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Susan Gittins

Longtime mainstream media (MSM) journalist and author Susan Gittins began writing about and photographing Vancouver’s many film and TV location shoots in the summer of 2010 after the Winter Olympics put the city and its beauty on the world stage. Movies and TV series often showcase the Vancouver area in similar fashion. Vancouver is Awesome commissioned her YVRShoots series in the fall of 2010 and it ran regularly for three years. She launched her own daily YVRShoots blog in the spring of 2012.

SHOOT: Karl Urban & Minka Kelly Film TV Pilot ALMOST HUMAN in Vancouver’s Business District

J.J. Abrams and Fringe showrunner Joel Wyman’s TV pilot Almost Human (formerly Human) is filming in downtown Vancouver’s Business District on West Hastings Street, transformed into a futuristic Los Angeles, for the second day in a row this weekend. Stars Karl Urban (Star Trek’s Bones) and Minka Kelly (Friday Night Lights) are on set as Los Angeles police officers at the crime scene of yesterday’s armoured vehicle heist.

Related: TV pilot Almost Human Films Armoured Car Heist in Vancouver’s Business District

Read More »SHOOT: Karl Urban & Minka Kelly Film TV Pilot ALMOST HUMAN in Vancouver’s Business District

SHOOT: TV Pilot ALMOST HUMAN Films Armoured Car Heist in Vancouver’s Business District

Fringe showrunner Joel Wyman’s new TV pilot Almost Human (formerly Human) for FOX pays homage to Fringe in so many ways. The production uses many of the former Vancouver Fringe crew as well as its production signs BELLY. Some of the set dressing looks familiar too, but with a twist. Almost Human is about a futuristic Los Angeles where police officers are paired with android partners and stars Karl Urban (Star Trek’s Bones) as one of the human cops and Michael Ealy (Underworld Awakening) as an android cop. Neither actor was spotted in the downtown business district for the armoured car heist although they were on set. Almost Human turned the Guiness Tower into Division Tower and Oceanic Plaza into West Plaza and hired thirty or so PAs (production assistants) to control the set and 80 costumed extras to work as background for the heist with loud prop gunfire. Almost Human is a big for a pilot. Huge, in fact. Almost Human’s second unit filmed up on Galardi Way on Burnaby Mountain at the same time as the downtown shoot. The heist drew a crowd, who lined the Hastings pedestrian bridge to watch the action, leaving only enough room for the camera crew on the bridge.

Read More »SHOOT: TV Pilot ALMOST HUMAN Films Armoured Car Heist in Vancouver’s Business District

SHOOT: Japanese Monster Reboot GODZILLA Rampages Through South Nanaimo – Part 2

The 3D Japanese monster reboot Godzilla let spectators get closer for the Friday afternoon shoot in south Nanaimo on Vancouver Island of prop wreckage on fire in Godzilla’s wake and U.S. military extras rushing to the scene on the railroad tracks. Crew set on fire a burnout vechicle and downed helicopter and filled the air with smoke from smoke machines. But no Godzilla was sighted on set. 

Related: Japanese Monster Reboot Godzilla Rampages through South Nanaimo – Part 1

Read More »SHOOT: Japanese Monster Reboot GODZILLA Rampages Through South Nanaimo – Part 2

SHOOT: Japanese Monster Reboot GODZILLA Rampages Through South Nanaimo – Part 1

Look out Godzilla. USAF missiles are coming your way. The 3D Japanese monster reboot is rampaging through south Nanaimo on Vancouver Island today, filming scenes of a WRail train carrying missiles and dozens of military extras through prop wreckage in Godzilla’s wake, including a burntout vehicle and a downed helicopter.  Production started filming at the Cambie Pub in downtown Nanaimo on Wednesday with Aaron Taylor- Johnson spotted on set, then moved to Ladysmith yesterday for more prop wreckage on railroad tracks and prop traffic. I will write more about today’s shoot when it wraps. 

