Showing posts with label key 2 time. Show all posts
Showing posts with label key 2 time. Show all posts
Friday, July 16, 2021
Influencing the Doctor #51 and #52
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
Graceless on the wireless
All this week, BBC Radio 4 Extra are broadcasting my original sci-fi series Graceless. You can listen to each episode, for free, on iPlayer up to a week after broadcast. Here are some handy links to each episode:
1.1 The Sphere
1.2 The Fog
1.3 The End
2.1 The Line
2.2 The Flood
2.3 The Dark
Abby and Zara were created to search for the missing pieces of the Key to Time. But having completed their mission, they're on their own in a universe that can be dangerous and unpredictable... They have special powers - they can teleport anywhere or when, and they can get into people's heads. But more often than not, that only gets them into more trouble...
The series stars Ciara Janson, Laura Doddington and Fraser James, with a guest cast including Colin Spaull, Patricia Brake, David Warner, Michael Keating, Derek Griffiths, Michael Cochrane, Joanna Van Gyseghem and Susan Brown.
You can also buy both series from Big Finish, as well as Abby and Zara's earlier adventures in the TARDIS. Speaking of which, here's a lovely illustration for that first adventure that Brian Williamson (yes, the chap who does AAAGH!) produced for Doctor Who Magazine. Cor.
I'm busy writing series three of Graceless at the moment, which should be released next year.
1.1 The Sphere
1.2 The Fog
1.3 The End
2.1 The Line
2.2 The Flood
2.3 The Dark
Abby and Zara were created to search for the missing pieces of the Key to Time. But having completed their mission, they're on their own in a universe that can be dangerous and unpredictable... They have special powers - they can teleport anywhere or when, and they can get into people's heads. But more often than not, that only gets them into more trouble...
The series stars Ciara Janson, Laura Doddington and Fraser James, with a guest cast including Colin Spaull, Patricia Brake, David Warner, Michael Keating, Derek Griffiths, Michael Cochrane, Joanna Van Gyseghem and Susan Brown.
You can also buy both series from Big Finish, as well as Abby and Zara's earlier adventures in the TARDIS. Speaking of which, here's a lovely illustration for that first adventure that Brian Williamson (yes, the chap who does AAAGH!) produced for Doctor Who Magazine. Cor.
 |
| Ice Warriors, the Fifth Doctor and Amy in The Judgement of Isskar Art by Brian Williamson |
Wednesday, May 02, 2012
Revealing Diary - a short film by the Guerrier brothers
SFX exclusively reports that the Guerrier brothers and a handsome gang of desperadoes made a short science-fiction film, Revealing Diary. You can watch it here:
We’re really pleased with the film, which was made as part of Sci-Fi London’s 48-hour challenge (#sfl48hr) – though a last-minute technical hitch meant we missed the deadline.
That’s especially frustrating given the hard work of the cast and crew – who gave their time for free – and the amount of preparation that my brother Tom and I put into it. But we weren’t alone: of 368 entrants, 161 films were submitted. In the hope it helps future entrants – or just because it's of interest to anyone else – here’s what we did and how it went wrong.
I've included links to the cast and crew's Twitter accounts where available. They were amazing and you should give them paid work.
Spoilers obviously follow. Watch the film before proceeding.
HOW WE PREPARED
The competition is to write, shoot and complete a film of between three and five minutes within 48 hours, based on elements given to you at 11 am on the Saturday morning: your film’s title; a line of dialogue; a prop; and an optional scientific theme.
Over the next week, we read the challenge rules, spoke to friends who’d taken part before and watched lots of previous winning and not-winning entries. We made notes on what we saw, and on what we could do that might help our film stand out.
A lot of previous films were set in apocalyptic ruins or wastelands. A lot were very bleak and graded brown and grey. A lot starred men who looked like Tom and me (30-something nerds who needed to shave and spend more time in the gym). So we wanted something present-day, colourful and chirpy, and with prominent roles for women.
Since we – as filmmakers – had to respond to whatever brief we were given, I suggested setting our story in a TV studio. Our characters would be hosting a live, cool show and then respond to some sci-fi event. They might get reports of a plague or alien invasion, or they’d interview the boffin behind some new invention. We gambled on me being able to make that setting work whatever we were given.
Tom planned to shoot most if not all of the film on the Saturday afternoon and evening. If need be, we could shoot a small amount on Sunday morning, but we’d need to wrap by lunchtime so that he could concentrate the remaining hours on the edit, sound mix and grading before delivering the completed film on Monday morning. Again, we gambled that I’d be able to write within that plan.
As our stars, I suggested two actresses I’d worked with since 2008 on Doctor Who and Graceless audio plays for Big Finish (@bigfinish). I rang them both on 4 April and they agreed to take part. My tentative plan was that Ciara Janson (@CiaraJanson)would be a presenter on the TV show and Laura Doddington (@LDoddington)her director.
Tom suggested the other three actors, though we wouldn’t know who they’d play until we got the brief. Once I knew we had Anton Romain Thompson (@This_Is_ART) and Adrian Mackinder (@AdrianMackinder) onboard, and James Rose just for the Sunday, I made notes on possible roles they might play.
