[HN Gopher] That time when I accidentally social engineered myse... ___________________________________________________________________ That time when I accidentally social engineered myself to a film set Author : rossvor Score : 67 points Date : 2022-07-28 13:09 UTC (3 hours ago) (HTM) web link (nibblestew.blogspot.com) (TXT) w3m dump (nibblestew.blogspot.com) | causi wrote: | _The area did not seem to be closed off so obviously I went in to | take a closer look. I was probably there for around 30 minutes or | so until someone finally asked me if I was part of the crew and | then kindly asked me to leave which I did._ | | How is this "social engineering"? If I try to beat a yellow light | and almost hit another car I wasn't "accidentally stunt driving". | mtalantikite wrote: | I once was leaving my work studio space in north Brooklyn and | there was a pretty large shoot happening a block away. I had my | headphones on and was going to a bodega on the corner before | heading home, not really paying attention to the shoot itself | because you sort of get desensitized to it living in NYC. | | As I'm walking all of a sudden I notice that J Lo was a few feet | from me with cameras on her, clearly in the middle of a scene | they were actively filming. I play it cool and walk into the | bodega, where the film monitors were setup and people were | watching the live feed. Some guy -- I read him as the DP -- goes | "hey nice work, you're background?" to which I respond "oh, no | man, I'm just buying something". They shut the whole scene down, | because clearly I had no contract and ruined the shot, and as I | walk out of the bodega J Lo is just looking at me smiling. | | Some PA totally got fired that day. | thinkingkong wrote: | Moments like that make me wonder what would have happened if | you'd just answered "yes". | jaywalk wrote: | Everything would have just kept going along? If he wasn't | just a random guy and was actually supposed to be there, | there wouldn't have been anything to worry about. | em-bee wrote: | could they have offered you a contract at that point to save | the shot? | technofiend wrote: | Accidentally walked through the set of The Devil Wears Prada | who were set up to film on around 5th Avenue and West 55th, | fortunately they weren't filming. They had a really nice craft | services table. Hopefully no one got fired. | [deleted] | h2odragon wrote: | A good way to get into things like that is to pitch in and help | carry stuff: Don't ask, just find the people moving things and | join the line. You may have to ask "where does this go?" when the | person in front of you drops their object. | | You can go far by simply asking to watch and learn, too. Sneakery | is only really required where there's "security" that hasn't got | enough to do already. | deebosong wrote: | Maybe I'm being overly cautious. But just some risks to | consider if you're gonna try this for the purposes of getting a | look behind the scenes: | | Some film sets with union folks can get very particular about | who touches what. But maybe the things you'd help carry | wouldn't fall under the responsibility of said union folks. | | Also, if a film set has had a robbery or theft, and the crew | has worked with each other long enough to know who the regular | day players are, you'd stick out like a sore thumb. | | But all these types of chicanery will come with such risks, I | suppose. | sdflhasjd wrote: | God forbid you damage something expensive... | | Best play it safe and pretend to be handing out coffees and | snacks (or actually do it you're feeling kind) | bragr wrote: | Why, you want to be caught by the catering crew? They're | probably union too. | dylan604 wrote: | Yeah, that doesn't go over well with the union | ancientworldnow wrote: | Departments are small enough on a film set with strict union | rules that if you're carrying something and ask the wrong | person you will immediately be caught and asked to leave. It's | much better to just lurk confidently like this poster. You can | always say you're a guest of an executive producer or something | and people won't push - they're isn't enough time to usually. | | If you want to really fit in, have an old walkie talkie on your | belt and an ear piece (surveillance). | jason-phillips wrote: | Or carry a clipboard. | krallja wrote: | In most situations, a high-viz vest also helps. Probably not | on a film set, though! | mod wrote: | I hear this repeated a lot. Have you ever tried it out? | | I don't think it would work in most situations. | Construction site? Sure. Sporting event? Probably. | | But in most of the places a person might try to go, I | personally would avoid