Development

I spent the last two days trawling through a work folder on my mac deciding what projects to mothball and what to pursue in the new year.  I came up with two:  The first one is a feature script set in film school about disastrous unrequited love.  (Something I would know nothing about).  The second a documentary chronicling a sea journey from Syria to the Hebrides in the footsteps of the Phoenicians, a mix of sea adventure, history and travel with my good friend and co-conspirator Theo Dorgan.

Here's to a creative and fruitful next couple of months writing, researching and budgeting! 

Keith Farnan and Money, Money, Money.

Just spent two weeks shooting a documentary for Blinder Films with the comedian Keith Farnan exploring the financial crisis.  Virginia Gilbert was the director and Albi Sheridan was my faithful and brilliant assistant.  It was a 3 camera shoot on XDCAM with a hectic schedule.   Great fun to do and very funny to boot.  We met Mick Wallace, David Mc Williams, Ivor Browne and a host of others.  Topped off with a side splitting comedy gig on the final day.  TX is November the 1st on RTE Two.

The things you say and then hear.

Teaching a class photography last week...
"When you open the diaphragm", I said innocently "more light can enter the lens".
 "Diaphragm", she says "Didn't fuckin' work did it".  The room erupts in laughter, chaos for two minutes.

Should have said iris.

Bill Oddie and the Snares

A couple of months ago I went to Scotland and shot this video with Bill Oddie for the charity OneKind.  I finished cutting it yesterday and they uploaded it this afternoon.  Thanks to Nicky Dunne for the grading.  It was shot on an XDCAM EX3 and cut in final cut pro.  Bill is a true gent and a consummate professional.  Fun to do and all for a worthy cause.

Check out OneKind at www.onekind.org

Nostalgia.. and happy new year.

The last roll of Kodachrome was developed in the last lab on Thursday.  It made me think about my shooting career for the last 25 years, strangely I seem to have shot more film than video.  Maybe I'm lucky, maybe that's the way it was meant to be.  I once thanked a producer for recommending me for a job.  Funnily enough it was 2nd unit on an ITV drama shooting film.  He was very nice about it and said "You are what it says on the tin".  So what am I, 7248, 7240, 7250 with some bright lights, who knows.  I'd love to think that after starting the beginning of my shooting career on so much reversal stock I'd know a little bit about exposure.  But do you know what excites me, the Alexa - a huge dynamic range that beats the pants off the anything else I have seen.  Maybe digital technology has caught up and now I'll stop shooting film and start to shoot digitally.  Last year all I shot was XDCAM and it was lovely, but predictable and needed a bit of work to be interesting.  Don't get me wrong the EX3 is a great camera.  But all this waiting around while you transfer the footage to a hard-drive drives me mad.  And it's all too sharp for me.  Which brings me back to Kodachrome - an arcane process that rendered colour so well.  Has all this new technology caught up, I know that when I look at greens on stills I shot on a 1Ds MKIII you don't get any of the usual problems associated with film which is great.  This brings me to my final point on my trip of nostalgia, I look across the room and see my bolex that I inherited with an Angineux lens attached to it and I wonder, do Kodak still make 100 foot daylight loads?  It was the first camera I used and romantically I'd like it to be the last - who knows what the future will bring, but maybe just maybe it'll bring interesting images, great exposures and use of light that stops you in your tracks.

Happy new year.

Dust

The other day I was in the college I used to work in and sitting on a shelf I saw an Angineux 12 - 120 zoom lens.  I immediately recognized it as the zoom lens Gerrit, my father used on Amuigh Faoin Speir.  It was clean and had been used recently as far as I could tell.  It got me thinking.  There are so many things now that seem redundant due to technology that sit on shelves gathering dust.  I think that this is sad.  I have spent the last couple of months gathering all this old technology so that it has a home.  Besides I'm sure there will come a time when I will need it.  Just because it's old doesn't mean it's obsolete.  You hear that film is no longer in use, but most times when I work I seem to shoot film.  The other day I sat in my fathers old studio looking at cans and cans of film wondering what I would do with it all.  It's been gathering dust for 15 years since he died and it's time the cans were opened, looked at, cleaned and cataloged.  I spent many years working with him.  I also spent many years working with film.  I like film, it's great to shoot and if you spend time with it the results are fantastic.  I wonder where all this data we shoot nowadays will be - whether the drives will spin up and whether all work will be intact.  I wonder whether in 50 years from now my son will be sitting in my studio looking at my work wondering what to do with it?

Nature does Matter!

Well I gave 2 talks in the last 36 hours.  On Sunday I spoke about Gerrit my father and it went well.  I was very pleased with the response.  It was very nice to talk to my friends and strangers about my Dad and I was particularly pleased that people I hadn't seen for several years came.  Also something struck me - a book about my Dad would be a nice thing to do - now there's a thought.

Secondly I went into my children's school and talked about hibernation and drawing birds.  The age group was 4 to 6 year old children.  It was an absolute pleasure and thanks Gerrit for the wonderful illustrations and slides - great to do and I'd love to do it again.