Samuel J. Bailey

Horsemen Post

2012-01-14T05:03:00.000-08:00

So we're way into the post now. ADR is done, we're nearly picture locked. Bit of compositing to do with some horse urine some time soon.

But right now it's composing time with Max and Maria.

I Found A Bike Today goes live

2011-10-27T05:15:00.000-07:00

After several months wait to get it out - we've finally released I Found A Bike Today's video with Adeel Akhtar. It was a shitload of fun to make. The extra footage from Adeel that didn't make it to the final cut will stay safe with me forever, some of the funniest things from a single human being in there. Enjoy!

The Horsemen, DONE!

2011-09-01T05:06:00.000-07:00

We managed to wrap in two days - now into the post segment. Bring it on!

Horses Head and other things

2011-08-22T14:09:00.000-07:00

So with a week to go before the production cranks up a gear we are putting the pressure onto Stables for their locations. Sadly Lea Valley Riding centre is a no go, however Mudchute have been very helpful already.

With a dedicated filming department they are much more informed when it comes to filming. This obvious comes with the natural downside that they have a figure worked out already, and may be averse to negotiation.

I have offered ‘in kind’ and via the lovely production manager, to film a promo video for them for free (usually to the tune of about £1500) to promote their site for more film locations. We won’t hear until Monday as to their feelings on this at which point we will really be struggling for a location.

Something I have learnt is how far the budget will go. And with this, how much everything adds up to some catastrophic figure. Coming from a theatre background where you can get away with a blank stage and an engaging performer/solid text, this is a huge blow to the old confidence.

“How much?!” seems to just hang around my neck on a chalkboard. No matter. As they say, it will all come together in the end!
In the meantime here’s the head so far… not shabby eh?!

Here are my original sketches of the Costume!

2011-08-21T04:57:00.000-07:00

Update

2011-08-20T04:56:00.000-07:00

So as of today, I have a lovely Production Manager - Treasa O'Brien - onboard as well as a great Producer - Tora Young (Caveman Films) overseeing the project and checking I don’t drop it on its head so to speak.

The script is back down to a healthy 11 pages from a terrifying 18 pager, but with several more characters. So casting will happen later this week.

The Horse costume is being constructed by Keely Shephard as we speak, the construction underneath is looking great…

Location Shots

2011-08-15T16:08:00.000-07:00

Thought I’d pop up a selection of location shots for the setup scene. Lea Valley Riding Centre. They've very kindly confirmed for both days!

Script Read Through

2011-08-10T17:54:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I ran a quick script run through with two actor friends of mine Dan Kent and James Kennan - brought home some interesting things in the wording. I’ve given one of the characters, Paul, the impossible task of dealing with an argumentative script, but approaching it light heartedly.

The guys did good and I subsequently destroyed the text once again in Liverpool st. to amend my mistakes.

I think it's going ok...

2011-08-09T04:49:00.000-07:00

Thank You IdeasTap

2011-08-03T14:11:00.000-07:00

It’s probably worth mentioning that this is all being made possible by the lovely people at IdeasTap!

Thank you chaps.

The Horsemen cometh

2011-08-01T13:12:00.000-07:00

So I thought it might be nice to start up a blog to document what will ultimately be a bit of a nightmare - making The Horsemen. At least when they all wonder where it went a bit pear shaped for me, as they talk me down from a first floor window, this can serve as a bit of evidence.

Here’s the skinny.

I shoot in 2.5 weeks.

I have a script and, although in its 5th draft now, feels like it’s nearly there.

I have no cast/crew yet. That’s this afternoon and next weeks job.

I have left myself 1 week to edit offline/online and deliver at the end of the process before I jet off to Argentina for my brother’s wedding.

The atmosphere at my brother’s wedding in Argentina will be heavily influenced by how well this project goes.

I may be bricking it a bit. But then who wouldn’t.

Now onwards.

2011-01-30T12:53:00.000-08:00

I have not had time recently to keep this thing up to date, but here is a quick catch up since October.

Soon after the last post I approached viral advertising company, The Viral Factory, and scored some work through then as a junior creative. I've been working on several projects with them concepting for clients such as Samsung, Google and Philips. The work has been challenging, but has taught me one vital skill - how to write something for an audience. None of this imposing, pretentious arty crap any more, it's all about making entertainment for shit loads of people. Brilliant.

Samsung's Project Space Planes has just been completed and the footage is below. Have a look at it. I am immensely proud of the planes, which I designed, short jaunt in Outer Space. I squee'd with delight at the shot of the one plane caught perfectly in frame.

