SHOOTING THE MERCEDES SLS AMG .

September 20th, 2011

SHOOTING THE MERCEDES SLS AMG .

Automotive photographer Igor Panitz (one of our oldest clients) contacted us to scout a remote location for a secret car project.

The set would need to be built-up somewhere where we could ensure that no candid shots of the car could be taken either on a telephoto lens or close-up. This is not quite as easy as it seems, most platforms and circuits are within easy reach of a road and have a town nearby for obvious reasons

The few that filled our requirements were booked out for our dates.

It was made more difficult because we would need the location for 19 shoot days plus the build and de-rig so we were looking at 22 days of rental.

After some serious scouting we were able to come to an agreement with the Guadix circuit just North of the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

This circuit is about as remote as it is possible to be. Its surrounded by flat open fields and is a good 5 km from the nearest road so its easier to maintain good perimeter security.

Our construction manager had a hard task ahead-

The set we were building for the shoot was roughly 20m long and approx 6 m high.

It had to be extremely strong and well anchored in order to withstand the gale force winds common to that area.

We also needed to organize a comfortable unit base as near as possible to the set on the track as it would be our home for the next 3 weeks. The post production tech` had to have a comfortable work-space with low light for the monitors so we opted to set up in the boxes usually used for the race cars.

The average daily temperature at that time of year was in the low 40`s but air-con was not an option unless we wanted to get ill as we would be constantly going to and fro from full heat and sunshine to semi darkness.

Basically we had to bring every thing we might possibly need with us, as once we started shooting there would be no opportunity to go and source anything missing – the nearest city was nearly 150 km away.

The big day rolled up and we set off with our 15 cubic meter van packed to capacity with everything we might need and the pick-up truck loaded to the max`.

A quick stop at the motel where we were going to be sleeping in order to check our rooms and reserve secure parking and then on to the track.

Time to get the base set up before photographer, art director and foreign crew arrived.

Our ever resourceful production assistant had to start finding a good variety places to bring lunch from, not an easy task in the middle of no-where!

The days quickly sped by and we rapidly fell into a routine that maximized our shooting-time while allowing us a short break during the hottest part of the day. aint it hot !

Up in the pre-dawn light, a quick breakfast and then the 20 minute drive to the circuit, shoot all day until the light faded and back to town for supper and an early night.

Clive our genial host at the circuit and his ever helpful crew were always at hand when needed and the recomendations for places to eat in the evening were really spot on.

Finally the last shooting day rolled up, after shooting we enjoyed a wrap dinner and night out.The next day we packed our gear, loaded the equipment and said goodbye to our German friends who were going home by road.

Later the set was dismantled and loaded out and it was time to set off home for a well earned rest.

Hasta la proxima!

Posted in Location scout, Shooting in Spain, filming on roads in Spain, location recce, photo shoot spain, production company spain, recce Spain | No Comments »

Migros BBQ Shoot March 2011.Cadiz

September 8th, 2011

One of our regular clients came to us back in early March with a layout for an outdoor shoot.

The scene was of a group of people enjoying a barbeque and drinks in an idyllic garden, as the product is sold generally in Switzerland we needed generic trees, lawn, shrubs etc.

No palm trees or Mediterranean touches pls!

The shot would be a composite with two famous athletes grilling “wurst” dropped in with post.

This kind of project calls for a well established garden with a Northen European influence, ie an old countryhouse, or mansion.

We have a very good selection of suitable locations all around the South. However this was to be a one day shoot and long travel times were not an option.

A shortlist was put together and on the Monday the photographer flew in to tech recce and decide on the following days location.

After checking several options, the location chosen was in the lush green garden of a historic British country house just a couple of km behind Gibraltar.

“Monte de la Torre” is one of our most well -liked and used locations.

Thanks for all the help guys.

In the meantime art department and props had sourced beer-garden tables and benches, barbeque accessories etc.

The casting for the extras (thanks to Target Models!) was locked off and confirmed -so all was ready for the final decision on call times.

The stylist had her briefing and the make-up lady and hair and make-up truck were on standbye.

