Part one of the filming journey - The Beach

One thing is for sure. When you go filming a short film to a beach in the middle of nowhere the whole concept of "beach" is changed forever. Even thought everything went well and everyone is alive, it wasn´t your average beach holiday that´s for sure.

Day 1: The first day we arrived the weather wasn´t exactly as we were hoping for. It was quite cloudy and it rained a little here and there. The sunset that was the most important thing to get filmed wasn´t going to happen, but we decided to film couple of pictures anyway. When we eventually started filming, it was already raining a bit and the sunset went under he horizon faster than we expected. Although we were able to film most of the shots we wanted there just wasn´t enough light to get all the shots that night. As soon as we got the filming duties done, we started to build our camp. At that point the rain started to get heavier and at the same moment we found out that one of our tent hadn´t got any outer shield with it. It was just some fabric that wasnt waterproof at all. Luckily we bought some shower curtains in the case of rain and after an long struggle we were able to cover the tent with them.. (that we had to fix in the middle of the night after the rain and wind almost tore the whole thing off) At this point it was clear that it even thought it was going to be an memorable trip, it wasn´t going to be easy.

Day 2: The morning was something in the between of sunshine and cloudy. Not bad compared to the night before, but still not the kind we were looking for. We started to organize things and after a while the filming was well on it´s way. The second day was maybe the longest in shooting wise. Thought it was cloudy the light was on our side. We were very pleased with the material we got and even thought the night was a bit rainy again, it was most certainly better than the night before. At this point we found out that sand is something you just have to get used to when you live on the beach. Our food, sleeping bags, clothes and tents were full of it but at this point it was still more or less funny.

For our surprise and kinda bad luck, there was some kind of festival going on at the nearest town of Salacgriva that made everyday a trip to get some neccessary food and suppliment. On Friday we made our trip in the evening and we were in a little hurry to catch the possible sunset. About 5km before the city of couple of thousand peolpe was just packed with festival folk. The only road leading to the city wasn´t moving anywhere and with the driving culture of Latvia it was some what an exotic situation to find yourself in. The car line moved approximately 5km per hour and after 45min of waiting part of our crew jumped out of our "papmobile" (Paprika mobile) and headed to the shops by foot. We had to get a ticket for a bus to one of our actors and cause of the festivals we wanted to buy well before it was leaving. Other than that, we needed some water, milk and some beverages aswell. After some running organizing and planning we had everything else with us other than the bus ticket. There was only one ticket left for the bus and thanks to some weird and confuseing webbank systems we failed to get the ticket and it looked much like there was going to be lot of driving on sunday to get our actor off the beach and on the bus from the next city to catch the boat to Helsinki. (Pärnu that was about 100km away from our location was our next best chance. but more of that later on)

After our shopping trip, we found out that we missed the sunset partially cause of the weather but also were super late to shoot the other shots planned for that evening. It also raid a bit again and there was the basic hassel that you have to go through with when you live in tents in the middle of nowhere and have a short film to film with really small crew. We got some shots but we already knew that we had to film some of those again if the conditions got better. The night was still long and after we got our filming done, that was some where between 01:00 and 03:00 in the morning we had the pleasure to witness one of the most amazing moonlights in our lives. The nigth was quite long and we had one of the best nights yet to come around the little bonfire that kept us warm and the stories that made us laugh.

That´s all for now. There´s so many stories and experiences that it would take the whole day to tell all about them in one time. We are already in Riga and been filming some pickup shots and scouting for locations. There´s been some miss fortune for example our car is still at the beach and such but more about that later.

IF YOU HAPPEN TO READ THIS AND YOU ARE IN RIGA HIT US WITH AN E-MAIL OR SO. We are still looking for some statistics for the main filming day that is on saturday, so if you want to have part in our film give us a hint. Till later

www.silentpaprikafilms.com

-SPF

Action!

At 05:50 Silent Paprika Films heads off to film our newest short films to Latvia! Wish us luck and check for updates from the road. Were heading first to beaches of Latvia (check the image below) so there won´t be any updates within week or so, but well promise to keep you up to date as soon we get to our second location that is the city of Riga.

www.silentpaprikafilms.com

-SPF

"Till death do us part" location: 1 - Beach in Latvia

One day till take off and new design for the blog

First of to celebrate some sort of milestone of this project (the ending of the first part of pre-production and starting of our filming trip) were releasing a new design for our blog!

The D.O.P and the Director just checked out the filming equipment and the chief of catering etc. headed out to buy some delicious ingredients for the whole crew. Even the props and costumes are backed just need to gather our own belongings and were ready to go.

We had a successful meeting yesterday and everyone was psyched to head on the road. Almost everyone was able to attend the meeting and at 05:50 tomorrow morning were heading off in front of our office.

Some of our crew members have been trying to shift their sleeping habits towards the early morning wake ups with more or less success. Anyway were going to have quite a rough couple of days to start off our filming cause the weather reports seem to tell that the sooner we film the better the weather will be.

Look for some final updates this evening cause there might be something a bit more special coming up!

www.silentpaprikafilms.com

-SPF

Reservation for our crew at Doma Hostel in Riga: Check

We just reserved a place to stay for our crew at Doma Hostel in Riga. Check out: http://www.domahostel.lv/ Thanks goes to the hostels pleasant service for everything already. We are really looking forward at our arrival there though there is still much happening before that.

We are having a final meeting with most of the crew including the cast tomorrow at Silent Paprika Films office. Even thought the pre-production schedule was quite tight and there is only 3 days till we leave, everything is almost checked and good to go. Still need to do some packing etc but just some minor things.

At the moment the atmosphere is really good within the whole crew and most likely it just keeps on getting better the closer we get to leaving to our adventure!

www.silentpaprikafilms.com

-SPF

Till the pre-production do us part

Although everything is well on its way and rolling forward smoothly it seems like the more you do the more you still have to do. Tomorrow were going to go scouting the last missing pieces of the props. Were heading for the good old Valtteri -marketplace here in Helsinki and if that doesn´t help there´s a couple of antique stores nearby.

At the moment The director/screenwriter/producer (Henna Välkky) and the composer/sound designer (Simo Reunamäki) are having a meeting in the other room meanwhile the assistant director/line producer (Eesu Lehtola) is sorting out the accommodations, catering, props lists etc.

It seems like the closer we get to the filming the longer the days get work vise. All in all at the same time we are more exited about everything cause day by day the pieces are coming more clearly together.

Henna edited just some casting footage together and we´ll see if there´s going to be some kind of an teaser how the castings went in near future. For the time were filming at the beach location it´s most likely that we aren´t able to update this blog, but we promise to tell you all about it as soon as we get to Riga and get a internet connection.

www.silentpaprikafilms.com

-SPF

t-9 days until the filming starts

The schedule meeting was eventually on Saturday but went quite well. We have been meeting since almost every day shorting out the last little details concerning our trip. All is set to go but look for some bigger updates in upcoming days before we take off to the first part of the filming our short film.

www.silentpaprikafilms.com

-SPF