ARD604 Creative Futures 3

Creative Futures Week

Dr Stuart Cunningham Opening Address

Creative Futures this year began with a rousing entrance from Dr Stuart Cunningham Head of Creative Industries. Stuart called it his "Wrestling entrance".

He began by explaining that the Creative Industries aims to provide tools that will enable you to "shout and sell yourself".  Creative Futures give students a heads up about the industry with key note talks and provides networking and entrepreneurial opportunites. Aims of Creative futures are

1) Provide insight into working into creative industries

2) Improve employability

3) Network with a range of professionals

4) Requirements of academic study

National Skills Academy

The first guest speaker of the day was Sarah Mair Gates from the National Skills Academy. She works in a number of creative genres.

• Performing arts
• Visual arts
• Craft
• Design cultural heritage
• Music
• Literature

The Academy provides the following services: 

• Research
• National occupation standards
• Apprenticeships
• Careers info events
• National skills academy
• Industry relative training

Sarah explained the the academy works not only with university students but school children from the age of 13 right through to adults in current employment.

The sector in Wales

27,990 total employment

1,745 businesses 65,000 in Wales

28.6% part time

45% freelance

She recommended we take a look at the Creative Choices website http://www.creative-choices.co.uk/ which provides a number of services including: 

• Short films
• Case studies
• Job opportunities
• Competitions &events
• Meet the expert videos

 

Creative Skillset Cymru

The guest speaker Gwawr Hughes wasn't able to make it so Dr Stuart Cunningham took us through the slides. Stuart provided us with information about the Welsh arm of Skillset which is the Sector Skills Council for the creative industry. It works with industry, sector bodies and government departments to ensure that training and education is repsonsive to sector needs. Skillset Cymru is overseen by an industry National Board for Wales made up of independent productions companies, broadcasters trade associations and many more.

Dr Cunningham provided some interesting statistics about the sector profile with 83% of companies employing less than 10 people. 28% of the sector are Freelance. The average income within the industry workforce in Wales is £28,700 compared to £32,300 across the UK. The Welsh Assembly are keen to retain creative talent within Wales so the fact that the average wage is lower than the rest of the UK needs to be addressed in my opinion. Demand for learning and development remains high however, with 56% of the workforce with a current learning or development requirement. One of the more encouraging stats was that 13% of employers in the industry in Wales have vacancies.

One of the key message was 'Don't limit yourself to one thing' it's important to have flexible skills that improve the employability skills of new entrants into the jobs market. Dr Cunningham explained that the Skillset website http://www.creativeskillset.org/ offers the following services:

• Skillset skills solutions
• List of initiatives
• Welsha back
• Skillset apprenticeships
• Skillset informed

Skillset provides support for companies and professionals. Bursaries are available to attend courses. Other services provided by Skillset are research, careers advice and guidance.

Growing the creative industries....

Skillset is passionate about how it gets people to stay in Wales and the UK. Unfortunately many are educated and then they disappear to other parts of the world. Dr Cunningham said "Have a think about how you can give back, don't just sell yourself, sell the industry". One of the main aims of Skillset is to provide increased support for the media and creative industries making it easier for them to grow, while procuring the interest of citizens. The sector is worth £36 billion per annum to the UK economy. Other areas where Skillset can help are with:

• Giving advice on tax breaks for those in film, tv, animation and games
• Funding and promoting sector advocacy
• Establishment of a creative industries council
• Supporting local tv and radio
• Addressing online copyright issues
• Entertainment licensing
• Inspire people to get involved!

Dr Cunningham showed us a clip from a film 'How to build your creative confidence' with David Kelly the founder of IDEO, a design and innovation consulting firm. Kelly explained that a series of small steps and successes can results in an amzing transformation for creatives. He is excited when individuals think of themselves as a 'creative person'. He used an example from

Doug Dietz who creates MRI machines. Kelly explained that Dietz faced the challenge that 80% of children that are scannaed by the machine had to be sedated. This made for a traumatic experience for the kids and their parents.He therefore re-designed the machine so it was 'kid friendly', he simply painted the MRI scanner and the room it was in the form of an old galleon ship. The kids were told to keep quiet whilst they were in the scanner as they needed to hide from the pirates. The results were super dramatic, the kids loved it and no longer needed to be sedated. Kelly explained how simple design changes can have a massive impact on the world around us. 

Plato explained in under a minute

This session was chaired by Professor Paul Haywood of Salford University. The Professor was asked to come and speak at Creative Futures due to his experience in research, education, art and design practice. He believes that as creative people we bring a completely different perspective.

 

The Professor told us he was here to share some of his observations. He began by telling us about his background. Born and brought up in Rochdale Professor Paul studied at what he describes as "An amazing art school". In his first Philosophy lecture as a student at university Professor Paul learnt about Plato and his 'Stage of Reality. He was shown an image of a group of chairs.

He explained that this was "the first tier of reality", as we all know what a chair is. The 2nd tier of reality  is the making of the chair as a commodity to generate commercial gain. Then he moved onto the painting of a chair.  Professor Paul said he what he took away from this first lecture that art was pointless! He went to art school to develop his drawing skills. One of the first pieces of art he produced was a drawing of a greenhouse. By the end of the first year he was drawing pigeons in the street in Nottingham. He said things change so rapidly and don't stay with you. He left uni and did an MA in Reading then went to Germany and set up a couple of networking groups with people from all over the world. Through this he did collaborative work he wouldn't call art. For example a performance outside a cinema. 

 

The Professor then went on to provide us with some interesting stats on tax avoidance. The amount of unpaid tax worldwide is staggering.