On the shootday the art department got in early to dress the location and hang the strings of party-lights, the photo assi rigged the lights (thanks to Frankie at Spot for the nice new kit) , by lunchtime we were ready, so just after a running lunch the 20 extras rolled up in their coach.

A quick stop at styling and make-up and then time to get on set, while we were waiting for the evening light to drop we rehearsed a few set-ups.

Then the light was dropping fast and it was time to shoot, first shot 17,00 and extras wrapped by 19,10 that’s fast work!

By 21,30 we were back at the hotel with the shots in the bag and a very happy client.

Take care guys, see you on the next one.

Posted in Location scout, location recce, photo shoot spain, production company spain | No Comments »

Shooting fashion in the footsteps of Sergio Leone.

August 23rd, 2011

Vila Bestseller Fashion Shoot. Cabo de Gata. Almeria.

While we were finishing the Kia project, our friends from Denmark came back to us with another job for the Summer line for Vila. They required a slightly desert-like feeling , wide open space, distressed walls and ruined buildings…… “Dust , Wind & Snakes”

The Natural Park of Cabo de Gata in Almeria province is perfect for this kind of ambiance, with excellent light, beaches, rock formations, abandoned mines and villages, and a plethora of locations to please even the most hard to please clients.( We had previously shot the Hugo Boss “Orange” campaign with photo legend Peter Lindberg in the same area).

Santa Monicas in-house database has a massive selection of images of nearly every accessible spot in Almeria, we have been photographing and collating images of the area for years.

Images and ideas flew back and forth across cyberspace until the right combination of locations was found and approved. The permits were applied for from Park, town-hall and landowners and rooms booked for the crew.

The Cortijo Sotillo Hotel in San Jose was famous for being used as a location for “The Good, The Bad & The Ugly, back in the late 60´s .It was converted to a very laid back hotel some yrs ago and is the most production-friendly place to stay, great food, and a beautiful location in its self. Our clients always love it so we naturally booked in there.

The schedule was quite tight, the Danish crew would fly in to Malaga on the Weds and then drive the 4 hrs to Almeria with our runner driver Lionel. At the same time Yiannie, our in-house producer drove down from Alicante and liased with them to start a very quick tech-recce. They would shoot Thurs & Fri then fly out early Sat.

The team turned up at the hotel, jumped in the bus with Yiannie and set off to check the locations for the following two days. Within a couple of hours the landscape had worked its usual magic and we had enough set-ups for a week of shooting!

So it was back to the hotel for a fine “ almeriense” dinner with loads of “Ajo Blanco” (white garlic & almond dip) .

Friday morning we had breakfast at 0600, and left for the first location an abandoned farm and homestead only fifteen minutes away. The crew set up and we started shooting.

Take-away lunch was served at 14.30 and we sat down amongst the ruins for a break until the light dropped a little. By sunset we were back at the hotel with some great shots.

The following day we jumped around and shot in a variety of locations, one of which was the ruined farm of Cortijo del Fraile, (Federico Garcia Lorca wrote Bodas de Sangre about the tragedy that took place there many years ago.Unfortunately vandals and the passage of time have left it rather the worse for wear but there is talk of a possible restoration.It is however a wonderful location, and has been used in many productions.

See pictures.

Hmmmn dont know if you can eat these yet ?

Once more the day sped by and by the early evening we were back in our hotel, packing up for the early travel and flight the following day.

Time to go home for some R&R before the next one comes in !

Posted in Location scout, location recce, production company spain, recce Spain | No Comments »

Kia Shoot Alicante April 2011.

August 18th, 2011

Kia Photo Shoot Alicante April.

At the beginning of April we received a call from the studio manager of the well known automotive photographer Igor Panitz. Sta Monica had recently successfully shot the top secret Mercedes SLS AMG with him and his crew on a hidden location in the badlands behind Granada.

It had been a 19 day shoot in average temps of 35 to 40 degrees centigrade with a massive build beforehand. The technical side was extremely challenging as the set measuring 20 m long by 6m high had to be able to withstand the 40km per hr wind gusts that occur in that area.

