NI Screen/Titanic Quarter

On Tuesday we interviewed Richard Williams the Chief Executive of Northern Ireland Screen,

on Thursday we attended the Next Generation Broadband Event at Titanic House in Belfast,













While there we interviewed Michael Graham, the Director of Corporate Real Estate at the Titanic Quarter, on the development of the area. We did the interview in the old Harland and Wolff Drawing Office where the plans for the Titanic were drawn up.












After that we got some footage of the Paint Hall Studio, Where City of Ember and Your Highness were shot

Ardmore Sound/Northern Ireland

We were up at Ardmore Sound on Saturday the 29th of May and interviewed Paul Moore, we were supposed to be travelling to the North the following week but had to put it off until last week, we were in Belfast on Monday and Tuesday the 7th and 8th.




We interviewed Mark Huffam who is producing the HBO series Game of Thrones in Belfast and got a tour of the Paint Hall Studio.






We also interviewed Eoin Lambkin who is the Director of Groupe intellex Belfast, his interview fit in perfectly within one major area of the documentary. We are back in Belfast at the beginning of this week coming to get more interviews, from what we have seen already Northern Irelands Film Industry compares quite well with the best of what we have seen anywhere else on our travels.

Interviews

Were in Dublin today to get two interviews,

Arthur Lappin

He was producer on films such as - In the name of the Father, Agnes Brown and Bloody Sunday.

and Robert Quinn

He directed the film Dead Bodies and recently directed episodes of the TG4 series Rásaí na Gaillimhe.

Wide Eye Films

We got an interview today with both Nathalie Lichtenthaeler and David Gleeson of Wide Eye Films, they are producer and director, respectively, of Cowboys and Angels and The Frontline.

We're coming towards the end of filming on the documentary, wrapping up interviews in Ireland before we start into the long haul of post production, hopefully we'll survive it!

Ossi Rawi

Got our interview with Ossi Rawi today, he was the Director of Photography on all four seasons of The Tudors.

Digital Domain and Giant Studios

Got into LA today on our return trip, had an interview with Eric Barba at Digital Domain first, he won the Visual Effects Oscar for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and is currently working on Tron Legacy. 

After that we went to Giant Studios to interview Matt Madden, Giant Studios is a Motion Capture Studio, most recently they had Tintin and Avatar shooting there,

both interviews went really well and we now have plenty of footage to review when we get back home! should keep us busy for a while

More New Zealand Interviews!

Got four more interviews today, it's our last day of interviewing and after that we'll just have to get a few cutaway shots of the buildings here and we're done!

This morning we got an interview with Tom Greally, he is general manager at Weta Digital,
Tom gave us a tour of all the buildings when we first got in on Monday so our interview was just following up on that, the interview was great we got plenty of footage and it will work well into the overall documentary,






After Tom we got an interview with Cameron Harland, the general manager at Park Road Post, again the interview was great and we got a lot of footage that will work really well,






After Cameron we got an interview with Dave Brown, Dave is a gaffer who has worked in films in New Zealand since the 70's and has most recently worked on Avatar and The Lovely Bones (we only realised when we looked back at the pics but we think he looks a bit like Jeremy Clarkson!) Dave Brown IMDB




After Dave we went North of Wellington, up the Kapiti Coast to meet Ken Saville, he is a sound recordist who, again, has worked here since the 70's and has most recently worked on District 9, Ken Saville IMDB







The drive back down the Kapiti Coast was great, we even got a chance to snap a couple of photos (although I nearly got blown over the side of a cliff trying to get them!)






Finally we just wanted to say thanks to Harriet at Park Road Post who gave set up interviews for us and took us on a tour of the place, after seeing the facility we didn't want to leave! With Park Road we came to the conclusion that if the facilities themselves weren't attraction enough then you would just go there for the people that work there! Everyone was great!

New Zealand Interviews

We got four out of five interviews today with the last being put back til tomorrow, pretty good altogether, we've had days where all our interviews had to be cancelled so we're happy!


Our first interview was with Delia Shanly, the manager at Film Wellington, the interview went well and we got plenty of good parrallels for back home,



after that we had an interview with Lindsay Shelton, he was the marketing director for the New Zealand Film Commission for over twenty years and sold movies from New Zealand at Film Festivels all over the World, he also has a book about it called The Selling of New Zealand Movies, we shot the interview at the Embassy Theatre which was built in the 20's and restored more recently, this is where Peter Jackson holds all his premieres.


