A guided peek behind the curtain of sorts.
If you are anything like I was when I began developing an interest in filmmaking, you seek out as much filmmaking information as possible. If that’s you then I hope you will find this series educational, hopefully even a bit inspirational. To this day I still love watching the behind the scenes of movies or listening to filmmakers commentary, as I always seem to find takeaways I may be able to use on a future project.
Okay, so let's talk about a project I Co-Produced/Production Managed with a great production company Running 4 Cover in Nashville, TN.
- Project: Ram Trucks CMT: Artist of a lifetime, featuring Raelynn, Danielle Bradbery and Kalie Shorr
- Type: Commercial
- Production Company: Running 4 Cover
- Summary: A co-branded spot between CMT and Dodge Ram promoting the Artist of a Lifetime Award being presented on the CMT Awards. The spot consisted of three upcoming female country artists discussing the influence of the artist of year recipient Loretta Lynn intercut with scenes with them driving around Nashville in a Ram Truck.
- DIRECTED BY: JAMES CLAUER
- DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY: JAMES KING
- PRODUCED BY: JIM JANGELS
- CO-PRODUCER: JOEL HARTZ
- PRODUCTION MANAGER: JOEL HARTZ
- ASSISTANT DIRECTOR: JAMES WEEMS
- CASTING DIRECTOR: JOEL HARTZ
- NETWORK: CMT
I got a call from the Executive Producer of Running 4 Cover, Jim Jangles, to come on board to help as Co-Producer and Production Manager for the shoot. Jim and I had previously worked with each other on several other projects over the years and I always love working with him. We have a similar approach to producing and we get along really well, which is always a huge plus (ask anyone in the industry) especially in these types of shoots which have a tendency to get green lit at the last minute. Essentially ramping up from a treatment to full speed ahead practically overnight and this one was no different.
On the vast majority of my projects I am both the Producer and Line Producer managing budget as well, but in this case I didn’t have to concern myself with budget and knowing where every dime is going, Jim had that covered! I was looking forward to not having that extra layer of responsibility which is a change of pace for me. Although admittedly it was also kind of weird for me not to have the additional responsibility.
A series of Challenges
First Challenge
We were 11 days out from principal photography when I got “the call” from Jim and everything was looking to be green lit at any moment. That would leave us at less than 7 business days at best to put everything together including the necessary permits, crews, locations, logistics.
Second Challenge
The shoot dates were already locked since we would be dealing with the schedules of the female country singers and CMT already had a deadline to meet. We only had rumors of who the three country singers would be, but the team at CMT was working on locking the ladies down. This did present our second challenge: finding stand ins for the artists. We couldn’t begin casting “look a like” stand ins until we knew who each artist was going to be.
Third Challenge
One of the constraints we had was only going to give us one day with artists to shoot their interviews, all of their b-roll around town, and them driving in the Ram Truck, including the car to car shots and interior shots.
Fourth Challenge
Talent availability. Every project has to deal with scheduling around talent availability, movie, music video, interviews, in one way or another there is always at least one on screen talent to work around. It was no different in this case either. Luckily the artists were all available that day but would have a limited availability as well, 8 hours in total one day only. So we had our work cut out for us.
While awaiting updates on our artists, we began locking down our core crew like the DP, Movi/Camera Car, Locations, AD, and Art. We brought on James King as Director of Photography, a good friend of mine and accomplished DP. Jim already had a call in to Sam Wiley a fantastic MOVI operator who also has a really great camera truck that is set up for mounting the camera with monitors and follow focus built in. Due to the nature of this shoot, James King our DP, decided to go with the Arri Alexa Mini system and Cooke S4i Lenses as our main camera package, since we would also need a second camera for the interviews James went with the Sony FS7 and Angenieux EZ-1 30-90mm zoom lens as it matches quite well to the Arri Alexa footage. We called up one of our favorite camera houses, DB Video in Nashville, TN to provide our camera package.
Dodge Ram connected us with a local dealership that would provide our picture car. I ended up picking it up which turned out to be a great opportunity to drive the truck. I hadn’t driven a Ram Truck before and really enjoyed the ride! My Key PA Corey Rich helped with the truck pick up and preparing the car for filming (removing dealership stickers, replacing mats, etc.).
Fifth & Sixth Challenges
After our production meeting with the Director, James Clauer, we had a better idea of locations for the b-roll and interviews that he wanted. Our Locations/AD James Weems (pulling double duty on this shoot) began trying to lock down our most ideal locations that would include our three artists. This began our fifth main challenge, as we were now just six days from principal photography.
In that meeting we also learned of the need for drone footage of the truck driving through the streets of Nashville and hopefully an iconic shot with the city in the background driving over a bridge. Enter Challenge six.
Our DP James King wanted to make sure the sun would be behind the truck as well and that would limit our options to make that happen due to the layout of Nashville, traffic and bridges. Our ideal bridge ended up right on the edge of the no fly zone right at 5 miles of the airport and right next to the stadium. We needed a drone operator that had all of the FAA exemptions and experience working within these constraints.
Solution 2
We had good news as well in that team at CMT locked the artists and I was now able to begin casting for the stand ins and finish crewing up our remaining spots.