For example, Anton was eventually Ciara’s co-presenter, but he could have been a guest – either showing off an invention or giving a first-hand account of some sci-fi event. We asked Adrian to bring a suit to the filming because I thought he might be Laura’s executive producer, arriving in the midst of the crisis and ordering her to change the content of the show… This was as much as I could prepare in advance for whatever brief we got.
Tom also pointed out that a lot of the previous winning films had at least one striking special effect. Tom worked in special effects before becoming a director, so we discussed the kinds of simple but striking effects that were feasible. He made sure our crew included CG supervisor Chris Petts (@ChrisPettsVFX), as well as a strong art direction team in Simon Aronson (@TheMakingSpace) and Gemma Rigg (@MUTEtheFILM). Again, that kept our options open.
I’d had a TV studio in mind for the shoot but it wasn’t available. Tom and I called round various contacts looking for alternatives. On the Tuesday and Wednesday before the challenge, me, Tom and Sebastian Solberg (our Director of Photography, @SebSolberg) visited three possible locations – all working TV studios. Millbank Studios offered us eight hours from noon on the Saturday. At first, this was for more than our budget would allow but they thankfully then offered us a discount.
To give the film a sense of scale, we provisionally planned three ‘sets’ – the studio, the gallery and a green room. Tom suggested that the green room scenes would not need to be recorded at Millbank – where we were on limited time. If those scenes were kept short, we could use another, cheaper location on the Sunday morning. I begged use of a meeting room at the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, UCL, which would need minimal set dressing – just a table with a mirror.
Tom planned to have an editor assemble footage while we were still shooting on Saturday and then work through the night, so that we’d have a rough edit of the whole film relatively soon after wrapping on Sunday. We would have a finished edit by about 10 pm.
Tom and I would then stay up Sunday night and Monday morning while the sound design by Tapio Liukkonen at Kaamos Sound, soundtrack by Matthew Cochrane (@matcochr) and grading were completed. It was a tight schedule, but we had a certain amount of “give”. The whole thing had to be made in 48 hours but we were determined to produce a high-quality short.
We were still calling round for crew on the Friday evening – several people were keen but had other commitments, while others (understandably) wouldn’t work for the terms we could offer. Some people could only work one of the two days, or only for a part of the day. But finally we had a full team, including Natasha Phelan (@natashaphelan) as 1st assistant director and Simon Belcher (@nimbos) as sound recordist.
Our crew was largely made up of professionals working in TV and film. Two members of the crew had worked on 48-hour films before. We felt we were as prepared as we could be. But I still hardly slept the night before…
We agreed to meet the cast and crew at 11 am at the Pret down the road from Millbank. I took my laptop, with Final Draft loaded on to it.
OUR BRIEF
I had to write the film based on the brief we were given. Tom received our brief by text message at 11.05:
At noon we moved from Pret to Millbank Studios, where the crew prepared the “set” for filming. They asked me questions as I worked – such as what the live TV show would be called. I needed an answer on the spot. Our given line of dialogue said “by Noon”, so it had to be a late morning show. I suggested “Late Wake Up” and Tom rang Alex Mallinson (@HelloAlexBam) who quickly emailed over different graphics to choose from.
By half twelve, I had a first outline of the script, which Tom read through and made notes on. By one, he’d agreed the script, and Ciara and Laura had their costumes. Tom led us through to the TV studio “set” where the actors read-through what I'd written, with me doing the stage directions. The cast and crew asked questions and clarified some points, we read it again, and by half one we were ready to start filming…
SHOOT
Sebastian (our DoP) shot the film on a tiny, handheld Canon 60D and used a Glidecam 2000 to keep the shot steady. He and Tom went through the shots while I was still writing, working out an opening shot to play the titles over. They went for a fairly standard shooting style, playing the scenes out in their entirety, starting with wides and then shooting close-ups.
We shot everything twice – given the limits on us, that was the quickest and safest way.
We shot quickly, Tom keeping the atmosphere friendly and fun – as you can see from the photos. The first scene took several hours to complete, the longest part of the short. It was quite dialogue heavy, which takes longer to shoot and cut – a lot of competition films had kept the dialogue to a minimum. We made it work because the rest of the film (effectively two scenes) were more visual and could be put together quickly.
Everyone mucked in. Most of the crew appear on screen at some point as extras. There wasn't much need for Chris' VFX brilliance while we shot, so he played the most prominent cameraman. Even Gary, the technician supervising us, had a role in our last shot – that all helped make the film look more expensive.
Chris, Laura and I all took turns holding the boom mike – it's not heavy, but holding it high up and out over the actors is knackering.
Meanwhile, Gemma and Simon hurried to the nearby Oxfam Bookshop to buy a hardback book that Adrian's character could plug on the show. Simon then battled technology to produce a bespoke dust jacket, with Adrian's best photo on the back.
Sunday’s shoot at the Petrie museum should have been quicker, but we’d not anticipated the complexity of the effects shot – and weren’t ready to start filming until after our 1 pm deadline. I'd already agreed to provide some writing work for the museum on a quid pro quo basis. Tom negotiated an extension on the shoot by offering to do some video editing.
