No! Not the bees!

On Thursday, we had a somewhat welcome return to Gav's class, though we are still waiting on the results of our tests from around this time last year. I did wonder where our post-production class was going this year since we seemed to learn as much as we could last year on Final Cut but now that AVID has been thrown into the mix, it's like starting at the beginning again. I enjoyed the class, but I think I much prefer to just mess about with things in editing rather than actually cut for a purpose. Any and all editing experience I have had in the past seems to get really frustrating when sound has to be dealt with since no matter what I had to work with, I could never find something even close to what I wanted. With the better facilities and options at the academy (stable and up-to-date AVID is an improvement) I could maybe eventually warm to editing but it's not what I have in my mind at this moment in time. Especially since this week I took quite a large step towards the camera department: purchasing my own slate.

On Friday, we had Adam's class and we watched an episode of Life On Mars, a show I have watched twice through. The second time I watched it, I realised that it certainly has universal appeal, since I was watching it with my 60 year old parents who were, oddly, the age I am now in 1973. The rest of the class had us discussing themes in the Adam way, which are much easier than the Richard way but seem to be things you can notice on the surface, rather than an underlying meaning or purpose which Richard pushes for.

Friday afternoon was also the deadline for half of the class with Richard's developed ideas. I'm very happy with how my script idea has progressed. I understood Richard's notes more than usual and found myself drastically changing the route and feel of the story without losing the core premise. Though since Richard really likes it, my mind has ran ahead of itself and I've already started to think of elements of production, which I know I shouldn't. I don't want to be one of these people who if they don't get a script picked up, go out of their way to shoot it outside the curriculum only to find that it doesn't work.

As I'd raised to either Andy or Adam last year, not everyone will get a chance to direct if they want to since the course doesn't really have enough room for it to happen, but I think I would much rather have a stronger course than 12 weeks of everyone making their individual film, like we did at college. It is however difficult to organise people outside of academy hours, most of the time not everyone is able to due to work commitments but sometimes, it feels like some simply don't want to. I get annoyed by this a little, I understand if someone doesn't like the script or doesn't agree with the subject matter but I try to see every bit of experience as good experience. Whether it be being thrown into the deep end and having to essentially, co-direct with a crazy New Zealand person you have met only hours before, filming a local panto with minimal lighting or shooting some very odd CPP performances. I don't mind going out of my way to help people since I imagine that one day, someone may need to go out of their way for me. It's like if you are going out drinking and doing rounds, always buy the first, because then everyone knows they owe you a drink, whether they get you one back or not. Sort of.

Anyway, less ranting, more media:

So me and a few others in the class found this clip particularly hilarious over the past few days. I'm posting it here for anyone interested in having a giggle at some pretty terrible acting from an A-List star. While all individual clips are quite funny, look at 1:40, the awful CGI bees and Nick Cage.

My film/tv review post is going to be a little later in order to fill it up a little but it may be quite interesting, since on Monday, I'm going to see Taking Woodstock at a fairly early preview. The odd thing is, of the two I've watched all the way through (Crouching Tiger, Hulk), I have enjoyed exactly 0% of them, should be fun.

"Sometimes when I'm flying over the Alps, I think,
'That's like all the cocaine I sniffed.'"
Elton John

"Have you heard the tapes? We're guaranteed a record deal, our stuff is that good."

A busy week for myself and some others, what with my idea for Richard needing tarted up and also work finally beginning on Phil's FilmG script. Thankfully, filming has been pushed back to next weekend which gives us much more valuable prep time. Having today (Wednesday) off, made me think of doing a mid-week blog, rather than doing a full week one later.

Monday started off with another early rise for me, when I had to drive the van for the 4th years again, seriously, when are these kids gonna grow up? The day made allowed me to work in a few different roles: driver/runner, sound designer, scriptwriter then Director of Photography, not many courses would offer this. Not all in a professional capacity but it's great to have this variety and I'm enjoying every minute of it.

The first class was Andy's Cinema Movements this time focussing on sound design which had a lovely little party game attached which not surprisingly, did waken me up somewhat. Maybe we should start class half an hour earlier each Monday just to do something like this! Then again, maybe I should retract that statement knowing how powerful a soapbox these blogs can be. In the class I saw my first ever clip of The English Patient, it looked decent enough and when broken down, the sound design was pretty amazing but only one thing cycled through my head: Does Willem Dafoe only ever pick roles that cause his character lots of physical pain and/or death? Masochist!

