Day 4: Props, Post, and Performance

 BLOG 4: May 12, 2022

3:30 p.m.

Hours Today: 4

Hours Total: 19.5

What. A. Day. For the past few days on the set of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, I have been spending time in no more than one department a day, but this morning I was told I would be spending time with the Props Department, Post Production, and spending some time on set during filming. I was beyond excited to say the least, and the Props department was truly so much fun. Prior to today, I had only thought about props as the cheap little objects actors hold or fight with, such as a ball or a sword. However, the line between what constitutes a prop and what constitutes a costume or a piece of set decoration is very hard to see sometimes. As it was explained to me, a prop is anything that the actors interact with, and then some. For example, props can be the accessories of an outfit, but they can also be an actor’s pet or the car the actors drive. Because of this, the Props Department is responsible for an immense amount of different objects and materials. After this debrief from the Props Department, I was led to one of the sets where filming was taking place, and was able to sit in on a scene. As a student incredibly interested in cinematography, it was riveting to be able to watch the process of prepping for a scene, adjusting certain aspects like lighting or camera angles, and then the actual execution of the scene from behind the camera. After this amazing experience, my expectations were once again blown out of the water as I spent some time in the Post Production department, where I learned the basic ins and outs of editing film, and also got to experience firsthand the VFX process and the incredibly rigorous work that takes place in the weeks and months after all the filming concludes. Prior to today, I was relatively certain that if I were to pursue a career in film, it would be either in writing or in direction, but getting to see the post production process has made me question this slightly. Though I have absolutely no experience in this type of technology, it was so intriguing to me that it may be something I study in college to see if it interests me as much as these other aspects of filmmaking have.