The delay was worth it as soon as Gemma and Simon presented the trick effect, and once we were filming we got through the material quickly. We were wrapped and packing up by 3.
We decamped with all our kit to the Marlborough Arms round the corner for much-needed late lunch – and beer. It had been a brilliant, fun shoot, the cast and crew a delight to spend the weekend with.
Tom called the editor to ensure things were on schedule, then stayed for an orange and lemonade with the crew.
THE EDIT – AND CRISIS
Tom and I took a cab to the “unit base” (Genium Creative, the office where Tom works. The editor hadn't finished the edit of all Saturday's footage, so Tom worked on editing the Sunday material and I made a quick dash home.
Having fought the Sunday service on public transport, I was back for half 9 and the takeaway Tom had ordered. Things were going well – and the footage looked amazing.
But as we tried to put the footage from both days together, we discovered a problem with the synching. The more we tried to trace the fault, the more embedded it appeared. Then the computers crashed. At 11 pm – 12 hours from the competition deadline – we effectively had to start the edit again from scratch. We had lost 24 hours of edit time from the 48-hour schedule.
Tom ploughed on anyway, finding me tasks to do such as making tea and compiling the credits. The editor left us at midnight – the time we'd always agreed he would work to.
That was our main failing. If we were doing this again, we'd make sure we had more than one person able to edit footage working through the final night. It would help if I knew how to do some basic assembly – I've since read Roger Corman's advice that the crew should all be competent in every part of production.
The morning wore on. Tom had worked for six hours non-stop when we took stock of the situation. We were both tired, and there was still a lot of work to do. We would be able, Tom thought, to deliver a rough edit of the material to the competition – the scenes in the right order, with basic sound and no grading. Or we could miss the deadline and finish the film later in the week, properly.
We made the decision to hold off and, exhausted, went for breakfast and then home to bed. Later in the morning, Tom emailed the cast and crew to tell them what had happened. Everyone was very supportive – again, a testament to the sense that we'd made something good.
In the next few days, Tom worked on the film, fitting it round other commitments. In principle, he tried to finish it within the time we felt we'd lost, the new cut taking him 12 hours in total. That self-imposed limit proved less practical when it came to tweaking the edit and working on the grade and sound.
It was frustrating to miss the deadline, but we don't regret a thing. We'd strongly recommend taking part in the 48 hour competition, whatever your experience in film-making. Apart from the technical problems at the last minute, we had a brilliant time making our film and have learned a lot that will be very useful on our future projects. We're already planning our next films.
We didn't submit Revealing Diary to the competition because we thought it was a good film in its own right and wanted to finish it properly. We're proud of what we achieved and very grateful to all those people who gave their time and expertise for free.
Sci-Fi London has announced the shortlist of top 20 films from the competition and the winners will be announced this Sunday. Congratulations to them – and to everyone who completed their films on time. We appreciate what an achievement that is.
Simon Aronson has posted more photos from the shoot.
We’re really pleased with the film, which was made as part of Sci-Fi London’s 48-hour challenge (#sfl48hr) – though a last-minute technical hitch meant we missed the deadline.
That’s especially frustrating given the hard work of the cast and crew – who gave their time for free – and the amount of preparation that my brother Tom and I put into it. But we weren’t alone: of 368 entrants, 161 films were submitted. In the hope it helps future entrants – or just because it's of interest to anyone else – here’s what we did and how it went wrong.
I've included links to the cast and crew's Twitter accounts where available. They were amazing and you should give them paid work.
Spoilers obviously follow. Watch the film before proceeding.
HOW WE PREPARED
The competition is to write, shoot and complete a film of between three and five minutes within 48 hours, based on elements given to you at 11 am on the Saturday morning: your film’s title; a line of dialogue; a prop; and an optional scientific theme.
“The 48 hours begins from when all teams have their brief (around Noon on April 14th) and all the creative work must take part in that time period. The only pre-production permissible is the organising of cast and crew (the Team), securing equipment and scouting for possible locations.”
Rule 12 of the 48 hour film challenge rulesTom (the director, @guerrierthomas) and I had talked about the 48-hour challenge before, but started to get serious on 28 March, when Tom emailed to ask if I was free the weekend of 14-16 April. I was, so that was that: we’d do it.
 |
| Pre-planning in Starbucks |
A lot of previous films were set in apocalyptic ruins or wastelands. A lot were very bleak and graded brown and grey. A lot starred men who looked like Tom and me (30-something nerds who needed to shave and spend more time in the gym). So we wanted something present-day, colourful and chirpy, and with prominent roles for women.
Since we – as filmmakers – had to respond to whatever brief we were given, I suggested setting our story in a TV studio. Our characters would be hosting a live, cool show and then respond to some sci-fi event. They might get reports of a plague or alien invasion, or they’d interview the boffin behind some new invention. We gambled on me being able to make that setting work whatever we were given.
Tom planned to shoot most if not all of the film on the Saturday afternoon and evening. If need be, we could shoot a small amount on Sunday morning, but we’d need to wrap by lunchtime so that he could concentrate the remaining hours on the edit, sound mix and grading before delivering the completed film on Monday morning. Again, we gambled that I’d be able to write within that plan.