a high-vis vest at all costs. | galdosdi wrote: | A few years ago I was once briefly directed into the | cockpit of a plane to check on its maintenance status | while I was boarding a normal coach flight. I was wearing | my only clean jacket, a waterproof high viz coat that | must be popular with people who work on rainy roads. | pc86 wrote: | It varies. The more you can look like "the help" the more | likely people are to ignore you outright. And the hi-viz | + clipboard is a pretty generic "you don't know me, but | I'm the help" outfit. | cwillu wrote: | Depends: in many places the high-vis hits the "I'm | wearing this because the rules say I have to and I'm not | important enough to flout them even though they clearly | don't matter here" note very well. | myself248 wrote: | Oh yeah. Walking around a manufacturing plant. Brand-new | hi-viz vest over a dress shirt, walk purposefully. "Must | be management." | | I wasn't management, I was just new on site and had come | from a planning meeting, and I was pretty sure the next | guy I needed to meet was in the belly of the plant in a | location I only had the vaguest idea of, but I knew it | was gonna be a long walk. | | I ended up walking the length of the place twice (almost | a mile) before I decided I'd had enough sightseeing (but | what sightseeing it was!) and and actually asked someone, | who made a wisecrack about how he helps so many visiting | managers in this joint they should make him a manager | himself! I decided against correcting him. | | Over the coming weeks at that plant, I wore a T-shirt and | older hi-viz if I wanted to blend in as a worker, or a | button-down shirt and the crisp hi-viz if I wanted to | wander. As long as I kept abreast of my assigned duties, | nobody sweated the details, and it was better than any | museum of science and industry I've ever paid to get | into. Had a few more folks make gentle cracks about how I | must be a manager of some other group over to see what | this group does, I'd ask a few questions and be on my | way. | | Likewise for jobsites and urbex, I have a hard-hat | covered in stickers, and one that's so pristine I keep it | in a pillowcase. Perceived wear is an important component | of The Look(tm). | dylan604 wrote: | and a walkie with a surveilence earphone. hell, get an actual | radio, and you can probably find what channel each department | is using. (typically, each group is on their own channel so | that people not in that department don't have to pay | attention. camera crew asking for new lenses/filters/etc | doesn't concern wardrobe. however, camera crew asking grip | for additional stands would flip over to grip's channel) | dennisnedry wrote: | Actually, just ask to be an extra. You will get paid, fed, and | get to hang out all day on set. | eCa wrote: | > Don't ask | | I'm in team ask-before-picking-up-other-peoples-stuff, but | maybe that works for some. | wrd wrote: | Definitely don't do this. Film sets are very controlled / | precise environments and an innocuous piece of equipment can be | INCREDIBLY expensive ($200k+). The chance of messing something | up as a rando is very high and you'll just end up making the | crew work longer and harder than they need to. | zw123456 wrote: | That brought back memories for me, it was 1981 or 82, the company | that I worked for at the time flew us to New Jersey for some | meeting. But three of us "younger engineers" (I was about 22 at | the time) wanted to go into New York City. Our boss let us use | the rental car to drive into the city. He told us not to do | anything he wouldn't do. In that case why go? We all joked later. | We got into CBGB's on a weeknight, by the time we got out of | there it was maybe 2 or 3 AM and we were pretty high and we were | walking back to the garage where we parked the car when we came | upon a filming in the streets. One of the security guys told us | they were shooting Hill Street Blues, but who knows, we were told | later they lie about that stuff to looky loos. But it was fun to | watch so we stood there for a couple hours. We got back to our | Hotel in Newark at around 6AM just in time to pack and head to | the airport. Luckily it was a direct 5 hour flight back home. I | slept like a baby. | wrd wrote: | If you're thinking about doing like this guy did, please don't. | | Film crews are incredibly overworked, underpaid and work in | absolutely terrible conditions. Film production is an intricate | machine that requires everything to be perfectly in place in | order to get a shot and things very frequently go wrong even | without random people walking on set and gumming up the works. | | Distracting people or touching / moving things can absolutely | hold up a shot and bring the entire set to a halt. The result of | that is you'll end up keep a very tired crew out for much longer | than they need to be. It can also easily cost a production | assistant their job. | | Film production isn't a secret. You can watch a documentary on | it, read about it in forums or even get permission to observe a | film shoot where they'll place you safely out of the way. There | are much better ways to satisfy this curiosity than just walking | onto a set. | krisoft wrote: | > If you're thinking about doing like this guy did, please | don't. | | idk. Obviously don't be in other people's way, don't climb | fences, don't lie to security, don't "social engineer" your way | in, and if someone asks you politely to leave leave. This is in | fact what has happened. Once they figured out that he doesn't | belong they asked him to leave and he left. | | But if it is true what he writes the set was just a public | street and he just walked up to them unimpeded. I don't see a | problem with that. If it is a problem for the crew they should | get fences and security to block people's way. | jacquesm wrote: | I've lived in Toronto and more than once accidentally found | myself on a badly demarcated set near the Carpet Factory (which | is used every other week for a shoot it seems because filming | in Canada is cheaper than in the USA and it is large enough | that you can pan a camera without immediately having a couple | of modern buildings in view). | | The degree to which this inconvenienced the locals was quite | high, we didn't get any compensation at all for this use of the | space that we were already paying for and more than once were | unable to leave or enter the building because some hotshot | director wanted to do things all over again. | | Whether film crews are underpaid and overworked or not is | really none of my concern, it is up to them to stand up for | their rights and whether they work in terrible conditions or | not I can't verify but I can tell you that what they spent on | catering in a day probably dwarfs the budget of some African | countries to feed thousands of times more people (and don't get | me started on the amount of stuff they threw away afterwards). | | So if someone accidentally walks on to a set then that's just | too bad. Some people have a life and/or a job and that counts | as well. | garyfirestorm wrote: | I don't understand what exactly did this guy do wrong. He | simply observed and chatted with someone and reported what he | saw. When someone asked to leave, he left. What's the problem | here exactly? | [deleted] | wrd wrote: | Walking onto a set without permission is inconsiderate and | disruptive because the crew is working very, very hard to | make something happen and his presence isn't helpful. He | effectively got lucky that he didn't mess something up and | accidentally force the crew to work longer and harder than | they have to. There's a reason the entire job of some | production assistants is just to keep random people off set. | rhoeft wrote: | The title kinda makes it sound like he tricked someone to | let him on a set, but if you read the story he was watching | from a distance and then they started setting up where he | was standing. He just stood still until he was asked to | move. He employed the same "social engineering" tactics as | a frightened hare. | reachableceo wrote: | Oh please. Stop trying to be a hero. It's pathetic. He wasn't | in anyones way and wasn't interrupting anything. He was | unobtrusive and simply observing. | | I encourage everyone todo exactly what the article author did ! | I do it all the time and have learned so much and made great | connections. I even chilled in the command center of a multi | agency response to a bank robbery with hostages. Met the head | of FBI LA SWAT and senior leadership of FBI LA office. | flanbiscuit wrote: | disregard my comment, I took the parent comment too seriously | and didn't get the joke/sarcasm. big whoosh over my head. | d'oh! | | > I even chilled in the command center of a multi agency | response to a bank robbery with hostages. Met the head of FBI | LA SWAT and senior leadership of FBI LA office. | | wow. That's some real lack of security. What if the bank | robbers had someone on the outside who did this and was | sending text messages back to the robbers of everything they | heard in the command center. That would be really smart of | the robbers actually. So the fact that they allowed a | stranger to wander into the command center and 'chill' with | them is concerning. | JTbane wrote: | That would make a great heist film: the