Today was really ambitious -- and we fell short. We wanted to shoot all of the banquet scene which, as first AD Richard Stiles recognised, was really a two-day -- and two full days at that. But our schedule didn't allow that, so we had to try to get it in one. And we did really, really well, but by around 5.30 everything on set started to get a bit tense. And very soon we knew that we'd never complete today. So everyone did their best and we wrapped at seven with some three to four hours of work on this scene to squeeze into what's already a very tight third week.

It was a truly exhausting day for the cast and for the camera crew. We had brought into extra track for the two cameras, together with a second dolly, so that both crews could circle right round the action. Our banquet table was laid out in the middle of our largest space, which had once been a ballroom, and through the day the cameras could move along and around the action. Movement, marks and continuity were all demanding, and the nature of the scene meant that we worked again and again at the scenes.

We also cleared out the ballroom completely, so that we could shoot 360 degrees around the table. But then we found that the radio links to the all-important monitors didn't carry picture and sound through the walls, and so most of the crew had to sit outside as we were filming, cut off from the usual feeds from the cameras.

Later in the day, as the initial tensions eased, some of crept back into the room, and found a way of walking along behind one of the cameras, keeping out of the eyeline of the other, which was often shooting at a 90 degree angle. I'm not sure if that geography makes sense, but it worked alright on the floor. Joining in this ebb and flow of observers were four members of the family from whom we've hired the location, who had come on a friendly set visit to see how we were getting on.

At the end of the day, as many of the crew headed off to London for tomorrow's day off, we reflected that the second week had gone pretty well. The previous night we'd been on schedule, and now we were perhaps four hous adrift. But we'd always thought that the second week was the toughest -- and if Seb and I had been offered this position at the start of the shoot I think we'd have grabbed it with enthusiasm.

Especially since we're a little over budget, but not too much. And since we showed our executive producers an assembly of about 35 minutes and, despite the audio on my laptop being unable to compete with the roar of a heater in the room where we watching, they seemed pretty happy. On, then, to week three.