Eve McConnachie is a graphic designer based in Glasgow. She trained as an animator at Duncan of Jordanstone Dundee and has been in-house designer and filmmaker for Scottish Ballet since 2009. The Bird is the first piece created under ‘Scottish Ballet Creative’  – an ongoing project in which the Company collaborates with contemporary artists, filmmakers and musicians. This short film for Scottish Album of the Year Award-winner Kathryn Joseph, directed, filmed and edited by Eve. Here she tells us more about the making of this film.

Scottish Ballet’s online audience has been growing steadily for the past few years, with our online videos receiving hundreds of thousands of views per year. The films I create are mainly behind-the-scenes documentaries and trailers that promote productions, but Scottish Ballet have been looking to produce more creative content that would not be for promotional purposes. This led to the idea of ‘Scottish Ballet Creative’, an initiative that would see the company produce creative digital projects and collaborate with other artists.

Kathryn Joseph’s involvement came about very organically; we were listening to her music in the office and were awestruck by her haunting vocals and her raw and emotive lyrics. When we approached Kathryn for this project she was pleased and, I think surprised, to hear from us. She is a big fan of dance already so she was very enthusiastic from the start. When I asked if she’d like anything in particular for the film, she said she’d be happy whatever we came up with. It was a completely open brief and you can’t really ask for anything more generous.

The first thing I did was to listen to the track on loop. I also collected a ton of visuals that fit with my emotional response to the song. I showed these images to Kathryn and she confirmed that I was on the right track. I wanted to create something that would do justice to her beautiful song – and then Kathryn won the SAY award and I really knew the pressure was on!

Image by Christina Riley

The film features Sophie Laplane (pictured above), who is not only a wonderful dancer, but also a talented choreographer. I knew that she would bring something special to the film. Sophie decided not to choreograph a complete dance piece; instead we workshopped some key movements and then Sophie improvised to the track on the day.

Kathryn already had a short video for The Bird – of a murmuration of starlings. I didn’t think I’d be lucky enough to find a similar flock of birds, but I wanted to echo Sophie’s choreography with the natural movements found in a wild landscape. So I knew I was looking for a location with long grass and water, and I was hoping to film at sunset.

I spent the next week combing the west coast for a suitable location, accompanied by my dad and his bearded collie, Ben (pictured below). Eventually we found a great spot at the edge of an Irvine golf course: secluded, with a nice view of Arran, even a gorgeously silvered driftwood tree on the beach nearby. It was a typically dreich evening – grey, windy and wet – so I couldn’t get an idea of the sunset, but Ben (the dog) unearthed the bird wing which you see at the start of the video.

On the day of the shoot the sky wasn’t the atmospheric grey that I’d expected – instead we got the best day of the summer! We packed my gear into the car along with sandwiches, biscuits, chocolate and gallons of hot tea – all the essentials. When we arrived the coast was bathed in the beautiful warmth of a low evening sun so we quickly got to work.

I was shooting on a Canon DSLR with 50mm and 28mm prime lenses; shooting on a DSLR lets me get the shallow depth of field that I love. It’s also lightweight enough that I can shoot without a tripod – which meant that I could adapt quickly to Sophie’s movements.

After years of filming dance at Scottish Ballet, I’ve found that it’s best to keep the camera loose and responsive. You can plan your shots to a certain extent, but often on the day it’s the happy accidents that are the bits I like the best. I use my own (cheaper!) version of steadicam, using the camera strap stretched tightly against my neck to steady the shot. I think if the camera is free to move then you can respond better to the dancer – perhaps your shots aren’t as perfectly composed but it makes the performance more alive. Personally, my favourite shots are often technically imperfect; out of focus or only catching a small part of the dancer onscreen, but I think that imperfection makes you focus on the detail in a way that isn’t possible in a live performance.

We shot from 7pm till just before midnight. Fortunately I had good light for a long time because it was just after the longest day of the year. However, that also meant that poor Sophie spent hours in the wind in nothing more than a light dress. You’d never guess from the footage, but when the camera stopped filming her teeth would immediately begin to chatter. You can’t see, but there was always someone standing ready just off-camera armed with a blanket and a hot cup of tea! She still looked amazing though and never complained once.

Image by Christina Riley

Image by Christina Riley

My favourite part of the video is the last third, where the sun is low and the sky was especially vivid. By this point Sophie was freezing so we only had time for two shots – one ultra wide to get the sky and a second in close up. The colours were absolutely beautiful, so I’m glad she toughed it out.