• Estimated 1.6 million companies in the U.S avoid payroll taxes
• Minimum 800 bn capital flight drain from Sub-Saharan Africa in the last 40 years
• Minimum 450bn capital flight drain from North Africa in the last 40 years
• Estimated tax loss due to tax evasion, worldwide is in excess of 3.1 tn annually
• UK tax evasion costs the economy 109bn annually
• In Germany 1 euro in every 6 is undeclared. The shadow economy repesents 16% of GDP

Professor Paul went on to show us a picture of a commission he was given. He placed an inflatable ball in various places around housing estates in Salford.

 

The idea behind this was to connect different cultural activities. They also analysed colours, on site amongst other things. He told us about a building site which kids were accused of vandalising as they were knocking down fences. However, when they spoke to the kids they were told the fence prevented them from playing their game. They therefore invented a card game that would help explain what they were doing. This was distributed to people to communicate to them that they weren't vandalising the site just using it for another purpose.

 

Professor Paul went on to tell us about some of the other projects he has been involved in. One of the most interesting was 'Guns to Goods' Www.Gunstogoods.org. There is a problem with gun crime in Moss Side. The aim of the project was to work with the community to reduce gun crime and help people that may be susceptible to get involved in it. They used art to recycle gun metal and create sculptures. The guns were turned into ingots because legally they couldn't carry the guns around.

The artwork was then sold on and the money used for other projects. Although they were working with guns this project connected people's creativity safely see Www.showmetal.co.uk. Once the metal had been converted they needed to get it into a mass distribution chain.  For example they made some into commemorative coins which they planned to sell for £200 each. However, this idea didn't really work as it was the victims' families that wanted to buy the coins and they felt it was not right to make them buy the coins for £200. They therefore ended up selling the coins cheap and starting again with another idea.

 

Colouredge Www.colouredge.org

The ‘Colouredge’ project was commissioned to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Littleborough Arts Festival in 2011. Artists Maxine Kennedy and Paul Haywood collected colours from the landscapes around the town and countryside of Littleborough to design a representative palette. With the help local people and school pupils they have now completed one set of colours. The exhibition showed a small range of products that use the colours as inspiration. Local artists and designers also showed worked they had created using the palette for example watercolour paintings, sculpture kits, fashion design and a book. School children came up with the idea of using the palette to create a nail varnish range.

 

Professor Paul said that he found people are very keen to talk about colour but not necessarily about art itself. He briefly mentioned the secret garden festival which has a lot to do with Media City in Salford. When Media City was first built the expectation was that it would change Salford and turn everyone middle class! This didn't happen but the local community has got involved and collaborated with several different cultural events. The Tenant and resident associations on a particular estate in Salford has even created a magazine which only includes positive things that were happening in the local estate. Anything negative isn't included. These project aim to join people together because they're interested in the same things  and don't just have cultural, religious similarities.

 

Professor Paul was charismatic and an engaging speaker. It was great to hear about the positive impact these community projects have had. However, the subject matter was tailored towards artists and as a filmmaker I personally didn't feel I got much out of this session.

'How not to be a Designer' by an Expert - Robert Ball

Learnt by doing a lot of things badly! Robert Ball is a Designer from Runcorn which he describes as a big chivvy blister outside Liverpool! He began by telling us a bit about himself, how his first job was making computer game graphics such as Robocop 3.

He then went onto study illustration but swapped to do design at Preston university. After graduating he ended up working in a ticket office for two years. His lucky break came when he got a placement for 2 weeks at an agency called 'The Partners' and he has been there ever since.

Robert works on branding. Branding is appropriate wording for appropriate people. He showed us a handmade sign selling 'fresh eggs' and explained that you wouldn't use this to sell flying lessons! Under the heading 'How not to promote a gallery' he explained to the audience how he tackled a brief for the National Gallery in London. The gallery has artwork spread over hundreds of years in many different styles. How do you promote this? Do you use its most famous painting (A Van Gogh). The problem with the Robert explained is that it says everything about Van Gogh and nothing about the gallery. The answer was not to think about the painting at all. His team decided to walk around the gallery writing down words that described the paintings. 50 of these words were then used in the marketing campaign, with no images at all.  They used Life, Death, Passion and Beauty to finish off the words.  Robert said a good tip is to think of the most counter intuitive thing to do as it can lead to a really interesting place. The branding they created for the National Gallery was used on posters, banners, tshirts, bags etc. Some posters contained descriptions of paintings with no images at all.

 

The next section in Robert's presentation was 'How not to do advertising'. One of the most important things in advertising (or any part of business for that matter) is building trust with a client. Robert demonstrated this with another example from the National Gallery. The gallery was asked if they could take famous artwork and display them in the street. For example, a Caravaggio was hung outside a sex shop in Soho.

The paintings were the exact scale of the originals and the frames came from Italy. These were first approved by the curators. A plaque was also included with an explanation of the painting. Only four got stolen from a total of 48. None were graffitied or vandalised in any other way, the campaign was a great success. There was some excellent feedback from the public. Other galleries from around the world went on to copy the idea.

In the next part creatively entitled 'How not to take the piss' Robert told us about a brochure he designed for a company selling toilet cubicles for schools. One of the challenges they faced was making a brochure about toilets interesting! The idea they came up with was to present the products in a brochure that was in the form of a school book. 