accomplice gaining | access to the local PD and ensuring the team doesn't get | caught. | dennisnedry wrote: | I believe the parent is being sarcastic. | [deleted] | jjulius wrote: | >Oh please. Stop trying to be a hero. It's pathetic. | | This isn't much better. | SkipperCat wrote: | Agreed. | | I don't know why but for some reason, more people feel like | they need to be the main character in an adventure. Maybe it's | TikTok or who knows what. Either way, I'm sure if some rando | walked into their life and started messing with their work, | they'd be quite miffed. | | I live in NYC and I see film crews all the time. I love the | fact that it happens here because it's one of those things that | makes NYC so neat. But it's like the zoo. You're encouraged to | watch from a distance but please don't jump into the animal's | enclosure. | 627467 wrote: | How is this topmost comment? | | > If you're thinking about doing like this guy did, please | don't. | | The author starts by stating: | | > The area did not seem to be closed off so obviously I went in | to take a closer look. | | And | | > I was probably there for around 30 minutes or so until | someone finally asked me if I was part of the crew and then | kindly asked me to leave which I did. | | Does one need to go through life like they are stepping on | eggshells? | jjulius wrote: | >How is this topmost comment? | | My guess would be that you're interpreting the comment as, | "Please don't accidentally wander onto a film set out of | ignorance," whereas my interpretation (and perhaps that of | those who have voted for it) of the comment was, "Please | don't be inspired by this to seek out and actively trespass | on a closed film set." | | They're two slightly different things. | EUROCARE wrote: | Are you a machine? This is how machines act. "NO BOUNDARY | DETECTED - PROCEEDING!" without any context awareness. | | Why not instead be considerate and respectful for others' | work by not ruining it? Road workers don't always have | perfect boundaries and yet I hope you don't just go step into | their paint while reciting your constitutional rights. This | is the same thing without the paint. | mrob wrote: | The work was not ruined. The film crew were working in a | public space that the blog's author apparently had every | right to be in. If they wanted to avoid any possibility of | interaction with the public then they could have built a | private set, but filming on a public street was presumably | cheaper. I don't see why an uninvolved third party should | have their rights curtailed just to save some corporation | money. | EUROCARE wrote: | Public areas can be very easily closed off if you ask the | local government, most have a form ready for it, it's | very usual - and at that point you have _absolutely zero_ | rights to be there, it 's trespassing. It's most likely | this was the case there as well, they wouldn't be able to | setup the whole shop there otherwise. And it's not | cheaper, it's actually much more expensive - but the | result is better. | | Corporations aren't the only ones making movies, btw. And | the whole "but my rights" talk when it's about a person | who could've just taken a different street makes me | laugh, nothing else. Is that really how you think about | your day to day life, or is it just a post-facto | rationalization? | mrob wrote: | If they really had the legal right to exclude the blog | author, then they also had the obligation to put up signs | or barriers to exclude them. | EUROCARE wrote: | And that's the point where contextual awareness and | respect for others come into play. | 627467 wrote: | It's funny how the robot argument can apply to anything and | the contrary: are all filming crews overworked robots | unable to willingly decide to engaging in casual | conversation with a stranger who happened to be in a public | area before it was cordoned off? | EUROCARE wrote: | It's not about the film crew being overworked robots who | can't talk, it's about accidentally ruining their work | without even realizing it by walking into the middle of | filming. This dude got lucky that he didn't ruin | anything. The next 1000 dudes who will try based on his | blogpost won't be so lucky - and I bet the film crews | won't be as happy talking to them. | Kalium wrote: | I've accidentally wandered onto a film set before. When | it's in a public space it's not always obvious what's going | on or that you shouldn't be there. I had no idea why a | generally quite busy part of town was almost entirely | devoid of traffic that day. There were no clear signs or | ways for me to know what was going on until I talked to a | random guy and he told