Richard's class wasn't the tense affair it can often be, this class had some terribly bad knock-knock jokes as well as some decent yet mental ones. A structure class was necessary though I didn't realise it until midway through when so many things that were said, seemed to affect my main idea for Richard.

Tuesday gave us Andy's factual class which focussed on interviews and the class had almost an infinite amount of great tips. I seem to have entirely forgotten about documentaries and while I do watch a few, mostly film ones, the idea of a short documentary sounds quite fun. Whether I could ever come up with an interesting enough topic is something else. Andy's endless reserve of interviewing anecdotes was also entertaining, they always make me giggle!

More later in the week.

"I am many things. I am an animal. I am a convicted rapist,
a hell-raiser, a loving father, a semi-good husband.
You don't really know me."
Mike Tyson

"I do not like the cone of shame."

It's a bad day when you have a backlog of films you want to see at the cinema. I managed to tick two boxes this week, but at the sacrifice of TV that I must get to watching. There was however, some much needed Dr Who, which I'll blog about when I finish Series 2. I'm not blogging about Flashforward this week because there isn't much I can say besides GRAPHS, BLOODY GRAPHS!

FILM

Pandorum - My hopes began high, months and months ago, then were dashed when I heard early reviews so when I approached the film with very low expectations, I was shocked when I got a good feeling about it in the opening minutes. It channels Event Horizon and Alien but manages to distinguish itself quite clearly with much grittier, darker visuals. Anyone who has played the recent Dead Space game, will see similarities but since the game was only released late last year, I doubt they ripped it off. The only problem I have is with shaky-cam insanity again. I had no idea of geography or even if they were really fighting, the score told me they were fighting but the visuals didn't seem to. Ben Foster continues his one-to-watch streak and Dennis Quaid plays the deepest character I've ever saw him play, which isn't really saying much but at least he avoided the cheese factor of The Day After Tomorrow or (C)G.I. Joe. A great little film with some good twists which will have me return to it on DVD. Let's just forget that Paul W.S. Anderson has his name on it.


The Conversation - I don't feel there is much I can say, since I found the film so difficult to follow and once I was taken out of the film, it really wouldn't let me back in. I look forward to learning more about the sound design which I could at least take from the film as being well done. I only really remember two things about the film, the somewhat gripping opening shot and a scene which contains Gene Hackman (HACK-MAAAAN!!!, South Park anyone?), Harrison Ford, Robert Duvall and a rottweiler yet somehow felt dull.


Up - Pixar's latest and very close to being their greatest. Everyone talks of the opening montage which takes you on a better emotional journey than 95% of any other films but for me, I found one of the closing scenes much more upsetting. I won't spoil it for anyone but feel free to ask me. I have one major problem with the baddie, though it's a mere timeline thing, again feel free to ask me. I've spoken to a few folk about the film and I've came to the conclusion that this is the best film I've seen in 3D. Not only is it the least pokey of the recent 3D crowd, but I was so caught up in the story, I didn't feel like I was wearing glasses most of the time. Now that's immersion. An amazing supporting cast including some talking dogs raise the film to repeat worthy heights and despite it's out-there premise, the film becomes on some level one of the most relatable and human stories in animation.

*************

I can't take credit for this (thanks Dionisis) but I thought I would post what is perhaps the man-liest man-fest you could ever manage, a sort of trailer from the forthcoming action star showcase The Expendables. I challenge you to watch this and not at least smirk. The trailer has been very shoddily cobbled together but I really don't think that distracts from the glory of what exists:

The Expendables Promo

It's tagline should be: Stuff. Will. Blow. Up.

Myself, Murch and Megan!

A week that was a little lighter at the academy though only in terms of how many classes, not really content. The week kicked off with kit return from last weekends Dramaworks "How To Be A TV Presenter Shoot". Some of the kids were hilarious but terrible time-management forced the last hour to become chaotic, a woman with one foot in the industry should have known better. The kit return meant I had to wake up at 6am, though after hearing that Ray had turned up (and woke up) earlier to check in kit for an ex-grad student shoot, I didn't feel so bad. I was then left with some fabulous time to mull things over before Andy's class.