As our stars, I suggested two actresses I’d worked with since 2008 on Doctor Who and Graceless audio plays for Big Finish (@bigfinish). I rang them both on 4 April and they agreed to take part. My tentative plan was that Ciara Janson (@CiaraJanson)would be a presenter on the TV show and Laura Doddington (@LDoddington)her director.
Tom suggested the other three actors, though we wouldn’t know who they’d play until we got the brief. Once I knew we had Anton Romain Thompson (@This_Is_ART) and Adrian Mackinder (@AdrianMackinder) onboard, and James Rose just for the Sunday, I made notes on possible roles they might play.
For example, Anton was eventually Ciara’s co-presenter, but he could have been a guest – either showing off an invention or giving a first-hand account of some sci-fi event. We asked Adrian to bring a suit to the filming because I thought he might be Laura’s executive producer, arriving in the midst of the crisis and ordering her to change the content of the show… This was as much as I could prepare in advance for whatever brief we got.
Tom also pointed out that a lot of the previous winning films had at least one striking special effect. Tom worked in special effects before becoming a director, so we discussed the kinds of simple but striking effects that were feasible. He made sure our crew included CG supervisor Chris Petts (@ChrisPettsVFX), as well as a strong art direction team in Simon Aronson (@TheMakingSpace) and Gemma Rigg (@MUTEtheFILM). Again, that kept our options open.
I’d had a TV studio in mind for the shoot but it wasn’t available. Tom and I called round various contacts looking for alternatives. On the Tuesday and Wednesday before the challenge, me, Tom and Sebastian Solberg (our Director of Photography, @SebSolberg) visited three possible locations – all working TV studios. Millbank Studios offered us eight hours from noon on the Saturday. At first, this was for more than our budget would allow but they thankfully then offered us a discount.
To give the film a sense of scale, we provisionally planned three ‘sets’ – the studio, the gallery and a green room. Tom suggested that the green room scenes would not need to be recorded at Millbank – where we were on limited time. If those scenes were kept short, we could use another, cheaper location on the Sunday morning. I begged use of a meeting room at the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, UCL, which would need minimal set dressing – just a table with a mirror.
Tom planned to have an editor assemble footage while we were still shooting on Saturday and then work through the night, so that we’d have a rough edit of the whole film relatively soon after wrapping on Sunday. We would have a finished edit by about 10 pm.
Tom and I would then stay up Sunday night and Monday morning while the sound design by Tapio Liukkonen at Kaamos Sound, soundtrack by Matthew Cochrane (@matcochr) and grading were completed. It was a tight schedule, but we had a certain amount of “give”. The whole thing had to be made in 48 hours but we were determined to produce a high-quality short.
We were still calling round for crew on the Friday evening – several people were keen but had other commitments, while others (understandably) wouldn’t work for the terms we could offer. Some people could only work one of the two days, or only for a part of the day. But finally we had a full team, including Natasha Phelan (@natashaphelan) as 1st assistant director and Simon Belcher (@nimbos) as sound recordist.
Our crew was largely made up of professionals working in TV and film. Two members of the crew had worked on 48-hour films before. We felt we were as prepared as we could be. But I still hardly slept the night before…
We agreed to meet the cast and crew at 11 am at the Pret down the road from Millbank. I took my laptop, with Final Draft loaded on to it.
OUR BRIEF
I had to write the film based on the brief we were given. Tom received our brief by text message at 11.05:
Title: Revealing Diary
Line: I should probably leave around Noon to be safe… Can you make that happen
Prop: “Sketch: We see a character write a list of 6 words, the first word beginning with R (does not need to be a name or real word) – they then do a small doodle by the last word”
Optional: Man in coma explores mind as environmentOnce we got the text message, I had to act quickly, deciding the rough outline and what roles the actors would play. Our costume supervisor Becky Duncan was only available that morning, so once she had a rough brief from me, she quickly took Ciara and Laura up the street to go shopping in Primark. I sat typing the script at my laptop while Tom and the crew discussed how they’d shoot my story. We agreed that Simon A would provide us with a fake book and a trick mirror.
At noon we moved from Pret to Millbank Studios, where the crew prepared the “set” for filming. They asked me questions as I worked – such as what the live TV show would be called. I needed an answer on the spot. Our given line of dialogue said “by Noon”, so it had to be a late morning show. I suggested “Late Wake Up” and Tom rang Alex Mallinson (@HelloAlexBam) who quickly emailed over different graphics to choose from.
 |
| The set of Late Wake Up |
SHOOT
Sebastian (our DoP) shot the film on a tiny, handheld Canon 60D and used a Glidecam 2000 to keep the shot steady. He and Tom went through the shots while I was still writing, working out an opening shot to play the titles over. They went for a fairly standard shooting style, playing the scenes out in their entirety, starting with wides and then shooting close-ups.
 |
| Shooting |
Everyone mucked in. Most of the crew appear on screen at some point as extras. There wasn't much need for Chris' VFX brilliance while we shot, so he played the most prominent cameraman. Even Gary, the technician supervising us, had a role in our last shot – that all helped make the film look more expensive.