How not to design a screen saver
For this section Robert told us about a brief  he had from Deloitte to create a corporate screen saver. After much deliberation they came up with the concept of giving them a blank screen. The idea behind this was they wanted to encourage people to save energy by turning off their screen rather than wasting energy with it turned on 24/7. The concept was called 'Planet Saver' it was basically an app which power down the screen and when the user turned it back on it provided information on how much energy had been saved during the time it was off and what that saved energy could have been used for. I really liked this idea I think it was ingenious. A fantastic way to encourage users to save energy by providing them with interesting information. It not only saves money on electricity bills but also helps save the planet! 

For the final section in Robert's presentation he discussed the topics 'How not to write a cv' and 'How not to put together a portfolio'. He said that a portfolio is more important than a cv. Don't put cinema music as interests hobbies as everyone puts that. If it's not something really interesting then it's best not to put it at all. Make it simple. People will want to see things straight away so ensure what you're showing displays fast and doesn't take time to load. For Graphic Designers and Illustrator there's no need to show roughs, but keep them separate from portfolio just in case someone asks to see them. Another tip is to enter your work for student awards. Winning an award can not only 'leapfrog' a portfolio, it can also get your work in front of industry professional. He also said opportunities are there even at placement level.  Finally Robert said for inspiration find things that you like (not only online).

This was an interesting insight into the world of the Graphic Designer. Although his presentation focussed on the Graphic Desginer much of what Robert said is relevant to all creative genres.

Business start up support Liz Wallens Wrexham Council

Liz is a Business Adviser at Wrexham Council. Liz was here to explain the services that the Council offers to small businesses. For example it runs new business workshops that are all free and funded by the Welsh Assembly.  Bursaries, start up grants and help with procurement processes are on offer. Ther is one to one advice on setting up a business with help on legal requirements, tax and grants. The graduate bursary is £6000 spread into four payments of £1500 for the first four months. I was surprised to hear that these grants are available up to 7 years after graduation. The only downside was that the business needs to turnover 80k per annum. This would be very difficult for any business within the first 12 months of operating. However Liz did say that the Council is trying to get this figure reduced to something more realistic. When applying for any grant, bursary or loan a business plan and cash flow forecast are required. There are no age restrictions on the person applying.

Liz went on to explain that there are other schemes such as the Royal Development Programme. For people aged under 30 £3000 is available and for anyone aged over 39 th £5k Royal Development Programme. Grants can even be applied for existing businesses. There are also bi-lingual grants available for between £1600-£1800. Again help can be provided with costing and pricing of services, cash flows, profit and loss and balance sheets. For grants businesses have to provide evidence of what the money is spent on. Before a grant can be authorised the same amount of money that you're applying for must also be in a business bank account and the business cannot be moved for 5 years. There is funding for training which can be applied for through the Welsh Assembly. One thing that grants won't cover is legal costs this is because grants are designed for something that is tangible. Bursaries are for revenue grants are for equipment. Liz said the best way to approach a bank is be honest with them!

There are 3 different types of business 

1. Sole trader (An indvidual such as a freelancer)
2. Partnership (2 or more individuals)
3. Limited company (This type of business has its own separate legal status and is responsible for its own debts. Need to apply to Companies House to set up. Tax is more.

Liz recommend that you start as a Sole Trader, as you can always change to a Limited Company at a later date.

 

To finish the presentation Liz gave us some information on tax. The self assessment personal allowance is currently £8105.00 but is increasing to £9k in April. Self Assessment need to be in before 31st Jan otherwise there is a £100 fine.

I really enjoyed this talk by Liz. I am considering becoming self employed so there was lots of useful information. For example I wasn't aware of the number of bursaries and grants that are available for businesses in Wales.

Day Two

Gellibaff Gelicity
Gelicity is a skincare company which products turn water into gel. It is a patented formula that uses salt to turn the gel back into water, the chemical name is sodium polyaccurate it swells up to 300 times its original size when it come into contact with water. The company was formed in 2006 by 2 Directors of which one is an expert in chemistry. The first product the company designed was for feet and was called 'Just for Feet'. It was sold into beauty salons. Gareth explained how the company used simple marketing techniques by stating clearly on the packaging what the product does. However, the company realised the packaging needed updating so they came up with 'Gel Spa'.

This was a more upmarket product and enabled the company to increase the retail price. It generated around 1000 sales per month and is sold in Boots and Selfridges. The company then decided to produce a bigger size for the bath and it increased its staff size to 6. It then started to look at the market for kids. Concepts were put together by a designer who did some focus groups with kids who came with 'Gelli Baff name'. However 'Gelli Baf' can't be used in some countries e.g. Germany as it has a different meaning. Gelicity developed at tv advert which helped generate an additional 500k unit sales. Gavin told us that the product works really well for kids but not for adults and the advert designed for adults didn't work very well either. You can view the ad here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=CjxYcp00RCs

Gelicity struggles with communicating to adults what the product does for them. The company used a marketing agency called ECRM that ran events to help businesses find buyers. ECRM guaranteed 20 meetings with '5 star' buyers. From that event they got one distributor which has turned around the business. Gavin explained that getting a meeting with a company such as Boots could take 4 years. For the childrens product they signed a deal with Spin master which is more of a toy industry distributor. The company signed a 3 year deal with agreed sales of £1m in first year £2m in second etc. The name of the product was changed to Squishy Baff for the U.S. market. Gelicity used designers from Glyndwr to help with design of packaging. First order was £200k Bratislava. With spin master £2.4m turnover. Number of students have joined from Glyndwr. Got into boots and self ridges with designs and communications. New tins retail at £20 sold some in Chester for £10. Question is do they continue with gel spa as sales are poor. Lost money on boots launch. Added in a bath on packaging explained that it's used in the bath.  Boots buyer said that their customers just don't get it. They have a backlog of packaging so they would have to write off this if they were to start again. At £10 to cheap for Selfridges. 2 units per week.