me. | | Perhaps your ability to detect and understand context is | simply vastly superior to mine. | EUROCARE wrote: | Accidents happen, and I am not perfect too. I live in a | city where film sets in public spaces are an (almost) | everyday thing, so I also wandered into a film set few | times. But I'd never do it on purpose - when you meet | them at a bar you'll see they really do work hard, and | that random strangers at the set are a really big problem | they face daily. | tmp_anon_22 wrote: | "They didn't say no" | | Is not by itself justification to do a thing. | jayd16 wrote: | Its a bit different for someone "thinking of doing this" and | seeking it out. | polartx wrote: | I would say the title is disingenuous the same way clickbait | is. A suggested alternate could be, "the time I wandered | around somebody's worksite until the inconvenience of my | presence outweighed the crews' Canadian-level non- | confrontational demeanor". But that's not as grabby. | ggambetta wrote: | They do this kind of thing more than you'd think :) Due to my | double life as an aspiring actor [0], I was an extra in a series | [1] set in futuristic New York, but filmed in Madrid. They had a | fake hotdog cart, a fake bus stop sign, and even a fake NY police | car! You can see me for a second, somewhat blurry, having a | heated argument in Italian, while Betsy Brandt [2] (best known as | Marie of _" they're minerals, Marie!"_ fame) walked past. Very | cool experience :) Photos here: | https://photos.app.goo.gl/ZmT11SFV3xWe5gft7 | | Also in Madrid, I was an extra in The Vault [3]. Near the | beginning, the main characters meet at a London pub on a rainy | evening - filmed in sunny Madrid in summer! I had never seen fake | rain on set. I also was within a meter of Liam Cunningham [4] | whose Ser Davos was one of my favorite GoT characters :) | | [0] http://gabrielgambetta.biz | | [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt11695350/ | | [2] https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1336827 | | [3] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9742794 | | [4] https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0192377/ | noah_buddy wrote: | Perhaps there really was a part of the script that it had just | rained. Oftentimes, they will wet the street in production | because you get better light off the street. Once you know this | fact, you will see wet streets everywhere in TV/Film/Commercials. | MontagFTB wrote: | > there were tens of people who walked by and asked the security | people what they were filming. They got one of two answers. The | first one was a name for a series that was different than the one | I was told. The second answer was "this is a new series with a | largely unknown cast". This answer sounded very specific and very | rehearsed. | | I believe this is standard procedure on sets to keep from | gathering a crowd, or leaking information about the film prior to | marketing release. I'm sure there are other good reasons. | neilv wrote: | For one shoot in Boston, the crew said "mayonnaise commercial". | | I don't approve of dishonesty, but I thought that was clever. | egypturnash wrote: | This is one of the stock answers, according to some folks I | know who do a lot of this kind of work. | j5r5myk wrote: | Yes mayonnaise commercial is the go-to industry wide cheeky | answer going back decades | djtriptych wrote: | Interesting. In NYC they invariably post the name of the show | on the parking permits they have to publicly post to shut down | streets (which I'm guessing 100% of shoot need to do out here). | | Crowds generally just don't form in NYC though. We see shoots | all the time. | | Coolest one was for The Knick, a turn-of-the-century period | piece about a storied hospital, which was filmed on my block | the year I moved to NYC (early 2013). There's a beautiful | building on the block, the Boys High School in Brooklyn [0], | which was used for the hospital exteriors. The Knick is a turn- | of-the-century period setting; they covered the entire street | in gravel (for weeks), erected gas lamps, etc. | | [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boys_High_School_(Brooklyn) | j5r5myk wrote: | They often use code names on those parking permit signs | bitcurious wrote: | I happened to be in New Orleans when LBJ was filming and they | were about to shoot JFK being shot, we're lining up extras, etc. | I just asked a PA if I could be an extra in the scene and she | said yes, so it doesn't always take social engineering. | JetSetWilly wrote: | A friend of mine was on holiday in Toronto and somehow walked | accidentally into a film set. He and his other half wound