Voluntary Caesura, A Dance Film, Part II: Behind the Scenes
Continuing on from Part 1 of this post series, here in Part 2 I’m presenting some Behind the Scenes (BTS) images from four different filming days of Voluntary Caesura. Please consider supporting Coriolis Dance
with a tax deductible donation as they enter their 9th Season of wonderful creativity. Don’t miss the trailer for this beautiful film at the end of this post!
As mentioned earlier, most of the filming was done in two long days at the Great Hall in Greenlake, just north of Seattle: it is a beautiful, fantastic, open space with huge windows.
Voluntary Caesura: Full Cast & Credits
Christin Call – Director, Choreographer, Cast
Cainan Martens – Director of Photography
Lauren Hlubny – Assistant Director
Katherine Grace Murphy – Cast, Producer
Dani Norberg – Lighting Designer
Natascha Greenwalt and Marissa Quimby – Set Dressers
Joshua Dent – Original Music, Cast
Devon Snethen – Very Fortunate Fellow

Katherine Grace Murphy, Joshua Dent, & Christin Call performing, Cainan Martens filming — image © Bret Doss All Rights Reserved

Katherine Grace Murphy, Joshua Dent, & Christin Call performing, Cainan Martens filming — image © Bret Doss All Rights Reserved
Each day we had the de rigueur professional call sheets and shot lists. As Josh’s beautiful, haunting cello soundtrack had already been recorded, the filming was to by synced to it, and no formal audio was being captured. This opened up many more possibilities for me, as I did not need to have a fully silenced camera (high end ‘mufflers’ for DLSRs are both expensive and awkward to use), nor really any silencing at all. Cainan Martens was especially generous, and briefed me on his camera moves and fields of view before each take: we could then coordinate either a place that I could shoot from, or a path I could move along with him during filming. Some of the ‘camera choreography’ was so dynamic that I HAD to move with him during the the take in order to stay out of the shot. In the full two days of filming at the Great Hall, I can count on one hand the number of times the shot required me to be entirely out of the room, and he was helpful and patient with my nearly constant shadowing. So my opportunities to photograph the team in action were many, with multiple takes of of each shot. As the hours went on of shooting, holding my fairly heavy camera to my eye, and trailing (sometimes very rapidly) about two steps behind Cainan, I occasionally found an opportunity to shoot from a seated position for a bit of rest. As we approached the end of each day, getting up off the floor seemed to take a LOT more time…. By the time we loaded out, getting home, uploading and backing up images, these were 12-14 hour days. Exhausting & exhilarating, and so much fun!

Marissa relaxing after completing a long set-dressing session — image © Bret Doss All Rights Reserved

Terrific attention to detail with postage, and simulated firelight. Set dressed by Marissa Quimby, Natascha Greenwalt, lighting by Dani Norberg — image © Bret Doss All Rights Reserved

Lauren, Christin, Cainan & Dani (with yours truly in the mirror – intentionally, that’s my story and I’m stickin to it) — image © Bret Doss All Rights Reserved
You can see more images in this gallery. Here is the trailer:
all images/content © Bret Doss, all rights reserved
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