Photography

Before I made a movie I was into Photography. I used to be a freelance photographer and take pictures of bands in low light pushing film to 1600 ASA. Bill one of the characters in Pub Crawl is a war photographer. I buy too much gear and with photo gear now it seems to be obsolete before you get to use it.

I still have Nikon F3 and a Nikon F4 stills cameras and 24mm, 35mm, 85mm and a 180mm. All prime Niikkor lenses. The still work on Nikon digital SLR’s with a 1.6 times magnify effect. They even work on Canon DSLR’s with an adaptor.

Before the Nikons I had Olympus OM-1 and OM-2 camera’s I mainly shot in Black and White and had an enlarger and developed my own films and prints up to A3 size. I still have some of the negatives, but no longer have an enlarger. The fact is with computers you don’t need one. I keep meaning to get a film scanner.

I now have a Nikon D80 which I can use with my old Nikkor lenses. I did think about upgrading it to a Nikon D7000, but it was too expensive so I settled on a Canon 550D.

I used to go out and take pictures on film. Now I can take digital pictures and upload them to my iMac computer, but I don’t get out that much. So even though the pictures are free to take. I take less pictures than I used too when I had to pay for film and development.

Strange really. The new Nikon interchangeable system cameras V1 and J1 with Nikon 1 lenses., look good. I would want to try one out before I buy one and as usual right at this moment, I don’t need them. I’ve hardly used the Canon.

Focusing on camera equipment rather than taking pictures  is the wrong thing to do. Nikon got flamed for suggesting that a better camera and lens takes better pictures.

Some Smartphones can shoot 1080p video and even edit it on the phone.The sound may bot be very good. Like I said I really should go out more and shoot some pictures.

If I am out I usually have an iPhone, but not a camera. I even forget to take my little Canon IXUS 120 compact.

The thing is I have a blind spot I very rarely remember that my mobile phone can take pictures. Seems silly really I just don’t see a phone as a camera, even though I am more than happy to see it as a music system for playing MP3’s, that I use it for all the time.

Not that I have much space to use for photo’s on my phone as it’s full of music. I will try and remember that my iPhone is a camera and a video camera even. 

Unless I go out with the mindset to take pictures the phone stays in my pocket playing music into the tiny earphones.

The Shot

Jessops, the UK’s premier photographic retailer, has teamed up with The Mob Film Company to launch a short film competition. Budding filmmakers up and down the country are being urged to put their work in the spotlight.

Using a Digital Camera or DSLR camera’s movie function, participants must produce a short film of up to 10 minutes called “The Shot”. I’m not sure from the rules wether this means you need to use the microphone on the camera for sound.

I’m not sure how the judges will be able to judge what the film was camera the film was shot on, but that’s the rules.

The competition will be judged by a panel of film and television directors, headed by Paul WS Anderson, Director of the Resident Evil series.

The competition, which runs until early next year, is open to everyone in the UK and offers one lucky winner a very special prize: an all-expenses paid trip to spend the day with Paul WS Anderson on the set of his latest movie. In addition, the winner will also receive a £5000 camera package, courtesy of Nikon.

Full competition rules and submission instructions can be found at www.facebook.com/jessops. Visit www.mobfilm.com for further information and biographies of the judging panel.

I’ve written a short script of about 3 minutes, I will have to find out if that’s long enough. I tried to go for something that should be cheap to shoot, but will need a gun and knife props and a stunt co-ordinator... I’ve copied it below the formatting sort of got lost somewhere. If I do get around to shooting it before the deadline for the competition, it might change a bit but you can get the idea from this script.

The Shot

Written by Harry McGeough

                                                                                                                                FADE IN.

EXT. STREET - NIGHT

It's an empty street lit by street lights.

A VICTIM, wearing black and sunglasses, is walking down the street.

A MUGGER, wearing a hoody and scarf over his mouth, jumps out and threatens the victim with a knife.

                                MUGGER
            Hand over your wallet And give me your mobile.

                                VICTIM
            No.

The mugger looks puzzled and brandishes the knife in front of the victims face.

                                MUGGER
            I'll cut ya.

                                VICTIM
             I need the mobile for my job and I'm not giving you my wallet.

