King Of The Ducks

The whole of Henry Scriven's 'To Let' is now online and can be viewed here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4JLlPsvslg

October 3rd 2009

The Making Of 'The Sea Is A Good Place To Think Of The Future'...

At the end of June I got a surprise; I received a press ticket for the Glastonbury festival.  So three days before the festival started I was scrabbling around borrowing tents, buying wellies and begging for a lift.  It was at this same time that I got a message from my friend Ellen, bass player for Los Campesinos!, that they were going to be doing a video for their new song and wondered if I could come to Cardiff at the weekend to shoot it.  Of course this clashed with Glastonbury, but dates were shuffled to Monday.

So after a fantastic four days at the Glastonbury festival I hopped on a coach, a bus and a train and got to Cardiff late-afternoon where I was instantly bundled into a car, driven to Ellen's, allowed to shower away the festival stench, then handed a camera and finally given the chance to hear the track!  Fortunately I really liked the song and could begin to picture what I hoped I'd manage to capture on film.

Of course the brief for the video was very vague; the band and friends would be on the beach, drinking and I'd film them and (hopefully) have enough footage to turn into a video.  Fortunately it was a nice evening, but I didn't want to 'direct' anybody, I just wanted to capture people having a nice time and craft something from it in the edit.  Naturally people can be a little self-aware if there's a camera on them, so I chose to use a lot of zooms to try and trick people so they might think I was shooting something else.  I was a bit nervous because most of what was being filmed was people kicking a football in a circle and I couldn't see much potential for that as a video.

Ultimately as the sun set I got some footage that I was really proud of, I also drank a bit too much of the alcohol that was there and ended up wading crotch deep into the sea to film paddling, swimming and aquatic wrestling.  A beach fire was constructed and I tried to grab some 'poignant' shots staring into the flames.  Finally as everyone bundled into their respective vehicles I shot a lip-sync with Gareth listening to the track.

The following day, after grabbing some sofa-bound slumber, I edited the video.  This wasn't under the ideal conditions as it was on a MAC's iMovie software and involved a lot of re-formatting, slo-moing, and other technical finickiness to try and get the footage just right.  The cut was finished around midnight and the following day I got the train back to Brighton.

Since then the video received a slight re-edit by Ellen to get rid of the lip-sync sequence (which was interspersed throughout as a kind of 'reflective' viewpoint), though one brief shot of it remains in the final video.  However I'm not going to have a directorial hissy fit and bemoan the death of my vision, because I'm really happy with the final cut and actually somewhat surprised it turned out as well as it did!

Anyway, regardless of that, I hope you like it and hope you've enjoyed this little insight into the filming of it!

September 9th 2009

On the July 2nd post (below) I gave you a glimpse of an upcoming video, I can now reveal it's the music video for Los Campesinos!'s new single 'The Sea is a Good Place to Think Of the Future' and it's online now (hope you like it):

The Sea Is A Good Place To Think Of The Future from Los Campesinos! on Vimeo.

July 30th 2009

Blast from the past: Whilst I lived in Aberystwyth as a humble student studying creative writing, I was also a member of the Film Society, and each year they'd do a 48 Hour Film competition, wherein you were given a title, a camera and then two days later you had to have all the footage you needed to make a film.  My first ever effort was 'Fear and Loathing in Aberystwyth' and is on YouTube now, it's also in the player embedded above, so you have no excuse for not watching it!  It stars me, Dan Witherall and has a cameo from Mike Stokes who also held the camera for most of it.