DIY won an award from IdeasTap as part of their editor's brief, which is excellent news - I'm compiling work for them to view as part of something internal at the moment, will wait to see what that's about. The winnings I took from it went straight to my rent, which was saddening and edifying all at once in that I have rent to pay, but I made the film with a bottle of wine in me. The very same bottle of red which tipped me into the..... well into the red originally.

I joined Swedish garage rock band Francobollo and have since played several gigs, signed a management contract and booked tickets of to Sweden to record throughout March. So things have moved fast. Listen to us here

2010-08-31T08:54:00.000-07:00

Back from Edinburgh having had a very battery recharging time. Saw loads of stand-up comedians and made the mistake of feeling like I was pretty funny too. A trap you tend to fall in when speaking to someone you know is a stand-up. It's like when you meet someone and find out they're a doctor, your hypochondria sets in and you begin listing through any ills that you think of in your mind in the hope of a free and friendly check-up in the corner of the bar. Same thing with stand-ups, although their diagnosis is usually wrong (see that was meant to be a joke. Didn't laugh did you).

I always find myself trying to slip half-arsed punchlines into conversations. I'm not sure whether I'm trying to make them laugh to prove that I am funny, or whether I'm attempting to plant some seeds of jokes of mine into their mind so I can be the 'friend' that is cited in their next show. I find stand-up comedians make me nervous like this.

Chip on my shoulder? Many. No sauce jokes here. You wouldn't laugh.

I'm currently writing a new short film in the hope of doing it real justice by getting real money together and real people and real things to make it a decent piece to take around festivals and the such like. Its first draft is crippled with sickening sentiment, so I have gorged myself on lemons and indulged myself in Charlie Brooker's column, so am ready to go back and make it more twisted and loathing.

Theatre-wise, our new stage show which is currently untitled is going very well and the process has been exhilarating. Some rehearsal images should be up on the site soon and we will be sharing our work so far in November at the Arts Depot, North Finchley.

Here's a classic sketch.

Busy bees are no match for me.

2010-08-09T04:31:00.000-07:00

Excuse the twee title. It's been shittily busy (tweeness destroyed). Worked on an Evan's commercial/behind the scenes photo shoot with comrade in arms Joe Connor, then onto a drum and bass msic video due to be finished in the next few days by director Drew Cox. All the while with a crossing over backlog of editing to do.

However I did manage to finish an old edit I'd been wanting to do for a while based on the TALK TO FRANK adverts. Have a gander on the website. Has Henry Perryment starring in it.

Favourite recent find online has been the series, Cowards, which stars Tim Key - a very funny faced comedian, and a guy who my brother went to school with too. One particular scene depicts a very middle classed dinner party.

Also to watch is Rohan Blair-Manget's behind the scenes at Secret Garden Party following the drummer of the Gorrilaz Sound System. Really stunningly shot on the ol' 7D. See it here http://www.vimeo.com/13714687

s.

New Website Up and Running

2010-06-21T13:57:00.001-07:00

I have finally beaten the odds and finished my new site. It's of the simple design variety and has a whiff of old Nickelodeon design for that sense of nostalgia.

If you've just come from there, then welcome and thank you for checking it out. Please forward it onto anyone you feel may be interested in my work at all. This blog is just to keep up to date with my movements and for me to post all the brilliant short films I have found on my various trips across the internet.

And who knows, I may succumb to online passive-aggressive-bullying and write some mean shit about people in the newspapers. Or the newspapers. Or just people.

Any feedback or problems with the site, please send them to me at samueljbailey@gmail.com

Anyways, watch this brilliant re-cut trailer of The Shining like a disney family film.

Short Versus Long

2010-06-10T13:01:00.000-07:00

I cannot rave enough about Ryan Fleck's amazing film Half Nelson. I saw it a long time ago after hearing Broken Social Scene did an original score for it. Although that is not strictly true, Half Nelson just use mostly BSS existing tracks - each track sounds perfect in the moment it is used in. Amazing scenes of passion and cocaine fuelled steamy sex on the couch to Passport Radio for example.

I ordered the DVD and watched it again, then trawled through all the extras in a bid to find out what caused such a lovely thing. It turns out the writer and director wrote the screenplay, but having trouble finding the $1million they needed, they condensed the script and shot a 20min short following the girl rather than the teacher called "Gowanus, Brooklyn". The most surprising thing? It was pretty rubbish. Badly shot and acted. The handicam/isitadocumentary styled filming was past your average shakiness and into the realms of nausea. But it was obviously enough to inspire some funders to back it!

Gowanus, Brooklyn - Ryan Fleck

But then, the film was amazing - trailer here.

