Hello internet! Sorry it’s been so long since I actually wrote anything on this blog! The last time I wrote we were just planning the first shoots and went location scouting. Well guess what? Now it’s been way too long and we finally released a bunch of our first episodes!
In the future I’ll usually do one blog post for each episode as it comes out, but since we have a bit of a backlog of episodes released I’m going to do a mass post here and embed each episode and tell you a little bit about making it.
Pilot Episode:
If I remember right, we filmed this episode somewhere up Provo Canyon. It was a bit of a hassle trying to coordinate getting there as we arrived in three or four separate vehicles and we were probably at least 30 minutes away from having cell phone reception at the shooting location. After much driving back and forth, including Steven driving up to deliver the blowtorch that Brian uses in the fire scene, we finally had everybody there and were able to go commence with shooting. I remember running into some people who wanted to know what we were shooting and so we recruited the first Staying Alive Comedy fans right there in Provo Canyon. 😉 Also, at one point Tim nearly knocked himself out smashing a mosquito on his neck.
Camouflage and Plants:
Dallin and David and the crew were troopers during this shoot! We knew it might rain so we bought an awning to rehearse and block out stuff under. Sure enough, it did rain. Luckily the rain subsided during much of the shooting, but the last scene or two it was drizzling pretty consistently (though you can’t see it very well on camera). As we were setting up the awning a corner of it tore luckily it still kept us dry, but we returned it as soon as we were done with the shoot.
Survivalist Trailmix (The First of our DIY Episodes):
We had a lot of fun shooting this one. Nathan improvised most of the dialogue and had a lot of fun being the quirky granola man. We were worried about the neighbors being creeped out if we actually filmed part of it in their yard, so we had to flip the footage of him climbing back down the wall to make it look like he was coming down on the other side. Also, our dog Babie kept trying to steal the spotlight with Nathan and follow him around during shots. 😀
Hiking Tips with Henry the Hiker:
Brad is really funny! You think he’s just putting on a character for the episode? Well he is, sort of, but he’s also kind of like that in real-life. If you ever get the chance to meet him, you’ll know what I mean. He really brought the perfect energy to the character that I was hoping for.
A random side note: In the original script there was a joke about how people often use photoshop to go “hiking” or just photoshop themselves into different outdoors scenarios instead of actually going there. The joke, though a funny concept, was difficult to convey quickly and clearly though and so we ended just ditching it.
DIY Binoculars:
Our latest episode starring Nathan’s brother Jacob is another foray into the Staying Alive DIY sub-series that will hopefully become a recurring part of the Staying Alive Comedy channel. Jacob was so good at being funny that he kept cracking himself up. An interesting fact about this one is that we didn’t even have the punchline planned until halfway through the shoot.
We’re all caught up for now. See you guys again soon!
Staying Alive Comedy: The Blog 