EQUIPMENT
Kodak Zi8
Filmed in 720HD. The simple, robust full HD pocket camera with external mic was the best suited for the majority of shooting. The actors could feel confident using it as if it was a phone and not worry about holding an expensive camera!
HTC Desire Z
Filmed in 720HD Online mode: Perfectly suited for social networking and the posting of social media. With its constant Google syncing to twitter and facebook, it was a phone that would provide the most realism in terms of how Karen was using it for story purposes. If anyone questioned how she was getting her tweets out and uploading them to various sites, I knew I could provide an answer with HTC and Google. We also used it for the night scenes as it had a constant flashlight built in.
Zoom H4 audio recorder
We ended up using the audio straight off the Kodak and the HTC as both mics were getting very good sound. But the audio was always a big issue for me, I most definitely wanted to make sure the other actor being filmed would have their audio picked up no matter what. So just in case, we decided to capture their audio separately as well as using the HTC phone and Kodak tracks. The Zoom H4 has XLR inputs to attach a directional mic so we could boom the actors and the sound is wonderful off it. In the end we used the H4 for capturing wild tracks and even a bit of ADR on the "I See You" scene with the Other Darren.