The brief for the new Kia job was to find him a private platform where he could shoot the six cars from dawn til dusk with a minimum of re-touching in post. This job had to be done almost at once so we contacted all the local platforms and spaces but regretfully they were all booked up for our dates.

Then our location scout came up with a previously unknown option in Alicante that we thought might work.

New Platform

He was immediately sent off to scout the new site and the pictures sent off to our photographer.

The new site received the OK and we set to work prepping the shoot.

Fifteen days would be required to shoot all the cars plus a selection of vignettes including a donkey, a bride and a small child. All this would need to be sourced locally or in Valencia, where the nearest agencies were based (thanks to Carmen Duran Models).

Offices needed to be allocated and set-up, overnight security, secure storage for the cars, stabilized generators for the computers and camera equipment, catering for approx 16 days , rental vans, hotels booked etc, all the many small details that go into making a shoot run smoothly.

Santa Monicas production crew kicked-in and within a short space of time all was ready.

We would be staying about 20 km away in a quaint little hotel on the beach for the first week and then switch to a larger base only 250 m from our location for the rest of the shoot.

Our in house production manager and plus a runner driver would drive the 8 hrs to transport the production vehicles up from Malaga. In the meantime the two photo assistants were driving a fully laden cargo van down from Stuttgart with all the camera and computer kit.The photographer and post-production technician would fly into Alicante and be collected there.

Day 1 rolled up and saw us at the platform checking out the site, the transporter with our hero cars would arrive with everyone else the following day. We were ready to start.

Over the following 2 weeks we would do child model and adult model casting, fittings and even a donkey casting!

During the next few days the routine began to flow smoothly as we got up to speed, a quick dawn breakfast at the hotel then into the van and start setting up ,

setting up at sunrise

Sergio our ever cheerful runner driver would set up the running hot and cold drinks, fuel up the espresso machine and then go in search of lunch and re stock the stores, while the photo team cracked -on through the shots.

Near the end of the shoot we had to do the donkey, bridesmaid and little girl shots, so I ventured out on my first “donkey casting” found the right one and signed her on. never done a donkey casting before!

See pictures below…

working with kids is always v funny.

: our lovely little donkey, needless to say the cases were empty!

Shortly after shooting these scenes we wrapped, packed up, said goodbye to the crew and the day after commenced another shoot , this time for fashion in the natural park of Cabo de Gata Almeria.

Posted in Location scout, location recce, photo-shoot Valencia, production company spain, recce Spain | No Comments »

Shooting the new Bentley GTC CONTINENTAL, Feb March 2011

August 18th, 2011

Early this year Santa Monica Productions was contacted by a client requiring highly sophisticated and wealthy looking locations for a stills and digital film shoot to promote a new top of the range luxury sports car.
The vehicle was top secret so the location scouting would be difficult as although we needed up-market backgrounds and driving scenes, we could not take the risk of the hero-cars being photographed by the general public.
This is an extremely common situation when shooting secret cars, naturally the agency and photographer/director desire the best possible enviroments for the shoot.
However a compromise has to be reached between the difficult task of the security officers responsable for keeping the vehicle secret and the ad´agencies obligation to show the car in the best location suitable to its luxurious image.

This is what we at Santa Monica do best and in record time an enormous selection of locations shots were on the clients desktop. The selection process began and as we knew quite a few of the favourites would be vetoed due to security issues we kept “B” and “C” options at hand.
A couple of weeks later the photographer, director and security flew out for an intense week-long tech recce of the first selection of locations.Almost every province in southern Spain was covered and also some regions in the North.

The recce crew flew home and an initial shooting schedule was drafted then re drafted until we had something that would work.In order to get the enormous variety of shots and locations required it would mean a grueling 2 week shoot , starting at pre-dawn shooting until night and travelling overnight to the next location.
This can be a worrying situation which often occurs on long intense shoots as the crew rapidly becomes very tired and the production manager has to decide if his runner drivers are able to drive long distances at night after 17 hrs non-stop. The wrong decision can be catastrophic.
Due to budget limitations we were down to one runner driver and a production manager to look after a crew of up 25 on occasions. However experience and common sense prevailed and there were no incidents.