Chris, Laura and I all took turns holding the boom mike – it's not heavy, but holding it high up and out over the actors is knackering.
Meanwhile, Gemma and Simon hurried to the nearby Oxfam Bookshop to buy a hardback book that Adrian's character could plug on the show. Simon then battled technology to produce a bespoke dust jacket, with Adrian's best photo on the back.
 |
| Shooting the green room scenes |
The delay was worth it as soon as Gemma and Simon presented the trick effect, and once we were filming we got through the material quickly. We were wrapped and packing up by 3.
We decamped with all our kit to the Marlborough Arms round the corner for much-needed late lunch – and beer. It had been a brilliant, fun shoot, the cast and crew a delight to spend the weekend with.
Tom called the editor to ensure things were on schedule, then stayed for an orange and lemonade with the crew.
THE EDIT – AND CRISIS
Tom and I took a cab to the “unit base” (Genium Creative, the office where Tom works. The editor hadn't finished the edit of all Saturday's footage, so Tom worked on editing the Sunday material and I made a quick dash home.
Having fought the Sunday service on public transport, I was back for half 9 and the takeaway Tom had ordered. Things were going well – and the footage looked amazing.
But as we tried to put the footage from both days together, we discovered a problem with the synching. The more we tried to trace the fault, the more embedded it appeared. Then the computers crashed. At 11 pm – 12 hours from the competition deadline – we effectively had to start the edit again from scratch. We had lost 24 hours of edit time from the 48-hour schedule.
Tom ploughed on anyway, finding me tasks to do such as making tea and compiling the credits. The editor left us at midnight – the time we'd always agreed he would work to.
That was our main failing. If we were doing this again, we'd make sure we had more than one person able to edit footage working through the final night. It would help if I knew how to do some basic assembly – I've since read Roger Corman's advice that the crew should all be competent in every part of production.
The morning wore on. Tom had worked for six hours non-stop when we took stock of the situation. We were both tired, and there was still a lot of work to do. We would be able, Tom thought, to deliver a rough edit of the material to the competition – the scenes in the right order, with basic sound and no grading. Or we could miss the deadline and finish the film later in the week, properly.
 |
| We drown our sorrows at 7 am |
In the next few days, Tom worked on the film, fitting it round other commitments. In principle, he tried to finish it within the time we felt we'd lost, the new cut taking him 12 hours in total. That self-imposed limit proved less practical when it came to tweaking the edit and working on the grade and sound.
It was frustrating to miss the deadline, but we don't regret a thing. We'd strongly recommend taking part in the 48 hour competition, whatever your experience in film-making. Apart from the technical problems at the last minute, we had a brilliant time making our film and have learned a lot that will be very useful on our future projects. We're already planning our next films.
We didn't submit Revealing Diary to the competition because we thought it was a good film in its own right and wanted to finish it properly. We're proud of what we achieved and very grateful to all those people who gave their time and expertise for free.
Sci-Fi London has announced the shortlist of top 20 films from the competition and the winners will be announced this Sunday. Congratulations to them – and to everyone who completed their films on time. We appreciate what an achievement that is.
Simon Aronson has posted more photos from the shoot.
Friday, July 02, 2010
Books finished, June 2010
Got all caught up in work and real life this past month, hence the lack of blogging. But I did get through some books.
Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve is superb: a thrilling adventure in a rich and vivid world, packed full of wild ideas, brilliant characters and eye-popping surprises. Just wow.
I'd read a lot of Lance Parkin's fanzine material in the original fanzines, so a lot of this collected edition felt like revisiting my years as a student in Preston. Lance has often been keen and forthright in his views and there are all kinds of nuggets of insight here, along with stuff where perhaps his enthusiasm goes a bit far.
"1974, then, was perhaps the year when the Copernican revolution came for Doctor Who - the year when Doctor Who stopped revolving around the TV series."I wonder what fans who've come to the show since 2005 will make of this insight into those dark days when there was No Doctor Who On Telly, and we clung to books and audios as keepers of the flame. There's some wild-eyed True Belief here, that the show will come back and be brilliant and prove all the Heretics wrong. How brilliant that he's been proven right.
Lance Parkin, 'A forty-year adventure in time and space', in Time Unincorporated - The Doctor Who Fanzine Archives Volume 1: Lance Parkin, p. 29.
You can still read Lance's blog about the writing of his Doctor Who book "The Eyeless", on which I commented back in November 2008.
The Gift by Lewis Hyde was a present from m'colleague Ben, and I made pages and pages of notes on it while on holiday in Malta. I'll endeavour to write those up some day properly. The book comes in two halves: first we're shown the difference between a market economy for products and a gift economy for ideas. I read-up on gift economies when I wrote The Judgement of Isskar and had the Doctor explain them this way:
- DOCTOR:
Oh. Well, you send Christmas cards out to everyone, and then it’s on their honour to send you a Christmas card back.
- DOCTOR:
Oh. Well, you send Christmas cards out to everyone, and then it’s on their honour to send out Christmas cards themselves.