After that we got an interview with Sue Thompson, who is acting CEO at Film New Zealand,

Lastly we interviewed Brigitte Yorke, a production manager who has worked on The Lord of the Rings, King Kong, Avatar and most recently Tintin. Brigitte Yorke IMDB

All our interviews today were great and we seem to be running up a lot of interview time, we should have plenty of footage to review when we get home.

New Zealand Film Commission & Weta Workshop

Busier day today, we got two interviews but had one pushed back so busier day tomorrow, all going well we have five to get,

First today we interviewed Mladen Ivancic at the New Zealand Film Commission,
the interview went well, we got a lot of relevant footage covered for the documentary,
there is a good parallel here for the industry back home,

(he looks very serious in the pic(!) but he was a really nice guy and we had a good interview)





















In the afternoon we got an interview with Gino Acevedo at the Weta Workshop,
Gino is the Prosthetics Supervisor and Digital Creatures Art Director at Weta Workshop and Weta Digital, the interview was great, we got a lot of footage and Gino (and Magnus) were a good laugh.

Thanks again to Magnus for setting this one up

Weta Digital

Got an interview today with Matt Aitken, he is a Visual Effects Supervisor at Weta Digital, has most recently worked on District 9 (which was great),
the interview went really well, everybody at Weta is really busy so we were lucky to get time with Matt, the interview went well and Matt's a really nice guy,

thanks to Judy at Weta Digital who set it up for us.

Wellington, New Zealand

Arrived in Wellington today, long flight! Glad to finally be here,
we have interviews throughout the week and hopefully it will all go according to plan (usually doesn't!)

San Francisco

We got an interview with Tom Johnson today, Tom is a re-recording sound mixer, he lives in Ireland and splits his time between Ireland and America,

He was good enough to give up his lunch to do the interview,
we hope we didn't keep him too long!

Tom has won two Oscars for Terminator 2 and Titanic and more recently has worked on Ondine, Coraline, The Private Lives of Pippa Lee and Sweeney Todd.

Tom Johnson IMDB

Leinster House

Olivia Mitchell

We started interviews again for the documentary after a break in filming (we had to move office), 

We interviewed Olivia Mitchell  (Fine Gael) and Mary Upton (Labour), both are spokesperson for Arts, Sports and Tourism for                                                                    their respective parties.

Mary Upton

Both interviews went well and it was interesting to get a perspective on the industry from some opposition politicians.

It was our first time inside Leinster House aswell, we were tempted to get some footage of the protesters outside but figured the Guards                                                                  would tell us to get lost                                                                     before we could!                           

Interviews and Documentary News

We interviewed Sarah Bolger about a week back, only got around to updating the website now, 

the interview went really well and was one of the easiest 

we have had so far,

We have more interviews coming up in the next few weeks and all going well should be finishing up filming over the next three months (hopefully! - although nothing ever seems to go to plan!)

(P.S. Colm I'm pretty sure I owe you a pint)

Henry Cavill/Max Brown Interviews

Due to interest and quite a few emails we received, we have decided to post some clips from the interviews we did with Max Brown and Henry Cavill from The Tudors. 

The clips will only be online for a few weeks and then we'll be taking the video down again,

it can be accessed HERE, or on our videos page,

Thanks for all the interest, we just hope you're not disappointed with the short length of the video,

Choppy Films

The Tudors

We got interviews today with two of the cast members of The Tudors, Max Brown who plays Edward Seymour and Henry Cavill who plays Charles Brandon, the interviews both went really well and the guys were both really nice, 

we're currently editing parts of the documentary together, we're filming pretty much straight for the next two weeks and hopefully we'll post back in the next few weeks with more news! hopefully . . .

Interview and Hardcore Punk documentary

We got our interview today with Morgan O'Sullivan, an Irish producer (currently on The Tudors series). It went very well and the documentary is moving along nicely. More on that one soon. 

From September onwards we should be picking up where we left off with the Hardcore documentary, which we are looking forward to (we were really disappointed to miss the summer gigs). 

We'll be in touch over the next few weeks to sort all that stuff out. 

Talk soon 

Choppy Films

What the f**K is the internet?

