It's Not That Easy Being Green

Well, we did it. Today we put our new Scarecrow rig to the test and attempted to gather actual footage for the film. Went mostly pretty okay. Before we could begin, we had to transfer all our equipment and props to the current location we're using to film in. We needed Scarecrow to get there in one piece, and he's sort of... like a person... So he rode like a person.

As of today, the director has officially served as chauffer to the... lead... puppet...

Steve arrived shortly after us, and we finished setting up the screen, markers, lights, etc. All that ready, it was time for Steve to begrudgingly don his fluorescent attire. The chromakey suit he could handle himself, though he needed his squires to help him get into the catcher's gear. And also to attach the small dummy to his stomach...

Nothing to see here, just a couple of guys doing... y'know... guy stuff. In a garage.

Filming was mostly successful and mostly noneventful, which makes for a not so amazing write-up. The rig actually functioned exactly as it was supposed to, with very little protest. In fact, it was much more precise and maneuverable than the old version, allowing Steve to perform in ways he couldn't have before. Which, given that we were shooting his very first scene and first time off the pole, led to a lot of drunken wobbling. And much laughter from Sean and myself.

And no laughter from Steve's chiropractor.

Since we're going through in a mostly chronological fashion, we also switched it up quite a bit, and broke free from the walking rig for a number of shots. We did some close-ups of him on the pole, including flashbacks, and also the scene where Dorothy and Scarecrow sit down for a spell. And some other weirdly specific actions.

You guys all totally remember the Mexican hat dance scene in the book, right?

We managed to burn through a little over ten script pages today, which we felt pretty good about. The redone rig rendered this a sort of experimental day, and we got through a bit more than we were expecting to. I've sent some footage away to Drew to make sure I'm not leaving nasty messes that will have to be cleaned up later, and we're good to go for continued shooting tomorrow.