                                MUGGER
            Give me your phone or I'll stab you.

The mugger jabs the knife at the victim.

                                VICTIM
            I told you. I need it for job, see.

The victim holds up his gloved hands.

                                MUGGE
            So your wearing gloves, you can get another phone. Give it to me!

                                VICTIM
            It’s dark. I'm wearing shades and gloves, because I have a scary job.

                                MUGGER
            It's not worth dying for, you can get another phone.

The victim puts his hand inside his jacket.

                                VICTIM
            OK you want my phone? Take it then.

The victim pulls out a gun with a silencer and points it at the muggers head.

                                MUGGER
            Shit! Forget it mate.

                                VICTIM
            You have to ask yourself did he fire 5 shots or 6?

                                MUGGER
            You didn't fire any shots.

                                VICTIM
            So I have a full clip, drop the knife.

The mugger drops the knife and starts backing away.

                                MUGGER
            It's not worth me dying over a mobile phone. Forget about it, mate.

                                VICTIM
            If you run really fast maybe you can outrun my bullet. I'm going to count to 5, then take the shot.

                                MUGGER
            Don't kill me man.

                                VICTIM
            1.

The mugger turns and runs up the road.

                                VICTIM (CONT’D)
            2,3,4,5

The victim fires the gun and hits the mugger in the back.

The muggers falls over face forward. He starts crawling up the road, leaving a trail of blood.

The victim walks up to within a few feet of the mugger.

                                VICTIM (CONT’D)
            Did you guess my job yet?

The Hitman aims the gun at the muggers head.

                                MUGGER
           No! I don't want to die bro.

                                VICTIM
            You're in the wrong place, at the wrong time. I'm on a job and I can't have a witness.

The Hitman fires at point blank range into the muggers head.

                                                                                                                                FADE OUT.

                                    The End.

FCP X First Impressions

I’ve just started editing Megachrist.com footage from script table reading and I’ve installed the 30 day trail version of FCP X 10.0.1 to see how it works. I used FInal Cut Pro 7  for editing Pub Crawl movie. I’ve archived the footage and saved the project files from Pub Crawl. Which means I now have enough hard drive space, about 500 GB, to edit the  new footage.

I saw a demo of Final Cut Pro X, Adobe Premier and Avid Media Composer, put on by BECTU. My gut feeling is actually Apple FCP X seems to do most of what I want and there are no real problems for me to move from FCP 7 to FCP X. Apple FCP X Film Editor was he cheapest at £199, out of the three I saw in the Demo.

Premier does look like a very good program and I can see that quite a few professional Film Editors, not happy with FCP X will move to it. I liked the demo and could see that I could use it and would be happy enough. Except for the price, I found it a bit hard from the website to workout what price is, as you get a 50% discount if you put in code “switch”, So I think it’s about $900. A demo of Adobe Premiere is available on Adobe’s website.

Personally I didn’t get any reason for why I would want to use Avid Media Composer. It seems Avid is really liked by Film Editors who already use and know Avid. Fair enough, but I haven’t and don’t, so see no reason to get Avid. It costs about £1,900 compared to £199 for Apple FCP X. By all means check it out for yourself on Avid’s website

OK you may like Premiere or Avid, but I think I’m either sticking with FCP 7 until till it breaks or upgrading FCP X if I like it enough to make me shell out 200 quid. For me that’s a lot just now.

So back to what I’m doing at this moment. I think I’ve uploaded my files into FCP X. Why am I unsure? Well I uploaded a tape that was one long clip and I can’t see it in the Event Library. When I try and quit program, FCP X informs me that it is busy rendering something, even though I have nothing in my project timeline. So if I quit, am I going to lose something?

As I wasn’t sure where my imported tape had gone too. I imported it a second time. I can’t see either of the file imports. I mean it should be 60 minutes long, so I should be able to spot it. I found where I think FCP X has parked the files on my Hard Disk. It is in my user account under movies / Final Cut Events / New Event / Original Media.

The first thing I notice is that the files I dragged in from iPhoto where not actually in this directory, but alias’s pointed to the source files in iPhoto library. there may well be a way to get FCP X not to do that, because it seems like it will be messy when I want to archive project in the future.

