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SHOOT: Charming Family Reunion in ONCE UPON A TIME Mid-Season Finale, 2×10

It was such a cold, wet October day in Steveston south of Vancouver when Once Upon a Time filmed the happy family reunion of Ginnifer Goodwin’s Snow, Josh Dallas’s Charming, Jennifer Morrison’s Emma and Jared Gilmore’s Henry walking arms round one another past the Storybrooke Library for tonight’s mid-season finale. But there was so much joy. I laughed when I saw Goodwin coming out of the cast van wearing an old-fashioned rain bonnet to protect her Mary Margaret pixie cut. Only Goodwin could look cute in one of these. And when Goodwin walked back from one of the takes with her arms outstretched like a monster.

But it’s been a long wait for this reunion scene to appear on screen. So it’s a bonus to have our season two villains, Barbara Hershey’s Cora and Colin O’Donoughe’s Hook, heading into Storybrooke on his pirate ship in the final scene. I photographed this dastardly pair disembarking from the ship at Steveston’s Britannia Shipyards a few weeks before Once Upon a Time filmed the reunion scene. Storybrooke is going to be one busy place in the new year.

Read More »SHOOT: Charming Family Reunion in ONCE UPON A TIME Mid-Season Finale, 2×10

WEEK: November 26 – December 2, 2012

SUPERNATURAL’s Cartoon Suicide on Lumbermen’s Building Roof for Ep. 8×08

Supernatural filmed one of its cartoon deaths from this week’s Hunter Heroici on top of the Lumbermen’s Building in downtown Vancouver two months ago. The guest actor below committed cartoon suicide by stepping off the ledge but not falling right away. He stands for a few moments in mid-air above Richards Street, long enough to exclaim, “It’s a miracle. God wants me to live”, and then suddenly drops in a cartoon whoosh.

I waited until the episode aired to post these photographs because I couldn’t figure out what I saw in this scene. And I still don’t know how they filmed it. I assume there was a green screen on the roof as our cartoon suicide acted as if he was in mid-air and then fell to the street below.

Read More »SUPERNATURAL’s Cartoon Suicide on Lumbermen’s Building Roof for Ep. 8×08

ARROW’s Katie Cassidy & Colin Donnell Filming Downtown at Oceanic Plaza

Uh-oh Tommy. Looks like Laurel’s mad at you. Katie Cassidy’s Laurel paced up and down as the Arrow cameras rolled in downtown Vancouver’s Oceanic Plaza yesterday, before stepping right into Colin Donnell’s face in take after take. She talked and talked until he walked away. It should have been a romantic setting with that big balloon light floating above them to simulate moonlight, but apparently not. Guy Bee (@GuyNormanBee) is directing this episode, which had an earlier outside scene of Colin Donnell’s Tommy walking and talking to Laurel on his cell phone along West Hastings. [Update: So Laurel was mad at her Dad who used her as bait in a bid to capture The Hood; and Tommy walks away because Laurel hadn’t told him she’d been meeting with The Hood].

Read More »ARROW’s Katie Cassidy & Colin Donnell Filming Downtown at Oceanic Plaza

BIG READ: Sarah McLachlan’s Holiday Music Video Shoot

Published November 29th, 2012 on Vancouver is Awesome
Sarah McLachlan’s new holiday classic “Find Your Voice” filmed its music video on a block of West 13th Avenue near Vancouver City Hall last Sunday. It features students from her Sarah McLachlan School of Music: exuberant students who spent all afternoon doing take after take fuled by hot chocolate, craft services and joy.
All of the proceeds from the music video will go to their school which helps at-risk youth to learn music. Click on Sarah McLachlan.com for a free download and on the Sarah McLachlan School of Music to make a donation. I spoke with the lovely and impossibly serene Sarah McLachlan briefly after filming wrapped when it was too dark and too cold to say antyhing intellible, so I’ll use her prepared words instead: “Christimas is a difficult time for many both economically and emotionally and I hope this Gift of Music can help in some small way. My holiday with is that we can all find the good in everyone and  in every situation and be kind to each other. I wish you all a very Happy, peaceful holiday filled with love, laughter and light!””

SHOOT: SUPERNATURAL’s 1950s Time Travellers in Gastown for 8×12 – Updated

Tonight a light high on a hoist above Cambie Street in Gastown lit up the alley that runs diagonally to West Cordova where two 1950s era vehicles were parked. Add smoke machines and a strobe light to simulate lightning and it looks like we have the setting for a Cary Grant-style cult member named Henry to travel from 1958 to 2013 when episode 8×12 — As Time Goes By — will air. Supernatural crew added the Arlene’s Golden Comb beauty salon neon sign to the alley for the night shoot.

Debonair and charming, Henry is said to be a rookie member of an anti-demonic cult who hurtles through the time portal, followed by a Katherine Hepburn-style dame named Josie Sands. I didn’t see who was cast in either of  these roles tonight.  [SPOILER UPDATE: HuffPost TV reports that Gil McKinney is Henry who happens to be Sam and Dean’s grandfather on their father John’s side. And Alaina Huffman was spotted in Vancouver for her role as the demon Abbadon in the body of Josie Sands.]

But the Impala was parked in the same alley this morning for the day shoot, implying Jared Padalecki’s Sam and Jensen Ackles’s Dean Winchester were two of the three actors talking while standing by the same large door our time traveller entered in the night shoot. Unfortunately this scene was hidden behind scrims.

In between the morning and night shoots in the alley, Supernatural filmed inside The Cambie Pub on the corner.

Read More »SHOOT: SUPERNATURAL’s 1950s Time Travellers in Gastown for 8×12 – Updated

SHOOT: Lance Reddick Returns for FRINGE 5×12 – Updated

It was good to see Lance Reddick  in aging makeup on set today at Harbour Green Park in Coal Harbour filming the second to last episode of Fringe. This is not his first appearance in the final season but probably the first opportunity for fans to talk to him and express their gratitude for his stellar work as Phillip Broyles. My only complaint — not enough Broyles.

Read More »SHOOT: Lance Reddick Returns for FRINGE 5×12 – Updated

SHOOT: ROGUE Wraps Season One with Thandie Newton & Marton Csokas

Marton Csokas, Thandie Newton & Matthew Beard @2013

DirecTV’s  first original series Rogue stars Thandie Newton (Mission Impossible 2, Crash) as Grace, a morally-compromised undercover cop in Oakland, who’s cavorting with Marton Csokas’s crime boss, who may have been involved in her son’s death. Now that’s a complicated relationship. Rogue wrapped filming of its first season of ten episodes on Friday in Vancouver.

I found them on location twice this past week, filming their season finale. First on Monday in the pouring rain on a closed block of Heatley Avenue in the Downtown Eastside, dressed as Oakland. Thandie Newton walked back and forth between two of the sets in small houses, wearing a blue baseball cap, hoodie, coat, striped track pants and running shoes. If I didn’t know her role as an undercover cop, I would not have recognized her. And then on Tuesday in the pouring rain at the Burrard Ironworks building near the Main Street overpass dressed as MacArthur’s Bar, Marton Csoka came out on breaks carrying his own umbrella to read his script (Csoka also drives his own vehicle from circus to set). It’s unfortunate that miserable, neverending rain was a theme this week.

Here are more photos of Thandie Newton on Heatley Avenue as Oakland, California.

Read More »SHOOT: ROGUE Wraps Season One with Thandie Newton & Marton Csokas

WEEK: November 19-25, 2012

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