Challenge Seven... locations
Nashville recently made some changes to the Filming permit process and fees, complicating it a bit more and also increasing the costs. Still the fees are reasonable compared to places like Los Angeles where it can cost $1100 or more just for some sidewalk permits. Nashville permits generally take at least 3 days for approvals and you technically need the film permit prior to your street permit, which they also ask for 3 days to process, so without all of our locations locked we could only submit our permits with general details and an explanation to the special events office. This is a challenge when you have drone footage and car to car driving shots planned but locations or routes locked down.
Solution 5
We scheduled to film the artists all on Monday, our first shoot day. With the limited time available to shoot them out, Weems had found most of our locations at this point and they were very close to each other. This was great as it would allow for minimal down time due to company moves. Although we were still looking for our final location.
Solutions 3 & 4
Additionally we wanted to take advantage of the company move from one location to the next by filming our artists in the Ram Truck while we move to each new location, kill two birds with one stone as the saying goes. We scheduled our second day to film all of our b-roll and hero truck shots, using the stand ins that were comfortable driving the truck on the off chance the camera sees into the truck.
Tech Scout, Solutions 6 & 7 and Challenge 8
Tech Scout day is usually the craziest day and it was definitely no different on this shoot. Luckily landing on a Friday gave us that extra breathing room to put out all of the last minute fires that always pop up right before the shoot as well as the expected fires that always come from the Tech Scout.
Fires that included our finding an available drone operator with the proper FAA certifications (Solution 6), submitting last minute permit updates (Solution 7), finalizing production documents like call sheets, adding on crew, security, production support orders, the endless emails, issuing Certificates of Insurance, and more.
When we finally made it to our last location on the scout, the parking lot which would also be our last shot on Monday, we had another challenge, number 8.
This location had been the most difficult to lock down for our Locations Manager. In fact he was literally locking down the parking lot during the Tech Scout and so we still had not laid eyes on the location of the final hero shot until the end of the day.
Upon arrival to the final location our DP James King quickly realized the need for a wetdown seeing as it was looking pretty boring in the foreground. It was a parking lot after all.
Hmm, we needed a solution and unfortunately there were no hydrants close enough to tap into and we couldn’t line up a water truck in time for that scene, so I sat down with my Art Director Selby Knoblock and pitched her a rather quirky solution…
I suggested we could fill a couple of 55 gallon rain barrels I had at the house with water, place them in the back of the art truck (U haul) with a submersible pump and a genny (to power the pump) and simply drive the truck in ever widening circles while spraying the parking lot down with the water from the barrels.
Possible solution, but we would have to wait until day 1 to find out if it would work well enough. You can read more about the DIY Wetdown here.
Final Prep
With 85% of it all falling in line by the end of day Friday, the next two days were spent finalizing all of rest: the move maps, prepping the crew paperwork, production book, finalizing the last scheduling logistics for the 4 company moves we had each day, and even sending PA’s to cone off the parking lots we had secured the night prior.
24 more hours of prep later brought us to Sunday evening and finally some time to relax. All of our planning and prep over the last 11 days was going to be put to the test in the morning and I was exhausted! It was time for a nice Green Spot Irish Whiskey before bed.
Principal Photography
Thanks to a solid crew and a solid plan filmming went smooth, like butter.
We started the day in the historic RCA Studio A, which if you’re a big fan of music then you will know the history there.
We began with our interview set up in the studio and grabbed some b-roll outside prior to our first of 4 company moves of the day.
The car to car footage was made to look effortless by our DP James King and our Movi/Camera Truck operator Sam Willey.
We ended the day with the shot you see at the top of this post, in a parking lot at the Titans Stadium looking back across the Cumberland river with Nashville and the walking bridge in the background. Our final hero shot, the one with the wetdown.
Solution 8
It worked! Perhaps not in the most ideal way, but we pulled it off in a pinch and got the shot!
Would i choose to do it that way again?
Well, it depends. If you have no budget, then by all means Yes, but if you have the budget then save yourself some time and headache and pay for a water truck or hydrant access.
Check out this video to learn more about how we solved this wetdown challenge, including behind the scenes video from set.
I used Envato Elements for the music, graphics, and more. Click below to find out more:
Our second day of filming went like clockwork
We scaled down to a skeleton crew, based out of Running 4 Covers offices and picked up all of the beauty shots of the Ram Truck.
Retracing the route from the first day of principal photography, we filmed the remaining exterior truck shots and brought in Snaproll Media (those guys rock!) to get the coveted drone shots. They used a DJI Inspire II drone to capture all of our aerial shots.
Thankfully the weather held out for us and we wrapped on time, sent the drives off to CMT and then went for the obligatory wrap beers!
Solution 1, we got it all in the can!
Check out the finished project below
Camera Gear used for Production
- Arri Alexa Mini
- Cooke S4I Primes Main
- 2nd Cam (interviews) SonyFS7
- Angenieux ez-1 30-90mm zoom lens
- DJI Inspire II
Gear I used for BTS
- Samsung Galaxy S8 Active
- YI 4K Action Camera
If you like this series or have any questions or suggestions about this project or filmmaking in general, please leave a comment and subscribe.
Of course if you find value in this please share it! If you are interested in working with me then check out this page.
