Risk Level

I just wrapped up the filming and it is important to access the risk level of production. The health and safety of all of the actors throughout the shoot was at a high importance. The first potential risk in my opening is that it was filmed at night. Low light conditions can create logistical challenges with the safety of the actors. I filmed in a dark neighborhood with lots of houses where we couldn't really see where we were walking which creates risk in tripping. To reduce this I had looked closely at the concrete when scouting locations to ensure there weren't any holes or major cracks in the pavement. Another risk factor was the cars. When I scouted before, the streets weren't too busy but it turned out cars loved to drive during filming. There were various instances where in the middle of a scene a car would come and we would have to quickly move the equipment out of the way. Luckily, since it was night time, the cars had headlights so we had a good head start to clean up. This caused disturbances in filming because I had to redo scenes over and over again. The third risk of being outside was the animals. This street is close to my Grandma's house and she told me the day before we were set to shoot that her neighbors spotted a Bobcat in their backyard. I still decided to film in this location but I made sure a light was on at all times and was looking out extra for it. Everything turned out okay but it could have been dangerous if we saw it.

The next portion I filmed that had risk was the garage scene. This scene had high risk because the use of a weapon and the physical restraint of being tied up. She had to sit in the chair for a while because we had to redo the scene a lot since it was one continuous shot. The rope could be too tight or she might get tired sitting in one spot for a long time so I had loosened up the ropes so she could get out whenever she wanted to. She had to play the most crucial part in the film with expressing her emotions so we made sure there were pauses in between takes so her voice wouldn't get damaged with all of the screaming. The axe was used to show real violence and a threat. To make this look realistic I had to use a real one. This obviously creates risk because the axe could have slipped off and that would not have been good. Mistakes could have happened and the stakes were raised with the use of a real weapon. I had the actor of the killer swing the axe slightly multiple times without anyone in front of him so he could get a good grip on it and learn to control it. The final thing I did was have him choke up on it so he had a much better grip on it and reduce any chance of it slipping out of his hands.

Bob in his surroundings at night, showing how truly dark it was during filming and I didn't know what was necessarily around.