Raul's Take: Day 01: Fort Qu'Appelle

by Raul Viceral, Assistant Director

It's finally here! The shoot has begun! We started out the day meeting everyone at the university to load up props, equipment and snacks. We'll have to stop by C's studio every morning to load up before heading out to the different locations, then come back afterwards to store everything again overnight.

C's studio packed full of filmmaking goodness.

We had to be packed up and in Fort Qu'Appelle (an hour drive east) by noon.

Careful with that camera, Andrew!

Kristine hauls her fake rock prop through the food court.

While we were loading up the car and trailer, we ran into Chris St. Amand in the woodshop working on the ship's wheel prop. This thing is going to be awesome!

Looks good so far.

Thank God (and Jackie) for this trailer. We don't know what we would've done without it!

Whoa! Andrew's on fire already!

Go-o-o-o-o-o-o-o Sisu!

After an hour's drive east, we reached Fort Qu'Appelle and the home of The Hardings, who are friends of our previous art director, Brette, and who agreed to let us shoot on their property. Thanks The Hardings!

The weather was gusty and cold with a few sprinkles here and there. We were all willing the rain to stay away.

Let's do this thing!

The Hardings had a small cabin which we were allowed to use as a staging area for our equipment, costumes and food. The first order of business was getting Don into his costume and then having a little snack.


Then it was time to start shooting. The first shot of the production was a simple shot of Tom walking which will be part of a larger walking montage.

It may not look like Minnesota in the 1910's, but it'll work.

Like I mentioned, this is all supposed to be part of a montage of Tom walking from Minnesota to Saskatchewan, so C had to get a lot of shots of Don walking through different terrain and backdrops.


After a few shots of Don walking, it was time to head up the hill behind the Hardings house. There's a nice flat prairie-looking spread up there, plus a nice shot of the lake which we'll use as a Minnesota lake.

It may not look it, but that hill was tall and STEEP. It was quite a bit of huffing to get all the equipment and sandbags up there. The gusty winds didn't help much either.

"Push on to the summit!"

It was even colder and windier up on top of the hill. We managed to get a few shots off before a menacing-looking storm front started bearing down on us from across the lake. We had to scramble back down the hill and waited out the rain back in the cabin.

C and Kristine and Dauminique hang out while the camera is set up.

Don stands out in the grass so we can focus the camera on him.

D chats with Tom Sukanen between takes.

"Here comes the rain! Hurry up and get the shot!"

The storm front ended up being just a heavy sprinkle and it only lasted a few minutes, but it did give us a chance to regroup and enjoy more snacks.

Day 01 - Fort Qu'Appelle (Part 2)

After our short break we had a few more shots we needed to get before we could wrap this location. One of them involved the fake rock tower prop.

Kristine built and painted the rock tower with C's supervision. It looked great and we were all a little nervous to touch or move it. So it was up to Kristine to haul it up the hill herself. The crew will forever refer to the site of her carrying it up as "The Turtle," or Gammera as she likes to call it.

Go! Go! Go! Go! Go! Go! Go! Go! Go!

I know the rock tower prop looks really cheesy, even I was skeptical. But after seeing Don up there with his telescope prop through the video camera's viewfinder, it actually looked pretty darn believable.

We had a heck of a time trying to get it to stand. Not only were we trying to stand it up on a slope of a hill, the slope itself was uneven and full of gopher holes. We rectified the situation with a few apple boxes (industry term for those wooden crates) and lots of sandbags (industry term for bags filled with sand). Dauminique and I had to hold onto the ladder while Don was up there because the paper machier rocks acted like a huge sail in the gusty wind. Thank God no one got hurt.

Ed Wood would be proud.

Another shot we needed was of Tom Sukanen frantically climbing up a hill. Poor Don had to scramble up the side of the hill about a dozen times! He still had a big grin on his face even though he was winded.

It ain't easy bein' Tom Sukanen.

The happiest DP in all of Saskatchewan!

Django and Moxie got to come along with us. They were occasionally on the disruptive side, but all in all I think they behaved pretty well. They even actually helped out by delivering rolls of gaff tape to whoever needed it. It doesn't look like we'll be taking them along tomorrow though.

Even Django was helping with continuity.

Moxie looks on as C and Andrew discuss the next shot.

Finally we got all the shots we needed and packed everything up. It was a long first day but we were all pretty happy with the footage we got, considering the weather and the fact that we had never all worked together before.

We were all starving so before leaving Fort Qu'Appelle, we stopped off at The Bounty for some fish n' chips.

I hope 'soft & hard' is referring to the ice cream.

After a day hauling sandbags up and down hills and being buffeted by wind, a basket of greasy fish and salty fries sure hits the spot!

"Hmmm... let see... yes, give me one of each of everything you've got, please."

The family pack

Don't blink or --doh! They're already gone.

After dinner it was back on the road for the trip to Regina. Once back at the university, everything had to be unloaded and put back in C's studio.

The rocks are wrapped! Yay!

Once everything was stowed away, we snuck in one of the lecture rooms with a projector and watched the dailies (footage we shot earlier that day).

Where's the popcorn?

I can't tell you how gratifying it is to see the shots through the camera, especially knowing there are C-stands and sandbags and crew and parked cars just out of frame. It's so magical.

The image below is being displayed at a TV aspect ratio of 4:3 which is all the projector could do. The final movie will be 16:9 widescreen.

Walk Tom! Walk!

We were all beat by then and were looking forward to a good night's sleep. Tomorrow the location will be in Estlin, which is only about 12 miles south of Regina, so it's a relatively easier drive, and we don't have to be on set until 12:30. Bonus!

Until next time... adventure!

R-