August 27th 2012
Surely that sound I hear is Noye herding the animals into the ark.....it well could be with this film. Ah a flippant remark there has led me to thinking of all the features I have wanted to make, especially one of Britten's Noye's Fludde. Features or series - as an animator I'm sure one's involvement with a feature is , in reality, a mere few minutes of screen time, however magnificent those minutes are. With a series you produce so much more footage, but sadly don't get to finesse or rework or revisit. That can be very frustrating. If gags don't work as an aniamtor misread my istructions or I was not clear enough, we do have to live with it, or be ceative in the editing or sound. In features, I'm sure it would be reshot. But to produce several hours, no many hours, or quality television in the same period as a feature is something to be proud of. In terms of storytelling, the disadvantage of a series is that no-ne ever learns anything and can only have a limited character arc. With a feature youcan have huge, life changing arcs. You can also dwell and set up the atmosphere, and go off on slight tangents an subplots. With a series you are straight in.......not a frame wasted. I think I could write pages and pages about this. Any thoughts anyone?
The time for the play I am doing is fast approaching, and I am also meant to be writing two short films. One I managed to spend some productive time on today, and managed to crack the elusive three act structure. Very hard to structure something around just one character, as I am doing again.
I had some pleasant feedback about my films in festival overseas.....they are not winning awards though. I do think that perhaps Tchaikovsky is the best film I have made, but it is awardless at the moment. Quitehard to keep that belief that it is a good film.
Wallace and gromit at the Proms today.....something I had hoped for with Noye again. I didn't watch it but am still enoying the Prom from last week of Yeomen of the Guard. Even as a semi staged performance it still moved me enormously, and I still think it would make a great animated film.
Very sorry to see Neil Armstrong go - surely no one has his name so secure in history, and no-one can ever achieve what he did, or gazump his achievement. Ah,how I remember that late night in July all those years ago.In this week, the International space station flew over Manchester for several nights, and on one night the sky was thankfully clear, and there is what, beaming with light, and moving so silently. There were two cosmonauts walking in space as it went over. I waved to them but was disappointed that they didn't wave back.