Editing theory was much deeper than I originally thought, my interest in pursuing it as a career has all but faded but great editing is something to be admired. Eisenstein and Murch are true geniuses and should be heralded as such. The clip from The Pawnbroker was particularly striking and having watched several films use the same technique, it's effect is somewhat lost on me but I find it reassuring that an editor made such a remarkable leap at a time of what I would generally call, slow-burn storytelling.

Monday afternoon was a cards-on-the-table session with Richard and an excellent one at that. The entire time allotted focussed on just one idea and he told me that even though he had two pages of notes, I shouldn't think that this was a bad thing, infact, it was the opposite. I found myself opening up to Richard about my recent idea hardship and he was very accepting of it and said I should focus on my main idea unless I really struggle with it. The idea was described as having "light at the end of the tunnel" which for me, reassured the faith I had recently lost in my writing.

Tuesday's class of Zam was again somewhat flawless. The treatments were good to hear but I think I could have said a bit more about my own film. I don't know what else to say about Zam's class, sometimes visiting lecturers seem to be a bit of a hit and miss but thankfully this year everything seems to have been corrected in that sense. I'm looking forward to this class developing.

Wednesday was a day "off" and I took advantage of the afternoon, seeing as actual days off don't exist for me right now. There was also a fun program meeting, where Andy told the 1st years (with my permission) about my "obsession" with Megan Fox. I don't know if I'd call it an obsession...

...more a keen interest.

Thursday was a day of sound with new visitor Cammy Mercer, not related to Cammy from the Street Fighter games, who was played by Kylie Minogue in that terrible movie. While I wouldn't want to "publicly" bad mouth a previous lecturer, I actually understood what Cammy meant when he explained things. He started teaching us from the ground up which was great and he seemed to give us more credit and be much easier to speak to than our previous sound lecturer. Some of us should maybe ease off the enthusiastic pedal though. I don't think we're all suddenly changing to sound but at least we all now have a much better general understanding. Though Cammy did come up with a classic line that our sound department will be constantly reminded of; They should be heard and not seen.

Friday has just a screening of The Conversation, which I know nothing about and that's the way I like it, some of the best films I've watched have came from total surprise. (This was written before we watched it, review in my next post.)

A weekend of working lies ahead, along with a couple of things I have to tie up assignment wise.

"I was there when I said it."
Murray Walker, Motor Racing Commentator

..."It's pride."

The academy is narrowing my time for lots of TV/Film, not that I'm complaining, just that I have to carefully balance time like spinning plates, returning to Asda next week will throw me another challenge. I've not reviewed Mad Men yet since I've only watched two episodes but in short: It's awesome!

FILM

Fame (09) - As you'll know I'm not a musical fan, though I have found a certain respect for a few over the past year, New Fame was not one of them.

(Somehow, I managed to delete the rest of my Fame rant, possibly for the best so instead I'll just post my annoyance in bullet-point form.)

• Very little character development.
• Nothing particularly cinematic about it.
• If the kids are so talented, why can't a shot be held for more than a few seconds? Back in the day you wouldn't edit around Bruce Lee's talent so why should you do it now?
• The only way we could actually tell that the students were moving from year to year was through the beautifully obvious titles. Maybe they should have just told the story through the final year and flashed-back to the audition process.
• Just some plot-holes: What happened to the film kid? Or how did the band get back together?
• The films perhaps biggest crime? A criminally under-used Kelsey Grammer, the man really shouldn't be sitting quitely in a bar situation.

Toy Story 3D - I know the original inside out and so would know exactly what made the film better in 3D. Nothing really did, though this is more how 3D films should be, not jump-y and poke-y but just 3D that looks cool but doesn't distract.


Strike! - Another Eisenstein film and somehow far more incomprehensible to our class than Battleship Potemkin. While it may be incomprehensible, it was never boring and in fact, was often unintentionally funny. I understand the gist of it but some confusing sections such as the people who were kind of like animals and bewildering cat smacking and baby throwing detracted too far from any narrative.

TV

Flashforward (White To Play) - There's something that draws me instantly to remotely interesting Sci-fi premises, partly because I love Sci-fi but also partly because Sci-fi seems to be the one genre that even major networks and studios are still uncertain of. The premise for Flashforward seems to actually tread old ground, feeling a little similar to the soon cancelled then renewed then cancelled Jericho, minus the end goal Flashforward has. The main difference between the two is that Jericho had some fairly grounded characters while Flashforward seems to suffer from characters who forget about family and are only interested in furthering the story. Take for example, in the season opener. Joseph Feinnes quickly calls his wife after the disaster and his wife tells him not to worry about his daughter, the babysitter says she can stay with her. Now, if that were me, I think I would forget about the global catastrophe and focus on my family being ok, though David S. Goyer is a comic book writer so maybe he just doesn't do reality.

