Bring Me Sunshine

Wow. Being sarcastically positive really works.

Today the sun shone, shone, and then shone some more.  In fact it shone so much, I managed to get all the shots I needed - plus quite a few additional ones - of my three very busy little girls.  They looked perfect, did as they were directed and ate ice cream afterwards with aplomb.  We even had time to hit the paddling pools to cool off a bit before lunch.

Today completed the 'shoot' part of my short: now for the edit and my nose being firmly pressed to some random grindstone. Crikey m'lord, we're nearly there.

Busy, busy. Stop.

A pretty manic week to be honest as I have been desperately trying to tie up the last few exterior shots for my short.  These are dependent on the availability of three young girls, and if their social agendas are anything like The Kid's (sounds like they are) then getting them in one place, at one time for two whole hours is really going to be nothing short of a miracle.  It also needs to be a sunny day - hey ho - but let's stay positive, eh?  Let's tick all those darned boxes, goddamit. Let's lift our dreary chins up to the bright sunny sky. Let's smile out loud. Yup. Yup. Yup. Hallelujah!

Anyway.

The Kid now has a rash and a continual drippy nose thanks to his MMR jab but that didn't stop him from pushing his own buggy for half a mile following Mummy doing another recce. I did offer to push him in it, but he flatly refused. T'was a fair deal after a year of me doing the pushing, I guess. 

So here we are, another Friday and another video to ease you into the weekend. I beg you to cast aside your shoes with impromptu nonchalance, divulge your relief in the most verbose fashion, and make merry with sheer frivolity.  

Ok, just have a good weekend, then - I really hope none of these are you...

Emm, Emm, Aaaargh!

Today I had that awful feeling of: if I didn't - I was a bad mother; if I did - I was also a bad mother.  I am talking the combined MMR vaccination here, and in the pending wake of an epidemic (or was it going to be a pandemic?), I figured I should be The Bad Mother Who Chose To Vaccinate.  So The Kid is in bed and we've only had one wake up so far to report (just the usual dropped dummy).  However, I did notice he had a feint rash across his cheeks along with a chipmunk-like look.  It could of course be my imagination, which I am sure is going to run riot for the next few weeks.  Elinor has suggested Calpol and Wine, though I'm not sure they taste so good mixed.  You never know, it could be the next Red Bull & Vodka.  I'll let you know.

Talking of drinking - sorry, I meant talking of talking - I had a lovely afternoon in the fantastic company of Far Away, Potdoll & Helen on Saturday and what started out as a very calm, civilised 'coffee and cake' turned into a hysterically funny meeting of the minds (and livers). Think Women's Institute morphs into Coyote Ugly and you're vaguely moving in the right direction.

Right. Back to work I go.  Enough procras for one evening. Laters.

Friday Laugh

Can't believe it's Friday already.  Here's another funny video to ease you into the weekend. Have a good one, all.

Featured Kaos

Kaos Films - they of the BSSC - have now announced further details of their British Feature Screenplay Competition (BFSC).  In a nutshell, the winner of this competition will have their screenplay produced (not put into development) and filmed with a pro cast & crew and budget of up to $2million.

Rules are pretty much similar to the BSSC in that the competition is open to writers from any country and screenplays must be written in English language, however, in this instance (being a feature comp!) the screenplay running time should be between 80 and 110 minutes.  The entry fee is also a little heftier too: £65 early bird; £85 before final deadline.

You've got until 12th September 2008 to get your 'early bird' script in although  I suspect a lot of people will be cracking the whip to get their Red Planet entry polished around the same time (deadline: 30th Sept).  

The final deadline for BFSC entry is 14th November 2008 and full rules can be found here.

Also, go check out Mr Beckley's short film, "Fatal" - he wrote it, directed it and 'just did it'.  Good on you, matey.