Sophie then escaped to sit in the car with the heating on, while I stayed to get some final shots of the deserted beach. I ended up leaving the camera balanced carefully on the sand while I ran at a group of seagulls waving my arms frantically to scare them into flying into shot. (I’m glad the beach was empty at this point.)

The shoot only lasted one evening but the edit took far longer. I probably listened to the song another hundred times over this period. My first step when editing is to re-watch all the footage, picking out my favourite moments. Then I’ll piece together a rough edit. We’d thought we might need to do a second day of shooting but I could tell immediately that I had enough footage to tell a complete story. Just as well, as that sunset was never to be repeated!

The first edit came together fairly quickly, but then I spent days chopping, changing, and rearranging – trying to get the overall flow of the film right. I’ve learned that, with dance on film, perfect continuity isn’t as important as visual flow. Rather than piecing together movements that match up perfectly in a linear progression, I think it is much more effective to combine shots which have the same feeling, or contrast in an interesting way.

The end result was really well received, and bringing us to the attention a lot of people who might not have noticed us before. Everything worked for us on the day – that freakishly beautiful sunset and Sophie’s amazing improvisation. I can’t wait for my next Scottish Ballet Creative project!

Sophie Laplane’s new work Maze will be performed in September and October as part of Scottish Ballet’s Autumn Season 2015. Find out more information here.

See Eve’s showcased work on Central Station here.

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Doc Heads are working with Rankin Film Productions (RFP) to offer the chance for filmmakers to win a new commission for HungerTV. They’ve launched an open call for UK filmmakers to send in their short documentaries (up to 15 mins) – any subject, any style, just no more than 5 years old.

Ten films will be selected to be screened on HungerTV for 2 weeks in February 2015. One filmmaker will win a £5k commission to make a new film, with Doc Heads support, that premieres on HungerTV later in the year.

To enter your film, visit here for submission details.

Deadline: 25 January

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Find more opportunities in our weekly bulletin here.

The Glasgow Short Film Festival 2015 is currently seeking submissions of short films of fifty minutes or less in any form or genre completed after 30 September 2013. The festival includes two international competition categories and two Scottish film competition categories. Running from 11-15 March 2015, the festival has a history of diverse programming across different genres and strands alongside talks, special events and workshops.

Find more information about the submissions process on the Glasgow Short Film Festival website.

Deadlines
Early: 1 September | Regular: 13 October | Late: 17 November

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Find more opportunities in our weekly bulletin here. 

You’ve got just two and a half weeks left to enter your 10-second film into 9.88 Films, the Channel 4 and Creative Scotland ultra-short film challenge we featured last month. All you need to do to enter is create an original film of 10 seconds or under on any subject, using any form of moving image. The challenge is open to anyone living or born in a Commonwealth country.

The final entry date has now been extended until 5pm on Friday 11 April, and as ever, entrants are in with a chance of having their film screened on Channel 4, as well as at cinemas around the UK, and at events around the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games. Great filmmaking kit and equipment is also up for grabs.

The challenge has had more than 150 entries so far – here’s a selection of just some of them…

Channel Flipper – William Garratt

Switch. – Harry Ward

Super Binoculars – Joseph Fallon

Take Me Back – Henry Woodley

Deadline: 11 April

For more details and to enter, see the 9.88 Films website.

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The Glasgow Short Film Festival launches tomorrow. Covering four days this year, the festival offers thirty new Scottish films in its Scottish Short Film Competition and thirty-four films vying for the Bill Douglas Award for International Short Film. There are numerous programmes ranging from Irish film to Queer Russian cinema alongside a series of talks, special events and a Low Budget VFX workshop.

But what to see? Matt Lloyd, the festival director took some time to highlight some of the must-sees this year. Focusing on the relationship between film and music, this year’s festival begins to blur the lines between the two. “Short film is a medium able to explore more interpersonal relationships with sound and music..[which is] used not only to support characters but in more interesting ways”. The festival’s opening performance and world premiere, PULSE draws upon this pairing. Featuring Grammy-nominated British/Bulgarian composer Dobrinka Tabakova and Scottish filmmaker Ruth Paxton, the event is a fusion of live music and short film that is not to be missed.

With so many films to see, the question that comes to mind is how exactly does a festival programmer choose such a wide variety of films? Lloyd compares it to putting together a mixtape, “Anyone can do it. You need variety but you also have to see the connections between films without allowing too much repetition”. However as anyone who has tried to make a mixtape knows, a lot of effort goes into making something that has depth, range and flow. With his distinctively bold style, Lloyd continues to drive the Glasgow Short Film Festival forward with innovative events and a blend of new talent from Scotland and beyond.