Hello to all of the three people who are going to read this! Our website is now (finally!) online, we'll have all our updates, pics, videos and anything else up on here from now on, 

if anybody feels the need to contact us (you won't) we can be reached through the contact page right here! yay that makes sense!!

Korda Studios using our trailer online

Hey all,

The trailer we shot from our trip to Budapest (Korda Studios and Colorfront) is now being used online as their new promo trailer,
you can see it on their website www.kordastudios.hu
God Is An Astronaut provided the music which everyone really loved.

Yesterday

We were at Gerry's book launch last night in the Irish Film Institute his book is called Lights, Camera, Dynamite - Adventures of a Special FX Director.We got talking to Tommy Dunne who just finished up working on the follow up to Band of Brothers in Australia, he's an armourer and has worked on loads of films, like gladiator, kingdom of heaven, black hawk down, saving private ryan, braveheart the list goes on,

we also met Martin Grace for the first time, he's a stunt man who used to be Roger Moore's stunt double for the Bond films (in a view to a kill when bond runs up the golden gate bridge - that's Martin Grace)

He was also the second double for Harrison Ford in Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Last Crusade (in the well of the souls when Indy climbs the giant snake statue and topples it over that's Martin - he was telling us all about it)

it was a good night and we got more interviews secured for our documentary so it worked out pretty well!

Woodstock

We got into Woodstock on Monday evening, really nice place, we got our interview with Doc from Bad Brains on Tuesday morning, again the interview went really well, then we had a long drive from Woodstock to Boston for our flight home, we hate airports and long flights!

Washington DC

We got into Washington DC yesterday evening and got our interview with Ian MacKaye, from Fugazi and Minor Threat earlier on today, he's a really nice guy and the interview went well, he had some really good things to say,off to WoodStock, New York in the morning and then flying home on Tuesday evening, its been a strange couple of weeks!

Darkhorse Entertainment

Got our interview with Mike Richardson today, he is the President of Darkhorse Entertainment and producer of 

Hellboy and Hellboy 2 (amongst others)

again the interview went really well and the guys in the Darkhorse office were great,not much more left in our trip, we have to head onto Washington DC on Saturday and then onto Woodstock, New York, then finally home!

Joel Schumacher Interview

Got our interview with Joel Schumacher today, it went really well,
we also met Zoe Saldana who was meeting Joel right after us, she's in James Camerons new movie and also plays Nyota Uhura in the new Star Trek movie, all in all a pretty good day!

Jello Biafra

We interviewed Jello Biafra tonight at the Uptown in Oakland, its the first interview from our second documentary and it went really well,
Respect to Big 'O'(security at The Uptown)

San Francisco

Crazy Traffic!! We got in about three hours ago, have another interview tomorrow night. We'll be putting up more pics from Boston and some from San Francisco over the weekend, then onto LA!

America

We got into Boston last night, here til Thursday and then we're on to  San Francisco, will have some pics up from Boston either later on or tomorrow... for all of the one person whos gonna read this!!

Finally!

Finally!! we have some footage from our documentary we are currently working on up, this is just the first glimpse and the footage is all taken from our recent trip to Budapest,we've been quietly working on the documentary for a while now and its coming along really well,

The music used is from God is An Astronaut,
you can find them on www.godisanastronaut.com
or here on myspace and also on bebo.

www.kordastudio.hu
www.colorfront.com
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0328996/
http://pro.imdb.com/company/co0177233

Budapest Trip

we were in Budapest last week filming for a documentary we are working on, just put some of the pics up now, will have footage up pretty soon,the trip went great, we went to Korda Studios in Etyek, just outside Budapest, Hellboy 2 wrapped there just before christmas, we got a full tour and then got to walk around ourselves and get footage of the facilities there,we also met Adam Goodman from Mid Atlantic films, he is a producer and provides production services for films shooting in Hungary,Lastly we went to Colorfront, a post production facility which recently teamed up with Korda Studios to provide full production services to any film coming to Korda,Colorfront is owned by Mark and Aron Jaszberenyi, they created Lustre, the industry standard DI grading system, most notably used on The Lord of the Rings, this system allows dailies to be graded to show the footage as close to it will look in the cinema as possible, they also gave us a tour of their facility and we interviewed Mark Jaszberenyi about Colorfront,we will have footage up over the next few days,choppy films