Director Jules Lucas recently returned from the belly of the iconic satanic-fair, Dark Mofo, shooting a campaign for the Asahi activation at the festival. Now back on the mainland, he’s had time to reflect on what goes into these documentary-style productions that are characterised by tight turnarounds and little control over the live elements.
How unscripted is a shoot that happens in an environment like Dark Mofo?
A job like this is a bit like doco filmmaking – I knew the basic framework of Dark Mofo and did a location recce on the shot day, but much of it was thinking on my feet and working with the environment as we moved through the festival.
It’s a bit like event coverage, where you have an idea of what’s going to unfold, but also need to be very ready to respond to challenges on the fly.
It was a crew of just two plus talent – what decisions go into the size of the production? What are the advantages/disadvantages?
It’s challenging, but a job like this warranted a small crew. We needed to move through large crowds and keep a light footprint. What’s also great about this kind of shoot is that, unlike very tightly scripted jobs, there’s the trust and freedom to piece together the narrative and shots as you go. It’s a far more fluid way of approaching a job. You can prepare to a certain extent, but in the end, there’ll always be things and moments that surprise you and push you to come up with other ways of shooting and answering the brief as you go.
You’ve worked with Julian (lead actor) previously, how important is casting?
When casting real people it’s important to have some idea that they are going to be comfortable on camera. I’ve worked with Jules before on fashion shoots and music videos and so knew that not only do we get along, he is also very easy to direct and can bring a lot to a shoot. I selected him over other talents from an agency for this very reason. We already had an affinity and he had the look and attitude to ensure we got what we needed from the shoot. It’s also fun working with friends.
The client needed the project delivered the next day, how did work with that requirement?
With incredibly tight deadlines to meet and so many deliverables, it made sense to bring our editor James along instead of a camera assistant. James acted as my assistant on the shoot and then we work up at 5am the next day to cut the first round of deliverables. Looking back I don’t know how I thought I would be able to edit it all myself, so well worth the decision.
