Uni OVER and work progress update...

Well uni is over for this year... and damn its a relief! Past few weeks I have been working on my final project, Making a DVD menu of all of our work done this year. Handed that in last week after hours in Adobe Encore, but pleased to say I am now finished.

Okay, few things that need to be done now. Met up with Jill Robinson last week day after hand-in, to wrap up our work. We have been asked to produce a batch of copies of the YMCA Documentary film, as it was requested by several people from YMCA's over the country. I suggested for this, that I will make a DVD menu. So I guess the next few weeks I will be doing that. Short clips from the film will also be produced to be put up onto the YMCA website.
Besides that, I have tried to get a copy of the ALIVE project, the green screening from the people we worked with. However, they have not yet completed the edit. So as soon as I get that I will post it up here!

Umm what else... Oh ye I have a client for our final year project. Just to be a bit ahead of the game, Im going to be meeting up with Deborah to discuss the project and hopefully meet the client to sort things out. I have also come up with ideas for my final year research project and some artefacts, but I think I will need to think up a few more. So thats a task for me to think over in the holidays!!

Just realised I haven't uploaded the full version of the YMCA film. Will post that in the next blog. Have a great summer guys and enjoy!

YMCA England Project Update

Well, we have had a little break after our film screening at the YMCA National Conference. We are now going to meet up with Jill this Monday at 12.00pm to wrap up and discuss what we are going to do further with the project now that the film has been completed. We have now been asked to produce short clips to take from our completed film and make them for the YMCA England website.

YMCA National Conference film screening... complete

It was great! I mean we were worried that the resolution may appear different on the screen at the EMCC, but it was fine. All the people loved it and we got a big applause at the end! The speech was a bit nerve-racking in front of a few hundred people, but it went good. I did mention in the speech for the opportunity for future projects to take place (for our third year projects).



Many people at the tea break congratulated us on the good work. At the end of the conference, we were approached by a few people for some potential third year projects. More on that soon!

The YMCA National Conference

Maybe, I forgot to mention this earlier on, but when we finished our YMCA Project, they wanted us to screen it at the annual YMCA National Conference (now thats a big deal!). All the editing for this has now been done, and tomorrow is the big day. The conference which is held every year by YMCA England, will take place at the East Midlands Conference Centre (EMCC), at the University of Nottingham.
There will be a few hundred people present at the screening, and yes we have to make a small speech about our film. After a unanimous decision (of course) its me who is going to do the speech. I'm writing up my speech right now, even though I was told something brief, it is rather long.
We will be recording the conference and screening for our portfolio's, so make sure to watch here for the video.

Dome ALIVE Project - Green Screen

I have also accepted an offer from NTU researchers to help them film in green screen for a dome project. I know it's so much with collaborating with fashion students to film their project, and working with YMCA England filming in various locations across the UK, and all the work from uni. But I think doing all of this will help me gain experience that will be valuable for me in the future. Not only will it provide me with practice, but also give me potential companies to work with in the future. So, for this Dome Project, we booked out a fairly large room in the new Newton building (I think its called) and set up a green screen. I've never done this before, so this was new to me. Also, all the equipment was fairly new to me too. We were using the new Panasonic cameras with the green screen attachments. This is an easier way to make a green screen, rather than having a green drop-down to work with.




















We interviewed about 7 people behind a green-screen back-drop. As this film is going to be shown to attract students coming to NTU and attract them to the course, all of the people interviewed were involved in the film industry some way or another. There was one person who owned his own film company in Nottingham called Shadow Smith Film. Another person who was a freelance play writer, a freelance editor and camera-operator, someone else who works with Spool Films and the EM Media Development Agency, an actor, someone who has been a runner on This Is England (2006) by Shane Meadows, and a 2D animator.










































































































































In the end, I learnt how to use green-screen and I networked with people who are in the film industry successfully. I got a few business cards from some of the people and talked about our projects, and talked through with them about how they made their way up in the industry.

Collaboration with Fashion Students...