The first of Lloyd’s recommendations comes from Scotland. Screening as part of both the Scottish and International competitions is Cara Connolly and Martin Clark’s Exchange & Mart. After debuting at Sundance and showing at Berlin, the Scottish film comes to Glasgow for its UK premiere. “It’s a strong mature work for a fiction debut that deals with isolation and the need for human contact- it’s got a lot of talent,” says Lloyd.

Looking forwards towards September’s referendum is a panel entitled ‘Independence and the Scottish Film Industry.’ Focusing less on posturing and more on discussion, the session will examine just what the effects of nationhood might have on Scottish film culture. Inspired by a casual question from a colleague, Lloyd says “I have no idea what’s going to happen and that’s exciting.”

In the international competition, Lloyd recommends On the Threshold (Sto katofli), a Greek film. “It has the steady deliberateness of recent Greek features which blends with the anger coming out of Greece at the moment.” Equally promising is Robin McKay’s international premiere of How to Abandon Ship, an American animation and live-action film about relationships that is in the words of Lloyd, “ both funny and heart-wrenching.”

Finally, not to be missed are festival guests Jillian Mayer and Lucas Leyva. Mayer, a visual artist and Leyva, a playwright both based in Miami, will present a series of films that “defy classification” in their first ever international setting. If Indiewire calls them “next great hope of American Film,” Lloyd’s suggestion that these are “ones to watch” should be heeded.

The festival runs from the 13-16 February at various venues around Glasgow. For the full programme click here.

Interview by Madeleine Schmoll

More: Website | Festival Blog | Twitter | Facebook

Hello, my name is Simone Louise Smith and I’m a filmmaker and theatre professional from Glasgow. After making a couple of music videos over the last few years, earlier this year I wrote, produced and directed my first short film entitled RED.

RED is an experimental, psychological drama in which a photographer is haunted by visions of war. See the trailer below:

RED takes place in an eerie quarry just outside of Stirling. Extreme wind and rain, broken umbrellas flying off the grid, a drenched cast and crew climbing back and forth over piles of rocks, a rifle (not loaded of course!) and a dark and confrontational storyline…  you could call it a crazy shoot over three weekends. Cast and crew performed amazingly throughout though. It felt like everyone just soaked up the pressure and channeled it into the craft. Everyone worked for free too which was amazing (super and forever thankful to all involved!)

Once I finished the edit, I decided to submit it to the Cannes Film Festival Short Film Corner. Organized by the Festival de Cannes, the Short Film Corner is the essential rendezvous for filmmakers. Directors get to show their latest work, talk to possible buyers and attract as much attention as possible to their shorts. It also increases the chances of seeing your film selected by other international festivals as many top festival programmers and directors are in Cannes on the hunt for fresh new films and emerging talent.

Wonderfully, it was accepted and added to the festival’s annual catalogue of films.

This was pretty cool! Suddenly I got very excited about going to CANNES! The biggest film festival in the world… I figured if RED got in then I’d promote it like hell and as a reward (from the stormy shoot in Stirling) I’d soak up the sunshine and dip my toes in the French riviera.

Topping up the good vibes was that I’d made RED on a zero budget and it was self-produced. All I could literally afford was money to cover petrol costs and snacks for the cast and crew so it was quite a feat getting to this point. The possibilities were now endless. Yeah, you could say I felt pretty unstoppable at this point.

On the weeks running up to the festival I mellowed out my Cannes thoughts. Other film projects ticking away were taking my full attention so I didn’t have time to think about the festival or devise any kind of plan…but now, with only a couple of days to go, my business brain snapped into action. I need flyers! I need accommodation! I need to pack my case.

I got my flyer designed by my designer friend Wil Freeborn and got around 100 printed off. I figured having a bunch of flyers to dish out to the big industry players wherever and whenever I’d bump into them was essential.

So here I was ready to brave the world of the Cannes Film Festival on my own.

Mon arrivée en France!

I arrived on Wednesday afternoon, having flown into Nice Airport the night before. I stayed with friends in Nice (thank you Johan and Ana Is!) and travelled back and forth to Cannes by train.

It’s a pretty surreal experience watching the film industry’s cream of the crop fluttering around in such close proximity. The street towards the Palais was packed with paparazzi, spectators and seemingly very important people. Lots of lavish middle aged men with suntanned skin, silver hair and quirky hats… women with dogs in handbags, fully clad in glittery frocks… so many people shoving and jostling, holding up placards with requests for invitations… all eager to get into a film screening or premiere. C’est bizarre!!!