On this weeks episode, we find out that their daughter has had a terrible flashforward, but instead of having their child tell them what it is, they decide to leave her alone and let her tell them little things scene by scene, never the best way to overcome your problems. Even in serial dramas, there is usually some sort of formula for every episode, for example in Lost, one character would be the focus of an episode while the main story would still progress around them. In Flashforward, there seem to be just random plot points that pop up on the computer systems. It's still early days though and I'll be seeing the season through no matter what, but the show has created a paradox that may be difficult to justify: If you see the future and follow clues in the future to help you get there, then will the future still be the future you saw?

"Do you know what your sin is, Doctor?"...

First full week and already we have the "Monday Mornings". Andy's Cinema Movements class is exciting fun and the line for me between DoP and Production Designer is becoming a little blurred, but in a good way. Each affects the other and the idea of a greater, much larger crew helping to service and function for the director's vision, sounds particularly great and would love to see this in action. Sir Ken Adam is one person that can't go unmentioned when it comes to production design and I'm glad to see that You Only Live Twice is on Andy's recommended list (along with a few I will put on my "when i get time" list), hopefully some of the class who only know Bond in Casino Royale/Quantum Of Solace can revisit that classic and finally pick up on all those Austin Powers references. The mise-en-scene (i THINK it's pronounced Mii's-on-sane) stuff also makes perfect sense in the chef analogy, hopefully in the future we, ourselves can put it into practice.

The second class was a return to Mr Smith in a classroom capacity. I don't know what it is but we always seem to end up in awkward silences which always get more awkward and more silence-y. I'm struggling just now with ideas and in a really bad way, yet I have no idea why. I'll be taking Richard's new advice onboard this week and hopefully turn up with a few better premises than what I have been turning in recently. Also, PLEASE can we have no more "digging deep", personally I find it unfruitful and wouldn't enjoy it in either a one-to-one or class environment. If it comes to it though and Richard says it has to be done, I'll guess I'll just grin (or cry) and bare it.

Tuesday morning began with a new content origination class with Adam. We looked at Teachers and in general, the Channel 4 remit. The task from Adam to come up with two new show ideas is going to be difficult but no doubt lots of fun but I'm not certain I'll be able to pull off two good ideas myself, one may need to be a collaboration.

In the afternoon we had another great class with Zam, this time it began with seeing a short of his called Mashed, which was shot by our very own Ray Tallan. It looked pretty great and could be quite affecting if it wasn't for the fact that I felt it was treading old ground. It was nice to see a further good mix of films from the others in the class with Michael's Saving Private Ryan clip telling me something about myself, sometimes I'm not as affected as I should be by brutality. Ross and John seemed to constantly shiver at the prospect of viewing the scene again. Galina's clip was one that she shouldn't have fretted about, it was quite interesting, even if I think Galina had an ulterior motive for her choice: A young Marlon Brando, sweaty and in a tank-top! Zam's homework task will be good fun since I love the scene I showed from The Thing so much and would love to deconstruct it that bit more.

Wednesday was my first day out of class, instead I was doing interviews for the marketing department for a somewhat overhaul of the RSAMD website.

Thursday was all day tech, something I've been looking forward to. The retention tests were sort of what I expected but a few questions were much harder than I thought, I would even question if some of these points had been iterated to us. The second test which was to be typed out, was a little more difficult and while I didn't epic-ly fail it, I could have probably done better. Some of the class seemed a little peeved that they didn't know the answer to the 1st A.C. question when only myself and the camera department would know it, since this was my role on Charlotte's, Little Clown. The fact that we had split into departments for the film gave us quite an unfair advantage.

In the afternoon we got out the new (to us) tripods, of the Ronford-Baker variety. I'll be glad to see the back of the Vinten's (they'll be back on Multi-cam shoots no doubt) and even just a change in tripod to an industry standard, gives me the feeling that we're progressing. We also were shown how to properly change bulbs on all of the lamps, which is helpful, especially since my now infamous injury last year. The new gloves are quite sporty however.