This was an intersting talk from Gavin on how a small company has developed its product and the challenges it faced when trying to get them to market.

Getting a job in the media Phil Hurst
Phil Hurst has worked in the media industry for 25 years. He explained that the media industry covers many different genres not just tv or radio but publishing, corporate video, adverts and PR. Phil explained that to succeed in the industry you have to be able to make decisions and solve problems. He recommends that you develop a flexible strategy for your career path.

Phil gave the audience a handout with four questions:
1. Why do you want to work in the media industry?
2. What am I good at?
3. What do I want to do?
4. What have I got to succeed?

He asked us to answer these questions as honest as possible. Phil told us that we should prepare a media cv and it is important that we can market and sell ourselves to potential employers. Be determined, and beble to deal with rejection. Showing enthusiasm and passion in your field is vital as is knowledge of the business you're applying to. Be ahead of the competition. Know your subject inside out.There's no simple answer you don't even need to be a graduate but most people working in media are. Work experience is also key so you can demonstrate that you can do x,y and z, but one of the most important skills is networking. There's a divided opinion in the industry about whether media courses are of value as employers have a strong interest in candidates with specialist subject knowledge in traditional subjects such as Sciences, languages, economics, politics and engineering. There is also some evidence that stronger commitment and passion for media is often shown by non media studies students with relevant practical experience.

Phil finished his presentation with a number of 'top tips':

• Make it count
• Work hard and work smart
• Have a strategy on which work to focus on, but be flexible
• Make friends, it's not what you know but who you know. 
• Make media, get better through constant practice
• Watch different programmes for research
• Make your own luck
• Make it to the finishing post

Phil had some good advice which I felt was tailored towards students that had not previously applied for or had a job.

Creating futures creatively at TAPE Community Music and Film Ltd Neil

TAPE is a 'Not for profit' social enterprise. It works in media & arts community community projects using its skills and knowledge to maximise community benefit. It also offer Project management and business skills. TAPE will become a charity in the near future.

Neil showed us a film a the 'Big noise 2012' event which TAPE filmed last year. It was an event where bands played and there was a skate park. The budget for the film was small at £600.

TAPE is funded on a project by project basis. It works with People from all walks of life such as vulnerable adults, people with disabilities, autism, young people and families. Volunteers also come via the probation service. Some events TAPE works on have age restrictions. It has links to the Prince's Trust who sent people to help out in various locations. Neil explained that he has also had a number of personal development opportunities through TAPE for example he is going to spend a week with Tiger Productions.

TAPE is currently Working on an animated cartoon character for its website. TAPE was recently involved in a tender process for the John Lewis group. They made a film for Waitrose and got down to the final four. Unfortunately they didn't win the tender but it was a fantastic achievement to get down to the last four. The feedback they got was that the production values were not quite high enough.

Tape has also worked on some documentaries, timelapse and a feature film. It aims to empower people. A future project that Neil is getting involved in is a collaboration with Nottingham University that is about a climbing community that are using an old quarry in South America as a tourist attraction.

This was an interesting talk from Neil it was great to see how the work they do is benefiting the community and hear a bout some of the challenges the company faces.

Making stop motion films on a tiny budget Linda McCarthy
The final talk of today was with Linda McCarthy who is an ex-student of Glyndwr and a stop motion animator. Linda was here to talk about a stop motion animation called 'Small Birds Singing'.

Linda explained that her background is in ceramics (which would prove to come in useful in her animation) but she has always had a passion for stop-motion. She used to be a puppeteer and one of her biggest influences is Jan Svankmejer who combined puppetry, animation and taxidermy! Linda showed us a photo of her sisters budgie that she had stuffed many years ago!

Small birds singing began life as a comic strip. It was created by Steven Appleby who is Linda's cousin. Steven has a cartoon in the Guardian newspaper every week. Linda explained that she tries to keep as close to his style as possible with her animations.

Linda's ceramic background came in useful when she used her knowledge to create the heads for her models. Using ceramics gave her animations there own style that could be attributed to her. Ceramics also helped her capture the different personalities of the characters. It's a laborious process making the models. Some models such as the tea sets are tiny.

Linda said she was fortunate to get a professional voice actor through contacts of her cousin. One person did all the voices which was great.

Linda has since Set up her own company called 'Tiny Elephants'. She has converted part of house into a studio which is much cheaper than renting a studio.

The first project from Tiny Elephants was a traditional Christmas at Small Birds Singing. This also came from one of Steven's comic strips. A new character appeared in this animation he was called 'The Stranger'. For this animation Linda used silicone hands, but it's difficult to get props to stick to them. Blue-tac and Sellotape didn't work. For this film she also gave the sets make-over so they looked more professional. It was also filmed in HD for the first time.

Linda's longest film so far was 'The Grand Easter Egg Hunt', an 8 minute film that took one year to make. The most recent film from Tiny Elephants is Hinterland which is also the latest Small Bird Singing Film. Linda explained some of the models were made from ceramics (e.g. Plastic bottles). She also obtained some funding for this project from the National Lottery. She also created the ident for BAF 2011.

