Danny Lacey has set himself off on a course of learning how to make movies. Danny makes video for corporate customers anyway but making movies, either short films or feature length film is a whole different kettle of fish. As part of his learning regime he has mad a short movie for a horror competition called ‘Angel of the Night’. I watched the 3 minute version of the movie and was impressed. You have to have a twist in a movie to make it more interesting.

Danny talks about how he takes an original idea, writes the script, tears it apart and puts it back together again and then takes it all the way though to the finished article. He has managed to come up with a very professional looking movie using this process. He says that the planning stage is vital to the process. Making a list and checking it twice, just like the one you send to Santa when you were a kid.

I was amazed that even for a short movie like ‘Angel of the Night’ he was able to film it in one day. Danny was able to make the movie with no budget if you don’t count the pints of beer he bought for the actors to consume in the pub scene. With no cranes being available he tells me that for one scene the camera man was hanging out of a tree to get the angle for the shot in the woods. A bit of film making  monkey business.

STADA MEDIA

A dedicated, creative and affordable video production company. Danny makes video for the web and for promos

Danny’s next movie is going to be called ‘A Love Like Hers’ he wants to have higher production values and for it to be longer. He is using a site called Indie Go Go to help him raise the $8000 he will need to make the movie. Obviously a more ambitious project and I am looking forward to seeing it when it is finished, later this year.

Click here to view the embedded video.

So…how do you get your film on iTunes? What’s the secret password or magic number?

That question has come up a lot lately on Twitter among indie filmmakers enduring the plight of self distributions. I decided to do some quick research on the matter and figure out for myself how one might go about getting their film on iTunes.

I know the filmmakers of Ink did it, but then again their film has a huge  following and has been around for a few years. I wondered if the little known indie filmmaker has the same access to iTunes that a more well known film has.

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I have the Magic Mouse for a couple of weeks now and I have to say it is thumbs up all the way. I was listening to the Mac Geek Gab podcast this morning and Dave was going into huge detail about his experience with the mouse. One of thing he said was about the size of the mouse. It is not very high or thick, or tall and seems small, built for small hands. The comment was that Steve Jobs must have small hands. Well my hands are not that small but for me the mouse is a good size. I had suffered with some RSI pain for about a month prior to getting this mouse and now after using the Magic Mouse for a couple of weeks I now can shake hands with people when we meet without wincing. Definitely a big plus for me there.

Another problem that other people have reported is the tracking speed of the mouse, and perhaps needing to run a third party utility to get to work fast enough. Strangely I have not had that problem. I installed 10.6.2 before I started using the mouse, which could have been a factor with this, and the tracking has been good. I adjusted it to the speed I wanted in System Preferences and that was that. I am working with 2 screens on my iMac also and I can easily track the whole width no hassle whatsoever.

So if you have not had a chance to try one of these Magic Mouse rodents from Apple then I would say you should definitely jump in there and have a play at your local Apple Store.

FinalCut Express

I have been learning how to do things in FinalCut Express during the week and using Lynda.com to teach myself. It is taking some practice time to get my head around the roll, ripple, slip and slide tools but I am getting there. The training videos in Lynda are very good and makes the learning much quicker and in depth. Reading the PDF manual is painful in comparison. So far I have been working on one video with footage I took while at a friends’ horse riding school. I had some good shots in there and I managed to make a short movie with FinalCut Express without too much bother. I struggled with moving clips on the timeline and I still need to learn how to make the audio fade where I want it too. In this case I looked at the length of the audio required and opened up AmadeusPro to do the job for me, but it can be done in FinalCut Express.

In the Lynda training videos there are details on how to set up the preferences to work better. It seems the standard prefs are not the best for working with. If I had not got Lynda.com to work with I would never have found this out. There is always a gap it seems between the designers of software and the users, the lessons are from people that know the application inside out and that is a huge benefit. As part of my learning I have been watching the videos for Final Cut Pro also and there is a separate series that deals with LiveType, the application that deals with titling. I am quite impressed with that application.

I have noticed that there are some small differences between the Express application compared to the Pro but for the most part you can do all that you need in FinalCut Express. For instance one difference is the speed controls. I see that in Pro it is possible to have easing in and out of the speed of a clip or a selection of a clip, so that when ramping the speed you can do it with more finesse. There is no 3 way colour corrector in FinalCut Express, which I saw being used in tutorials on the FinalCut King site. So nothing major anyway and watching the tutorials for the Pro application are also helpful and not potentially confusing.