The first class with Ray did highlight a big flaw in this current year: We are developing scripts for Richard, and while the focus of the year is understandably on boosting our tech/directing skills, there seems to be no time in the timetable for our own stories. Something very odd and this leaves me with a slightly odd feeling and makes Richard's class a little bit goal-less.

Tomorrow will be a screening of Strike, sadly I can't go watch Wizard of Oz because of a production meeting but still work or WoZ, make your choice.

"Dog for sale: eats anything and is fond of children."

...but it is quite long (Episode 2)

So, Episode 2 of this weeks blog, with my film/tv/reading/music happenings. There is a bit of backlog so the films/tv over the summer only get a few lines.

FILM

Scarface - A classic which looked amazing in the new digital presentation. One thing I did notice was that DePalma's direction is very subtle. He seems to give each of the actors plenty of room to run with their characters, no needless cutaway, the pacing seems to come from the line delivery, something which seems to be missing from modern cinema.

Inglourious Basterds - Certainly one of Tarantino's best, and I'm not a fan of his either. It could lose about 20 minutes, some of it is too dialogue heavy and Eli Roth should never act but it works well as a piece of crazy escapism. Also, was it just me or is this his least graphically violent film?

District 9 - Another new Sci-Fi film which, like Moon, was excellent and showcases a promising new talent. It goes a bit mental towards the end, but worth going to see.

Gamer - The controversial and sometimes overly graphic Michael-Bay-on-a-realistic-budget directing style of Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor continues with Gerard Butler playing a character who is an avatar controlled by a 17 year old kid who is a games champion. The film contains what some may call "unnecessary" violence but since this is based on the wicked and violent world of online gaming, calling it "unnecessary" would be like calling a war film with violence "unnecessary". The film is very dumb but is still entertaining if you go in expecting nothing at all though is nowhere near as fun as the somewhat excessive masculine/testosterone masturbation of Crank and it's sequel. Look out for the hilarious Michael C.Hall musical number.

(500) Days of Summer - Not being a fan of romantic movies, hearing of one that was a bit different intrigued me. The film itself plays out like Memento-lite, jumping around the 500 days somewhat randomly yet staying entirely coherent. I really enjoyed this though didn't get one thing, if she was actually such a bitch and uninterested in him, would any guy REALLY be infatuated with her for so long.

Away We Go - This Sam Mendes road movie is also a bit different, probably the only story about a couple who are totally in love and are never tempted by another lover or have another lover come into their lives and ruin it. While the film did follow a very simple formula, it worked on a level which allowed us to fall in love with the central characters and their dilemma.

Metropolis - Knowing the films and genre it has influenced quite well, I find it odd that I haven't watched this sooner. The story, by modern standards is very simple and would be over much sooner but besides a couple of scenes that I didn't quite understand, the film never felt too long since I was wowed by the production design and what was accomplished so many years ago. Visions like this don't come along often. While Star Wars, and especially C3PO seem to be the biggest thefts from Metropolis, I found myself thinking it felt closer to Terry Gilliam's Brazil and Alex Proyas' 90's sci-fi Dark City as well as the vast cityscapes of Blade Runner.

This week: Hopefully, Pride & Glory, Toy Story 3D and maybe another new cinema movie or two.

TV

To keep the TV nice and simple for now, I'm going to just summarise batches of episodes/seasons, rather than individual episodes.

Battlestar Galactica (up to S2E2) - A great show which is fast becoming a favourite with well-written characters and amazing serial storylines. One of those I'm trying to savour by taking it slowly.

Supernatural (Season 3) - What a great season and one of the few that didn't seem hampered by the writing strike. Throughout the season I travelled to hell, relived Dean dying over and over again, Groundhog Day-style and the writers even managed to create a show within a show in a Blair Witch inspired episode. The show continues to be always funny, often creepy and still has the best and most realistic brother dynamic (which isn't easy considering how far-fetched the show can sometimes be) I've seen in TV.

