FDMX Wired Wednesdays- Freelance survival

Was incredibly torn between staying at home and getting on with work (3 weeks of core-unit) or going to this presentation which looked brilliant. I definitely made the right choice by going and risking a lower quality portfolio for tomorrow. Of course this blog is also a great distraction from writing my long overdue 'critical evaluation' for the bloody research portfolio- but the afternoon session at the County Hall was great. Pretty lengthy (3 hours) but could've sat through more really. So many hints and tips, which may seem totally obvious, like 'pay your tax on time' and 'keep your receipts' but good advice on decisions made concerning being a sole trader or a company for instance. The very animated couple were from Urban Fox LTD www.urbanfox.tv very entertaining and totally informative. As soon as I got home I bought a few domain names pertinent to what I want to do in the future. This was one of the questions they asked us.."do you have a domain name" "No" they were quite flabbergasted with this collective news. Also they advised to always have an Apple Video ipod with your show reel on at all times as you never know who you may bump into- in fact they were like Apple pushers in a way, but I do see their point. I myself was a bit anti-Mac a while back, but now I am a convert. They are nice.

Music Videos from Superface

Here's a couple of music videos what I did make, one for The Toy Dolls and another for St.Louis ska sensations MU330 -






cheers!

BA Final Film

Here's my final film for my BA -

Collaboration Project - The Foxes Tail

Last night was exclusively spent sketching various characters for a party scene in the first paragraph of the short story - I took inspiration from my visit to the Staatsgalerie in Stuttgart and feel that the costumes for the Oskar Schlemmer ballet will make great characters for that particular scene. I ideally would like to make 3d models and animate them in a 3d program. I downloaded an educational version of Maya, something I'm totally unfamiliar with. I looked at it, and it's not so different from 3dsmax-but this version is watermarked to hell, so anything produced with it will looked crap as you like. Still, it will help me navigate around the program and to get to grips with it. Well, that's the plan. I have already made a ball bounce and given it a material to make it appear less naked., A* star and top of the class, well done tiny-brain! After a few initial experiments with After Effects to attempt to get a title screen together I moved onto Premier to really roughly edit some stuff to the soundtrack with the aim of having the narration over the top of this. I met up with Paul Knight (author) and set upon recording the narration in the sound room this afternoon. After help from Phil, we were ready to roll so-to-speak and we managed to get the recording down in with not too much hassle at all, Paul was obviously well rehearsed which was a great help. Good also that he is very keen to help in any way possible with this project. I do aim for the assessment to have a good chunk of the story completed- so from that a feel for the whole film can be achieved, but I would if possible like to complete the whole lot. Blogging is a great distraction from the horror that is THE 'research portfolio' I'm finding it increasingly difficult to articulate what I actually already know.(or think I do) I think my 'stupid gene' may have kicked in over the years spent away from education. I hope I can find an antidote. and bloody quick.

Collaboration Project - The Foxes Tail

Yesterday evening I visited Paul Knight, authour of 'The Foxes Tail' I showed him the progress so far and typeface ideas for the beginning-the typeface wasn't to his taste so that was changed. Also we decided upon a suitable background track to the narration, a track from a band Teflon Tel Aviv whih seems to fit with the atmosphere of it. The track is quite dreamlike in its own way. Also was recommended more books filled with example of medieval woodcuts (a passion of his and stylistically an aim for this short film) so a good visit with positive feedback for the progress so far. Will edit together a 'rough cut' version of the first scene/paragraph of the story- fingers crossed.

Collaboration Project - The Foxes Tail

Following on from the storyboarding I set off again to the coast to have another go and getting some beach footage. Had to hurry as my main objective was to time lapse the sun setting over either Cromer or Sheringham and I left Norwich around 2.30p.m. The weather was o.k. quite dry thankfully and was a relative success. Was a little worried about the possible detrimental effect the salty sea air may have on the equipment - also there was a moment of panic when the laptop had a rubbish moment and for a while it was 'thinking' about saving what I had shot, maybe as I shot every scene as one project-in the future it would be better to shoot lots of seperate projects. But in the end it did save which was a relief. Not so happy however with what I did shoot but had planned to return today to explore a good spot that had been reommended to capture the sun setting, but again the weather scuppered this plan. So today is spent frantically drawing and thinking about completing the research portfolio which I wish I had have taken care of a while back. 'Never leave it all to the last minute' is advice I seem to not take notice of unfortunatly! Mind you, if I was interested in it I think my attitude would be alot different! From looking at the photo above I grow ever increasingly edgy that the seaside excursion will have bad long term effects on the equipment.