A squib hit, for anyone that ain’t in the know, is a tiny explosion set up on someone that blows up a blood pack, simulating a bullet hit.
The way it works for real movies is that a plate is put on the actor where the explosive and blood pack will go. Under this plate is often times some padding. The plate is to protect the actor from the explosion that will go off to simulate the bullet hit. Then, a condom of blood is put on the plate, with the explosive either inside the condom, or between the condom and plate. Then, when the gunshot goes off, a pyro-technician completes a circuit, which causes the explosive to detonate, sending the bloody goodness out into the world to be caught on camera.
Obviously we can’t do that because this isn’t a real movie.
I’m playing. A licensed pyro-technician needs to be present on set to make sure this shit goes down safely. Also, as with any explosion, safety and respect needs to be taken to make sure no one gets hurt. Even then, sometimes people get hurt from squibs. I’ve heard of a dude that either died, or almost died because the squib was attached to the guys shirt and not his skin. When the explosion went off, it whipped back against his chest, causing his heart to do some bad shit.
I can’t have that. We still need the actor for other scenes.
In Streets of Wonderland, we were testing different ways to do the squib hit while we were filming the scenes leading up to it. It was a pretty crazy time because I’d call “cut,” then run to the parking lot and check on the status of the testing. I think we ended up getting a pretty good result, but I’d like a better one, so the night before Bill ran out with me to get some supplies.
A lot of flicks now do a lot of their squib hits with CGI. For instance, the shot of Matt Damon getting shot in The Depahded at the end was done with CGI. Well, I don’t know how to do that in post, and I’m not too sure how much Bob would be up for it, as he’s the only one I know that can make that shit work, so I’d rather go this route. I like practical effects more anyway.
So we’re doing this shit pneumatically.
I got plans off the webbernetz and went out to get the supplies. Since we’re going to use an air compressor, I forgo some of the parts, thinking we don’t need them. Turns out I do need an on/ off valve after all though, so in the morning before we shoot, Bill and I run to Home Depot to get one, as well as a shitload of size adapters. Our rig ends up looking pretty fucking bad-ass.
Our call time is for eight, but Home Depot doesn’t open until then, so we ring Alicia and tell her we’re going to be a little behind. We were going to try the trick without these parts, but have decided against it.
We arrive at Bills Moms Salon, which is home to The Barber all day today and start setting up. It turns out that we weren’t the only ones that were late. The day starts with Jens and Rick, and both cats didn’t find the joint too easily.
We bang out the first scene pretty quick, and start shooting the second scene in which the simulated gunshot is needed, with Jukes, played by Rob Jukosky. He brings his wife Kim to the set, and it’s great seeing these guys again. Jukes and his wife are genuinely nice people and it’s always great being around people like this.
Jukes ended up getting hurt at work, so he’s hobbling, but trying to cover it as much as he can. He’s supposed to run out the back of the shop once the guy in front of him gets shot, but that’s out the window. Poor guy. We improv it that the bullet goes through Nigel and gets Jukes in the hip, so that explains the limp.
We shoot all around the gunshot as much as we can until it’s time to do it. I want to do this in one take, because it’s going to be a mess, and we’re unsure of whether or not we can clean it up enough to do it again.
Everything gets prepped, we rehearse it, and it goes pretty well.
I screwed up a bit as I was in charge of releasing the air, and I panicked thinking I turned it on again when I turned it off. The end result ends up looking like a Chest-Buster from Alien coming out, but the initial shot is there enough to fly for the scene provided I cut when I need to.
That’s a relief. The night before, Bill and I were up pretty late testing the rig, and we never ended up getting the right PSI for it. At one point, we tested it at 90 PSI and the stopper in one end of the tube flew off in Bills hand, causing his arm to whip around. If we would’ve made the same mistake today, you bet either someone would’ve gotten hurt, or a mirror or something would’ve been shattered.
We shoot everything involving the gunshot wound as quickly as we can. The scene after the gunshot involves Harry coming into the shop and taking Nigel out of there. We get it done quick, and then Harry goes back to being a surprise crew member. How awesome is this guy? He shows up early, offers to help us out, then kicks it with us in a crew position until later in the day when we’ll need him again. I’m so glad that for the most part, I’ve surrounded myself with amazing people.
We head outside to film another kind of improvised scene. The Barber is supposed to be chasing Jukes until Jukes escapes, but obviously that can’t happen now. We shoot the much easier scene, wrap Jukes for the day, then chow down on lunch that my Mom brought. Yeah, my Mom brought us lunch. She did it because she’s awesome.
After lunch we shoot another small scene where The Barber reenters his shop and sees that his victim is gone and makes a quick phone call.
Irish and Lyndsey arrive for their scenes today, so we start shooting them as well. We get ahead of schedule, and have some time before Leslie McBay, who’s playing Kitty, arrives, so we book over to Bills Moms house where we couldn’t get a shot before because it was raining, and shoot that small scene which is The Barber, Lyndsey, and The Mick going up to the house.
We book it back to the Barbershop and meet up with Leslie. It’s nice seeing her again after working with her so much for Episode 3. We break the news to her that Dan isn’t coming down and we have no other days to schedule him. We tell her our plan of killing his character off and hope that she doesn’t freak out or get too upset about it. Surprisingly, she’s fine with our decision. We go over the script, changing some of the lines to accommodate our decision and we’re off.
Leslie is an amazing actress. It takes her a few takes to get into it, but when she does, she flies with it. We wrap the Barbershop, then we’re back to Bills Moms house, where the basement will serve as the new hideout for Kitty.
At Bills Moms, we grab a quick scene that we also missed before of Bulldog coming in and inspecting the house. We try a few walkthroughs of the house with the Glidecam, but I’m not sure how good it’ll turn out, so we also grab a few takes on the sticks. Harry is now wrapped for the day, but chooses to kick around with us.
So now we come to another point where we have to change the script. The Seed has lines, and the beginning of The Barbers visit to this hideout was some banter between The Seed, Lyndsey, and The Barber. Well, since The Seed is now dead as a result of his wounds from the end of the third episode, he can’t very well talk can he?
So the first part of the scene is gone, but now we have to find out why Lyndsey is with Kitty. We get together and chat it up, and I think we get some pretty cool shit out of it. I really dig this series, because a small character that seems to have a small role could very well have a huge role and be a major player in future episodes. It happened with Jukes in Episode 1, where I think he only had one scene, and ended up being the character that Episode 3 was told around.
Lyndsey, who didn’t even have any lines in Episode 3, could very well become a larger role in future episodes, very much in part because of the situation we just came up with. It’s pretty tight.
We bang off the last scene of the day where The Barber visits Kitty. Rick handles the scene nicely. So nicely in fact, that he makes Harry totally dig on him and his character. Leslie also blows me away. I always thought she was good but working with her today, I’m sad that she doesn’t have a bigger role in this episode. She’ll definitely be visiting the Lot B realm again, as long as she’ll continue to work with us.
We pack up our shit and bounce back home. Tomorrow is another early call time so I’m hoping to get some quality zzzz’s in. Too bad that doesn’t happen when Harry crashes at your pad.
We get back to my place and we play a few games of Scene-It. This game is so much fun to play when you got other cats playing with you that are into movies too. If they were as into movies as I am, maybe I wouldn’t kick their ass so often. Oh well, I can still feel like a winner. I’m not above that.
So much for my plan of getting some sleep. Harry and I stay up until around three in the morning shooting the shit, laughing, and just having a great time. Harry crashes and I hit the sack as well for a planned three hours of sleep.
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