The first video I sent out of FinalCut Express is now on my channel at YouTube, if you would like to have a look,

Clive has an interesting approach to writing, particularly with his choice of tools to do the job. He told me he use Excel to start with to outline the characters, moving on to using scrivener and then on to Final Draft, which is the industry standard for presenting the movie when makng the film. Final Draft gives the timings for the movie apparently.

The Filmutopia company website, where people can see clips from Clives’ movies and there is also a Filmutopia blog, The blog is published with a new post every Sunday morning – European time, which I then discuss with readers on twitter.

Here’s a little bit of blurb about about Filmutopia :

Clive Davies-Frayne is a screenwriter and producer, whose company Filmutopia Ltd develops and produces feature films for cinema. So far, Clive has written and directed half a dozen short films, including one which won a UK Royal Television Society award.. and also two feature films. The first “Punx,” never completed due to funding issues… the second “No Place” was made in HD with a $750,000 budget was completed in 2005, but has spent the last four years mired in distribution issues…

Filmutopia was founded after “No Place” was completed, when Clive decided to walk away from his previous production company and a nine year business partnership, in order to change dramatically the way his movies were made, in particular the business strategies adopted. Clive admits “Everything I ever learned about how to make movies, I learned by first getting it completely wrong”

Filmutopia’s latest movie project, “Smoke” is a comedy and is currently in the development phase… the projected budget, €6M.

“After making movies the indie way for years and seeing little in return for my efforts, I decided to look at different way to make, finance, market and distribute movies. My passions are movies and the movie business… I don’t see the two as contradictions. All I want to do is entertain people and make a profit in the process.”

Please Leave a comment on this post about the Podcast

The Filmutopia company website, where people can see clips from my movies and Clive has a Filmutopia blog, The blog is  published with a new post every Sunday morning  – European time, which I then discuss with readers on twitter.

Here’s a little bit of blurb about about Filmutopia :

Clive Davies-Frayne is a screenwriter and producer, whose company Filmutopia Ltd develops and produces feature films for cinema. So far, Clive has written and directed half a dozen short films, including one which won a UK Royal Television Society award.. and also two feature films. The first “Punx,” never completed due to funding issues… the second “No Place” was made in HD with a $750,000 budget was completed in 2005, but has spent the last four years mired in distribution issues…

Filmutopia was founded after “No Place” was completed, when Clive decided to walk away from his previous production company and a nine year business partnership, in order to change dramatically the way his movies were made, in particular the business strategies adopted. Clive admits “Everything I ever learned about how to make movies, I learned by first getting it completely wrong”

Filmutopia’s latest movie project, “Smoke” is a comedy and is currently in the development phase… the projected budget, €6M.

“After making movies the indie way for years and seeing little in return for my efforts, I decided to look at different way to make, finance, market and distribute movies. My passions are movies and the movie business… I don’t see the two as contradictions. All I want to do is entertain people and make a profit in the process.”

Please Leave a comment on this post about the Podcast

The Filmutopia company website, where people can see clips from my movies and Clive has a Filmutopia blog, The blog is published with a new post every Sunday morning – European time, which I then discuss with readers on twitter.

Here’s a little bit of blurb about about Filmutopia :

Clive Davies-Frayne is a screenwriter and producer, whose company Filmutopia Ltd develops and produces feature films for cinema. So far, Clive has written and directed half a dozen short films, including one which won a UK Royal Television Society award.. and also two feature films. The first “Punx,” never completed due to funding issues… the second “No Place” was made in HD with a $750,000 budget was completed in 2005, but has spent the last four years mired in distribution issues…

Filmutopia was founded after “No Place” was completed, when Clive decided to walk away from his previous production company and a nine year business partnership, in order to change dramatically the way his movies were made, in particular the business strategies adopted. Clive admits “Everything I ever learned about how to make movies, I learned by first getting it completely wrong”

Filmutopia’s latest movie project, “Smoke” is a comedy and is currently in the development phase… the projected budget, €6M.

“After making movies the indie way for years and seeing little in return for my efforts, I decided to look at different way to make, finance, market and distribute movies. My passions are movies and the movie business… I don’t see the two as contradictions. All I want to do is entertain people and make a profit in the process.”