Flashforward (No More Good Days)- ABC are not being shy about telling everyone that they're looking for the new Lost. Lost reaches it's final year in January and the network seem to be making sure that Flashforward follows the formula of their much loved/loathed sci-fi drama as close as possible. Take an intriguing premise, a few washed-actors (remember when Joseph Fiennes was the next big thing?) as well as some untested ones, throw them into an (at least initially) accessible sci-fi show and give them a bit of money. The similarities don't end there, eagle-eyed viewers will spot an Oceanic Airlines advert and a post-incident sequence very reminiscent of the fabulous Lost opening. I might even go so far as to say that if you ran both of them together, there would be explosions and the lead character running through the chaos at almost the same time. My faith in the longevity in the show is up in the air, David S. Goyer may have a great movie script pedigree but his TV work is mediocre at best and the less said about his directing "ability" the better, but he has produced an engaging enough opening episode to make me want to put my bum in the seat for next weeks episode.

This week: Starting Dexter, Ep2 of Flashforward, starting Mad Men and maybe more Battlestar.

MAGAZINES/BOOKS

Since I rarely find the time or concentration to read books, I'll be keeping this mostly to magazines, though I do have a few books I will be tackling.

Total Film (160) - A good selection of reviews, including Up, The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus and Christopher Smith's forthcoming boat horror Triangle, gave me some great insight into films which haven't been very well covered in the past few months. The issue also has a hot 100 feature, showcasing new films and talent to look out for over the next year or two, though am I the only one who is slightly annoyed by how far Fantastic Mr Fox seems to have strayed from the source material? Also included was yet another article on videogames which have been turned into movies and this needs to be let go, they don't work unless each media is telling it's own story which works best for that format. No-one would want to play a 2 hour game and no-one would want to watch a film where the lead character spends half of his/her time in menus or looking through his pockets for items to heal himself with. For me, Silent Hill is the best game-to-movie since it keeps the story in the gameworld but tells it's own tale while staying true to the hallmarks of the game.

MUSIC

A short simple section and one that I'll probably rarely ever use.

Brand New (Daisy) - The band's 4th and easily least accessible album, generic time signatures no longer apply and as a result, it's become even more difficult to peg them to a genre, very few bands have developed so extremely over the space of 4 albums. The album seems to be influenced in production by Weezer's Pinkerton which often felt unmastered but in a world of overly polished pop tracks following a verse-chorus-verse-chorus-chorus format can anyone really say this is a bad thing?

And So I Watch You From Afar (Live at O'Henry's) - It was my first time seeing this band live and what an experience. The room was not much larger than the vocal rooms at the academy and if I wanted to, I could reach out and touch the band with great ease, since there was no stage. Sadly, this will never happen again, since the band are getting great buzz though due to the type of music, you'll probably never hear them on the radio. I look forward to seeing them again in a few weeks.

THOUGHT(S)?

Something occured to me (either that or I had a delayed thought process and ripped the thought off from somewhere else) recently, I've been thinking of reasons why filmmakers and more so directors, like to tell everyone that they've just made a low budget film. Should it really matter? Would you like to know that the beautiful girl you've been eyeing up for the past hour bought her dress from Primark? Or if you met someone, would you like them to always tell you how much they were earning? I know I often mention it myself but it should only really matter that you enjoy the film, regardless of what it cost. I know that if I know the budget of a film before I go into it, I may make allowances for flaws in the storytelling or set design but I think in future, I'll only be taking it into account after I've watched the film, maybe. Thoughts?

At least It's not about boats...(Episode 1)

A little re-introduction first, concerning this blog. Each week we have to now make 2 significant posts, I don't imagine I'll struggle but the only problem is where do I draw the line? My aim, at least initially, is to update two seperate posts each day, one with what has happened that day and the other with film/tv/reading/music reviews/talk(since reading was recently included, I thought I'd add a touch about music to encompass just about everything, hopefully social life isn't added by next year, or I wouldn't have one, since it would consist of only blogging!). Hopefully I'll post them at the weekend though odds on I'll run a day or two over. I'll still be interspersing this with photos/media, since I know that for me at least, everything is much easier to read when there are pictures and it can sometimes take the harshness off of the length.

First week back and while it was quite a long summer, and I was looking forward to going back, I could have done with another week or two for a simple reason. SHOOTS! Nothing all summer then 3 pop up within 2 weeks of each other. The first was one called "Behind The Door", written/directed by Des Hamilton who has worked in casting for many years and which was shot in ACTUAL film, where I was joined by Murdo and Galina (should I post her in-joke nickname here?) which was a fun experience. Galina became a 3rd AD for the 4 days and myself and Murdo were tea-boys/door guarders/generator truck guarders/streetsweepers/babysitters/roof climbers e.t.c. It was all great fun however, since the crew were all nice and somehow it was a very relaxing shoot, since everything had been over-scheduled which means getting home early when working with professionals, now isn't that great producing. The producers were my main contacts for the shoot and while I didn't see everything that went on, I gained a greater insight into the trials and tribulations of being a producer, which helped me further solidify that producing is not what I want to be doing in the future. This was also my first experience with being on the same crew as stars (Rafe Spall and Kate Ashfield), "clear the eyelines" was a call from the 1st AD which initially confused me. All in, one of my top on-set experiences, filled with great banter and greater people, even if I only got near the camera and got talking to a camera assistant on the final hours of the 4th day.

