Current Projects
Branch Out has recently completed its first completely motion graphics project; a promo video for the Random House Sales Conference which can be viewed...
It's ultra-cheesy but I can ultra-cheese with the best of them.. I have also been working with Annie Goldson on her documentary... This month I will be cutting together a video for the incredibly talented ensemble group...Geeking Up
After passing the Level One exam, I thought I may as well increase my editing power level as high as possible attending a 3 day advanced editing course and sitting the Level 2 exam on Friday... 95%
Europe and long awaited qualifications
Natalie and I returned from our big Europe trip just a few weeks ago. And I've just recently sat my apple certification exam for Final Cut Pro... a program I've been using for over 5 years. After reading almost the entire FCP user manual I passed. So you'll see I've plastered the Apple logo all over the website, just because I can. I will be sitting the advanced certification in about a month, geeking it up big time!
Wallace
Film work has been on a little hiatus over the last couple of months as I was painting a two and a half metre tall man with a goat head wearing a loin cloth on an autopsy bench... for the Wallace Awards. I'm also filming a series of video blogs for The Learning Connexion following my experience preparing for an exhibition next year. These will be being released soon on The Learning Connexion's...
Mid Year Update
Half way through the year. Work with Moisture Detection has been ongoing throughout the year, and we have had good feedback from the first video which is proving a great marketting tool for the Step Up Group. For Myspace I have filmed performances and interviews with Die Die Die, Rhys Darby, Boh Runga and recently Smashproof. A highlight has been a project working with director Oliver Kraft and DOP Jan Steffen (who filmed the Human Rights Commission videos) for the South Auckland Poets' Collective. A couple of weeks ago we had the group screening which was really satisfying watching everyone laughing and clapping. I've also begun filming interviews for Random House and seminars for the Market Research Society of New Zealand. Plans for this quarter include working on the new Annie Goldson documentary "Brother Number One".
I am currently trying to upload and embed a new production logo clip (above) to the website frontpage, with some difficulty. Natalie has had some more success with her writing recently being published in Her Magazine, as well as having some really positive feedback from other publishers. Darwin, as anyone who has seen his videos will attest is taking a lot of my attention, and making my once lonely workplace fun. I've also managed, miraculously, to get some photo and extra work through Red Eleven, you can check out my photos on http://prefrontallobotomy.blogspot.com
I just received this in an email and thought it might be interesting. More interesting to me as I have recently bought a house...
A new colleague
This is Darwin - He has come to keep me company at work.
Ist Screening of "Msanii: Artists of Bagamoyo"
Yesterday we had the first screening for tutors and students at The Learning Connexion, with a good turn out and good response I'm really happy with the re-edit Matty has done with the film. This will now be the version I use to apply to festivals
HRC Video complete
Branch Out Media has completed editing and post-producing some short videos for The Human Rights Commission. The project was a great success, no mishaps with the HD footage, bring on the next Huge-Definition project!
Natalie and I are also working with a clothing company called Kow Tow on a proposal for a documentary about fair trade cotton
So, finally some business news!
I am currently editing a short documentary about Equal Employment Opportunities with the Human Rights Commission. It's a really exciting project as, although it is a commericial project, it still deals with human rights issues (obviously). I am working with a friend Briar who I attended art school with. The project is Branch Out Media's first project in HD and I'm happy to announce that we are managing to work without any sign of technical difficulties.
I have also posted an ad on the big idea website which has had a great response and put me in contact with a number of talented potential collaborators. This is part of a "Branching Out" philosophy I am employing with Branch Out Media, each day introducing a new person or group to Branch Out Media in order to find untapped markets, collaborators, and other opportunities - so far it is working wonders.
The site is all up and running now, there are a couple of empty spaces on some of the "branches" to be filled but the styling is as of now satisfactory, and all the links work, still some IE bugs (borders and hover commands on 'services' page) A working site. Still more to come though.
Services page is now up and running, with some simple popup graphics, the images are place-markers only to be filled at a later date with production stills
Sorted out some position discrepancies with IE, not yet the "ugly borders" though. So far, pages that are up are Home, Msanii, Contact link, NEWs and videos, if this isn't what you're after look forward to some stylish "dead links" or some butt-ugly unstyled html. Working on the "people" page now.
So this is my first update. Just a test to see how my updates page is working
Later that day... Apologies to any Internet Explorer users, I've just been informed by my wife that the site looks "kinda strange" on her PC at work. Unfortunately I'm running Safari and Firefox on a Mac and this apparently leads to some conflicts, if anyone is seeing an ugly site please feel free to check it out in Firefox (for PC or Mac) to get the real flava. Ironically, this NEWs page is the only one that's not completely messed up for IE users, isn't that convenient?