A Savaege Blog?

What the feck have I been doing the past year since I finished college? Sweet feck all to be perfectly honest… okay I did shoot a short film ‘Turn’ and write maybe two or three other shorts. But is that enough? No!

At the moment I work 9 to 5 and then spend the evenings working on my own projects some not film related at all. I was looking into taking on some more non-film-related projects. But this has to stop now! I tell you why, a week from today is officially the start of Summer here. No one wants to be inside on a fine summers evening when it’s bright up ‘til 11.

But since June, July and August are the three best months that gives me a month before holidays and the real fine weather kicks in. A month of pure writing! …Oh yeah I want to squeeze in a day of shooting for ‘My Ball’ …okay a month a mainly writing with a bit of production work thrown in as well but no non film related work!! Not a THING!!

Goodbye to all my scams that were going to make me loaded (for the time being any way!)

As I’ve said an earlier post I’ve got to get some serious stuff done this summer. So a have to push all these other distractions away and concentrate on what I spent 3 years in college doing.

So My aims for this month

Fine list there to keep me going… and it all starts at 5 o’clock!

I’m working on a new project which I hope to shoot in next month or else in June with the aim of submitting it to the Cork Film Festival.

It’s called ‘My Ball’ I won’t go into it much as it will only be about 3 minutes long. I’m considering shooting on my K3 16mm camera but as I have yet to test the camera I don’t know how well it works.

Watch this space…

…interesting isn’t it?

Been a week since I lasted posted someting so thought I’d freshen things up a bit… small bit at that. I’ve not done anything film related in the last week so haven’t really been thinking about it much.

You see I have a day job a boring 9 to 5 job (won’t say it’s very bad ‘cos its a family business). Anyway for this month my work load has been doubled cos my Mother decided to take a month off!!! And they left me in charge of accounts and paying the wages… 300 for you 350 for you 30000 for me 400 for you…. he he he. I wouldn’t do that….

Anyway that has nothing to do with anything. So in the evenings is the only time I get to write or edit or sit down and watch soaps …I hate it when they drag you in …Mike died on Coronation street …stop it!!

Also in the evenings I work on my schemes to make me rich… they haven’t worked yet but I’ll keep trying.

Basically all I’m saying is I’ve done nothing.

I said I would write a short from scratch a few posts back by the end of the month, that month being March… well I failed to do so.

I did manage to write a first draft to an idea that has being in my head for a few months but that wasn’t the brief I set myself. I think I’ll give myself a C+ anyway for this task… yay I past!

Anyway with the Summer months approaching fast it’s high time I got the finger out and get some idea’s down on paper.

Last Summer I had planned on shooting a few projects one being my short “Turn”. I spent weeks trying to get a cast and crew together. I got some but failed to get the people who I thought would help make a good short.

When things weren’t working out I pulled the plug, I felt that I if I went ahead then I wouldn’t do the crew or myself justice. By then the summer had past. I later did shoot Turn in December.

This Summer I am going to shoot at least 3 shorts! There I said it.

They will be short zero budgets. I have several projects already and some are almost ready for Pre production. Ideally I would like to start shooting in May… a whole (less than a) month away! We’ll see.

Filmmaking is great isn’t it? All the glamour, money and fame… yeah if you’re an A list filmmaker maybe. Truth is, it’s very hard work with little or none of the above. If it’s the fame, glamour and money you’re after then I’d suggest a different career, perhaps enter Big Brother or something.

I’ve seen it with several people who I went to college with, yes they may have been very much into film but just didn’t realise what it was all about.  Long hours, weeks with no days off and often working for free. Why? For the love of it, for the hope that when you get the rushes back that you have something special.

On set you’re most lightly going to be very busy or not busy but have to wait and wait and wait until you’re needed. Two shorts I was in the lighting crew last year were like that. In one we set up the lights for a scene and then went off and had a cup of coffee and read the paper. We might get a call to tweak a light a bit, and then we’d go away again and have another cup of coffee. It can get boring at times, you’re well away from the shooting but close enough that you have to be quiet. Then an hour or two later you might get to light the next scene.

In another shoot it was the complete opposite. We’d set up the lights in one scene and then go off and light the next. Once the first scene was shot we’d go back there take down the lights and go off and set up the next scene (we were lucking to have enough lights to do this).

We only got about five minutes at lunch for a quick cupa and we were off again to be ready for when the rest of the crew were finished.

When shooting finished then we’d be the last to leave because we’d have to take down all the lights, wait for them to cool before putting them away.

I enjoyed the latter the most without a doubt.