I'm not going to attempt a fully fledged reply now, but the book really prickled my brain, challenging me on what I do for a living and how. I squawked with horror at the snobbishness about getting a day job to pay your way, and Hyde's sense that any kind of compromise or patronage is selling out. And Whitman and Pound, whose lives both went so awry, are hardly people we should aspire to emulate. More on this as soon as life allows...
The Three Incestuous Sisters is a picture book by Audrey Niffenegger. I loved The Time Traveller's Wife and have her next one on my pile of imminent reads. This is a twisted, gothy story that reminded me a bit of Tim Burton's melancholy tales and also Edward Gorey. Strange and broken and haunting, it echoes with some of my Real Life. And also, there are goth girls without any clothes on.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Graceless
Just this second handed in a script, to find that Big Finish have announced the Graceless mini-series. The three CD box-set is written by me and stars Ciara Janson and Laura Doddington as a pair of troublesome sisters packed with special powers.
I created the characters for the Doctor Who mini-series the Key 2 Time; this is them gallivanting off on their own.
Guest stars include David Warner, Patricia Brake and that nice Alex Mallinson in the pivotal role of "Nicholas Payne". Alex has also designed the rather lovely cover.
All very exciting to be able to speak of it. And the series will be launched at the HurricaneWho convention in Florida in October. Dang, I'll probably have to be there.
I created the characters for the Doctor Who mini-series the Key 2 Time; this is them gallivanting off on their own.
Guest stars include David Warner, Patricia Brake and that nice Alex Mallinson in the pivotal role of "Nicholas Payne". Alex has also designed the rather lovely cover.
All very exciting to be able to speak of it. And the series will be launched at the HurricaneWho convention in Florida in October. Dang, I'll probably have to be there.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Making history
What a splendid episode of Doctor Who. Will leave a little space for spoilers in case you have not seen it...
[Incidentally, I have written a diary of writing Blake's 7. And here is a nice photograph of me with stars Benedict Cumberbatch and Carrie Dobro. It will thrill you to know that this was taken outside the offices of Innocent Smoothies, of which I am an acolyte. Om nom nom.
End of spoiler space, back to Doctor Who.]
Perhaps not scary in a make-you-jump way (though I'm told by parent-friends that their kids were traumatised), but disturbing-scary because you knew they were all going to die, and because the Doctor walks away. And then...
It reminded me of the bit in School Reunion where Sarah tells the Doctor he can't save her from getting old; it's a really bothering and grown-up idea that sometimes people can't be saved. Kept me awake last night mulling it over.
I also loved the Jerking Deaths when people aren't looking. And how brilliant to make the Doctor saving everyone sinister. I also liked him calling "fixed moments in time" just a theory, so we can ignore it when we want to.
Yes, of much interest to a mercenary hack like me is the gaps it leaves for other stories. Most importantly of all, I don't think it contradicts a key work of Ice Warrior history.
Also watched Sarah Jane and Mona Lisa's Revenge, and afterwards as I chopped parsnips tried to reconcile it with City of Death, in which that portrait of Lisa Gheradini spends 400 years bricked up in a cellar and has “This is a fake” written in felt-tip under Leonardo's brushwork. Why didn't she reach critical mass in the cellar?
This sort of thing is what passes for fun in my house when the Dr is out.
Both the Doctor Who and Sarah Jane stories note that Lisa didn't have any eyebrows, as was (probably) fashionable at the time. But they don't mention some other interesting things about that portrait. Lisa sits high up on a balcony, a mad fantasy landscape behind her. As the landscape recedes into the distance, it fades to blue-green murk, an early example of aerial perspective – that is, the affect of the Earth's atmosphere.
That fantastic background contrasts with the calm posture of the sitter. And that enigmatic smile isn't gas or not being able to sit still; the effect is created by shadows at the edges of the mouth and eyes, a technique called sfumato (that is, as if seen through a veil of smoke).
So I had embarked on a complicated theory involving as-yet-untold interventions by the Doctor, Leonardo seeing an alien world through a veil of smoke and learning about the Earth's atmosphere. And then Lizbee tweeted a fine, indeed handsome, answer which is all a lot easier on the brain:
[Incidentally, I have written a diary of writing Blake's 7. And here is a nice photograph of me with stars Benedict Cumberbatch and Carrie Dobro. It will thrill you to know that this was taken outside the offices of Innocent Smoothies, of which I am an acolyte. Om nom nom.
End of spoiler space, back to Doctor Who.]
Perhaps not scary in a make-you-jump way (though I'm told by parent-friends that their kids were traumatised), but disturbing-scary because you knew they were all going to die, and because the Doctor walks away. And then...
It reminded me of the bit in School Reunion where Sarah tells the Doctor he can't save her from getting old; it's a really bothering and grown-up idea that sometimes people can't be saved. Kept me awake last night mulling it over.
I also loved the Jerking Deaths when people aren't looking. And how brilliant to make the Doctor saving everyone sinister. I also liked him calling "fixed moments in time" just a theory, so we can ignore it when we want to.
Yes, of much interest to a mercenary hack like me is the gaps it leaves for other stories. Most importantly of all, I don't think it contradicts a key work of Ice Warrior history.
