Production Designer
Ooh a Production Designer’s dream: “Hey, let’s make a movie entitled Spring, we’ll shoot it in the FALL and incorporate fantastical winter elements”. Um ok!
A labour of love, I guess we’ll call it, but I couldn’t help getting sucked in. First off the script was great! Humorous, creative, and relying heavily on 3D animation it seemed totally achievable on a micro-budget. Then came the meeting with Lynne Kamm, the Director. If you could bottle this woman’s energy Redbull would be out of business! We brainstormed on the visuals; fun, colourful, with fantastical pops. Every idea she had, I expanded on and vice versa, until suddenly I was designing thousands of dollars worth of sets, without the time, budget or manpower to pull them off.
Over the next two weeks Lynne and I pooled all our resources together to make this project happen for practically no money. From giving up my living room for a week to paint the cloud backdrop and snowboard myself; to getting “snow” donated (for the emerging tulip shot) from Nexus Canada; to paying one of my suppliers in arrowroot cookies, and arranging barters with others; I pulled out all the tricks in my hat. Not only did Lynne provide me with the snowboard to paint and lend me the bindings off her own board, she found me Karen Henwood, my angel dressed as a props master; who came on to supply, coordinate and wrangle all of the props for the weekend shoot, and even brought out her daughter and friend as helping hands on the day. Lynne even tried her hand at prop building making a giant snow globe out of a fishbowl. A wonderful addition to my set, I might add!
With all of my sets up on the first day of shooting, all hands were on deck the day before to load-in, paint and prep to turn the photography studio into an ‘homage to all things winter bedroom’; ‘MIB automated closet’; and an outdoor ‘winter wonder dreamland’ set. A task that flowed from day into night, and from dawn on shoot day right up until the camera rolled. Along with Karen and Summer and her friend, my assistant Jeannette Nguyen were right there by my side as filled the bedroom with layers of white, adding a pop of texture with wall art made out of a silver shag floor rug. They manned the sliding doors and wall rig for the closet with perfect precision. And once we’d placed our white Christmas trees in front of the sky blue back drop, they recreated everything from a blizzard to light flurries of foam chunks to shower Natalie during the dream sequence to finish off our day.
With all of my hard work completed, day two of shooting was a walk in the park… Literally. Dodging marathon runners and police officers while grabbing last minute ice cream and flowers highlighted my day. Karen and Summer spent the day making a Labrador sized “dog sleigh” harness; supplying the kids with props in every colour of the Olympic rainbow; and accessorizing Natalie so that she could conquer the highest snow-covered mountain… Or 6-foot grassy hill in a park off Yonge St. While in between setups Jeannette had the honourable task of raking away the evidence of autumn as needed.
All in all it was a lovely autumn weekend when we shot Spring, our homage to winter and it’s sports, with a girl named Summer!
Biography: A Toronto native, Deirdra Morris has been Production and Costume Designing for film and television since 2004. Studying studio art and theatre at the University of Guelph, she began her career designing for theatre. Deirdra’s portfolio to date is quite diverse. From Production Designing Sun of the Sunshine (2009), and Burgeon and Fade(2007); to Costume Designing such independent films as Sweet Karma(2009), and Ten for Grandpa (2009). She also works extensively in commercials, music videos, and television as an Art Director and Buyer. Spring marks Deirdra’s 7th film as a Production Designer.
Spring Note: This is Lynne’s first collaboration with Dei but not her last. Dei is a down and dirty designer who is the last person to leave a location during prep, assuring the sets meet her immaculate standards. Deirdra is determined to make everything the best. And with an ambitious eight stylized locations to film in two eight-hour days, she was a busy-bee on Spring. Dei’s mad art skills along with her ability to amass a talented, stealth crew, helped her to pull off the impossible. When it came to creating a snowy-white bedroom for our winter-obsessed character, Dei’s astute knowledge of filming with Red and creative eye, help combat the issue of HD “flatness” by giving the set a brilliant life of detailed texture. Deirdra just rocks.