Another film that Linda worked on was 'Mother's Song The Long Dead Sevens' which was different genre to previous films. It is a western style animation about a mother who kills her children. For this animation Linda used clothes over latex bodies. It also used one of the largest sets she had used. She explained how putting objects in the foreground can create a good depth of field.  Some props were re-used from other films. There is a scene where one of the characters vomits. Linda told us how the vomit was created using a combination of  vegetable soup, plaster cine and tacky wax. The film won an award for best Eco-film at a festival last year for which she was extremely proud.

This was an enjoyable session the animation were very entertaining and it was interesting to hear Linda's experiences and challenges in making a stop motion. I could relate to many of the issues she faced which have parallels to  making a life action production.

Day three

HMRC
Day three began with a talk by Andy Gardner from HMRC. He is part of the Business Education Support Team. He explained that the tax year runs from 6/4/12 - 5/4/13 and when tax returns should be submitted by.

Return by 31/1/14
6/4/13-5/4/14
Return by 31/1/15

Andy advised us to treat our National Insurance (NI) numbers as an account number. It is effectively a means to insurer yourself to have an income at retirement. Working people start paying NI from the ageo of 16 right through to retirement.

Employees pay class 1, the more you earn the more you pay first however the first £148 is free of NI.

Self employed pay class 2 flat rate and £2.65 per week which is going up to £2.75 in April 2013. It is paid by. DDI. The Self employed can receive 5 out of 6 benefits but there is no cover for job seekers allowance. They can also make voluntary contributions as this group do not pay NI they are making a profit over £7605 9%.

Andy said one of the most important things as a self employed person or a business is to have a records system. You must keep records. There is no prescribed format, but there are 3 golden rules:

1. Set up a system (Separate day to day from capital e.g.Vehicle and tools are capital, ink, paper and petrol etxc are day to day
2. Maintain the system
3. Keep them for 6 years

What does HMRC need to know?
Turnover (money in)
Allowable expenses (day to day expenses) can be deducted (e.g. fuel and internet)
Capital allowances/expenses (e.g van, laptop)
Net taxable class 4 profit or loss

For example with a 30k turnover
10k allowable expenses
5k capital expenses
= 15k profit (You will therefore be taxed on this)

Meals are only allowable at a reasonable rate if you are stopping somewhere overnight. Entertaining clients is at the businesses/individuals own expense. Clothing is only allowable if it is business related. For example, safety hats, waterproofs and anything with a visible company logo. Training is also not allowable. Fuel allowance can be claimed at 45p per mile.

Time line
1/5/2013 -5/4/2014
April 2014 notice to file
Paper versions have to be ordered. 7 months To complete.
31/1/15 to file online

So how would 15k profit be taxed?
Tax free allowance on first £8105 tax free
1st rate of tax 20%
2nd rate of tax 40%
3rd 50%
£9445 in April

One of the most important pieces of advise that Andy gave us was to budget for your tax bill and put money to one side.

Limited companies are not self employment they are a legal entity in their own right. They allow individuals to limit their liability so it gives some security as Directors can't be pursued for company debt. If you pay yourself a wage you come under PAYE. Businesses will pay corporation tax. Administration or solvency of limited companies would result in individuals going bankrupt.

The HMRC run webinars on the web to help people with questions they may have about their tax liability. For example there are webinars about allowable business expenses and capital allowances. 

Despite the subject matter this was a really interesting and informative talk by Andy. It contained lots of really helpful information that will be a great help to me as I am setting up my own business. I really enjoyed it.

Witch ward productions limited.
The penultimate presentation of day three was from Jason Davitt who is a local filmmaker and the founder of Witchward Productions. Jason was here to talk about his experiences whilst making the film and tv series Witchward and give advice to budding filmmakers. I was really looking forward to this session as filmmaking is my passion.

Jason said that people just don't get up and do things. If you want to make a film you need to get up and make it happen. He's had 5 years in the business and has no formal training or qualifications. Despite this his films have 3 million fans worldwide and he's currently working on his latest full length 'big budget' feature.

Jason gave us advice for each stage in the film making process. I've listed this below

Pre-production
1. Idea (winning concept). It's vital that you have an original and creative idea that will help you get buy in from supporters
I. Make a film for your target audience
Ii. Realise what's popular. Your film will be more successful if it's a popular and 'in vogue' genre
Iii. Consider the general audience's mentality.

2. Script
I. Write it all and don't read it or correct it until it's finished. Leave a script for about 2 weeks once it's completed before you pick it up again
Ii. Expect at least 3 drafts before the script is finished
Iii. Show no one until you've finished the first draft!

Cost
1. Money, money, money (without some funding you won't be able to make a film)
2. Produce a realistic estimate plus some! (Calculate your budget and add some more!)
3. Know your filming/production plan inside out
4. Know who to go to for funding (Give me your money!)
5. Consider crowd funding (For example Amazon kick start) and know what you're asking for
6. Approach local businesses and rich families. Be positive and show enthusiasm
7. Look at film funders such as BFI etc (Google them). They can however try to take over and introduce red tape etc
8. Pitch your idea well, prepare!
9. Use two known successful films as an example. Eg something something meets something something
10. Elevator method. Image you only have time from one floor to the next to sell them your idea. Break it down to one sentence to describe your own movie.

What you really need to make a film:
1. The people:crew
2. Director/producer (you) one person, sometime known as God!
3. Cameraman (you do it if you're able)
4. Lighting/sound (great if they know what they're doing), have a clear dialogue
5. Runner helper assistants (grab and make anyone you know do it!)
6. Make up hair (only if you need them!)
7. Catering (no horse meat)

Storyboard artist is a god (you if you can). A film needs a storyboard artist as much as film in the camera. Never make a film without a storyboard. Storyboard is everything it will cut the work in half.

