First foray into video

Thought I'd have a go at creating a short film set to music. As a teenager I was really into the sombre but atmospheric music of groups like Japan, Tubeway Army, John Foxx et al. I loved the videos that accompanied this music, especially the aesthetic of Anton Corbijn. I found the Black and White imagery, which at times was totally random but always stylish, a real draw. A track that I was obsessional about at the time, was 'Red Guitar'by David Sylvian and I can remember sitting in front of the telly taking stills photos of the video with my old 35mm slr. Here's the video in all it's glory. Enjoy!



So the other day, I drove down to Dungeness in Kent with my hacked Vivicam 5399. I recently ripped apart an old Polaroid camera I paid 2 quid for at a boot sale and messing around with the main lens and viewfinder lens, realised that combined they created an interesting look, blurry with a sharp warped drop-off around the edges. I'd been hoping to use my TTV set-up but came up against a lack of freely available video editing software that included a cropping facility, which is vital when using TTV shots. So thought i'd use the Vivicam with taped on polaroid lenses instead. I bought this camera, prior to going to Hawaii this year because it came with an underwater housing. I didn't know at the time that it took video as well, so was well pleased when I discovered that facility whilst snorkelling on The Big Island. I subsequently took all of the photos, whilst in Portugal this summer using the Vivicam, it has it's idiosyncrises, but I love it for that, it's a bit like a Holga in as much as you're not really sure what you're going to get, but it's proved to be the best £15.00 I've spent. It took me roughly 2 hours to get about 100 seperate clips, to knock together some sort of short. I had absolutely no idea what I was doing or the direction I was going in, just that I love the feel of Dungeness and wanted to convey that in some way or other. Infact whilst shooting I didn't really know what track I was going to set it to either. That same evening, I started to piece the thing together, with no real structure. All I knew was that it had to be Black and White, slow and moody, with an empty, bleak aesthetic, that matched the location. I decided on the track 'Horses in my Dreams'by Polly Jane Harvey, it's one of those tracks that pops up regularly on my ipod when set to shuffle and I love it, but didn't even know what it's title was. I pieced the images together before adding the music and was surprised when I did finally add the sound track to discover that certain shifts in imagery matched changes in music and even a mention of 'train tracks' and 'waves' in the lyrics coincided with track and wave visuals- I couldn't have done it if I tried! So take a peek at my first proper attempt into film making.....Horses in my Dreams by PJ Harvey.