(Pic by Jamie Morgan)
-08/28/2015
-This was a quick shooting day. Basically a pick up shoot for an effect that wasn’t done 2 weeks prior. As you can see from the pics, it’s pretty easy to see what we were filming. It was done rather quickly. Prior to me arriving was filming on some scenes that John & Berndele had to do as well. Afterwards me and Matt went up to Pulaski to catch the premiere of ‘AKA Alice’-pics / recap of that can be seen on that album.
-08/29/2015
-As you may or may not know from the ‘AKA Alice’ premiere recap, me and Matt didn’t get back to Utica till around 2 AM. I still had to drive to Syracuse-I’d left most of costume “c” there due to bad planning (20/20 hindsight ya know). How bad? Well, I got into Syracuse at 3 AM, then had to be up around 5:30 AM to be on the road back to Utica by 7 AM to hit the call at 8 AM-and with filming to go on all day. I was around 30 minutes late-my bad. Everything seems to be moving in slow motion when you’re dead tired… Then we all car pooled to this beach for filming. We had to go down a trail that, we were told, would only take 8 minutes to get to the beach. It was more like at least 20-30… The trail wasn’t as bad as that from Overhead Mountain, but it did bring back some flashbacks. 🙂
This was a smaller cast / crew than previous-John, Jennifer, me, Matt, Mark and Jamie.
-We then proceeded to get all dressed up on the beach. I’m glad it wasn’t humid this day. We went thru the speaking parts and then there were some action shots. Unfortunately, I can’t detail them here-or post pics-until the movie comes out. Spoiler alerts ya know…I think people will be very pleased with the action here as well as later this day. Hopefully we’ll hit all the emotional bulls eyes we are aiming at. In addition, one of the spikes on my arm bracer broke off and is basically forever lost within the sand. We all basically had to get sand out of our hair and clothes thru out the day. As you can see from the pics, I did have a fight scene with John. It came out very well I’m told. I was taught a wrestling move by John which was cool. I taught John that I sometimes go full out and accidentally pulled his hair for real-in addition to causing some damage on his cyborg arm. ( DOH! 🙂 ) John did most of the heavy lifting when it came to falls and stuff since I’m rapidly approaching the date I qualify for my AARP discount 🙂 Seriously, I was frustrated with myself cause I wasn’t in the shape I should’ve been for this. There were several factors involved in this but, bottom line, it was still my responsibility to be combat ready on this day and I wasn’t. However, I was told that the footage was great so…yes, I’m my own worst critic so maybe I’m being too hard on myself, but that’s the way I am-aging and lack of sleep / fitness be damned…
-Then we hiked back to the cars. I should’ve at least changed out of the boots, but didn’t. As a result, I had the skin from a section near my ankle basically rubbed off to a degree. Also had one of the buckles on that boot broken. The life on set huh? 🙂 Still way preferable to the 9 to 5 grind for me… We then went to a pizza / sub place that was awesome (Johnny’s Pizza I believe) and rested / re-hydrated for the next part of the shoot-which was done in Cooperstown.
-After a long drive-and yes, I did konk out during this-we arrived. Jay S. was already there to meet us. Filming was done at this huge graveyard and we basically got filming done before it got too dark. BTW-big thanks to Jay suggesting that we can drive to the spot for filming, basically, instead of us hiking again. 🙂 Once again, no talk or show pics (up to a point) here due to spoilers. This was basically a wrap for Jay, John and Jennifer (Mark was wrapped at the beach). All that’s left was me and Berndele the next day in Utica. By the time I got home this night, it was around 10-11 PM-and call was 8 AM. I think I need to get some PA’s 🙂
-08/30/2015
-At least I got some more sleep before this day. This was the shortest cast / crew yet-just me, Matt and Berndele. As you can see, this was a sword fight and I’m glad it was done on a separate day by itself. Now, admittedly, me and Berndele weren’t even able to get together to rehearse the choreography even once due to scheduling, distance, etc. In addition, with all the filming and other stuff happening in our lives, neither one of us was able to put the time we wanted to into it as was “due proper” 🙂 Having said that, we broke everything down and put safety at the top. I can’t reveal the ending-and there really wasn’t any pics taken (except maybe still shots with what Matt was filming)-but it went off as well as we could. I will say it was a good thing I had the arm bracer on in regards to a blade swing and something that happens to me in many of the films I’m in with Mad Angel Films once again happened here 🙂 Hopefully Berndele’s back has recovered by now -how’s that for being vague? 🙂
-We were basically done before noon. It felt kinda weird-like we had more to do-and we kinda do. Matt now has to go thru all the footage to review it and see what was missed and / or needs to be fixed. I already know of one pick up that I have to do. However, this was still the official “last day of principle photography” for ‘Romeo 3000.’ It seemed like it had just started and here we are at the end.
-I want to give a HUGE thanks to all the people involved in this production-whether we’ve worked together on previous projects or this was the first time. You were all awesome and hopefully we’ll work together in future projects. I know the aim is to get this done and released around summer 2016. I also want to say thanks to all the people who have supported us in anyway. It’s deeply appreciated and I hope that you all enjoy this film as much as we did in making it. Keep an eye out on the Romeo 3000 FB page for news and updates.
WAYNE W. JOHNSON 