment needs hiring this also gets done.
Now everything is booked, it’s time to get all the information together and start the mammoth task of creating our ‘location bible’ aka a Call Sheet. This is basically a document that has all the vital information everyone on the location needs to know (we do these for all locations regardless of how far away they are). They include everyone’s names and phone numbers, addresses of locations, accomodation, call times, booking references and flight numbers, maps and directions and any other important/useful information. In doing this, the task of checking out where we’re going and how we’re getting from place to place also happens. Maps are collated, shoot timings and details added, then everything is thoroughly checked and double checked and sent to all parties concerned.
With all this done it’s a case of sorting out all the equipment, checking we’ve got plenty of tape stock, enough Euros and a sat nav with Austrian roads on it, as well as printing plenty of maps (just in case the sat nav fails) and copies of the call sheet as well as blank logsheets and any scripts, treatments or question lists that exist….. and we’re good to go!
Now it’s just a question of making sure we all set our alarms properly and successfully get up at 4am on the day!