Related: Japanese monster reboot Godzilla turns Vancouver Convention Centre into airport terminal

Read More »SHOOT: Japanese Monster Reboot GODZILLA Rampages Through South Nanaimo – Part 1

SHOOT: Eion Bailey & Michael Raymond-James Film ONCE UPON A TIME 2×18 Manhattan Flashbacks in Gastown

In early February, a savvy friend predicted that August would return to Once Upon a Time at that day’s shoot in Gastown dressed as Soho. So it wasn’t a complete surprise to find August’s motorcycle amid a dozen prop yellow NYC taxicabs parked on Columbia Street. Or when his August stunt double appeared on the Powell Street set. Or when Eion Bailey showed up along with Michael Raymond-James as Neal/Baelfire. The two men had a long animated chat while their Manhattan flashback scene was set up near the building used as Neal/Baelfire’s apartment.

Production asked us not to share the secret of August’s return and we agreed. It might have worked if others hadn’t seen the public scene in the afternoon of the two men talking and  Sonequa Martin Green (The Walking Dead) as Neal’s future fiancee Tamara, bumping into Neal in take after take.

Selfless, Brave and True is the story of August — of a wooden Pinocchio made boy who grew up to be a man ashamed of his actions. 

Read More »SHOOT: Eion Bailey & Michael Raymond-James Film ONCE UPON A TIME 2×18 Manhattan Flashbacks in Gastown

SHOOT: John Stamos Films NBC Pilot VICTOR at St. Andrew Wesley United Church Downtown

Victor (formerly I Am Victor) had camera crews on two corners of the downtown Burrard and Nelson intersection  last night to film a scene of John Stamos (ER/Full House) as a high-powered divorce attorney waiting on the north steps of St. Andrew Wesley United Church for a young woman coming out of the church and then walking with her to the main entrance where they sit together on the steps. Later crew set up on the sidewalk in front of the main entrance to film closeups of Stamos talking with the young woman. It was a big shoot for the NBC pilot with lots of people stopping and staring throughout the evening until the film lights went out around 11 p.m. and Stamos left.

Read More »SHOOT: John Stamos Films NBC Pilot VICTOR at St. Andrew Wesley United Church Downtown

SHOOT: GODZILLA turns Vancouver Convention Centre into Honolulu Airport Terminal – Updated

Update: “Earthquake Rocks Eastern Japan” says news crawl on set screen.

Japanese monster 3D reboot Godzilla with Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Bryan Cranston, David Straitharn and Ken Watanabe from a script by The Walking Dead’s Frank Darabont has begun filming here and on Vancouver Island. Godzilla crew transformed the Vancouver Convention Centre into what looks like the [Honolulu International Airport in Hawaii] last weekend. And on Vancouver Island, crew transported WRail train cars and a locomotive from New Westminster to tracks near Shawnigan Lake and started filming in Nanaimo. Aaron Taylor-Johnson could be on set inside the Convention Centre but Bryan Cranston is not expected here until he wraps filming of the Breaking Bad series finale.

6.3 Earthquake Rocks Eastern Japan, says newsreel.

Read More »SHOOT: GODZILLA turns Vancouver Convention Centre into Honolulu Airport Terminal – Updated

BIG READ: Hitchcockian BATES MOTEL Debuts on A&E Tonight

Published March 18, 2013 on Vancouver is Awesome.

The Bates Motel set out in Aldergrove on 272nd Street is the spitting image of the 12-room Seafarer motel and Gothic house set from Alfred Hitchcock’s horror classic Psycho, except for the missing top of the Bates house which was CGIed in post-production for tonight’s premiere on A&E.  This contemporary prequel  focuses on a younger version of Psycho movie killer Norman Bates (Freddie Highmore) in a coastal Oregon town called White Pine Bay and explores his relationship with his unhinged mother (Vera Farmiga) as he approaches his evil destiny. Is this the relationship that turns Norman into a killer who stuffed his mother?

Read More »BIG READ: Hitchcockian BATES MOTEL Debuts on A&E Tonight

SHOOT: John Stamos Films NBC Pilot VICTOR in Downtown Vancouver

Victor (formerly I Am Victor)  crew brought their own jungle today to film some brief exterior scenes of lead John Stamos walking in and out of the front door of Pender Medi Spa in downtown Vancouver. Most of the action takes place inside the spa with a night shoot at another location. Stamos seems perfectly cast to play a high-powered divorce attorney in an NBC pilot from the producers of White Collar. The Full House and ER vet can be spotted around town over the next two weeks and hopefully will be back in the summer if the pilot is picked up to series.

Read More »SHOOT: John Stamos Films NBC Pilot VICTOR in Downtown Vancouver