Locks of Love- Flowers for Film

2nd March 2014 

It's not everyday that you get an interesting volunteering job via facebook from a film producer to a florist- and yet that is what happened to me around Christmas time last year. When a film producer, Janine was desperate for a florist, she managed finding me via an article about my Royal Easter Show win, 'googling' my name and then contacting me on facebook- and the rest is history!  

The movie project is conducted by ScreenACT- a Canberra film company who has been working hard on a few short films using locations and talents from Canberra. 

My main project was to decorate a gate with flowers for a wedding scene. Janine and I was communicating actively for a few weeks discussing logistics and what we want the gate to look like. I drew her 4 different sketches of ideas to show her some creative possibilities, different flower choices and also options covering a few different level of budget. Janine chose a simpler version of my sketch but was sold by it because it has mainly South African/Australian Native flowers. 

I also brought the 'Royal Bluebell' to Janine's attention. The Royal Bluebell is a delicate wild-floral emblem of the capital city. It is too small to be placed on the gate to make any impact so we've decided to put them in the bride's hair. 

I had such a great time decorating a relatively large space of the gate with natives. The variety of texture, size of Australian foliage and flowers are so vast and delicious it is so easy to make things look that they belong together. I have to confess that while I was covering the oasis in foliage at home I was entertaining the idea of one day doing some serious flower decoration for a big box office movie. A future bigger and better version of 'great gatsby' perhaps, haha.... I absolutely adore the frills in that movie!  

The gate was covered with foliage at home 2 days before the shoot. On the day of the shooting I arrived 4 hours earlier before the actors arrive to finish it off with the flowers. Working in a shooting location was an experience in itself. I had no idea how much work goes into making a movie until that day. There's camera technicians who are very busy doing just one very specific jobs. Director, producers still discussing creative options to resolve the weather changes issues. Assistants making sure everyone have got their coffees and making sure the public knows what is going on in the area. 

Slightly different to the nature of my usual gig, the priority of this arrangement is for the flowers to look good for the camera only- which means that I could economized in some places if necessary. I also need to know which angle the camera is facing, and which side of the gate is priority. I knew that I was doing the right thing when one of the key cameraman commented that he wished he have had something similar for their wedding! Haha... 

I had my lunch break when the shooting commences. I came back and watched the final few bits of the shoot and then it's already time to dismantle everything. It felt a bit weird that after weeks of planning, days of preparing, the gate was only 'alive' for less than 4 hours before it was pulled apart. 

The release date for the movie is still pending. Will definitely announce it as soon as I find out from Janine.