Despite only 13 members showing up, it was an enjoyable evening.
Apologies: Murray, Peter, Adam
Film Bite - Creepshow
Freddie-Lee opened the meeting with a film biFreddie-Lee opened the meeting with a film bite based on Creepshow (Opening, 1982), which got him hooked onto horror. The screenplay was written by none other than the king of horror, Stephen King. Creepshow consists of five short stories: "Father's Day", "The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill" (based on the King short story "Weeds"), "Something to Tide You Over", "The Crate" and "They're Creeping Up on You!" Two of these stories were adapted from King's short stories, with the film bookended by prologue and epilogue scenes featuring a young boy named Billy (played by King's son, Joe), who is punished by his abusive father for reading horror comics. Creepshow is an homage to the EC horror comics of the 1950s, such as Tales from the Crypt, The Vault of Horror and The Haunt of Fear.
The cold opening sets the scene for the anthology and draws in you, the audience, by grabbing your interest through creative use of lighting and the introduction of one of the comic book horror characters (paying homage to the genre). The lighting and set design were not accidental. Horror films tend to use muted yellow and green as cautionary colours, with blue to convey/foreshadow uncertainty and dread. The indoor living room scene is very yellow and beige, whilst the outdoor and window scenes are deliberately green and blue. There are elements of anger in the scene with the father who is scolding his son for reading comic books, which is accentuated by when he sits down on a red cushion. Freddie-lee noted that more contemporary horror productions tend to focus towards more red, which leans towards anger and hostility. With this in mind, if you now rewatch the Creepshow opening, you will literally see it in a different light.
Upcoming Workshops (planning)
Members were canvassed for their ideas for rotating workshops with a suggestion to run 3 linear workshops delivered to the whole group as opposed to running them in parallel which can become quite noisy. Some of the ideas proposed included: interviewing skills - preparing for a shoot - DSLR’s and different lenses when to use etc, photography and using stills in video, manual camera operation vs automatic, setting up an edit(order of activities), preparing for a film shoot, focus pulling and using a remote monitor on a shoot. The final idea was to explore the fundamentals of photography and videography to cater for newer members.
Outdoor Events
Glenn will be running another outdoor event, a drone shoot. Spots are very limited so contact Glenn once he publishes the details on the website.
The Awakening
After the break, members watched the premiere of The Awakening. Members were then asked about the films messages and the characters of who provide two different perspectives of carers of a person with Alzheimers. The first is a daughter looking after her mother with Alzheimers, who as the carer, is showing signs of stress, emotional and physical burn-out, frustration and perhaps feeling that she is missing out on life. This is then juxtaposed against a paid carer who arrives, who is a stranger, who is not as personally connected and is therefore not as emotionally invested, and is naturally engaging and compassionate. In the centre of it is the mother, who on the surface seems to oblivious to all that is happening around her, when in reality, she is not, but is instead trapped within the vagaries of the illness. As this was the first public showing, the production team was also open to some post-production suggestions to elevate the film e.g. sound transitions, visual/digital corrections and will incorporate some of the suggestions in the final edit.
UGG Competition - due June 20th
Our upcoming UGG competition themes are Colours as Emotions, Making Holiday Videos Engaging and Death by Chocolate
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