Cottonwood Update #27: Lakeside Filming

Kyle Antes and Eric Hanson pictured above.

Cottonwood had a lot of scenes that took place at or on the lake. Many people think the film is named after Cottonwood Lake which is in Windom. The film is partially named after the lake, but all the fictional town in the movie, Cottonwood. As I go through photos from this summer I ran into the above scene. A conversation scene between Kyle and Hanson that takes place later in the film.

Above is our dolly system we used for the movie. It is a rail set with a portable dolly. We cut the custom piece of wood so we could collapse the tripod down all the way for lower shots. A sandbag holds the tripod down pretty good. I used this set-up quite frequently throughout the film and it ended up working very well.

Colin thinking about how he is going to light this scene, obviously. In all seriousness though, lighting these night scenes was definitely a challenge. I'd say a good 75% of Cottonwood takes place at nite. Colin, Jordan, Tylan, and Dalton really had to get creative with lighting for this film. They did an amazing job especially considering none of them have any kind of formal training.

Kyle with his favorite beverage. I'm just playing. There was nothing in it when Kyle drank it for the scene. Kyle is older than 21 in the film so he gets to enjoy some adult beverages in the movie.

Thanks to Jordan for capturing this beaut of a photo. Always fun looking back at all the shots these guys captured with he BTS camera.

I am getting close to having the 1st complete draft of Cottonwood done. I am heading home in a couple of weeks to do some re shoots. Some scenes need to be re shot due to audio issues.

Editing continues though. After the 1st draft is done I will review it with the crew and head back to the editing booth to rework scenes, touch everything up. We will review again after this and then hopefully head to the final cut. So there is quite a lot to do still, but I am super happy with how it is coming together so far. Stay tuned for more updates and an OFFICIAL Trailer coming soon.

Ethan Clerc