Cottonwood Update #15: The Police Station

We were able to get a lot of great locations for the film, but the Windom Police Station was not one of them. So we did the next best thing and that was build our own police station. I went to the BARC and talked to Greg and discovered we had a brief window of time to take over a room at the BARC. So we spent a day or two transforming an almost empty office room into a police station.

We tried to get all of the details down from labeling file cabinets to posters and legal documents. Thanks to Jeff and Jason for allowing us to get a tour of the actual police station to inspire our own police station.

Not being able to use the real police station was not all bad. As I look back now I think it actually was better that we had to build our own. There are a couple of reasons I think that. First of all we were able to totally customize our own from all of the papers and posters on the wall to the decals and police logos on everything. We would probably not have been able to do this at the real police station. We were also able to pull out walls to get shots that we would not have been able to get at the real police station. There are a list of other benefits of building our own from lighting to noise to scheduling. In the end it was a great experience.

Along with the benefits of building your own set there is the experience that goes along with it. I love doing production design for my films and I honestly wish I had more time set aside to do it. Getting little details in my films is one of my favorite things to do, but sadly when I am doing so many other jobs, it gets hard to be extremely detailed.

The filming continues, but there is good news. We are very close to being done. A couple of scenes left and Cottonwood is a rap.

Until next time!

Ethan Clerc