Accepted an offer a few weeks ago from fashion students at NTU to help them with a project for their course. We filmed and interviewed about 30 fashion students, using two cameras. We were fortunate as we filmed in a studio where photo shoots take place, therefore most of the lighting was already in place and we were given various backdrops. We have a few more dates set to film some more things. This is all for their end of year fashion exhibition.

Feedback for Notts County Film

So today we showed our films and I believe we got good feedback. Feedback received was that it was a lot better than the previous draft, the interviews interlinked well, the sound worked well where it was used, however could have done without at some points, and the titles sequence and voice-over worked really well.



I believe this was well-deserved feedback, as I spend A LOT of time changing/editing (not being big headed), so getting the good feedback felt good. A group that worked well to achieve a good result.

Notts County editing editing editing CRAZYY

Ok, so i've been editing our Notts County documentary for a few weeks now and it's honestly doing my head in! I've spend a crazy amount of hours on it, due to changes etc. I took out a whole interview, added the voice-over the second time after re-recording, and cutting each of the FIVE tapes and taking out what was needed was a mission in itself. However, I have now editing a final piece, just under 10 minutes. With all this effort, I hope everyone likes it!

Meeting for YMCA Proj

Met today with Jill from the YMCA to discuss how we are going to go about editing. We discussed the length and we were also asked to produce short clips (taken from the documentary) that would be put up on the YMCA website (and potential payment may be in place for us to complete this task). Editing will now go on it's way, should be done in a few weeks!!

YMCA Project Video Blog (Liverpool) - 10/02

Video blog for the first part of a project we have done for YMCA England. This took place in the YMCA in Liverpool on the 10th of February 2010.

Link for it on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KM6h6BmsjWs

Notts County Doc update... SVEN RESIGNS (and makes our doc even more interesting!)

Went down to Notts County ground today for some GV shots and footage that could be used as b-roll. Oh yeh, between today and yesterdays interview with John Staplton, Sven Goran Eriksson has resigned as manager from Notts County!

At first we thought that this will make our documentary harder to film, due to all the media attention, and we also had good comments from John about Sven's arrival and how it will serve Notts County well in he future. However, we could incorporate this into our documentary and link this in with the issues of why fans have decreased and the how the change of so many managers over the years have affected the club.

As we were not given permission to film anything within the ground, we got alot of GV shots from all around the ground. As well as this, we got gained alot of good stills also.

Given that there was loads of media attention at the football ground today, we were lucky in gaining an extra interview. We met someone who worked as an accountant for Notts County. Due to all the problems etc the team have been facing recently, he refused wanting to be interviewed. But after a bit of persuasion, he agreed to do a short interview for us, but NOT mentioning anything about the issues of finance and just talking about the club in general. We did get some VERY interesting stories about Notts County from him, but it was a shame we couldn't get them on film as he didn't want to disclose anything on camera.

Whilst filming all around the ground, we also met a VJ (video journalist), who was also there to film the ground, who gave us a good few tips. Me and Chris, asked the reception if we could film in the ground (again, just in case), however we were told by the receptionist that it would be really difficult, as there was alot of media around. He did, however, tell us to come back next week and we may be able to do it.

Notts County Doc update... Interview with John

Today we have filmed an interview with John Staplton, who has been a Notts County fan all of his life. I believe we got alot of footage that will give ease in the editing phase. Ben, our director, wrote down a set of questions, and I believe from them, we got good detailed responses.

Tomorrow, we will be visiting the Notts County stadium to film some GV shots (and obviously much more), the more the better i.e. what I said in my earlier blog that because we will have limited time given by Notts County, and all the group will be coming along, we will use all the equipment we have to get more footage completed.

YMCA Liverpool... Shooting complete

Its 09.15pm and we have just got back from Liverpool.

Two and a half hours on the train damn! Really tired now, but it was a great day. We got alot of footage and some really interesting and very moving interviews. We interviewed four people in total. The interesting thing was that each person had a different story to tell and where they have come from, to how they have bettered themselves by being part of the YMCA organisation. We chose to do the interviews in two separate loacations. We also got some GV shots of the surrounding area of Liverpool YMCA. I was very pleased with the support we got from Jill and Darren from the YMCA.

