Week five began with a day in the office. I had finished up all the sound design and mixing for a project SolidLine is working on and Michael and I put the sound to picture. As with any technologically based project, there can be a few hiccups getting things squared away, but Michael helped me make sure everything was in sync and after a few changes it looked, and sounded, really good.
The next was a travel day, we were heading to Philadelphia to shoot at a cancer center. I hit the road around 9, picked up Ed in the city, drove him to get his Chinese Visa all set up for an upcoming production trip, and then we drove off to Rockford. From there we loaded the truck with water, grabbed some food, drove back to Chicago to pick up the rest of the crew, and off we went. We drove for a few hours, and then a few more hours, and then a few more hours, and finally found ourselves in the suburbs of Philly early the next morning. On the ride there, however, we had to go through a bunch of shirts and select which ones work best for the new SolidLine branded logo shirt that the crew wears during shoots. And, well, this is what happened somewhere on the road along I-80 as Greg, The Forn, and myself tried on all the choices:
The clinic was off of a small road leading into the woods, and after the truck getting stuck in Kentucky, we decided to park in a mini-golf parking lot and use the golf cart to get all the equipment up to the main entrance. After a couple trips we loaded in and were given our bunny suits to wear because we were shooting in an operating room. Everyone was very accommodating to us and fun to work with. We could tell it was going to be a good day of shooting.
The interview went really well. The operating room made for a great backdrop with different machines and computers. This was one of our last interviews with Advanced Practice Registered Nurses, and I thought I had heard all there was to hear on the subject, but as always the interview was able to give us a unique spin on the topic of nurse anesthetists and we got a lot of great material for the film.
After the interview we were able to recruit a few other nurses and docs to come in and do a mock surgery. They volunteered one of the staff to be the patient, I think we was owed some payback of some sort. Everyone was very natural and it all looked very real. After that we picked up a few shots of APRNs and doctors walking down the hallway and conversing and a couple outside shots of the building and we were done. We packed up and drove through the night back to Chicago.
Our Philly Trip in a Nutshell:
The next day we pulled into the city around 3:30 in the afternoon, parked the truck by Rush Hospital, where we were shooting the next day, and then we headed off to do our own separate things. Since the shoot was at 7am the next day, I decided it was easier for me to stay on the truck than it would be to take the train back to the burbs for the night and then come back in the morning. After meeting up with a friend for a while I met Greg back on the truck and hit the sack.
In the morning we got up around 6, Ed and Mike P. met up with us, and we loaded into Rush. This was the final interview we had with an APRN and it went off really well. On top a great interview and a bunch of sweet b-roll shots with the jib and dolly we were also able to take some cool shots of the El from the windows of the building.
After loading out Greg and I drove back to Rockford, I picked up my car, cleaned the truck, and drove back to the burbs. Another great trip under my belt and a couple great interviews and tons of b-roll footage in the can. The next couple of weeks are going to be a little slower as Greg and Michael head to China on a 2 week production for the Shandong Power Company. But of course they have a bunch of office work for me, so I will keep everyone posted, although maybe not as exciting as these last few weeks!
The Doctor
State count:
This week I was in Ohio and Pennsylvania, bringing the total to – 14
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