Another Shoot Birthday - Selva's Today

Today was a great day. I managed to learn how to fold a reflector. Now this may sound simple but trust me it's a skill! I've been working on my technique for the whole week and I've finally perfected it. We were shooting all exterior stuff today. Mike had created the most beautiful market scene. We also had the Donkey's back on set, although I don't think they were the same ones. I think these guys were new on the scene, much more relaxed and completely happy to pose for pictures and be interviewed!
Photo on the left is a piece of film memorabilia at Atlas Studios.


We then had lunch and another amazing cake (it was Selva's birthday - though he wasn't really celebrating it as he's saving it till he gets home and is with his family) and then continued with the exterior scenes. It was super from my point of view, seeing how the big productions are made. I'm used to shooting in a single room so to have all this amazing space to play with just seemed too much. I don't know how David decides where to put the camera because there are so many beautiful positions to choose from. However the position that was chosen for the last shot of the day quickly got scrapped when David realised (by testing it himself) that the place he wanted to put the camera was on top of a very suspect fibre glass room, which you had to climb an even more suspect ladder to get to. We wrapped half an hour early. The Photo above shows Ben, the camera and some crew in the Ouzazate countryside setting up a shot.

In the evening we all went out to this funky little restaurant on the edge of a cliff. As you walked in there were pictures of all the famous people who had eaten there, including a photo of Laurence Fishbourne (the actor who was in the Matrix)! We had dinner on the roof terrace with a little speaker to provide music, we all had a fantastic meal and celebrated a great first weeks shoot.
J

Extra Illusions

Hi all, James here with a couple of days blogs as didn't get a chance to write in yesterday. Yesterday morning went really smoothly on set. We spent our morning doing hand-held shots of Jesus being mobbed by crowds of people.
The photo on the left is Jesus preaching to his disciples and the photo on the right is Deane with the Easyrig camera!
After lunch we did a sort of CGI shot where we kept moving our fourty extras to different parts of the desert and then we overlayed the shots we had taken to make it look like there were hundreds of people, really clever! After the CGI shots we did some more hand-held work and then wrapped in the desert with enough time to go to another location - a small rural cottage. I stayed behind and helped Robin pack up, when we arrived at the cottage a bit later on we found that there had been a few problems as the cottage was owned by two brothers one of whom wasn't that happy about us filming even though it had all been pre-arranged and set up by Hamid our Line Producer with the other brother! In the end we were able to get our bit of filming done, after which we wrapped for the day.Today was our first day at the Atlas Studios, it was a very different shooting experience to all the locations shooting we have done so far - mainly because we had to light scenes for the first time which really slowed things down. We spent the morning in a synagogue which Mike Fowlie (Art Director) had built, it is really amazing. We had a light on the room and the whole room was filled with smoke to soften the light. It was pretty crowded in the room with about 20 extras plus the main cast and our crew as well as a track and dolly. The footage looks amazing some of the best film we have shot so far I think. We did our first official stunt in the movie with myself acting as stunt man before Selva (who plays Jesus) did the actual shot, it basically involves Jesus being thrown out of the synagogue which might not sound particularly dangerous but let me tell you I have a nasty little graze on my knee!!

Lunch times are different at the studio, instead of eating on set with lunch brought down we go and eat in the restaurant by our hotel right next to the pool. There are lots of posters up on the walls of all the movies that have been shot in this location like 'The Hills Have Eyes' and 'Kundun'.

After the lunch we spent the rest of the day in a small room for a scene with Jesus praying - it was strange but this scene which seems simple actually took the longest to shoot - trying to get that perfect shot meant that we ran over properly for the first time and ended up wrapping at 7 o'clock.

Marzipan Locusts

Hi, Katy the Stills Photographer back again to blog. Today on the shoot it has been a day off for everyone. The establishing shots days are all completed and the shoot itself starts tomorrow. So it's a rare chance to catch up and get some rest in before the shooting starts. There is a really busy pace to every day here but they are great days, there is so much going on, so much to take in and so much to capture on my camera!
This photo is of Charlie our Production Manager with her mobile office - which consists of a large bag, lap top and mobile phone!


The cast has all arrived here now and are ready to go. I will be taking photos tomorrow in the make-up department showing them all turning into their characters, transported by costume and oil paint to the first century BC! Our first scene is of John the Baptist eating locusts - this is not as bad as it sounds as we have some life like ones made out of marzipan so it's actually pretty nice!! There will be some live ones on the set too be part of the scene - they won't get eaten!


It has been fascinating working over the last few days around the make-up artists, set dressers and wardrobe team, we are all based at the Atlas Studios in Ouzarzazate. The huge amounts of work and the level of detail that goes into everything here is amazing. I can't wait to see the sets all in place. In the photo to the left you can see a couple of Mike Fowlie's team working away - he is Head of our Art Department. I also can't wait to see our cast tomorrow in costume and made-up - even the camels on the shoot have to be dressed!

As well as shooting scenes with John the Baptist tomorrow we are also going to shoot a scene with Herod Antipas (played by our George Clooney Khalid) and Salome doing her temptress dance. Can't wait!
Thanks for reading and that's all for today.