The reason the movie files where in iPhoto is because when I plugged Canon 550D into my Mac, iPhoto popped up and downloaded the files from the camera. I did try using a USB SD card reader, but it didn’t recognise one of my SD cards. Plugging camera in with USB lead worked best.

On location it would be useful to have something, either a PCMIA SD card Reader or a USB SD card reader. That would allow off loading what’s on the SD card, while camera is still be used to shoot more video footage. The PCMIA seems a better fit for my Apple laptop, but USB SD card reader is cheaper.

On the Megachrist shoot it was the first time I’ve used DSLR camera. I don’t have a “RIG” or any add-ons, so I used the camera hand held or on a tripod. At first I thought that the camera would auto focus, which meant early shoots where... out of focus. I didn’t really get what I wanted which was close-ups. I didn’t have the other Camcorder set up for the right wide shoots. The sound I got seems useable. Some of the video footage is OK, but I really want to re-shoot it again.

I know I need to get more batteries and SD cards for Canon 550D before next shoot. The batteries seem cheapest on Ebay or Amazon. Prices for SD cards seem to be average of £1 a GB. I forgot to bring USB SD card reader, so I couldn’t re-use SD cards by uploading them to laptop. I had 2 SD cards, but one was too slow being a class 4 card. I only realised this when I looked at footage from card. Really should use class 6 or better still class 10 cards.

Some of the movie files have a yellow exclamation mark on them. I have no idea why. FCP X seems to be telling me that something is wrong, but not what is wrong. I know I really should read the manual, but I’ve got out of the habit, as most things seem to work mot of the time and I can figure out how to make them go. Even if I actually figure out how to use them wrongly and in a way that takes more time to use.

The manual for FCP X is on Apple’s website. My first impressions of FCP X is that I like it, even though I don’t know how to “make it go” yet.

Finally Wrapped Post Production on Pub Crawl Movie

I’ve finally wrapped Post Production on Pub Crawl Movie.

I’ve been using FCP 7 to edit the movie and I now have a Widescreen 235:1 version, a 16:9 version and 5 30 minutes Pub Crawl TV shows.

I have archived the FCP project file and the scratch capture files to a 330 GB Hard Drive and now I have 500 GB free on my iMac’s internal Hard Disk.

I have some footage that I shot from the Megachrist.com script reading but before I download it from the camera, I’m going to install the Apple FCP X 30 day trial.

I used a Canon XHA1 to shoot 1440 x 1080 HDV on 2 Mini-DV tapes. The new FCP is supposed to be able to import from a Firewire device so I was going to use that to import my video footage.

I also used a Canon 550D on the shoot. It was my first time using a DSLR. Now I know I need to buy more SD cards and batteries, before next shoot. The DSLR went through 2 set of batteries, while the film camera only used half the power of one battery. The 550D files are already on my Hard Disk. I plugged the camera in and Apple iPhoto imported the video footage as if it where photo’s.

I didn’t have any other crew so I used tripods and operated both cameras and recorded sound on the Canon XHA1, using a gun microphone on the camera and another mic on the table. I was surprised by how good the sound on the 550D was just using the on-board microphone.

THe Megachrist.com worked out great from my point of view. I hope the actors will also get something out of it. The script has gone from 109 pages to a faster 87 pages. The beginning and ending are better. The main prophet characters now enter earlier into the story, Moses enters on page 9 now.

I’m planning to do a re-shoot in the near future, but I might wait till after the new year. I want to see how I get on with editing the footage that I have before doing a re-shoot.

MEK ROBOT WAR

MEK is a story about the far future... Far into the distant future mankind has moved into the stars. Only he has left his body behind him. The universe is populated by machines. Thinking machines, MEK. And the ghost in those machines is man.


Commander Tom Black is part of a new breed of hero who commands the Dark Clan MEK Fleet. He wants to save the world. So it can be a fit place to bring up the children he wants to have with the lovely Russian beauty Natalia Andropov. 


It happened gradually but peoples minds where copied into computers. When the end of the world came the people disappeared because they could not survive in the new world but the machines lived on and conquered new worlds. 


They went to Mars, Venus, Mercury and Jupiter. They didn’t stop there they left in vast armada’s for different solar systems. The machines could live forever all they needed to do was replace their parts when they wore out. 