Wrath of the Edit Suite

A friend just emailed me this and I had to share it with you all.  Quite the best laugh I've had a for a while.  ;)

Never Rains but it Pours

I recently succumbed to the deadly tummy bug lurgy thingy which has been a total killer. It steam-rollered me during the early hours of Sunday morning and I have only just begun to function properly today.  I still ache from head to foot but that is down to the fact that around 1am on Monday I stumbled out of bed in a hallucinatory state, convinced I was going to be sick for the tenth time that hour, lurched towards the bathroom, missed the door handle and face planted into The Kid's door with a rather loud crash. At least that's what my Miss Marple braincell thinks happened but I can't verify the details - I just woke up in a heap wondering what all the noise had been, why I was kissing the door and indeed, how long I had been there. I managed to cut my shoulder, graze my arm and nearly break my nose, which is still a lovely blackened shade along with the pretty, dark "oops, my eyeliner really slipped" looking eyes. Not so much a sexy, smouldering look, as a bruised, smoked kipper effect. ;(

On an up note, last night I finally managed to complete the rough edit for my Swarovski/Tank Films comp entry No.1, so now I know exactly what footage I need to shoot in a couple of weeks' time to complete it.  I'm quite happy with it thus far so hope things will carry on in that vein.  I also got a lovely email the other day informing me of my successful ticket application for the VISA London 2012 Party in August.  Acts are to be announced but it promises to be on par with Live Aid (1985).  It's a bit of a double edged sword as it is happening the day I was meant to be returning from the Edinburgh Festival but I guess I'll just have to head home a bit earlier.  

So, me and 39,999 other peeps on The Mall will be "celebrating the hand-over of the Olympic flag from Bejing to London".  Anyone else going?  Be sure to wave.

Time Out Meme

I seem to be going round in circles with my rough edit mainly because I changed editing software half way through: never a good idea.  I was extremely impressed with Apple's service though - I ordered my software at around 3pm on Wednesday and it arrived less than 24 hours later.  Very coolios.

Now I am getting to grips with all the functionality of the aforementioned software, Final Cut - and there are a lot of functions to get my tired little head round - but all in all it seems to be going ok though. I think. I have sat in on so many edits over the years I can dream-walk through all the correct mouse clicks and visualize the perfect requirement - if only I knew where they were in the menus and what they were actually called to begin with.  "The thingy that makes it go all fadey and frizzly" is a strange way to explain a cross dissolve but as I said, I'm getting there. I doubt any whizzy-dizzy editors would agree, but I'm trying!

In order to rest my Final Cut brain cells a little, I have thought up a new little meme, so here goes; copy and paste this info into yours and off you go...

"Name the last ten (10) programmes/films saved onto your hard drive/ Sky+/ Virgin+Box/ video / other media recording drive and then tag five more people to do the same."

Mine are:

1. In the Night Garden
2. Top Gear
3. Imagine...Annie Lebovitz
4. Rough Guide to Ultimate Escapes
5. Saturday Kitchen
6. Blade: Trinity
7. This is England
8. Rough Guide to Urban Adventures
9. The Ipcress File
10. Gordon The Garden Gnome

I have only stuck the links in mine in case you are really bored today. 

Right then, here are my lucky lot: I tag Potdoll, Lianne, Lucy, Mark, Arnopp & Beckley.

Free Falling

At least, that's how it feels. Mad? Tick. Exciting? Tick. A revelation? Tickety-tick-tick.

Whilst most of my learned cyber-buds were soberly sanctifying their scriberly souls (ahem) at SWF, I decided to throw down the gauntlet and set myself a little challenge.  Or perhaps that should be: I threw a great, heaving, metal gauntlet at myself and it hit me in this guise:

Swarovski has teamed up with Tank to search the creative community for the freshest film directors around. The Three Graces competition, which launches today, is an open call to filmmakers and creatives working with the moving image to develop a short film to accompany one of three exclusive tracks we’ve commissioned for the project.  Submissions will interpret the myth of the Three Graces, who symbolise the qualities of radiance, joy and abundance.

After reading about the competition in Saturday's (28th June) Shooting People Filmmakers' Bulletin,  I spent the best part of yesterday storyboarding, setting up test shots, checking light levels, filming, chucking together a rough edit and thoroughly enjoying every single darn second of it. After very little sleep (editing becomes strangely obsessive, y'know), I woke up exhausted but buzzing and ready to get going on my plans for a second day of filming drop-ins and cutaways which will complete the shoot.  

After editing and perfecting (ha!) the current material, this will be Entry Number One.  Whether I have the time to devise/shoot/edit Entry Number Two, Three and so on is another situation entirely but I do have lots of ideas kicking around - what happens to those remains to be seen; however, if I don't do something with at least one of them, that gauntlet is going to jump up and choke me. Fingers crossed it doesn't!

For all you out there who wish to have a punt, full details are here.

Good Luck & leave a comment if you are entering!