The main crew and clients flew in and the job commenced and ran smoothly throughout without major problems.
Production is not an exact science and no matter how well organized you are, there will always be unexpected situations.
The secret is to be aware of this and thus “be prepared” then you can get on with minimum fuss,do the best job possible for your clients and ensure everyone gets home safe .

: Road shoots Rock!

Chalk up another successful car shoot to the Santa Monica team!

Posted in Location scout, Marbella, Shooting in Spain, Spain filming, filming on roads in Spain, location recce, production company spain | No Comments »

Vila Bestseller Fashion Shoot March 2011

August 17th, 2011

March -Fashion shoot for Danish client Vila Bestseller.

In the second week of March, we shot with fashion photographer Henrik Adamsen for two days in a fantastic new modern Mexican-style house in Cadiz.
shadow-play int terrace.stairway
The brightly coloured walls, cubist lines and shadows were the perfect backdrop for their new

Summer line. (see pictures).

This location is exclusive to Santa Monica Productions and it’s been written up in seven different design and architectural magazines so we were very happy to be able to use it for the first time.
All went very well with our new Profoto lighting package coming from Franky at Spot Light Rental . The equipment was unloaded and checked at the crew hotel the night before, the racks , steamers, irons etc were set up in the stylists room and all was set for an early start the following day.

The crew arrived at the location in Sotogrande Cadiz at eight o clock, set up hair and make-up in the pre-heated guest apartment and shooting commenced.

We worked around the interior and exterior of the house as the weather was rather wet, An Arri hmi 4k was stood by just in case we had to “brighten things up.

”

Two days later we wrapped at a very late hour, had a midnight dinner at a local steak-house and the following day everyone travelled home in fine spirits.

Another successful job and some more new friends.

Posted in Location scout, Shooting in Spain, location recce, production company spain, recce Spain | No Comments »

January -Actimel Danone Commercial shot in Malaga for 7th Heaven

May 27th, 2011

Around the tenth of January we were contacted by one of our regular clients with a story-board for Finland.

The location required was a small wooden shelter typical of Lapland by the side of a hiking track in a Nordic-looking forest.

After several days of scouting we opted for the Juanar Refugio and Natural park in the municipality of Ojen.

Reserva de Juanar

The permit process began, town-hall, park authority, land-owner etc.

The pines there are of a stature and type not found easily elsewhere in the province and for a 1 day shoot we wished to avoid any un-necessary travel.

Our shelter set needed to be easily assembled and carried up to the location and then de-rigged on wrap so the location could be left unharmed.

The shelter also had to be made of timber, aged to look as if it had been out in the extreme elements for many years.

A lot of research went into finding timber of the right size, shape and colour , finally our construction manager went to work up at a small lumber yard in Jubrique. A small problem arose when we were informed by the park rangers that another production company already had a permit to shoot in the same area on the same day! The odds of this occurring are very small, but we contacted the other company, and an agreement was arranged.

getting the right stuff!

Fortunately we had already scouted a B-plan location just in case and the location was moved on to what turned out to be a more suitable site both lighting -wise and production-wise.

In the meantime, crew were being booked, budgets were flying to and fro and long-range weather reports scanned anxiously.

Our location was in a mountain pass at approx 1,300 m so we needed to be prepared for any untoward weather.

Finally the director and producer flew in for the pre –recce and casting, all went well, they flew home and we set a date for the shoot.

The twentieth of January rolled around, people started to arrive, vehicles were collected , gear rented, catering arranged and the myriad details that go into a shoot plan ticked off one by one. Shoot-day dawned with us already up on location since six o clock, the lights were set, the track laid for the dolly and shooting commenced on the Canon 5D.

Despite some inclement weather by the end of the day we had it all “in the bag “.

Shooting in real Lapland weather!

Setting up the unit base on location at 1300m,

Our crew drove down the mountain to some welcome hot drinks and a sauna.

Meanwhile the construction crew dismantled the shelter and shipped it off to a local home for stray dogs were it was to become the house for several happy hounds.

Another successful shoot finished and wrapped!