Film making Mac users were interviewed,  Jamin and Kiowa Winans of Double Edge Films. They were great to talk to and impressed me greatly with their approach to the movie industry. The Movie INK was well received at the Santa Barbara Film Festival and now is being show around the country in the USA.

It’s been six months since premiering Ink at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, and though we’ve been having a lot of successes, Ink has taken a path I never could have predicted. A lot of filmmakers have asked us about our strategy with the film and why we’ve made some of the decisions we have with the release of Ink. Here is a description of our experience and an explanation of why we’re doing what we’re doing.

To read more click on the picture to the left.

I am so looking forward to seeing the movie, it looks so exciting in the trailer. Not only are they from Colorado but they filmed INK there and used actors from the area too. Kiowa tells me that Colorado has so many different types of scenery just perfect for filming a movie, no problem in finding locations and even helps to keep the film in budget when you know the area and the people of the area.

Jamin has had a camera in his hands since he was 10 years old, making feature length films as a teenager learning how to cut and splice video tape, he must be so pleased to be using Final Cut Pro now.

So you can see that he has quite a background in making movies. INK most certainly is not his first movie and he has other movies in the pipeline for the future. The exact details as a bit hush hush but I bet it will be scifi in its outlook, he seems likes that genre

Kiowa has a huge involvement in the making of the film INk and has been responsible for the Producers job and worked the sound for the film. They have a small sound studio in the house where they sometimes whip out the senheiser mic and record what they need and also to combine with foley sounds to further enhance the movie.

Here is the trailer for the movie INK for you to enjoy.

The music for the outro of the podcast is by Louis Vig a track called Can You Feel It

What a coup to be able to interview the film makers Jamin and Kiowa Winans of Double Edge Films. They were great to talk to and impressed me greatly with their approach to the movie industry. The Movie INK was well received at the Santa Barbara Film Festival and now is being show around the country in the USA.

It’s been six months since premiering Ink at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, and though we’ve been having a lot of successes, Ink has taken a path I never could have predicted. A lot of filmmakers have asked us about our strategy with the film and why we’ve made some of the decisions we have with the release of Ink. Here is a description of our experience and an explanation of why we’re doing what we’re doing.

To read more click on the picture to the left.

I have seen the trailer for the film and I am so looking forward to seeing the movie, it looks so exciting. Not only are they from Colorado but they filmed INK there and used actors from the area too. Kiowa tells me that Colorado has so many different types of scenery just perfect for filming a movie, no problem in finding locations and even helps to keep the film in budget when you know the area and the people of the area.

Jamin has had a camera in his hands since he was 10 years old, making feature length films as a teenager learning how to cut and splice video tape, he must be so pleased to be using Final Cut Pro now.

So you can see that he has quite a background in making movies. INK most certainly is not his first movie and he has other movies in the pipeline for the future. The exact details as a bit hush hush but I bet it will be scifi in its outlook, he seems likes that genre

Kiowa  has a huge involvement in the making of the film INk and has been responsible for the Producers job and worked the sound for the film. They have a small sound studio in the house where they sometimes whip out the senheiser mic and record what they need and also to combine with foley sounds to further enhance the movie.

Here is the trailer for the movie INK for you to enjoy.

The music for  the outro of the podcast is by Louis Vig a track called Can You Feel It

You really must have a look at her paintings at her web site. She is conveying a dream world as art and with them being in black and white it reminds me of the work by Giger the artist that created the creature in the movie Alien. Karen is having an exhibition this month of her art work and if you live near enough you are invited to go and have a look.

Karen also writes screen plays for movies and has a script for a romantic comedy, where does she find the time to do all these things?

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Highly Toxic

Gallery Godo
6749 San Fernando Rd.#C  Glendale, CA 91201
Opening Night: September 25, 2009
7 pm to midnight - Please join us! http://gallerygodo.net/

He developed a new system of film training and on the 16th 07 09  received an Honorary Doctorate for his work from Britain’s Open University.

On 15 Feb 2005 the world of cinema changed forever – it was the day that the co-founder of Youtube registered the URL. With it, cinema distribution is changing dramatically, in parallel with advances in film making (ie: digital) making film making and distribution available to anyone.