Dissertation update

I have finished the first draft of my second chapter, a feat that was achieved over one weekend of SOLID writing.

On Friday morning I was having a chat with Ally about how little time we have left of term, but was still thankful that I had enough time to do a bit of writing before our last possible meeting with my Dissertation Tutor, David McQueen. At this point Ally pointed out to me that the last date we could have a meeting with our tutor was the 15th! (today). What that meant was that I had to rush home and finish off the tweaks I had been constantly doing to my first chapter as well as arrange a meeting for Monday or Tuesday. I sent him an email with my revised first chapter and a plea for a meeting. He got back to me that afternoon asking if Monday at 4 was OK? I said yes and cracked on with the daunting task of writing 3000 words in 3 days.

On Monday morning, After a weekend of not doing much, apart from writing and the odd break to watch some sport or play some xbox (and a quick drink on Saturday night ;) ) I had finally finished, (and realised I had written almost 5000 words!!!) I sent my second draft in by email and went into uni to grade a project that I had been editing.

Eventually, the meeting came. The first time I went to his office he hadn't finished marking, so we postponed the meeting by a half hour. Second time around we sat down to it. For the first 10 minutes it was one way traffic on his behalf, only interrupted by me trying to fondle with my iPod and asking him if I could record the meeting. He had already said so much that he had to recap for the recording. The general gist of it was:

"Its a shame because your first chapter is very good and this one is only really a draft, if you had come to me 3 weeks earlier with this you could have tightened it into something a lot better, its a shame as you only have 2 days left...."

I was confused at this point because I thought the last days of meetings was the 15th and not the 16th like he had said, so I questioned this to which he replied:

"The last day for imps and scriptwriters is the 16th."

At this point I realised that some wires had been crossed. He thought I was an imp or a scriptwriter who's deadline was the 16th, and that's why he was stressing. I was worried because it was the last time we could talk about the dissertation face to face, but was more than comfortable because our deadline is on the 27th of April!!!

"Oh!"

he says realising that he has been stressing himself out and slating me for the past 10 minutes,

"That's ok then."

After all of this furore, we settled down to a more civilised chat, were he explained the things that I had to do to make a better second chapter, and I asked for a bit of advice for my third, and this time its all recorded (my note taking is abysmal!) so once I get my major edit out of the way it should be all systems go for the dissertation! YAY!

Still got that one issue of a 4,500 word production analysis to go with my Major, but 5000 words in one weekend bodes well I think.

Peace. x

Major Shoot - Done and Dusted.

I finished my Major shoot Sunday before last and have enjoyed the ensuing week, spending time back home in London and out in the countryside with the family. The shoot itself was not too tiresome or stressful and could even have been condensed into 3 days I feel. The weekend of shooting coincided with one of my housemates birthdays so I did what most of my coursemates would consider as mad and went out on the night before my final day of shooting but it bore no major consequences, and overall I feel the shoot went well. I have captured the first and third tapes and already cut together a few scenes with the footage looking good, the second tape has a lot of the cool shit on it so that will be fun to capture (never thought I'd say that!) as well as it was to shoot. I'm especially looking forward to the slow-mo stuff with the secretart/shampoo ad scene which should look insanely hot!

My main actor, Guillaume (or G-man to his mates, and everyone else), is a guy that I have worked with - although briefly - before. I only gained his services a few days before the actual shoot after a fruitless search of the local actors on casting call pro. I told him that I had seen him in Westside Story and thought he was really good which seemed to win him over, and shows that flattery does get you a long way! He was a good actor which I already knew about, but could also play the varying styles required of my protagonist, Nate. My lead lady, Christina, who I got to play the hard-nosed and unforgiving character of Miranda was also a very good pick, I got her through casting call pro. It also offered a new experience of having children, her children, on set, although they were very well behaved! On the Saturday morning we worked with Kim, she was very professional and was obviously used to being directed, as I have mentioned before a scene should look good! My other actors playing the character of Posh Boy and New Media Type played there roles... uniquely. I say uniquely because I wouldn't describe their acting as good, but there general personae fit the characters well. Adam, who plays the character of Posh Boy, seemed to fit the bill of a Posh Dickhead almost perfectly with his after wrap confrontation of me in front of my entire crew and cast asking for an extra £12.50 that had not, in my opinion, been pre-arranged, but because of the awkwardness of the situation I caved in (I should explain now that these characters are imagined to be in a comparison website advert called Compare-a-Dickhead.com, although I do consider him a bit of a dickhead anyway). Tom, the guy playin New Media Man was just a bit weird.

I used the same crew as for my Minor, Jack on Camera, James on Sound, Chris PM, Callum PA and Charlie will be helping me out with the credit. I feel as a group on set (without obviously the PM and Editor) we all get on well and as a result the mood on the shoot was very fun and relaxed, G-man also aided to that with his involvement in our jokes.

All I can hope now is that it turns out well as a finished article.