I have also filmed a video diary for this project, and I will be continuing this for London and Nottingham. Keep an eye out!


Next stop is the London YMCA this Monday the 15th. Looking forward to it, should be good.

YMCA doc update...

All arrangments have been sorted for the days. Both sets of train tickets to Liverpool and London have been recieved to myself. We had a meeting on Wednesday, with Jill, Deborah and the whole group and discussed everything and made final arrangements to be set for filming on the 10th February. Alan just needs to have a look at the pictures Jill has sent and complete risk assessments. We are going to have another meeting to complete the shot list, shot schedule, and other things prior to our filming day. I have contacted Jill for some archive footage that we can include, however she is still in the process of getting hold of that. We will also, after the next meeting, meet John and re-check all the equipment and check that the tie mics are working as they were not previously.

The roles of group members are:

Abdul Seedat - Director and editing and camera assistant
Umar Hussain - Producer, and Sound recording and post production music/effects
Duncan Leigh - Camera/Lighting, and post production visual effects
Alan Vickerstaff - Locations Manager, titles designer, photographer

FAIL

We have abandoned our idea of the 'unseen heroes' theme of our documentary because we have not been given permission by Notts County Football Club to film the interiews that we needed to. However, they have allowed us to have a 30 minute slot in which we will be allowed to film GV shots. We have discussed in our meeting today about how we can make the most of this 30 minute slot, as this is the only time we will be given. We will take two Sony Z1's, a camcorder, any relevent sound equipment, and a stills camera to get as much footage as we can. The whole group will be present on this day and given individuals jobs, so that everything can be done on time and within the allocated 30 minutes.

However, on the good side, for the YMCA project, I have spoken to Jill about some other arrangments about tickets to the locations and she will be posting them soon. Jill has also proposed another meeting with the whole group sometime next week, in which we will also meet Simon from the communications team from the YMCA.
The only concern I have is clashing of days, as both of my projects will be running alongisde each other. If we arrange to interview someone on a day (for the Notts County Doc), it may be on one of the dates I am doing the YMCA shooting, mentioned in my earlier post. However, as of now, I know for sure the dates of the YMCA project, and we have planned to shoot one of our days for Notts County on the 11th February, which is the day straight after our filming in Liverpool. Hopefully, it will work out well, because the way I see it is, the YMCA project we are doing will help me and give me a real-life experience on working with a client and getting valuable work experience. It will be good practice for me for my final year clientel project also, as I have spoken to a few finals years and they have mentioned it is something similar to what they are doing in their projects.

YMCA Project

Ok, there is another project we have took on a few weeks back. Its a project that the YMCA have asked us to do. There are three other people as well as me who are doing this. We have been asked to make a documentary about the various YMCA centres across the UK and show what work they do and how they help young people. Basically we will show the hard work and contribution of the YMCA throughout the documentary. We have had a meeting with someone from the YMCA and have discussed how we are going to approach the film and we also organised the days and travel etc.

We will be filming in Liverpool, London, and Nottingham. The dates are as follows:
Liverpool - 10th February
London - 15th February
Nottingham - 3rd March

Should be good!

Documentary For NottsCounty

So, we have been given our groups and our topics for our documentary projects. Our topic is about the Notts County Football Club. We have already had one meeting to understand how we are approaching the film. We have come up with many ideas, but the one we have chosen to stick with is a 'unseen heroes' theme of the football. Hence, we will be interviewing thpse people who work behind the scenes to make the football club and run it. We have come up with a title 'Notts County: The People behind the dream'. The sort of people who we are aimed at interviewing are people who have been working at NottsCounty Football Club for a long while. In this way, we can get a more better understanding and personal experience from these people.

Roles for Documentary

Ben Thorpe: Director
Alan Vickerstaff: Producer
Umar Hussain: Editor
Chris Swann: Sound
Ryan Carthy: Camera