Other essentials
1. Locations
2. Back up locations
3. Back up plans for actors, weather, alien invasion etc

Actors are dreamers that have big egos. They can be disorganised and poor time keepers. Bear in mind the following when chossing your cast:

1. Think about how to chose them! (Chemistry is key)
I. They should show willingness and have a drive
Ii. Punctuality is very important, time is money!
Iii. Talented, they need to do a convincing job!

Filming
1. Plan ahead
I. Create and follow a shooting schedule (link scenes that can be done together)
Ii. Make sure everyone is early
Iii. Set everything up the night before and confiscate mobile phones

2. Legal bits
I. Ensure contracts are understood and signed
Ii. Have image release forms ready for crowds
Iii. Have image release forms for buildings
Iv. Get permission to shoot (only if you can't get away with it). It is legal to film anywhere in the street. Unless you're causing a noise, obstruction. Gorilla as much as possible.
V. Buy insurance always cover yourself.

Filming essentials
1. Lighting
2. Sound
3. Storyboards
Tips for acting for screen
1. Audience - rememer they may be only 2 feet away from the screen
2. Use Overact technique (off camera before shoot then don't think about it when they actually do it)
Filming
1. Get a minimum 4 shots for everything
2. Use the180 degrees rule and thirds rule subject matter always to one side

So you've got your films now what?

Marketing/Festivals
1. Screeners watermark them all
2. Send the festivals what they need and only the relevant ones. Provide what in the format needed blue ray DVD etc
3. Always get advice on contracts

Internet vs DVD/blu ray
1. Make a website for the film
2. Self distribution can be effective but is costly

There was so much useful information in Jason's presentation. I was actually in the process of making a film for my final project so it was all relevant to me. It would have been great if I had spoken to Jason before taking on my film project as we hadn't followed all of his guidelines!

Documentary for production for tv and home video with Anthony Masi
I was excited about this session as it was via video link from a Producer that lives in LA!

Anthony Masi is a Producer mainly for documentaries that are shown on TV then released on DVD etc. He focusses on cultural icons in the horror genre. E.g. The slasher genre such as Friday 13th. He told us that Friday 13th and Freddie Krueger would not have existed without Halloween.

Anthony became involved in the film business in an unexpected way. He began by putting a convention together for the Halloween movies for the 25th anniversary of the movie. All actors, writers, producers got together. He filmed the event over 3 days and whilst doing so thought he could edit the footage together to make a documentary.  His company Masi Media was created in 2006.

Many producers have challenges raising money but using a subject with an existing following makes it easier. Others projects were more challenging. Market crashing meant it was difficult to get funding. Half a million dollars budget was required for the documentary Friday 13th. Some of the actors wanted to get paid to appear in the documentary. 8 Jason's agreed but they wanted $1500 each! They also had to pay to use clips and stills of the movies. Paramount wanted $10,000 per clip per minute. They needed 8minutes so it cost $80,000! You also need to get a signed waiver from the actor and licences for music clips. This means there's lots of work and it's very expensive.

Tips for fundraising
The best way to get money is to plan. Funders need to know you will make the money when they want it. They will ask why should I use you? What's your access? If you can answer these questions you have a better chance to get funding. If you're doing a documentary do it on something that's already established will make things much easier.

How has the industry changed?
Technology has improvide, less equipment is required due to digital.

Guarantee hotels around convention centre will be filled otherwise he would pay for them. Proceeds were going to the local hospital. Jaws retrospective started a sub-genre within the genre.

Magician. Had Friday 13th in mind.


Making a documentary about Clive Barker. Halloween used an academic approach. The tone of the documentary was different for Friday 13th and Scream. Each interview could last 45mins lots of footage is required to get enough for the edit. You can always put the rest of it on bonus DVDs.

2002 convention started a fan website in 1998 as was a horror movie collector. Put photos on the website, had a great following on the website. Had already built credibility with the fans through the website. Funded convention through the ticket sales. Invited all of the producers, actors to the convention. Saw that he could put an event together and was hired by the producers to make a separate documentary about Halloween. This opened doors to other opportunities. Knock on doors, don't give up you have to really want to do it.

Documentaries are available in all formats.  Believe you tube could be killing the independent market. 150k illegal downloads.

Clive Barker retrospective
Anthony's idea. His company funded a number of interviews with the cast. Used this to make a trailer to try and get funding. There was a licensing bottleneck as Miramax had gone out of business and was bought by Disney. Fear net heard about the project and talked about how it could get finished. They then needed to get Clive Barker onboard. He agreed to create a cenobite just for the documentary. Paid 3 special effects companies to put it together. There were concerns about Barkers health. Need to create an urgency for your project.

Tips for interviewing people
Lighting is really important. Make subject as flattering as possible. Fr example shine on their face. Get a make up artist in if you can afford it.
Doing several interviews in one day can help to keep the budget down.
Used a canon 7d but had problems with it burning out so take that into consideration.
Brevity don't get someone to talk for an. hour if they don't need to. Get what you need right away. Tell them to put the question in their answer.
Ask them to talk slowly. Take out the erms etc.

Gossip
Lori metcalfe didn't want to do the interview. Felt like she didn't want to be there. Wes Craven was great to interview look at camera and told people off for releasing parts of the script online. He was very honest. If people don't give you what you want. Have them sign the release form before the interview.
Scott derekson director was difficult asked them to turn camera off. He was promised that he would not be asked about Clive Barkers views on his movie. Most interviews they don't give interviewee the questions before hand because they want spontaneity. Don't let people see footage before hand.
Work with people who support you and see your vision.



