Bleak

On Saturday Reuben and me spent the day in the performance center visiting the "Ways of Watching Winter Dance Symposium". Our stay there began with a discussion on the artist and audience in a regional context and later another on ownership and authorship. I noticed that most of what these flexible people in tights were talking about was transferable to film as well as my own background and future. We saw a total of 6 performances by students and professionals, but to be honest I mistook one of the professional performances as students, so the difference there was not that great (to my untrained eyes, I guess).
The first performance called Echoes of a Lost Music featured music by Christopher Best (first song if you scroll down) playing a solo guitar in the middle of the room. The music was this one guitar played on separate delay tracks which repeated and overlapped throughout the piece. The music accompanied a wonderful dance which involved many strange contortions. The combination of the dance and music allowed my mind to wander and I began constructing nightmarish images with my imagination. There were slugs, people rolling on the floor on fire, bodies melting into each other, it was all very intense and at times it frightened me. Another performance which I liked involved around 17 or so dancers and was very energetic and evoked beautiful images such as a wavy sea of bodies...being washed back by the waves, then coming forward just to be washed away again.
I was really surprised at the quality of the work that I saw. I know several of the students in the second year and I never thought they would be this good and professional. Being inspired by their talent makes me even more determined to perfect my work practice this year, so that hopefully, the films I make will inspire people who see them and render them speechless.
We also handed out call cards and spoke to many of the dancers in hope of finding out lead lady for Diorama. This was a success as many of the students were interested and open to collaborate with us.

Reuben and me traveled to Plymouth on Sunday to scout out a location we had heard about and looked up. The square around the Plymouth Sundial is suitable for Diorama's key scene as there is a lot of pedestrian traffic around, many people sitting and waiting, the surrounding buildings are (above the ground floor) bleak and nondescript. The sundial itself is also a very interesting image.
I think Reuben is not fully convinced by the square, but I think we made much progress over the weekend.

Sunday night after a rather downcast and hung over journey we met up with Jamie for our second weekly mealting. We went over the scripts of Repossessing Tim and Clearwater Revival and talked some serious sound. The meeting was a big reassurance as I was getting a bit anxious about the projects. I am confident though that the three of us will collaborate well and that out sound design will enrich the films we work on. Here is a small sneak teaser of the dancer's leitmotif which Jamie pitched to us at the mealting. I think we're on to something here!

We had a second recce today for Repossessing Tim. We drove out to the location with AD Nicholas Raybould and I was able to walk around the location and record. I managed to get some good clips of the tunnel and the bridge area as well as some nice drips and drops down some of the deep holes spread out around the quarry. Helicopters flew overhead several times and I recorded these for some time, I might be able to use them in some way as they possess an interesting and dynamic sound. I also did some mic tests to see how they cope with the wind. Everyone is getting ready for the shoot this weekend.
I am just happy to be making films at the moment, this is what I am here to do.