Given the aggressive shooting schedule — 14 scenes, a combination of exterior and interior locations, moving cars, many actors, minimal rehearsal time — Dave, Sebastien and Ajay's Ro-sham-bo encounter outside the bathroom has been purposefully slated as the final sequence of the shoot, before pick-ups. There is a great deal of physical interaction required of the characters in this scene, coupled with blocking issues for the multiple camera setups, two of which are dolly maneuvers incorporating pans (camera moving side to side) with focus pulls. We estimate three hours to get the roughly three minutes of footage needed.

The first two setups are the twin dolly swipes (as illustrated in storyboards), which go smoothly. The shots depict the three characters converging on the bathroom door and establish what it is they're after. Now comes the tricky part: the three guys standing in front of the door talking and playing Rock, Paper, Scissors.

As a result of rehearsals on Sunday, our actors are prepared. However, while their exchange needs to be covered from five different angles over the course of the next couple of hours, requiring them to repeat their performances each time, there's two suprises, 1) We're losing the actress who plays the president, and 2) The crew member whose eyeglasses Zachary is wearing (as Sebastien) has to go to work and pretty much can't see well enough to drive without them. The pressure's on. We must get the shot!

EYE SPY

We can't get the shot. The eyeglasses go and we still don't have sufficient close-ups of Sebastien. Approximately 40 crew members are spread across the AIU campus and our radios are useless. We need wire-rimmed glasses fast. A mad dash is made to find somebody with glasses while we continue to shoot everything but Sebastien's face. The president's emerging from the bathroom is covered in three takes and the actress (from the camera department) is cut loose. Harold's bathroom entry is covered in three takes, as well. We're suddenly out of options. Everything thought to be needed has been shot but the most important shot of all — Sebastien's close-up.

"Ta-da!" Glasses arrive. While not identical to the previous pair, they'll work in a pinch and we are being pinched. Fingers are crossed that the audience won't ever notice and we knock off the final shot and begin striking the location. Time for pick-ups, and sun is getting low.

WRAPPING UP

The final shots of our two-day shoot, the interior car stuff introducing Ajay that was bumped from Friday, is assigned to cameraman Kevin Duggan and his assistant. He takes his gear, his actors, and the picture car, then disappears down the road to get all the footage before losing our light. They've got no more than 45 minutes.

A half-hour later, Kevin's back. The shots have been gotten. It's 6:04 p.m.. Principle photography of Rock, Paper, Peace is offically wrapped!