Professional Practice
For the professional practice element of this module I have been working on a number of ongoing projects. Please also check out my previous blogs for all of the work that I did during the Summer break of 2012!

Gavin Preston Performance Accelerator

I started working with Gavin Preston back in August 2012. Since then I have produced over 30 films for him for a variety of events. Gavin is a mentor for the Business Wealth Club in Chester. He works with entrepreneurs and organisations large and small that have hit a plateau and need to get back into growth. Applying his 4 step "Entrepreneur Accelerator Model" Gavin helps his clients address the internal and external obstacles that have been stifling growth, helping them develop real world strategies to put the business back on track. Below is an example of a recent film I produced for Gavin for the Business Wealth Club Chester. It's all about "Revving up your profits".

The production quality of my films has increased significantly since I began filming with Gavin. This is partly due to the fact that I have invested in some quality lighting equipment and backgrounds, which make a huge difference. Gavin said that he liked the clean and fresh 'Apple look' and asked me if I could re-produce this for him. I therefore purchased a white background and with a 3 point lighting set up and by overexposing the background I achieved this look. I had fantastic feedback from Gavin who was extremely happy with the results. In my opinion my films now have high production values and have a professional finish. In the future I'm hoping to do some green screen work with Gavin and experiment with different backgrounds to get a different look and feel.


Mette Munke
I recently met with Bill Finch who runs Mette Munk UK. The name Mette Munk consists of two Danish words - Mette which is a traditional Danish female name and Munk that translates to monk. Mette Munke dates back to 1135 when English Benedictine monks were asked to build a watermill in Odense by the Danish King.

In 1962 the monks opened the Mette Munk bakery. It became the first company to export Danish Pastries and ever since it has been the mission of Mette Munk to deliver delicious authentic pastries.

Bill's brief was to produce a film that he could use to send to potential customers to tell them all about his company and their product. He said this would help save him time and money as he could send the film to customers as an introduction before he goes to visit them. Below is an exerpt of the film:

Bill had never done a presentation to camera before so he was obviously nervous. After a few practice runs I decided that a good approach would be to film in a documentary style with me interviewing Bill, asking questions using his presentation. This approach worked really well as Bill was much more relaxed and answered the questions without hesitation. This resulted in a film that flowed really well, with Bill coming across much more naturally.

Focus Wales
Focus Wales is a fantastic 4 day Music Festival & Conference held at multiple venues in Wrexham, North Wales, UK, and will took place over between 24th-27th of April 2013. The festival showcased live performances from a collection of musicical talent of Welsh origin. It included special guest headliners such as Charlotte Church and selected International acts. There were also music industry panels and discussions, featuring experts from all sectors of the music industry.

I was involved in filming two live events. The first was a musical event at the Royal Oak pub in Wrexham called 'Folk at the Oak'. There were several acts that we're all excellent. There was some real talent on show. The following day the second event I filmed was the Focus Wales Business Conference at the Catrin Finch centre in Glyndwr University. There were a number of sessions with industry professionals who discussed their experiences in the industry. An excerpt of one of the sessions is below.


Scala Prestatyn Film Festival
I was recently put forward by one of my Tutors to be a Judge in the Scala Prestatyn Film Festival. The Scala is an independent cinema and arts centre, based in Prestatyn. They are holding a youth film festival (11 to 16 year olds) on Friday 22nd March (http://www.scalaprestatyn.co.uk/syff/) and have received entries from around 11 countries. They need to judge all of the entries to create a shortlist of films to be shown at the festival and asked if some Glyndwr University students would be interested in being a judging panel.

We were asked to judge one category of short films – there are 10 in total and we needed to decide upon 1st, 2nd and 3rd places and provide some critical comment on each film to feedback to the kids who have made them. I really enjoyed watching all of the films, there is some fantastic up and coming young talent which bodes well for the future of the British Film Industry.

Arena Lifestyle Magazine
I was recently asked to do some work on a new free magazine for 'Arena Lifestyle'. The magazine is a stylish and contemporary publication that promotes local businesses and the local area, to help enhance the way people live, striving to achieve the best quality

I was asked to write some content for the magazine and get some clients signed up for the free advertising (This was the first edition so all of the advertising space was free). The challenge going forward is to get paid clients to fill the space. I enjoyed working on this project as it was an opportunity for me to practive my writing skills and have some contact with external clients. Sales and marketing will be an important part of my business going forward  so it's always good to practive those skills.

Light from the Middle East Exhibition
I recently went to see a photography exhibition at the V&A museum in London. It was the first major exhibition of contemporary photography from and about the Middle East. Light from the Middle East: New Photography featured over 90 works by photographers from across the region.

Photography is a powerful and persuasive means of expression it is perfect media for artists to show the social challenges and political upheavals in the Middle East today.

Light from the Middle East: New Photography presents work by artists from across the Middle East (spanning North Africa to Central Asia), living in the region and in diaspora.

The exhibition explores the ways in which these artists investigate the language and techniques of photography. Some use the camera to record or bear witness, while others subvert that process to reveal how surprisingly unreliable a photograph can be. The works range from documentary photographs and highly staged tableaux to images manipulated beyond recognition. The variety of approaches is appropriate to the complexities of a vast and diverse region.

Light from the Middle East was divided into three sections, Recording, Reframing and Resisting, each of which focuses on a different approach to the medium of photography. Some of the photography was amazing and really brought to life the mood in the middle east and the struggles that the people who live there have on a daily basis. I really enjoyed this exhibition.