Also watched Sarah Jane and Mona Lisa's Revenge, and afterwards as I chopped parsnips tried to reconcile it with City of Death, in which that portrait of Lisa Gheradini spends 400 years bricked up in a cellar and has “This is a fake” written in felt-tip under Leonardo's brushwork. Why didn't she reach critical mass in the cellar?
This sort of thing is what passes for fun in my house when the Dr is out.
Both the Doctor Who and Sarah Jane stories note that Lisa didn't have any eyebrows, as was (probably) fashionable at the time. But they don't mention some other interesting things about that portrait. Lisa sits high up on a balcony, a mad fantasy landscape behind her. As the landscape recedes into the distance, it fades to blue-green murk, an early example of aerial perspective – that is, the affect of the Earth's atmosphere.
That fantastic background contrasts with the calm posture of the sitter. And that enigmatic smile isn't gas or not being able to sit still; the effect is created by shadows at the edges of the mouth and eyes, a technique called sfumato (that is, as if seen through a veil of smoke).
So I had embarked on a complicated theory involving as-yet-untold interventions by the Doctor, Leonardo seeing an alien world through a veil of smoke and learning about the Earth's atmosphere. And then Lizbee tweeted a fine, indeed handsome, answer which is all a lot easier on the brain:
“Only the one painting was made of living ink; Leonardo had enough for the first six? Figures the psycho one would be fireproof...”
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Absolutely capital
Via BoingBoing (and Nimbos), here’s some extraordinary, beautiful images of London from above at night (apparently a follow-up to images posted lasted year). It gives me warm, glowy feelings about the city I share with just a few million other Londoners. And there’s a whole bundle more pics at photographer Jason Hawkes’ own website.
If you like that, I also recommend the exceptionally squeesome book, Castles from the Air. And, in a deft bit of linkage, there’s a castle in The Judgement of Isskar…
In a follow-up to my notes on writing Home Truths, the Big Finish website now boasts my diary of writing The Judgement of Isskar. There’s also an interview with Laura Doddington, the wicked sister I created in my brain. (I'll do a separate, single post on reviews and stuff sometime next month, so it's easier for you to skip.)
If you like that, I also recommend the exceptionally squeesome book, Castles from the Air. And, in a deft bit of linkage, there’s a castle in The Judgement of Isskar…
In a follow-up to my notes on writing Home Truths, the Big Finish website now boasts my diary of writing The Judgement of Isskar. There’s also an interview with Laura Doddington, the wicked sister I created in my brain. (I'll do a separate, single post on reviews and stuff sometime next month, so it's easier for you to skip.)
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Key 2 Time now out
For just 99p you can hear the first episode of my new Doctor Who play, The Judgement of Isskar. The accompanying Prisoner's Dilemma is also out now, too - and you can hear a trailer for my forthcoming The Two Irises.
There's already a Livejournal community devoted to Amy and Zara - the characters I created for the Doctor Who plays - with (hooray!) glowing reviews and even (already!) some fanfic.
There's already a Livejournal community devoted to Amy and Zara - the characters I created for the Doctor Who plays - with (hooray!) glowing reviews and even (already!) some fanfic.
Saturday, August 02, 2008
Grey namer
Very rightly, writers of things tend only to get copies of them after the shops and subscribers. So I've not yet received my copies of the audio version of Doctor Who and the Pirate Loop, read by the lovely Freema Agyeman and available now in all good shops.Kudos to clever Steve Tribe who abridged my complex nonsense. I had the privilege and pleasure of reading his abridgment, and he's done wonders in cutting it down by 50% - that's every other word! - and still having it make sense. In fact, it probably makes more sense than my original effort did.
Popping round to R.'s house last night to swap some DVDs, I got to listen to the opening. And - hooray! - she pronounces my silly name just perfectly. Geh (with a hard "g") - ree - uh. In fact, if I had any kind of technical know-how I would make a little loop of just that bit and play it all the time.
Having a distinctive name is good for this self-commodifying lark. (Self-commodification is something I learned about in the Mid-Victorian Literature module of my degree at Preston.) I seem to be the only Simon Guerrier on Google, and the only one on Facebook.
In fact, just this morning a girl I was at primary school with got in touch having decided it had to be me. Well, I say "girl". She is winning in the having-kids-and-dogs stakes.
I used to be very bothered by people mispronouncing my name. And now I don't really care as long they give it a good go. And don't add letters that clearly aren't there, like the man who seemed to insist on it being "Pru era" even when I corrected him.
My favourite is call centre folks who are reading from a script, and are already into their spiel before they smack bang into the all-Huguenot monicker. "Good afternoon," they say, all breezy, "is that Mr -" You hear the brakes come on too late, a sharp in-take of breath. They take a run-up and just try to say it quickly, in the hope that I won't notice.
Anyway. After all that, I'm rubbish at getting people's names right - remembering them is hard enough, let alone saying them correctly. And you will be able to hear me get lovely Sophie Aldred's name wrong - and to her face - on an extra little thing we did for The Prisoner's Dilemma, when it comes out in January. Whoops.
