CPD Lecture 1

Sara Downham- Lotto was our first guest lecturer and coming from a predominately art background, her work was an example of a  different creative practice from my own, but one that could provide me with some future creative and professional opportunities.

She seemed more or less unfamiliar with our work as much as we were with hers, she showed us some examples of some of her collaborative efforts with year 2 B.A. film students which was primarily time-lapse. She asked us for our opinions how what could be done to make it better,  for which i myself made a suggestion. I said that she should embrace the overall composition of the film rather than trying to break it up to try and make it more "digestible", as I felt that flowed better and seemed more authentic the way it was.

I felt as though my advice was valued and appreciated, it gave a different perspective on how I can use my skills to assist individuals and potential businesses with similar questions. I have spent a lot of time thinking that my professional skills and practices would only be helpful to fellow film-makers and media personnel, but through spending time with Sara it was obvious that my work could be of use to a larger creative and professional community which should have been glaringly obvious since i have been working as freelance music video director for the last three years.

 This lecture was of great use and I hope to work with Sara in the future, as I'm potentially staying with the college as part of my PGCE placement studies. It would give me a chance to advertise my own work whilst collaborating to reach a  collective goal.

THE VOICE

The voice that saved my film

One of the many risks in my film was that it was not a linear journey, it was a series of interview clips that would tell the story of a troubled film production. It features two rather bewildered and weird characters that are appear to be bereft of self awareness.

In instances where a retrospective documentary is similarly assembled, a voice over artist or a narrator can help to solidify the narrative and the plot. I knew that this voice over would be exceptionally important to get right, the voice had to have an authoritative scholarly tone, someone who could both guide the audience and promote the film in a kind of overtly  self -important kind of manner.

I did seek the talents of professional voice over artists but the kind of performers I wanted were just too expensive, Ironically I found the exact kind of voice I wanted from a fellow student, someone who was of similar age with the appropriate tones and diction and most of all, professional sounding.

when I consulted Guy about the job, he asked me whom I had in mind when I wrote the dialogue, to which I replied " Mark Kermode " guy seemed to instantly recognize what it was that he should be doing.

The session was, in fact, a resounding success, I found myself focused but relaxed whilst directing Guy and after listening to the delivery, I started to see the potential of this project, the voice over had already started to act as a thread for all the different pieces I had filmed so far, which gave me a massive confidence boost moving forward but it inspired me to re-shoot my entire performance, now knowing what Guy's voice over meant to the overall project. It allowed me to realize who my character was in juxtaposition with Guy's character, allowing for a entirely different delivery and a far more successful outcome.

DIRECTING MYSELF

Directing Myself

One of the many challenges that I faced whilst in production was recognizing how to try and direct a performance out of myself as an actor, which it turns out was far more difficult than expected.

In my previous venture " Door to Door " I had played the " straight man", essentially I was the audience's window into the world that my character's inhabited. This time though, the role I was taking on was very much  " in his own  world ".  I got help from a few of my fellow students to man the camera and operate  the  sound equipment while I tried to give the performance that I had envisioned. Watching the footage back was difficult because the performance seemed flat and a bit lifeless, after all I had to try and find a way of entertaining people for fifteen to twenty minutes, so having them stare intermittently at someone sat in a room, this character has to be at the very least engaging.

But maybe I wasn't really sure what I wanted this character to be like, until I watched my performance back, because I knew exactly what I didn't want.

Maybe the difficulty of being sole person responsible for the fate of my film, is that  bringing others in to help out when I needed to be in front of the camera is that they can't direct me because they have no frame of reference, they have no personal investment in the project which made it difficult because I had no true collaborator to bounce my ideas off.

Luckily I would be recording my voiceover artist within the next few days, which would open my eyes to the kind of person my character should be.

C.P.D. lecture 4

Robert Young & ...... ......

"The Wraith" was a local production that utilized local talent as well as students from the college and its facilities. Robert Young came in to deliver a lecture and talk about his experiences making  "The Wraith" as well as some interesting accounts of previous work.

He went into some detail to talk about his own practices and methodology when working. he talked about how the film-making and script-writing practices had changed over the years and how today's technology had made his most current production easier and less time consuming.

what I found the most interesting was listening to Robert Young talk about how he approaches directing and what he regarded as good directing. I understood that his job involved a lot of input before filming and how assembling  a good collection of crew around you was extremely important. He explained that  a good casting director was very important as he maintained that  if they find the best cast for your film , half your job is done. He talked about how even through careful planning in pre-production, things didn't  always go as planned during the production of " The Wraith".  He explained that some people ended up sometimes taking on multiple roles to assure the production went as smoothly as possible. He also talked about a planned stunt that couldn't take place because certain logistics had been overlooked. I thought it was rather impressive , that a man of Robert's age still had the drive and the passion to make films and television and was also willing to embrace an ever changing technological climate.

I really appreciated the chance to speak to a notable director, as It's something that rarely gets any investigation. I gained some great insight into how a director works and how he faced some of the common problems in being a director.

That evening, I was lucky enough to be invited to a screening of The Wraith in the studio theater. I really enjoyed being amongst a lot of people who were involved in the production process. the screening had a great atmosphere and it certainly signaled how beneficial this could be to aspiring local filmmakers and the college.

CPD Lecture 2

Peter Cadwell

In the second week , our visiting lecturer was writer, producer and actor Peter Cadwell. Growing up in Cornwall eventually he went on to study at the " Central school of speech and drama " and was at the college to talk about his experiences in the television and film industry. a lot of the focus was on his first work as a producer, " The Fighter's Ballad " ( Dir. Ukpo T.S. 2011)  for which he was securing distribution.

I found him to be a very engaging presence, who 's experience in the theatre certainly helped him to maintain the group's attention. He was candid about the many obstacles he had to overcome in his professional career and the personal sacrifices he had to make to be able to commit to his work.

As many of us, are looking into directing, writing and producing, it was extremely helpful to have Peter tell us his stories and give us advice and tip on how to survive in the entertainment industry.

He engaged us in some worthwhile exercises, some of us were asked to pitch our ideas whilst he acted as an executive looking for new projects. He asked us individually why we were  on the course, which although seemed a bit obvious out of context here but on the day it served to be something of a challenge amongst the students.

By the time of this lecture, I had enquired about a possible PGCE placement within the college, which quite frankly I didn't think would be a possibility a few months earlier. So I had already been looking about carving myself a possible future, so although I wasn't intent on trying to get myself work within the industry straight away, I found his story extremely interesting and  in fact,  some of things he said did make me think about how important the opportunity to further my studies would be if I was offered a placement and how it may mean making some serious personal sacrifices.

Overall, I found it to be a very informative and entertaining lecture that I think gave my peers and myself a lot to think about.