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

SANTA MONICA PRODUCTIONS 2011.

April 15th, 2011

Upper platform ext museum

Foto team

January 2011 – Fitflop Photo-shoot Valencia.

January 2011 kicked off to a running start for Santa Monica with a four day photo-shoot for Fit Flop at the prestigious Ciudad de Artes y Ciencias in Valencia.

The foreign crew of eleven people flew in on Jan 4^th after a rapid tech reccie, we commenced shooting very early the following day.

Although we were shooting on 3 Kings Day ,( the Spanish gift-giving holiday) our production was able to organize the logistics of location and gear rental etc in order for it all to work smoothly.

We were very happy to hear that the photographer was fashion-legend Steve Hiett, as we worked with him before for Wallpaper .

Steve among his many other achievements has shot for French, Italian and English Vogue and directed commercials for his fashion clients apart from being an well accomplished musician.

Our shiny new light package turned up via courier from Loclum Barcelona and local power was supplied by local supplier Lux Light Team.

The gods of weather were on our side and the location looked totally amazing. Calatrava the architect who designed the city has created something truly unusual and futuristic, its small wonder most car manufacturers have used the location for ads at one time or another.

All went extremely well including shooting with children and a street-cast capoeira model so at the end of the second day we wrapped the shoot, had a celebratory dinner and the following day the clients and foreign crew flew home from Valencia airport.

Yiannie , our in-house producer drove back from Valencia on the eighth of January, just in time to start on the next project.

Posted in Location scout, Shooting in Spain, photo-shoot Barcelona, photo-shoot Valencia, production company spain | No Comments »

New Worldwide Jamesons Whiskey Campaign Shot in Spain with Santa Monica Productions

December 15th, 2010

Santa Monica Productions has just completed yet another successful high-profile photo shoot .

THE JOB.

Once again we were contacted by top American photographer Jim Fiscus and his London based agent in order to put together a shoot for MC Saatchi client “Jamesons Whiskey”.

THE BRIEF .

The brief was quite complex requiring 4 different principal images for their new campaign.

All four images would be composed of montages requiring major post production and cgi work. Only matching up the lighting was a massively complicated task which would take considerable effort.

Montjuic Exterior

THE LOCATIONS .

The locations initially considered were of a very international selection including Rio, New York and Los Angeles. After some comprehensive and very specific scouting, the diversity of locations and production value in Spain won the job, the main locations were chosen in NewYork , Gibraltar and Barcelona.

Shooting above Barcelona

The actual shoot in Spain would take almost three weeks including pre-.production.

We would also shoot at the end of the job for several days on a set in a large film studio at Banzai Studios on the outskirts of Barcelona in order to obtain key interior shots.

setting up in the studio

THE GEAR .

A comprehensive equipment list was ordered from our rental -house , and a truckload of shiny new gear was delivered to us in record time , some in its original factory packaging, thanks Loclum!

THE CREW.

Due to the complexity of the lighting set-ups and the speed at which we needed to swap sets -extra local crew needed to be brought-in for these days.

The crew, client, talent head-count during the studio days alone would be over forty people per day.

The styling and art direction had to be absolutely spot-on in order to satisfy the requisites of two highly acclaimed art directors and their exigent clients.

Our network kicked-in and cv`s were emailed back and forth and closely perused. Eventually we opted to source wardrobe, stylist and head of art department in Barcelona and this proved later to be a wise decision as their local knowledge was invaluable at the hour of providing crew..(e.g. exemplary product-prep people) and locating material of all types.

Santa Monica Productions had booked the crew into The Granados 83, it’s a production-friendly hotel, with helpful staff and many excellent restaurants very close by.

THE HURDLES:

One of our major problems was that we were in the middle of Summer-holidays and many of the more up-market furniture retailers and warehouses close during this period. To further complicate matters for our stylist, most of the designer boutiques and fashion stores had already sold out their Summer-wear and were waiting for the Autumn collection to arrive.(The option of buying the wardrobe in London was discussed at one stage but in the end we sourced everything in Barcelona).