I could feel myself slowly turn into a pap myself… (perhaps using my camera as some sort of defense mechanism)

Viggo Mortenson!

My next port of call was to explore the Short Film Corner. I arrived during ‘happy hour’ and with my first alcoholic beverage in Cannes, I began to relax and soak up the atmosphere. Everyone discussed their films and hopes for the future and it was clear that everyone was on it networking-wise. There was an amazing buzz in the air.

Numerous film flyers on the wall

Inside the Palais

Going to Cannes on my own was exciting but there were moments when I felt quite overwhelmed. Everyone seemed to be with someone and knew where they were going. I felt lost in the maze. The festival is HUGE by the way. It has a complex structure to it and more or less everyone I met was surprised that I came on my own so I felt a little out of it at points. However, that feeling soon transformed the moment I got a supportive text message from a friend. So I stood up and thought ‘Da hell with this, I got a film to promote.’ Liberated, I went for it and started dishing out my flyers, talking to everyone. Immediately afterwards, everything just flowed. I ended up meeting loads of people, getting invited to parties on the beach and was able to meet one person or another in the industry who would then connect me to another person that I could talk to about my film.

Rob and Richard

Another nice moment was meeting my friend Rob (by chance!) who was a sound recordist on a feature film ‘Sightseers’ (directed by Ben Wheatley) and his friend Richard (actor in Sightseers) I had such a good time hanging out with those guys. It was a relief getting the chance to share stories and laugh at all the madness, and again meet more contacts that night.

My big career highlight there would have to be attending a Short Film Corner breakfast. There I ‘speed dated’ with some of the biggest players in the short film industry (festival programmers, distributors and buyers). I pitched my film to a few of those guys and three distributors asked me to send it to them right away. Filmmakers and Producers came up to me randomly (and emailed) telling me that they “loved RED”, asking me where the idea came from. It was a great feeling.

What’s next for RED?
Through the Short Film Corner I’ve been invited to enter into other international film festivals. I’ll be speaking to distributors next week and one Producer asked me to be in his documentary when he shoots in Glasgow this year. Haha, no idea what I’ve to do though. Overall it’s been an awesome experience and I feel like I’ve learned loads. I understand how the festival works now and most importantly, I met loads of cool people who share the same dreams as me.

I didn’t get to see many films as I was busy fluttering around the marketplace but my fave short film was Tram directed by Michaela Pavlátová. A brilliant and bold animation about a sex mad tram operator. Hilarious.
My favourite feature film was Mud directed by Jeff Nichols starring Matthew McConaughey, Tye Sheridan, and Reese Witherspoon. A truly moving and inspiring story about life, growing old, love, and freedom. Still thinking about it. On the Road directed by Walter Salles (based on a novel by Jack Kerouac) was the perfect movie to end on before catching my flight home… got me thinking about the true meaning of adventure.

Tips for Filmmakers
Submit your film to the Short Film Corner, find accommodation in Cannes (book well in advance), bring plenty of flyers (even some screeners of your film) watch at least one film a day and believe in yourself. Believe in your film and know why you’re there. Talk to everyone. Enjoy the ride. And when it’s all over, go for a swim in the sea!

View Simone’s trailer for RED here and visit the production company website here. Follow the Production company on Facebook and keep up with RED film updates on Tumblr. Follow Simone on Twitter here.

Write, Shoot, Cut is a blog for people interested in short filmmaking, independent feature films and carving out a career in the movies. Curated by Edinburgh based scriptwriter, Neil Rolland, the site showcases short and independent films and the people behind them as well as having interesting interviews and features that aims to encourage and inspire.

The latest short featured on Write, Shoot, Cut is a film by Lee Hardcastle. It’s a Pingu remake of John Carpenter masterpiece THE THING. Enjoy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToCq_c3wOM8&feature=player_embedded#!

Short Film #12 – Pingu’s THE THING (2012) Lee Hardcastle

Visit Write, Shoot, Cut here. Now.

Jessica McDermott is starting her own campaign to get her trailer viewed – give her some feedback and she will screen the full version of the film during the festive period.

Follow the #HOFIFOU50x50 conversation on twitter to find out more.

Click on the vimeo logo to see more of Jessica’s films.
We also enjoyed this short:

There are 42 days left – get yourself featured in our 50×50 promotion and in the running for cash prizes. Find out how here.

As The Glasgow School of Art Degree Show 2010 opens, alumni talk about their memories of their shows.

A GSA-commissioned film by GSA alumni Cara Connolly and Martin Clark.