July 15th 2009

Whilst in London a week or so ago I made the first installment of a new spoof series with Carl Morris.  It's inspired by two old shows from BBC2's heyday, Moviedrome and Scene By Scene, each presented by Mark Cousins.  Here's the first episode of MOVIEDRONE, entitled STALLONE.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3evPPDOVi8

July 2nd 2009

Just got back (ish) from a rock-n-roll week away.  As mentioned in the previous entry I was filming Henry Scriven's short film 'To Let' on the 23rd of June, it was a fast-paced and fun day's filming and I'm really looking forward to seeing the finished film.  He's a behind the scenes glimpse at some of the cast:

(l to r) Hannah Robinson, Me, James Tilby

Afterwards I went to the Glastonbury Festival which I have written a piece about for God is in the TV 'zine, you can read that HERE.  Whilst at the festival I saw the new film 'Adventureland' and you can read my review of that HERE.  I also saw Pixar's new film UP, and will write my review of that very soon and then edit this paragraph so you can read that too!  Instead of coming straight back to Brighton I went to Cardiff to film a music video for a single from a band's third album, it was a lovely evening shoot on a beach and then I edited the footage the next day.  I'm really pleased with how the video's turned out but don't think I'm allowed to show it to you yet, here's a sneaky still from the shoot though:

If you can figure out who the video is for from that screen grab then you are gifted!

June 22nd 2009

Since the last update I've performed in the Brighton Fringe production of 'Enjoying Alan Bennett', begun rehearsals for an upcoming stage production of Aaron Sorkin's 'A Few Good Men', shot a couple extra days on the aforementioned film 'Broken' (with another, probably final, day's filming early-July) and tomorrow will be acting in Henry Scriven's short film, the dark comedy 'To Let'.  Following that I'm off to the Glastonbury Festival in my other guise of 'music journalist' and then going straight from that back to my old stomping ground of Cardiff to film a music video (more on that soon).  Will, hopefully be able to give you a glimpse at some of the work I'm doing, there's also a short film I shot back at the start of the year that I'm still looking forward to seeing, once the lengthy task of editing is completed (got slightly delayed as the director, Ellen, had to go off on an American tour immediately after the shoot!).

May 7th 2009

After a month sans internet I'm back online, which means QUACK SPOUT (see below) is up and running again and I can show you a photograph from behind the scenes of the aforementioned short film BROKEN.  There's a couple more days of shooting to go, sometime in June, so hopefully will have some more 'goodies' to show you then.

(l to r) Amanda Sterkenburg who plays Ria, Jean-Paul de Claite-Rosse the director, me and I play Stephan.

April 6th 2009

Firstly I'd like to point you in the direction of my PODCAST; 'Quack Spout'

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It features great music from many unsigned and independent artists and bands, along with my own half-muttered ramblings about any and every thing.  Please have a listen, let me know what you think, recommend bands, discuss stuff you hear and subscribe!  I plan to record a Podcast every Sunday, so keep your ears peeled.

This week I'm making my return to short film acting in Vertu Media's 'Broken' directed by Jean-Paul de Claite-Rosse, so I'll hopefully have some photos to add from that some time soon.  I'm also currently in rehearsals for a play that will be performed at the Brighton Fringe, but more on that at a later date.

January 2009

Happy New Year!  A few things are going to be happening at the start of 2009, the first is that there is a brand new showreel for King of the Ducks productions that features some footage from 'The Bet' among other recent films!  There's also a new clip (audio over old visuals) of movie producer Mike West talking about his passions: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=EoMr7yZjyO0 This is likely the precursor to a documentary about Mike West and Dr. Jay's respective careers.  The coming weeks will see the first issue of an independent film 'zine I've produced being published, and if you're interested in getting a copy £1.50 (inc. P & P, or £4 for overseas) then e-mail me at kingoftheducks@hotmail.co.uk with the subject heading 'SEAT 13'.

Hope 2009 has gotten off to a great start for you!

A brief glimpse into what is currently harassing my mental and electrical equipment...

Currently Listening To:
Ades: Asyla, These Premises Are Alarmed, etc. / Rattle, et al
Thomas Ad�s, Simon Rattle, City of Birmingham Symphony Or…, Birmingham Contemporary Music …
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Currently Reading:
The Book Thief
Markus Zusak
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Currently Watching:
Monkeybone (Special Edition)
Brendan Fraser, Bridget Fonda, John Turturro, Giancarlo Esposito, et al.
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Currently Playing:
Herdy Gerdy

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Contact: kingoftheducks@hotmail.co.uk