I was in San Francisco again this week, but unlike last time, this time it was a mix of toy job and Biz. And the whole thing ended up being a mini/lite version of a Biz film production.

I was asked by my BigHugeCorp to do a non-broadcast industrial, with the understanding that it'd be "your project".

I was told to hire a crew, write a script, do the editing, and "git 'er done!"

After having written the script and solicited local crew, BigHugeCorp let me know they'd be hiring the crew, sent me a script they'd written, and told me it was still my job to "git 'er done!"

I actually thrive on adversity (what successful actor doesn't?), so I negotiated a bunch of the stuff in the corporate script as optional, filled in the gaps with stuff from my script, added transitions to make it all flow, and fully storyboarded the thing out.

During actual filming, OneWhoHasSomePower freaked out from Cali because she wasn't onsite to see what I was doing, and because she didn't have the background to make the leap from text script to conceptual vision (fair enough, though the reaction was unequivocally out of whack). Which meant I had to shoot a bunch of scenes twice, in case she nixed my ideas.

Which meant also I had to spend a whole Saturday with her when she got back into town, walking through all of the rough-cut footage, to end up at the end of the day with my original plan, with a two-day delay (Friday FedEx would have gotten to SF; Sat. FedEx arrives on Monday).

Editing was also out my hands, since all post was being done out of the Bay Area. All I could do was ship the beta tapes, storyboard, and annotated shot log, and hope for the best.

So, how did it all turn out? The video wasn't what I hoped it would be (the
editing job was lower caliber than I expected). But it didn't matter.

The crowd loved it.

Coupled with my brief emcee stint (my secret to being comfortable on stage? I don't care if I'm liked), the video had a couple of execs laughing so hard (in a good way) they were almost crying.

It probably helped that the video had a talking jackalope (voiced by me).

And now when I get the original footage back, I can edit stuff for the "directors cut".

Like I said, the whole thing ended up being a mini/lite version of a Biz film production.

Video will be up (hopefully) soon.