  

Filmmaking Blog

During the summer of 2012 my friend Gemma and I decided to convert a story she had written into a screenplay. The story is about a normal girl who is turned into a vampire. This blog talks about my experiences during the making of the film.

Pre-production

Some of the challenges we faced were that we only had access to the performing arts students during evening and weekends as they were rehearsing for their Christmas show. We were unable to get access to one of the locations that we wanted for the pub scene. This was the Wrexham social club on Regent Street. Having spoken to the Chairman he said that he would have to discuss the use of the venue at a committee and it was likely they would say no.

The first casting call we did was for an ‘Open Audition day’ from 9-5pm on /1/2013. I had emailed the performing arts lecturer and asked her to let he students know about it. She said that she would. We had one potential actor turn up at 10.30am but unfortunately nobody else all day which was very disappointing.

I therefore decided to take the bull by the horns and I went to the Terry Hands theatre to speak directly to the lecturers. They were very accommodating and said that I could talk to all of the students as they were in the theatre. I told the students all about the film and the roles that were available. I managed to get contact details for 35 students so.

Auditions

I had 35 email address from the performing arts students so I was a little surprised that only around 10 people turned up to audition. However, the ones that did were excellent and suited the parts really well. Some of them had also learnt their lines which was great and showed that they were taking the auditions very seriously.

Production
Day 1
This was the first day of the shoot with 3 of our actors. The scenes we were shooting were 5 & 7 which are set in a coffee shop and pub. I had previously scouted out the locations which were in Wrexham town centre. I had a meeting with the owner of the coffee shop and asked him if we could use his premises for the shoot and he kindly agreed to open up late so that business wasn’t disrupted. The Landlord of the Horse & Jockey pub also agreed. He said it would be quiet on the evening we were filming so there wouldn’t be any disruption. However, when we got there we were told there was a pub quiz later that evening.

 

Day 2

Today was the photo shoot for the promotional poster. It took place in the photo studio at Regent Street campus. Gemma created the poster. I think she did a great job!

Day 3

This evening we filmed scenes. The weather was terrible it was freezing cold and pouring down with rain which doesn’t go well with equipment with actors or equipment. The first scenes we shot were inside as they were in Grace’s house from the 1950’s.Gemma’s parents kindly allowed us to use their house as a location.

We filmed the scene outside the library in Flint which is near a road. As the scene was set in the 1950’s we had to be careful not to include any modern day technology such as automatic doors and new cars.

Day 4

This was another evening shoot with the characters Grace and Viktor. Fortunately it wasn’t raining but it was freezing cold. Lighting was an issue (as we didn’t have any portable lights) so we decided to film the scenes near the university main campus as we could make use of the lighting that is used to illuminate the building.

The scenes went well but it was a struggle for the crew and the actors because of the cold weather. It’s hard to operate equipment when your hands have gone numb due to the cold. Right at the end of the shoot there is a scene where Viktor attacks Grace and she screams.

Whilst filming this scene a couple of security guards turned up and asked us what we were doing. I explained who we were and what we were doing and they asked if we had permission to film. I gave them my tutors name and they also took my student id fortunately they let us finish the final scene.

Day 5

This was our first weekend shoot. It was a 9am start and we had to film in a number of different locations. We had to finish some filming on the campus (fortunately no security guards prevented us from doing this!).

We then headed off to a couple of other locations to film a bus stop scene and some scenes within Grace’s new house. The location was provided by Lauren who is also starring the film as Alexa Frost. It was a long day and we didn’t finish until around 9.30 but we got lots of scenes finished.

Day 6
Today most of the main characters were required for scenes. We had to shoot the final scenes with Grace & Viktor and some scenes with Seth and Alexa. The lack of light was an issue in some of these scenes as we had to have the curtains closed.

We had 3 different cameras, some were better than others in low light, which caused issues when I came to the edit. I saw this as another lesson learnt. It was another long day myself and Gemma had a falling out but we managed to get through the day and finish the shoot.

Day 7
This was one of the final days of filming for 2012 and we had a couple of hiccups. We had planned to shoot the book shop scene and a scene with Eli and Grace. I had arranged to meet the actors at the university. One of the actors disappeared and I was unable to get hold of her. We continued to the book shop and was on a very tight deadline as the centre where the shop was located closed at 7pm.

Unfortunately Gemma fell ill and I had to shoot the entire scene on my own which was a bit of a challenge as I only had around 30minutes once we arrived at the location. I got the camera set up, the actors mike'd up and we got on with it. I enlisted the help of the shop owner Alan as a boom operator. Fortunately I managed to pull it out of the bag and I was very pleased with the outcome. This is one of my favourite scenes in the film. It has great atmosphere.

 

Post production
I was assigned the role of editor and the process took me 5 months in total. There were hundreds of hours of footage shot over several weeks from a total of 20 scenes. I had to watch all of these again, sort and edit into the final film. I also added the VFX, music, audio replacement and colour grading. Some of the audio had to be replaced due to wind and external noises so I arranged for the actors re-record some of the dialogue. It was a tricky process getting the audio to match but I managed it in the end.

It was hard work but I learnt so much from making this film. All this experience will put me in good stead for hopefully a career in the film industry. Some of the (many) lessons I learnt during this process were - you never have enough time when you're using actors that aren't being paid! If possible all of your camersas should be the same make and model. This makes it so much easier when trying to match footage during the edit. Look after yourself as well as the actors! Next steps for the film will be to enter it into festivals and competitions. We also have our official premiere and the Art School on the 30th May!