It's a Wrap for Shoot Two

Hi all, Charlie here with my last blog from Big Book Media Shoot Two - it was our last day the shoot today!

James finally managed to pull himself from his bed today, he was adamant that he wasn't going to miss the last day of filming!

In addition to it being the last day of our shoot Hilary Clinton was due to visit Ouarzazate today to meet with the King. There were flags absolutely everywhere and lots of security - Ouarzazate was under lock-down, they even turned off all internet connections in the whole of the region for security reasons!

I feel much better today which is a big relief as there is plenty to do today and lots of filming to get through so we can wrap and finish with everything completed.

We started off filming back at the barrage, we were working with fish today - not the best of animals to direct but we did well and got the shots! Unfortunately due to the very thick weed in the water one of our boats got tangled up and the dingy boat we had could not get the main boat out of trouble, it just wasn't big enough. Both myself and Hamid spent some time sourcing another boat - which is pretty hard in the middle of the desert! Luckily we found a bigger and more powerful boat from the golf club a few miles up the barrage but alas whilst it was traveling to our location it too got stuck in weeds! In the end our boat managed to come unstuck and filming was resumed!

After we wrapped at this location we then went to a small oasis where we did a few pick-up shots in the olive grove with Jesus and his disciples. It only took an hour to get the shots and then we finally wrapped Shoot Two which I found very euphoric and satisfying as all had gone very well - I even shed a tear of happiness!

After we had finished up we all met up in the evening and Hannah took us all out for dinner at a lovely French restaurant and we ate delicious food and had toasted the success of Shoot Two - my toast was with water (still in recovery!). Tomorrow its the long haul trip across the Atlas Mountains which takes four hours to get back to Marrakesh and then back to the UK until the next time!! Charlie

Kingdom of Heaven

Hi all, it's Charlie (Production Manager) here with my first blog from the second Big Book Media shoot, my job has been a much more lovely experience this time round. We have been working with a guy called Hamid who is my Moroccan counterpart and who has his own production company out here - 'Irene Productions'
(he is our Line Producer for the shoot).

Filming has been fantastic so far, we are having a really smooth shoot.

This Sunday was our day off - I arranged a tour for Selva (actor who plays Jesus, James (Production Assistant), Deane (DTI) & Kathy (Photographer) to look at the 'Kingdom of Heaven' set and 'The Journey to Mecca' set which are both at Atlas Studios (which Mike, Art Director and Hamid created) and also a Jerusalem temple set at ECLA Studios. Deane was in heaven over how fantastic the sets were and how they had been created in terms of using the sun and light for filming!!

In the afternoon I bumped into Hannine in Ouarzazate town who is Mike's assistant in the art department but isn't working on this shoot for us as she is pregnant. She lives in Agadir but has come down to Ouarzazate which is her home town where her family live to give birth. There is a fantastic midwife in Ouzarzazate - she's called Rosie and is originally from Brighton! What a small world it always turns out to be. We are all wishing Hannine good luck and we can't wait to hear news of her baby.
The photo on the right is of Mike Fowlie and Hannine working on the last shoot.

In the evening myself, Hannah and Kathy went shopping for the UK Launch Event (which is on 10th Nov in London), our bartering skills were very very good, we bought some beautiful things. In the last shop where both Hannah and I bought bracelets they served us mint tea and called us both fatima's, which we found out is a very big compliment as it means our bartering skills are as good as the locals.
The photo on the left is Hannah in the last shop looking at bracelets and the photo is below is both myself and Hannah bartering!

After a very successful day off it was back to the hotel to get a good nights sleep in before the start of week two of shooting.
Charlie

One Shoot Ends And Another Begins

Hi all, Liz here in the Big Book Media office with a concluding blog from our first shoot.
Charlie (Production Manager), Vicky (Production Accountant) and I are meeting this evening to go over the actuals from the budget for BBM Production One and get the final cost of the shoot!!! Hopefully none of us will suffer an actual heart attack when we total it all - I might have a first aider on stand by just in case!!!

Everyone has returned home safely from the first Big Book Media shoot and has time to recover before the second shoot which we are planning for mid October 2009.
Deane and Charlie arrived back at the Big Book offices last week in their desert wear looking exhausted (Charlie especially!!) and with tons of camera equipment in Deane's Landrover. Deane left Charlie with me and then drove off home with his red camera and other gear. The lenses and filters we hired went to Pinewood and were collected by London Filter Co, Take Two, Richmond etc..

The shoot lasted a total of two weeks in the intense summer heat of nearly 50 degrees out in the desert - hopefully the temperature will have dropped a bit by mid October so it won't be so sweaty! We had a camera fan melt at one point on the shoot!!
Various of the team are having a holiday to get over the shoot!! David our director is in the south of France, Tim our editor is in Croatia, Deane, DTI Technician had a few days rest in the Oxfordshire countryside and Robin, Focus Puller went away to Scotland straight from Marrakesh! Charlie our Production Manager hasn't gone away she is just enjoying getting some sleep in a bed which is rest enough for her!!

Charlie has been back to work in our office in Brighton and has started planning the next production
'The Bible Project Shoot Two' which is scheduled in for 19th October (at the moment).
We are just planning our recce trip first to check locations, then we can get fully organised for this next shoot. David (Director) and Trevor (Consultant) are going to go out the first week of September to check out the east of Morocco - Essaouiia Region to make sure the places we are planning to shoot are right and then Mike (Art Dept) is going to go to those locations and start his set, costume and props planning.

Hannah (Producer) and Amory (Music and Post Production) are coming down to the office tomorrow to get some work done on our post production projects - Promo, Cards, Demos, Readings etc.. I'll blog again after that meeting with an update on what we cover.

Until then.....