The second shoot was one which I ended up DP'ing, with no warning, no time and no script. Ray sent out an e-mail asking for crew and being me, I was happy to oblige, though something screamed unprofessional from the off. So a day or two later, I turn up at Arnold Clark, waiting to meet the director, she seems pleasant enough, the only problem(s) is that she has never met the actors, only gave them a script the night before, was using one of the actor's houses to film in (which she had never been to and had no idea where it was) and later it turns out, had NO experience filming. "How do you direct drama?" is a question I never want to hear again. On top of this she had no shotlist, no idea of the amount of time you should get for setting up shots and assumed a 5 page script could be shot in 6 hours. As you can imagine, it's not really possible, but we (myself and Graeme) did an amazing job at pulling it off (mostly), while doing a bit of teaching at the same time. It was later a mad rush to get the van back in time and it was returned so close to closing time, that we had to get the kit out of the van as quick as possible outside Arnold Clark. The problem was, the kit was going to Balloch...and we were in Shettleston. So we then had to wait two and a half hours on someone who didn't arrive, which resulted in the girl getting a taxi, something that was suggested at LEAST an hour and a half before. It was all quite insane but still, all experience is good experience. Next time though, I'll be expecting to work with director's above a certain experience level; which is none.

The third shoot was a one-day one for me since I already had Asda to contend with that week. It took place in Annan and starred Sean Harris of TV's Red Riding and the short itself was a collaboration between Scottish Screen and Channel 4, I think. It took me a while to get used to a slightly different way of working but by the end of the day I was enjoying myself and wished I could stay for the rest of the week. Even if we were out in fields getting soaking wet and forever having to run to get more hot urns.

The rest of the summer was taken up with playing Fallout, revising old TV shows, part-time work (where my iPod was stolen) watching a good few films and coming up with ideas for Richard, one of which we both quite like. Oh and Black Cats, which I will eventually be fully paid for.

Now, onto the return to the academy. I took advantage of some of Freshers week, being the only buddy from our class (though Charlotte and Gav also turned up) on Sunday night, going to the quiz and then onto Polo, which was actually quite fun and not as scary as I thought deep down, though the atmosphere is quite different. On top of this, Murdo had a flat warming/newbie meet and greet at his and Benoit's (R.I.P.) new flat, also the first orgainsed DFTV night out of the year (thanks Steven) was a great success, with record turn out and was only let down by one handsome member of our class being overdressed for the ABC, but all was eventually well.

Academically, this week was a nice ease into the exciting new year. A drama school meeting, followed by a DFTV group meeting and then our first class, which consisted of us researching Mr Dougan. Andy seems to always know how to make classes that bit more interesting, since we could have been asked to research anything or anyone but this great hands-on and personal approach works really well. I reckon however, that Andy googles himself as well, since typing "Andy Dougan RSAMD" into google brings up a Yahoo answers page with someone asking what you need for the DFTV course with a personal reply from Andy himself. The factual unit itself is promising and it'll be great to learn more than just film history and tv.

On Wednesday, we treated to our first class from Zam Salim, an industry professional with a great sensibility and a good taste in film. I assumed The Thing (with the testing scene being my scene of choice) would be slated by him but I was glad to hear that he likes it, even if the clip didn't exactly motivate anyone in the class to seek it out. It's great to have professionals visiting us and Zam's class may well help with a certain goal-turned-fear I have of directing, maybe fear isn't the right word, possibly anxiety.

Thursday was a day off, and Friday was only a screening of Metropolis, which will be touched on in the other post to (hopefully) soon follow.

This week: A sober academic week, Ray's first class and more Zam and Andy.
"We don't necessarily discriminate. We simply exlude certain types of people."
Colonel Gerald Wellman (U.S. Reserve Officers' Training Corps instructor)