Things are happening thick and fast now. To begin with, I finally finished draft six of the screenplay. Amazingly, looking back at last year’s journal, I notice it’s exactly a year since I announced that I had started draft six. There have been some major changes and, though some of the new sequences are necessarily not quite as polished as the long-standing material, I believe the whole story has been lifted and strengthened.
Ian is now working full time on the production design, visiting prop houses, liasing with painters and sculptors and so on. The mysterious R.A.C.T.A.B.E. insignia and Swordsman spare parts are amongst the items currently taking shape. As for set dressing, Ian can barely get into his room without falling over all the stuff he’s gathered.
Yesterday morning the two of us plus a van driver and his son moved all the scrounged wood into a lock-up on the other side of the Pinewood lot, where it will await its calling on November 10th, the day set construction begins. And today we visited the workshop at FBFX, where Grant and his team have assembled the basic elements of Max’s bio-suit (podcast coming soon). So far the suit consists of two layers, between which compressed air is inserted. Many straps, mechanisms and pouches are then worn on top, only a few of which have been made yet. Kev, who modelled the suit for us, told us it’s nice and cool inside thanks to the escaping air.
Last but definitely not least, we’re running auditions at the end of this week for the parts of Isabelle (formerly Kara) and Max. We have some very talented people lined up and we can’t wait to put them through their paces.

Today is the fifth anniversary of the start of principal photography on Soul Searcher. (Thanks to Colin for reminding me.) That shoot seems so long ago now. I never thought it would be this long before I would be lensing another film of my own.
At Pinewood Studios Ian has been collecting wood from Prince of Persia’s set strikes. He’s been working very, very hard getting all the nails and screws out of it, not to mention doing his day job and finishing the set design.

A meeting at the Model Unit today was very fruitful. We finally sorted out how the ceiling mechanism which supposedly controls the Swordsman is going to be achieved. The solution, or in fact solutions plural, are actually quite simple, and in all fairness Ian has been suggesting one of them since day one. They’re difficult to describe, but they don’t require a walkway and they don’t pose a problem of connecting ropes in a live action plate to post production elements. The bulk of the mechanism will be achieved with a miniature element of some kind, but the section immediately above the Swordman will be in-camera.