up | "pretending" to be extras. So now the film "Kick Ass" opens with | a panning shot down a skyscraper to a foyer where my friend and | his wife can be seen having an animated argument. | unnouinceput wrote: | Is your friend and wife credited in the film? Something along | the lines "couple arguing at beginning"? | throw__away7391 wrote: | Film crews are truly the scum of the earth.They only pay a couple | hundred dollars for a filming permit (at least in NYC) and then | proceed to attempt to monopolize entire blocks as if they're | doing some "official" important business, attempting to block | people from passing, as if anyone at all cares what shitty movie | they're filming. They leave trash everywhere, not just | accidentally, but they literally just throw empty water bottles | and such on the street and leave piles of food on the street for | rats. | msarrel wrote: | I also have a funny story about a film set. When I lived in New | York they were filming an episode of Blue Bloods. I had a | 12-year-old French bulldog. When the guy with the walkie-talkie | told the crowd it was okay to walk down the block, we started | walking. 5 minutes later everyone else was gone and the scene was | clear except for me and Elvis. Security started hassling me to | make him walk faster and I told them that they were idiots. And | then Tom Selleck stuck his head out of his trailer and said | what's the holdup. I yelled they're trying to make me rush my | elderly dog. And he yelled guys leave that old dog alone we can | film in another 2 minutes and went back into his trailer. | | So I have it on pretty good authority that you can social | engineer any situation with an elderly dog. | kaczordon wrote: | Technically they have no legal right to tell you to move/stop | somewhere on a public sidewalk in New York. You could've just | strolled straight onto set if you wanted to. | jaywalk wrote: | _Technically_ they can say whatever they want, but you can | also just ignore them. | vitno wrote: | I live on a street in New York that's pretty popular with | filming. I generally try to be respectful of their work, but | I work from home and sometimes I need to go get a coffee. | | I'll usually ask if when I come back in 5 minutes or so if | they'll be filming so that I don't disrupt them. Even if I'm | super respectful, they usually wind up trying to stop me from | getting back to my apartment when I return. It took me a | while to figure out that I can just ignore them and keep | walking. | | Still, it was cool to see Oscar the grouch on my street. | AdamJacobMuller wrote: | > It is a better "making of" experience than any professionally | produced featurette or documentary. The main reason being that it | is about the actual making of instead of of millionaires lying | through their teeth on how all other millionaires on set were so | professional, super awesome and how the whole experience was the | best thing ever because that is what they are contractually | obligated to say. | | Highly recommend _Under Pressure: Making 'the Abyss'_ it does not | do this. It's definitely still rich people talking to really rich | people who are now crazy rich people, but, it does not sugar coat | things. Very good watch. | KaiserPro wrote: | Its fairly common to have a codename for the show that you are | working on. | | For example "the dark knight" was Rory's first kiss(rfk) because | the director's son had his first kiss (or so I've been told, I've | not actually verified that) | | Prince Caspian was TOASTIE (or something like that) | | I think that casino royal was saville row, but that might have | been an internal name | dylan604 wrote: | Working Title | Kye wrote: | Spielberg liked to tell a story about doing this. It was made up | and constantly evolving, but still entertaining. | | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/spielberg-universal/ | shrx wrote: | Just curious: what law allows the movie crews to close off public | property like streets and sidewalks? | colechristensen wrote: | There's a whole permitting process with the city. | | In LA obviously it's a streamlined process: | https://www.filmla.com/for-filmmakers/permits/ | nathanvanfleet wrote: | He did what? Stood around? | ChrisMarshallNY wrote: | We had a movie ( _In and Out_ ) filmed in the town I lived in, at | the time. | | It was a North Shore Long Island town, but the movie was supposed | to take place in Indiana (I think). When I watched the movie | (somewhat forgettable, IMO), I kept looking for seagulls. | | They actually made a facade on most of the buildings downtown. | Lotta work. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-07-28 17:00 UTC)