Shiny New MacBook Pro

I just had my shiny new MacBook Pro this morning, my, she's pretty. Shiny, too.

 

I've just finished installing FinalCut Pro HD, and I'm about to start playing with all her goodies!

Katch gig in the edit

I've been working over at Frozen Moon again, editing the half-hour Katch gig, filmed at the end of the Wrexham Science Festival. Its going to be a half-hour program, but also be chopped up into the individual songs, and its looking good

Explosive New Films

I've been experimenting with black and green screened explosions, courtesy of www.detonationfilms.com and have been having great fun. I've already made some drawing boards in uni explode, and my friend's head has exploded as well. You can check them out on my YouTube page: www.youtube.com/filmsbynick

 

Right, what's next to explode?

My New Website

I took the plunge, and now have a brand spanking new website. There's nothing on it yet, but there will be very soon!

 

its at www.filmsbynick.com

Robert Murat press attention

I saw on the news last night that Robert Murat seems to be almost declared guilty by the press regarding the disappearance of Madeleine McCann

 

When I turned on the TV last night, the first thing I saw was loads of people milling around, with members of the press saying how 'suspiciously' Robert has been acting. Is it not possible that this guy actually WAS trying to help out the police, and why do people get accused of something totally out of character when they try to do the right thing.

 

I need to point out that I do not know this man at all, but there's no need to jump all over him, especially as there is no solid proof he had anything to do with the little girls disappearance. It really does annoy me that the press over there have jumped all over this poor guy because they have nothing new to report, Don't hang the guy on a suspicion people!

 

I hope that girl is found safe, and lets not all jump on the bandwagon against Robert. There's every possibility that he's done nothing wrong at all.  This is why I didn't want to be a journalist.

New Music Video

I've been playing around with the idea for making a music video for 'Sleep' by MCR. I'm not giving the visuals away as of yet, but it should be good, I'll be starting work on it as soon as I have enough footage,

Later dudes....

Revised LAN date

Ok, so the last date I had for the next LAN party was wrong, its actually on the 19th May - a Saturday, and I'll be staying over at a mates house seeing as we will probably be playing until like 3AM Sunday morning.

 

On a different note, I have been doing some research about the North Wales School of Art and Design building. Turns out it used to be an infirmary, and still has a basement area. I'm trying to arrange to go down there to film part of my student survival film, might be a bit creepy, but might also look good on film

Next Lan Party

I have just been informed by one of my mates that the next LAN party is 15 May - that's a lot sooner than I originally thought, but its good that its so soon

Watched 'The Holiday' last night / Buying a MacBook Pro

So I bought 'The Holiday' at ASDA at the weekend, and watched it last night, I knew it was a romcom, but didn't know it had one of the main characters as a movie trailer maker, another as a film scorer.

 

Overall, it felt a bit too long, but I did like the way that in certain points throughout the film, there was a voiceover (like the one used on movie trailers) describing one of the women's situation in the film - this I found quite refreshing.

 

Okay, I know as a review this totally sucks, and its not really a review as such, just my ramblings.

 

On a separate note, I should be getting a MacBook Pro soon, Mark from Frozen Moon wants one, so he's going to try and get a discount when he buys 2, and then I pay him the discounted price, saving me lots of money.

10,000 views on 3 episodes of SAWPC

Well, I was planning to release the 4th episode of San Andreas Wildest Police Chases when I had reached 10,000 views together on all 3 episodes, but I've already broken that number, and have only just started to get footage for the 4th episode.

 

I have had a surge in views over the last week, so in the last 2 weeks, I've had like 3,500 views, which I really didn't expect.

 

Oh, well, at least its popular - especially the second episode!

Science Festival Edit

I'm working on the science festival edit, and Mark has chosen to let me be in sole charge of the whole edit, SO, I'll be making the trailer for next years festival, and a short film promoting the festival in general, PLUS editing the whole Katch gig footage, This is just what I wanted to do, and it speaks volumes that Mark has enough faith in me and my skills to leave me in sole charge, and represent Frozen Moon in this way.

 

Oh, and there's a possibility of working on a feature length film soon - just thought I'd tease you with a titbit of information, more to follow soon

San Andreas Wildest Police Videos Episode 4?

My 3 episodes of San Andreas Wildest Police Videos have now collectively been viewed 6,449 times, as of 15:14 on 3rd Apr, 2007.

