Our First Car Rig

By Tony Vallone story, screenplay, associate producer

The other night we had scheduled our first car rig shot. We had plenty of other shots to get done that night and only about 2 hours to make a car rig and film the scene. Now a proper car rig requires a bunch of different considerations.

Lighting
At night, the actors need to be seen, so there needs to be light. How are you going to get lights on/in the car? Will it be enough light? Will you be able to light it nicely?

Power
All those lights will require some juice. A standard construction generator will give you about 4000w which is enough for maybe two of the lights you'd want to use.

Sound
Wind noise? Generator noise? noise from light fixtures? If there is dialogue in the scene then you need quiet everything.

Camera
Will the camera be fixed? Will the camera operator need to fit in the car?

Safety
hah. not important.

Here are some photos of our success.