Central Casting

The wikipedia entry on stock characters. There's also a few lists of stock characters for genres- war, sci-fi and horror, but none for crime, which I'd be interested in seeing for a non-Presents project I'm working on.

Technorati tag: Characters, Spinneyhead, Stereotypes

Cheap Movies

Cheap, but influential.

Maybe we've got something to learn. Looking at the budget for El Mariachi, well over half was in the cost of film reel and the post-processing colour conversion. Brings the cost down nearer to our £35.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

The trailer for Memory is now online

From Spinneyhead Presents-

Memory

Original music by Alan Ward.

Featuring Mary Hooton, Kate Ambrose and David Robertson.

Thanks also to Clare who helped with the initial edit that I've tweaked to come up with this version.

It's permalinked here if the embedded Flash version isn't working for you.

We should be filming the last of the footage we need in the next week or so, and then I'll get down to editing it all together. After that there'll still need to be a last session recording voiceovers for the stuff we shot in Salford Quays because all you can hear is wind noise..

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

A few links

Digital Departures, a scheme to fund three micro-budget feature films in the northwest- specifically Liverpool. £250,000 sounds huge compared to Memory's budget of 35 quid, but I guess it is tiny compared to other professional film ventures.

The Urban Screens conference, to be held in October, will cover the creation of content for big screens such as the one in Exchange Square.

Kinofilm. I will make it to one of their nights eventually. Kinofilm on MySpace.

Wysiwyg film distribution.

Castings Factory.

Girls on Film

Girls on Film began in March 2005 when a group of creative women arranged to meet at the Cornerhouse in Manchester. Alissa Juvan had contacted the women, who were all on Media Training North West's Digit-elle scheme, with a view to starting up a film group.

Spiderbrace

The Spiderbrace is a shoulder mounted rig for getting steadier shots from your video camera. Not quite a full steadycam, but slicker than the $14 version.

via BoingBoing

Revenue

A list of websites that pay for video content, either through charging for downloads or advertising schemes.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

Chase Scene

Would it be telling to say that there isn't a chase scene in Memory? Shame, I think what we need for the next film is bike chase scene. Only so we can try a camera mount. As long as we don't make it like any of the 80s bmx movies, we'll be ok. Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

Location, Location, Location

Ian's film (which currently has the title "memory") has started shooting in Manchester.

I managed to take quite a few photos today of the cast and crew (which will be released later), but just to wet your appetite a little bit, the photos I took of the location and the view can be found here.


Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

Film Sound

www.filmsound.org

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

BigStoryLittleFilm

The BigStoryLittleFilm competition challenges you to make a short film (of no more than 5 minutes duration) based upon or inspired by something from the Bible. Maybe a story, a theme, a character, a particular passage or phrase or even a word – it’s up to you.

The winner, category winner and short listed films will be
screened at a special Gala Awards ceremony at a leading
cinema venue in Greater Manchester on 9 June 2007.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead, BigStoryLittleFilm

Five pound entry for a film festival

A digital short- Colin Can't Be Killed- made on a budget of £5 has been picked for inclusion in the DNA Film Festival on Toronto. This is the sort of exposure we're hoping for for Spinneyhead Presents' productions.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead, Film Festival

Fonts and Stuff

Fonts and other resources for film makers.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead, Font

How to make a short film

Darren Rowse at ProBlogger is having another group writing project. I haven't decided what, if anything, to do for it yet, but I did find one piece that's already been submitted that deserves linking to-

How To Make A Short Film For Tropfest

With the exception of meeting the festival requirements, everything on that list applies to any short film project. We've done a bit of the first five parts, but are still in pre-production in other areas. The filming schedule has slipped back to starting in October as well, but that's just the way it goes.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead, How To

Video Blogging- Microphone Tests

It seems logical that Presents should have a video blog, so here's the first one. It's actually a couple of weeks old, I had problems getting it uploaded. Microphone Testing, in case you wanted to know the sort of silly things I say when I'm put in front of a camera unscripted.

Technorati tag: Video, VideoBlog, Vlog, Spinneyhead

Revver 1.0

Revver, Spinneyhead Presents' video host of choice, has left beta and is now officially in version 1.0. This means a better looking interface for everyone and more comprehensive stats for uploaders. I finally managed to get the video blog I did w8ith footage from testing microphones (my own fault, hadn't compressed it enough) and it should become available soon.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead, Revver

Going semi-pro

Part one of a series on producing low/no budget videos that look more professional than the outlay would suggest. As with so many articles of this type, the comments hold as much information as the post.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

Anatomy of a shootout

A documentary on YouTube showing how the short film Semi Automatic was made. (Semi Automatic part 1, part 2)

Note I don't have headphones to hand, so I can't watch this with sound. I'm bookmarking it as much for my own reference as anything else.

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

Stunt cam

One of the ideas we've been knocking around for Spinneyhead Presents is the purchase of a few "stunt cams", cheap video cameras that could be strapped to bikes or cars or dropped off buildings because their survival isn't paramount, only the footage. They'll probably be found on Ebay or in a Cash Converters. Then we might make something like "I dropped my Super 8 off the Golden Gate", but with footage of the actual fall.

via BoingBoing

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead

Microphone Blimps

If you're aiming for any sort of quality sound on location recording, you need to cut down the wind noise. Can get very expensive, very quickly. So how about we make a blimp of our own? Better still, I want eyes on mine

Technorati tag: Video, Spinneyhead