 

Now, I have had some people asking for a fourth episode, and I'm considering it, I have footage I put to one side, and I'm sure I could make another one, but make it even better than all 3 put together.

 

I'm thinking of waiting until the 3 episodes have been viewed a total of 10,000 times, then releasing the 4th episode, which means I will have to start working on it now then... Well, after the current filming shoot I'm on.

Practice shoot for film festival final

I'm heading over to the William Aston hall tonight, where 'Katch' are setting up their equipment and making a sound check in preparation for tomorrow.

 

I'm going to be taking notes on which shots to get, where to stand so I don't get in the way of the band, and just do a general practice run for tomorrow, should be good

Wrexham Science Festival Day 7 Part 2

OK, so just after sending the last post off, I thought,'Hey, instead of talking about what I'm doing right now, I could have talked about Saturday!' so here it is...

 

Saturday was a good day, apart from the waiting around at the beginning, but then I guess its like that on any film shoot/event.

 

We started off by splitting into 2 teams, Mark and Julie filming some kind of stop-motion thing with kids, and me going off, and finding out where all the main attractions were. Turns out most of them were in the sports centre - even a Robot Wars exhibition! (which featured the real life bots called 'wheely big cheese' and some other name I cant remember now) but the point is... It was really busy.

 

For me, the highlight was filming the live birds that were on show, they were amazingly calm, and obviously used to being watched by loads of people. I got some really close detailed shots, and some golden shots of kids holding the birds while stroking them - golden they were!

 

Later on, there was a few other attractions such as a cholocatier, dino digs, and a live linkup to another building on the other side of the country, but the real fun came when we were on our way back to the main building.

 

On the way there, we saw that the birds that had previously been inside, had been taken outside, and were flying all around. at one point, I was aiming the camera at one of the birds, and it started to fly right towards me. I was thinking 'man, I wanna get this shot, its amazing!' but on the other hand, I was thinking 'man, I don't want to loose an eye' - the latter thought won out, and I ducked, just as the bird flew to the left of me, to a handler which was waiting there for it! If only I'd have known!

 

Anywhos, it was a very good day, and I got lots of good footage to use, but its not over yet, I still have tonight and tomorrow to film, and then on Wednesday, its the film festival!

Wrexham Science Festival Day 7

I'm sitting here, waiting for my fellow camera people to turn up, I came half an hour early, as its Easter, and the main uni building I study in closes early at Easter, so I went to the chippy, hoping to get a quick bite to eat before I start filming, but that was closed as well.

 

SO, in the end, I just went to the vending machine, got a bar of chocolate, and bought a bottle of water while in the middle of typing this. - Not very interesting in terms of filmmaking, but this is the Dairy of a Filmmaker - I think that's the first time I've ever used that excuse for a boring post on this blog!

Shortlist available on Scifilm website

The complete list of shortlisted films can now be found at http://www.scifilm.co.uk/films.html 

My film is called 'Spider' This also means I've had a chance to scope out the competition!

'Spider' Movie Trailer Gets Shortlisted!

I had a message from Frozen Moon last night informing me that the BBC had chosen my movie trailer as one of the final 10 shortlisted films to be screened at the Sci-film festival on 4th April.

 

I got the message at 9.47 pm last night, right before I crashed for the night, after filming the second night of the Wrexham Science Festival, which spans 7 days in a row.

 

Saturday is going to be very busy, with lots of people milling about, and lots of hands-on experiments, so I'll have to get some good kip on Friday night.

 

I'm amazed that my movie trailer has been shortlisted, and it WILL be shown at the final on Wednesday 4th April. I'm going to be filming the festival as well, as there's a local band named 'Katch' opening with a half-hour set, then plunging right into the films, should be a great night!

First day of Science festival done

Last night was the first night of the Wrexham Science Festival, and it went quite well.

 

Frozen Moon are filming all the festival, making a compilation of the whole event, and it will be put onto DVD.

 

I'm now preparing for tonight - the second night

First upload to Current TV accepted!

I uploaded my first Channel Ident to Current TV yesterday, and it's been accepted for showcasing on the website:



I hope it gets Greenlighted!

All Go for Wrexham Science Festival

Just been in a meeting with Frozen Moon, with regards to the science festival which starts tomorrow. We will be shooting a small section of as many talks and demonstrations as possible, then editing them together to make a short video of the event, which will be on the website, and could possibly be handed out on DVD as well.

 

So its all go for tomorrow - exciting!