I spent the most of yesterday wandering around our main location for the shoot – Bury Hill Fisheries, near Dorking. This venue has a lot of advantages and disadvantages. First off disadvantages – it just isn’t as spectacular as we wanted. Second, there could be a lot of fishermen on the days we shoot, though […]
I am suffering right now (well actually last night to be specific, but past it this morning) from one of the symptoms I discuss on my two day film makers course. It’s a common problem and it can be quite crippling. When you set out on any creative venture and think up some kind of […]
I spent another whole day in casting – looking for the young actors to play the two young boys in ‘Gone Fishing’. I know we found one boy who was amazing, but until the parents and agents have agreed for him to play the part, I don’t want to say anything. Let’s all keep our […]
I spent most of yesterday and last night updating the schedule, which has gone through several major revisions already. The first one was done by Producer, Ivan Clemments, who then had to leave for two weeks, and it was subsequently revised by Sabina Sattar, who stepped into his shoes as acting producer. The schedule then […]
Great news today. Experienced sound recordist Adrian Bell has agreed to record sound on ‘Gone Fishing’. This is particularly good news for me as Adrian recorded sound on my first feature film, ‘The Runner’, the movie that inspired ‘The Guerilla Film Makers Handbook’! So terrific! Adrians website is here. He will be using hard drive […]
I have been working out how do some of the visual effects for ‘Gone Fishing’. Of course having no money, it’s a sellotape and string affair. But, I now have recieved tremendous support from a special effects company called Men From Mars. These digital effects guys are real wizards and usually work on $50m movies, […]
I spent the whole of yesterday in the main grading theatre at Midnight Transfer in London. We were working on the final grade for a 35mm short a friend of mine produced (Director Andreas Wisniewski, Producer Claire Trevor Roper), and they had a little bit of budget available, so we could use these guys and […]
Yesterday was a great day! Sabina Satta, production designer extraordinaire, joined Team Living Spirit on ‘Gone Fishing’. Not only is Sabina a wonderful designer, but she is also a writer, producer and director. This will bring a wonderful and holistic approach to the design department. She fell in love with the project when she read […]
We are currently working through the usual dance with agents and actors for our cast. The most important character is Old Bill, who the story follows, and we are looking to a warm and generous older classical Brit actor for this part. Without saying who is at the top or bottom of the list, you […]
I am a great believer in what you give, comes back to you. But that is often in ways that you don’t expect. A friend of mine just, last weekend actually, swam the English Channel. Each year about 800 people manage to climb Everest, but only 200 manage to conquer the Channel. Lynn is one […]
Something I have been very fortunate to have in my life is a group of experienced and passionate film maker friends. I cannot stress how vital this is both to the execution of my own personal ambitions as a film maker, but also on a nitty gritty story development level. I just had a short […]
Things are going very well here at Living Spirit. We are just four weeks away from the shoot for ‘Gone Fishing’, (shooting on 2 perf 35mm), and now up in glorious Scotland. We are still a little short of cash, so if you want to contribute, you can get more information here… If you are […]
I am getting very close to locking the storyboards now. I will be done by tomorrow. If you want to see how some of them look, I have put a few up on our site here. I will be pleased to get this behind me as it’s eaten up a whole load of time – […]
I have spent the whole day on Storyboarding again – not working with Gabrielle this time, but planning the shots and ordering them so that next time we meet, I am clear about every single shot and how it will cut with each shot on either side. I am used to doing a shot list, […]
The last couple of days has been spent storyboarding with one of the most talented guys I have ever worked with, Swiss storyboard artist Gabriel Schucan. He is a very fast sketcher, and it’s wonderful to see the story come to life visually. The process itself has precipitated a script re-write as little problems are […]
Music is always a vital element of any movie, and I have often felt that it’s all too often used to prop up dodgy drama. There is that great Alan Parker cartoon that says something like, ‘the script is terrible, actors incompetent, director an idiot, editing is terrible – right we’d better fire the composer!’ […]
Today has been a big day – the final prep meeting before we officially move into pre production, lock down and head out. Some big choices have needed to be made. Producer Ivan Clemments and I, sat around a table and worked through the script, budget and schedule. Passions ran high – after all, I […]
I am delighted to announce that the production company, Bradgate Films, have come on board as a co-producer for ‘Gone Fishing’. Through their excellent connections they have managed to bring £5k of private investment to the project, which is excellent news. Here is what Bradgate say about themselves… ‘Bradgate Films are an emerging, midlands based […]
As we hit the tarmac running today – Monday – just a recap on where we stand money wise. Over the weekend we received a further £500 in donations. So thank you to Paul Nugent, Huw Jenkins, Hazeley Wilson, Jurgen Wolf, Rod Duncan, John Basham, Steve Payne and Simon Reglar. Splendid. We are in the […]
As many of you may know, stunt co-ordinator Terry Forrestal was a key element to us getting started here at Living Sprit. In the very early days of The Runner, he was an industry professional who was instrumental in giving us credibility. He also added huge production value by doing amazing stunts and bringing in […]
Yesterday I sent out a mail to my mailing list, asking for crew help and specifically a storyboard artist. Boy! I got about 250 responses, so it’s going to take me a little time to get through everyone. It struck me, there is enough enthusiasm and passion there to make five short movies! I think […]
OK so fund raising is continuing, and we now have a rather spiffy graph, to show us all where we are at. In the last day we had four more people contribute, raising the cash figure to £2,200 – they are Mike Mindel, Ross Edwards, Martin Bowen and Harriet Barbir. So thank you very much […]
I have just spent a frantic week, working on casting and all sorts of other stuff. There will be a script redraft very soon, and this little tweak I hope to be the final one. Most important though is that cash has started to flow into the production- pictured is a post card that came […]
Yesterday I spent the whole day auditioning kids. With the help casting Director Catherine Arton, and her two helpers, Sammy and Janna, we managed to get through an astonishing 65 children. We worked in small groups, which Sammy would take through their paces with fun and games ‘warm up’ routines. In this first stage, the […]
‘Gone Fishing’ moved a step closer today when Production Manager Stephanie Wrate joined team Living Spirit in their offices at Ealing Studios. Stephanie has worked in the production department on over 20 films and her experience and professionalism will be a great asset to the movie. She was thrown in at the deep end today […]
