ROCKSTAR

Keri Kelli calls  me and needs to get some video interviews of the members for a project he's working on called Rockstar.  The turn around timeline is very short but I am game.  For this shoot I called in my brother Chris and good friend Ray C for assistance.  We had one afternoon to get all the video coverage for the promoters of this tour in Russia.  Today we were to interview, Rudy Sarzo (Ozzy, Dio, Whitesnake, Quiet Riot) James Kottak (Scorpions, the Cult)  Keri Kelli (Alice Cooper, Slash's Snakepit) Teddy Zigzag Andreadis (Guns n Roses, Carol King) and Tim Ripper Owens (Judas Priest, Dio's Disciples)  Tim was flying in from Ohio just for the interview and rehearsal and flying back just a few hours later.  We had to nail this.

My help couldn't meet me until later so I went to the rehearsal space to scout and set up early.  Robert from Mates was awesome.  He ushered me to a vacant area and said I could basically set up anywhere I'd like.  I moved the couch from against the wall and set it up cock eyed in the room.  I found a yellow anvil case in one of the other rooms and brought that in for background.  There was a Slash's Snakepit picture hanging in the hallway and the text happened to be yellow like the anvil so I grabbed that and set it next to the anvil.  I set up my lighting and Chris arrived and set up audio.  We were good to go!

The guys came in one by one and we did the interviews.  We did a three camera shoot with the main camera being a Canon 5D mkii.  The footage looked good and we wrapped up quickly.  As an after thought, we decided to shoot some stills for promotional use.  I shot those in the same room as the interview.  We moved the couch over to the wall, set up some strobes and in about ten minutes, we had our shot.

The guys took off to another building to rehearse and we packed up the gear.  I kept two cameras out just incase and Chris kept his Tascam digital recorder handy.  We entered the rehearsal room and decided to get some impromptu coverage of the guys playing together for the first time.  I asked Chris to record audio and shot some video of the rehearsal.  This footage made it into the final promo and there's a compilation of it located here, and in this blog.

After the rehearsal, Keri needed to take Tim back to the airport and the following day he left for Vegas on business.  The following night we corresponded  into the wee hours as we picked a promo shot and began the editing process.  Thanks to cell phones, texting, email, ftp and today's technology, we were able to have the video and stills in the hands of the Russian promoters within three days.  Now that's the kind of pressure I like!  "I love it when a plan comes together!"