Outside the Earth are worlds run by machines. The machines are run by people who have long since died. They live on in virtual worlds where they have bodies and go about their business as if nothing has changed. The virtual world is the world of the late twentieth century. 


The MEK clans have territories. 


Dark Clan - are dark heat resistant robots from Mercury. They have fleets of dark strong shielded battle cruisers. It trades in advanced weapons and technologies. 


Green Clan - green chemical resistant robots that can survive on the planet Venus. The planet has vast cities carved into mountains. Venus has large chemical corporations and mining companies. 


Blue Clan - the home world the weakest clan as the world has been almost mined out. The surface still has vast polluted oceans, deserts and is in the middle of an ice age. The forests and jungles are gone. Some of the main cities still survive. 


Red Clan - the red planet. Mars was the first planet to be colonized and is the richest and most war like of all the clans. 


Gold Clan - the gas mining clans of Jupiter. The clans live in vast floating cities and 
on the Jupiter moons of Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto.


White Clan - control Saturn the ring planet and its moons. This has proved to be a very lucrative location as it contains precious metals and diamonds. They also control Neptune and Uranus. Battle hardened robots able to survive in the freezing temperatures of the out planets. 


Exploration is still going on in the outer reaches. Several interstellar ships have been sent out, but nothing has been heard from them. So most of the fighting is for control of the solar system. 


Man has lost it’s humanity but has one last chance to get it back. The Dark Clan has perfected human cloning and want to rebuild the Earth. They want to replant the Forrest's and jungles, re-freeze the polar ice caps, clean up the air. Make the Earth a place where people can live again. 


The other Clan’s are against this plan. They want to explore the galaxy. The Dark Clan go to War with the other Clans and so begins the MEK Robot War. 


MEK short for Mekanoid, the first go anywhere, do anything Robot, made by MEK Corp. 


It’s inventor Mary “MK” McKenzie, is still alive and well living in the Net, in Digital Los Angeles, the movie capital of the Net. She got feed up designing Robots after a hundred years, “Anyway the MEK’s do a better job of designing themselves”, she gave it all up and became a movie producer. 


She still has a controlling interest in MEK Corp, the company she started to produce MEK’s. Sometimes referred to as the Mother of Robotics.

Countdown To Sponsume Crowd Funding End

The audition was a bit of a disaster, nothing to do with the actors. As I was going out I did a last minute check and realised that I didn’t have my wallet on me. I usually leave it in my pocket, but I’d been shopping so I’d left it in my jack pocket, but  it wasn’t there. I looked for it everywhere I could think of but, I didn’t find it. So I had to go out without debit card, credit cards, unlimited Cineworld or money.

I did have 50p and my Oyster card. I arranged with my friend and co-producer to get to The Dublin Castle on time and meet with the actors. I’ve known Mick for years. One of the characters in Pub Crawl movie was based on him. He was a producer on

the movie, so I expected Mick would be there. I had spoken to him twice that morning.

I got into to Camden ten minutes late and got a call from an actor waiting at the bar. No Mick, still haven’t heard from him. He didn’t show up.

What else could go wrong?

The last timeI used The Dublin Castle for auditions for Pub Crawl movie, seemed to work OK. I think we had a great cast. I had set the time for 11am, but found out the bar didn’t open until 12pm. So this time I had set the time for the auditions for 12 noon.

When I got there the Pub was closed. It didn’t open until 1pm, they had some sort of meeting. Yes, I know I should have checked.

So out of thirty actors six showed up and one Magda had read the script three years ago when it got optioned by Trudie Styler’s company Xingu. Magda really wanted to play Kate and I feel she is the best one for it. She is also helping with asking some of her actor friends to read in the script reading.

Later I met with Leigh and Tricia, who where both in Pub Crawl movie. Leigh played Ray and Tricia played Nicky. I convinced Tricia that the part of Julie in Megachrist would be great for her and Leigh likes the Devil part that I wrote as the last scene of the movie. 

It turns out that Tricia now runs a talent agency, so she is helping Magda with getting more actors for the shoot. Which should still go ahead on the 14th October, two days before my birthday.