For the record, Aldred is of course pronounced "McShane".
Monday, July 07, 2008
From Ace to Zara
It has been a tad of a hectic week. The spangly new computer I bought on Wednesday is an HP Pavilion M9070 with a quad core processing wossname. It's clear how clapped out the old model was: this one is fast and silent and deadly.
Schlepped the thing home from Morgan - incidentally bumping into my old boss John Bradbury and finding out about his new business, Blink - and strained all sorts of previously unknown muscles in my arms. Connected everything up and flicked the on switch... and nothing.
Turns out the base needed a DVI/VGA adaptor before it would fix to the monitor. (It's rather deceptively got a VGA port, just not one that actually does anything.) This meant a bit of hunting around Tottenham Court Road, and another day's delay before the thing even started.
Then there was a morning of saving and transfering files, installing Norton, Open Office and the various components for wireless cleverness, each of which needs you to restart the computer every five minutes or so. But eventually, having bought the thing on Wednesday, by Friday afternoon it was working.
At the same time, a number of different plumbers have come to um and er at my bathroom floor, and on Saturday a man came to tile it. It all turned out to be a lot more complex than expected because tiles had to be cut to fit round pretty much everything. He was going to be finished at four, then half six... Finally, the Dr was dispatched to deal with the inspecting and paying (just as Rose was snogging her own bespoke Doctor).
I loved the conclusion of this year's Doctor Who. The Dr was a little less enamoured, wrinkling her nose at the slushy bits. Were joined by K and my Best Man, and then tumbled into the pub for too much drinking. The Dr insists that yesterday I spent the day asleep with a hangover, whereas I think it was more a migraine collapse.
So the Dr represented me at K's birthday bash and I slept off the contagion. Watched the repeat of Journey's End in the evening. It's odd that the Children of Time only include New Series companions (bar open-brain Adam and Kylie). Where were Tegan and Ace and Ian Chesterton - or do their laptops not have web-cameras either?
Incidentally, Big Finish have announced that I've been writing for Ace again. "The Prisoner's Dilemma" is a Companion Chronicle (a sort of talking book with knobs on), in which Sophie Aldred is joined by Laura Doddington as Zara, a character created for next year's Key 2 Time extravaganza.
There's still plenty more writing things to be announced in due course, but last week's various expenses also mean I've had to sort some additional paying work (and so also had to shunt some non-paying work further back in the schedule). Means some juggling of commitments to get it all done, so probably won't be blogging much over the next month.
But one last thing: shocked to see on Millennium's blog that Ian McKay has died. What awful news. Ian was a regular, cheery presence at the few signings I've done, enthusiastic and chatty. He even bought me beer. My condolences to Ian's family - he'll be much missed by all those who met him.
Schlepped the thing home from Morgan - incidentally bumping into my old boss John Bradbury and finding out about his new business, Blink - and strained all sorts of previously unknown muscles in my arms. Connected everything up and flicked the on switch... and nothing.
Turns out the base needed a DVI/VGA adaptor before it would fix to the monitor. (It's rather deceptively got a VGA port, just not one that actually does anything.) This meant a bit of hunting around Tottenham Court Road, and another day's delay before the thing even started.
Then there was a morning of saving and transfering files, installing Norton, Open Office and the various components for wireless cleverness, each of which needs you to restart the computer every five minutes or so. But eventually, having bought the thing on Wednesday, by Friday afternoon it was working.
At the same time, a number of different plumbers have come to um and er at my bathroom floor, and on Saturday a man came to tile it. It all turned out to be a lot more complex than expected because tiles had to be cut to fit round pretty much everything. He was going to be finished at four, then half six... Finally, the Dr was dispatched to deal with the inspecting and paying (just as Rose was snogging her own bespoke Doctor).
I loved the conclusion of this year's Doctor Who. The Dr was a little less enamoured, wrinkling her nose at the slushy bits. Were joined by K and my Best Man, and then tumbled into the pub for too much drinking. The Dr insists that yesterday I spent the day asleep with a hangover, whereas I think it was more a migraine collapse.
So the Dr represented me at K's birthday bash and I slept off the contagion. Watched the repeat of Journey's End in the evening. It's odd that the Children of Time only include New Series companions (bar open-brain Adam and Kylie). Where were Tegan and Ace and Ian Chesterton - or do their laptops not have web-cameras either?
Incidentally, Big Finish have announced that I've been writing for Ace again. "The Prisoner's Dilemma" is a Companion Chronicle (a sort of talking book with knobs on), in which Sophie Aldred is joined by Laura Doddington as Zara, a character created for next year's Key 2 Time extravaganza.
There's still plenty more writing things to be announced in due course, but last week's various expenses also mean I've had to sort some additional paying work (and so also had to shunt some non-paying work further back in the schedule). Means some juggling of commitments to get it all done, so probably won't be blogging much over the next month.
But one last thing: shocked to see on Millennium's blog that Ian McKay has died. What awful news. Ian was a regular, cheery presence at the few signings I've done, enthusiastic and chatty. He even bought me beer. My condolences to Ian's family - he'll be much missed by all those who met him.
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