Same thing with Sean Ellis's Cashback. It started as a short, but interestingly, it was received so well that he re-wrote the script in 7 weeks and shot the rest of the film, turning it into a brilliant feature film. Well worth checking out. Basically Sean Ellis was a fashion photographer, and so really captures a sense of style in this spin on life on the night shift at Sainsbury's. Don't let Michelle Ryan being in the feature put you off. Part one of the short here.

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And finally, another wonderfully exciting short film that had a previous life as a home made rough short. Our favourite Terry Tate: Office Linebacker was an original short film, before it was picked up by a network to be reshot. The upside are the production values, the downside is that we lost all the swearing. Motherfuckers.

Pure class.

Are We Nearly There Yet!

2010-05-05T12:48:00.000-07:00

So the Woodland Project that I secured the funding for a long time ago is now finished. It took another 50 hour straight edit session, but was lovely and a great experience. Despite a lack of some decent coverage to make up the time at the end, considering I was matching it to the music, it all came out really well.

I may have another stab at re-colouring and grading it, but for the moment I'm really happy. It was a very ambitious thing to undertake - and I will aim to bite of as much as I can chew next time. Considering the production week saw my diet drop down to nothing and my body decided to act defiantly and try and shut itself down slowly. Anywhos, I say that now, but next time I will end up creating something with a pack of wild animals and power tools. These things just seem to go well together.

Big well done to everyone on that project and also a thank you to the guys I live with for putting up with my constant questioning of how it looks. I actually forgot I'm slightly red-green deficient and was told after the first 20 hours that it looked '...a bit pinkish'. I can't tell you how crushing that was. But so true as well.

Anyways, you can see it here

Grading and Sleeping

2010-04-30T17:43:00.001-07:00

Am currently putting the final touches to the new short 'The Woodland Divorce Court Youth Orchestra' (working title at the moment). Have taught myself how to grade and am doing the painstaking task of correcting everything deep into the night.

Everything is starting to match and have a bit more warmth, lost a lot of the blue-bias the 5D has on a neutral shoot. Relieved to get to the last frame - have just hit the wonderful render button and am going to let the computer work into the night sorting everything out. Feel kind of guilty making it do the hard stuff while I rest.

Next step is to implement all the audio, level it out, line it up and pray we covered up any little hiccups in the car scene! Which reminds me, here is a little pick of one of the rig setups on the day, sadly it was the only one I got that day and it was on a cameraphone, but you can see our lovely actors Kirsty Besterman and Russell Layton with Max and the main child actor Georgia in the back.

Screenings and Sexual Inadequecies

2010-04-12T16:11:00.000-07:00

Just got home from a screening of 'I Can Never Find The Right Words' at the Sway Bar in Holborn. Enjoyed skulking in the background and saying the words '...my sexual inadequacies and disabilities' to a group of strangers. Film went down well too, I like drawing out the men stuck in their own stereotypes who come say they enjoyed it. Think I may start a brotherhood of men who have come to terms with being no better than just men.

My massive social ineptitude stepped in - I've never been a networking sonofagun. Specifically didn't speak to to the person from the UK Film Council directly after being introduced to said person from UK Film Council.

Next project!

Production Week

2010-04-11T14:16:00.001-07:00

So tomorrow, the engine gets turned on on my 'Woodland Divorce Court Youth Orchestra' project. Got a lot to get on with and a week that needs to go pretty flawlessly to give me a chance of enjoying the whole experience.

I have a crew of 7 and a cast of 50. Have certainly enjoyed delegating on this one and having a support network around. Once we have the location confirmed tomorrow by the Wimbledon Common Ranger's office I'll feel a whole lot better. Sure the sleepless nights and delicate relationship with the toilet will subside.

Praying for good weather for the week and watching Clark and Michael to get some calm.

Excursions on your Blackberry

2010-03-03T12:29:00.000-08:00

So just finished the last sessions to the 'Are We Nearly There Yet' Project in Wimbledon Park. Next thing is to have a couple of weeks of tearing hair and trying to sort the production side of the project out. I need a producer. Horrible fact that my slightly controlling nature is coming to terms with. I think the only problem is that I always feel like no producer would be interested in working with me. I'd imagine Tarantino's PA would feel very similar. Not likening myself to Tarantino, but he was the only person I could think of who speaks faster than his tongue can lick the words coming out.

Bad analogies aside, I have got a nice week next week working with a group of drama students from the Ignite program at the Arts Depot Theatre teaching them about devising with technology. The idea is to tell stories through the use of mobile phones. Will see how that goes.

Here's another fun short film