The four main models would be cast in UK and some featured and non-featured extras would be sourced from local agencies through our very experienced casting director Rafa@ Modexpor.

THE SHOOT

Our photographer flew in from the U.S. with his two assistants and we commenced the technical scouting on the 2^nd of August for three days.

Then on the afternoon of the 4^th we flew a skeleton-crew down via Malaga to Gibraltar in order to prep the night shots from the rock

Tech recce Gibraltar

Ape attacks not withstanding – we shot the following evening and travelled back to Barcelona on the 6^th, shooting continued through the next seven days .

Hours were long as the photographer and key photo crew spent most evenings and some nights organizing and briefing post-production and cgi teams in the U.S in order to keep the other images on schedule.

Prepping on location Barcelona

THE WRAP.

Shooting finished the early evening of the 15^th.

The sets and lighting were wrapped and some Cava was broached to celebrate another successful completion .

Once back at the hotel our crew and cast went out to dinner …and that’s another story!

Posted in Location scout, Shooting in Spain, Uncategorized, location recce, photo-shoot Barcelona, production company spain, recce Spain | No Comments »

A Taste Of The Right Medicine.

October 28th, 2010

The Autumn season has seriously kicked-in again for Santa Monica Productions with several jobs shot locally in Malaga province and scouting taking place all over Spain.

In September amongst others , we completed an advertising photo-shoot with renowned British photographer Phil Sureby for a medicinal product made by a well-known international pharmaceutical company .

The location brief was for 3 locations, two exteriors and one interior which would allow the models to be shown in a variety of everyday situations, while using natural light as much as possible.

We needed a white beach, a florists and a café terrace. The locations had been discussed in great detail and we decided that we would only require two days to scout the café and florists as naturally the best beaches in Europe are a stones throw away on the Cadiz coast in Tarifa.

The layouts required female models of different racial types and so some of the featured models would be flown in from UK and Target Models our excellent local model agency would provide the rest of the talent. An economical Profoto lighting-package was sourced from Spot Marbella rental, collected and checked the day before shooting, thus avoiding expensive excess baggage costs.

Location scouting took two days as planned and the proposed locations were emailed to the clients for approval. A week later the photographer flew in for the tech recce of the confirmed Tarifa beach, Marbella café terrace and local florists.

Due to the fact that most of the florists shops scouted tended to be rather small dark and cluttered, ultimately we decided to go with a very clean and tidy garden center outside San Pedro.

This gave us added production-value as it now meant we could shoot the beach on day one and then the café and florist on day two eliminating a third days shooting and making a serious budget saving.

Shoot-day One,

We set off from our crew hotel at five in the morning for an hours drive to the beaches.

There had been some concern about the weather letting us down but as usual when the sun came up it was in a clear blue sky!



sunrise outside the m/up truck Tarifa beach

On arrival we all drank a hot coffee and the stylist and models went straight into the heated make-up truck to prep while photographer, assistant and production manager took the creative director and client down to select the spot.

At nine we were ready for the first shot and due to the professionalism of models and crew we were able to finish shooting at midday when the light started to become too harsh. Lunch had already been laid out and we sat down to eat with the exotic African coast in the background.

Shoot-day Two.

The two locations were within fifteen minutes of each other and five minutes from the hotel so we started at nine am in bright sunshine and by ten were ready for our first shot of the day at the garden-center.

All went well and although we shot several variations we were finished at one pm.

The cafe terrace.

The café location took a little longer to set up as there was some set dressing to be done and again several different shots. However the owner and staff were extremely helpful so at six pm the camera was put away and after re-setting the café terrace we were back at base by seven thirty.

Checking frame.

The following day the crew flew out on afternoon flights and so were able to take in a little of the sunshine and near-bye shopping, completing a very successful and enjoyable job.

Posted in Location scout, Marbella, Shooting in Spain, Uncategorized, location recce, photo-shoot Barcelona, production company spain, recce Spain | No Comments »

Recent Posts

Upper platform ext museum Foto team January 2011 – Fitflop Photo-shoot Valencia.

Upper platform ext museum

Foto team

January 2011 – Fitflop Photo-shoot Valencia.