Tips

Here are a couple of things that I've picked up over the years.
Maybe this is just me, but I think you need a good notebook to write in, something that is a pleasure to open. I discovered Moleskine notebooks last year and I am now officially addicted to them. They are the perfect notebook, the right size, nice weight, wonderful paper to write on, even the lines are spaced the perfect distance and the off white paper is that much easier on the eyes. I love them. They are expensive,but I think worth it.

Something else I searched for for a long time was the perfect pencil. I've been drawing for as long as I can remember, did a year in art college, four years studying animation and I simply always drew. But I could never find a pencil I loved. Then, at a masterclass with disney animator Glenn Keane he shared with us what pencil he uses. The Sanford Ebony Pencil...

I love this pencil, even more then I love my Moleskines, if I had to choose, I'm sorry Moleskine, it'd be the pencil... but luckily I don't have to choose and together they form a perfect partnership, like Fred and Ginger, Tracy and Hepburn, Laurel and Hardy. They are a great pencil to draw with. They are round, smooth and slightly narrower then other pencils. They have a hard wide lead that creates a smooth dark line with perfect consistency, perfect for finite detail, dark broad strokes or equally light and heavy shading. For my money the best pencils around.
It's something I always tried to find out about, what other writers and artist use, so hopefully I can pass it on to some other budding storyboarder!

Untitled

We've started a new project. Untitled at the moment. It's a story about two brothers, wrongly accused of a crime. It's a new feature script and I have a good feeling that this will be our first one to shoot. We took a look at THE RACE and knowing it's going to take a large budget, huge crew, lots of locations and hundreds of extras, we thought we should scale it down... way down and do something achievable on a low budget first, with a small crew (only slightly bigger then Emily's Song) a small cast of good actors, not nessecary famous and minimal location work, in fact, so far, we have about three locations in mind.
It's exciting stuff. We're thrilled with the idea and we know it's going to be a great script. We got that buzz we get when we hit upon something we both want to make. We had it on Emily's Song and The Race. We had been working on a short script, but neither of us felt it was going anywhere. In the end we realised it wasn't a film we wanted to make. But this new idea is.
We're putting the story together now and we'll start writing the screenplay in about two or three week. Hopefully we'll have the first draft written by the end of the summer.
Summer is usually a quiet time for us, we don't get much written... kids, holidays, that kind of thing. Personally I use the time to catch up on my own writing. I've all ready dusted off BAD MOON, my werewolf script. 95 pages in and it's looking pretty good. I'm hoping to get back on NEVERMORE once that's done. I think another rewrite on both should see them right.
There is no other new at the moment, so I shall get back to it and wish you all the best until the next blog.

PUCA

Here are some images from Harvey's Sketchbook.

Out of the Blue

Howdy howdy, It's been too long since last I blogged, Having a sleepless night so I thought I'd blog away the empty minutes. It's been a hectic couple of weeks. Thomas and I have been writing our little handies off. We rewrote Puca (Concept art above. Not final design) and it's all the better for it, we believe. We've given it much more depth, and put the fun back in, for some reason it got lost along the way. It also has some wonderful abstract and sureal moments which we're really proud of, like windows floating in clear blue skies... you'll have to wait and see why they are! And we've added a new character, who we're delighted with, adds a whole new demension to the piece... she's actually picture up above too! And in case you hadn't guessed, that's Harvey in the middle looking somewhat morose.
So that was put in for funding with the Irish Film Board on their Short Cuts scheme this week. Hopefully they'll go for it, but you never can tell. Say prays to your gods, cross fingers, sacrifice virgins, what ever it is you do, it's all good, but send us the good juju!
Another short script we put in was something that came out of the blue, a short about a bike race called "Two Man Break". We wrote it in one sitting. It's a short piece, maybe 6/7 minutes and it's about a mind game that plays out between these two riders as they race along perilous roads. It's exciting and quite unlike anything we've done before, in that it's quite dark.
It's probably the more relivant of the two script, seeing as we want to make a feature based on Cycling! So if we get to make it it will be fantastic practice for the feature, as well as being and exciting six minutes of film!
We're sitting down later on today to start Thomas' Irish Language film, as yet untitled, it's a great idea, which I wont ive away hear, but it's basically a love story... with a twist!

We had a meeting with the filmboard yesterday and like too idiots we went to their Galway office for the meeting, when we were actually supposed to go to Dublin. So instead of having a nice lie-in and spending just an hour on the train, we had to get up at 6am and travel the whole way across the country!
It wasn't our fault, so I don't feel so bad, and they were very nice and apologetic when we got there! So what was the meeting about? I hear you cry!!! For a Blow up of Emily's Song, a transfer to 35mm film, which would be lovely... we'll find out in a couple of weeks what their decision is. But after making us travel all the across the bleedin country for nothin it better be a yes! The Blighters!

There's not much else going on, no new festivals of late, we're screening at Showcomotion at the end of the month, as well as in Korea, at the 9th Youth Film Fest there. It will be interesting to see how that goes down. Little Big Shots in Australia is coming up soo too. And there's a few more, but not until later in the year. We're still waiting to hear back from about 20 others.

Did I mention that we sold Emily's Song to RTE? I forget if I did on this channel! Well, just in case I didn't there it is, RTE. We have no date for the broadcast, but it wont be until much later in the year, if this year! We'll let everyone know when of course. But it's great news, we couldn't have hoped for better.

So I guess after this we have some time off. We tend not to write much together over the summer. But I think I'm going to take the time and go back over The Wolf of Nevermore, there are a lot of changes I've been eager to make and I think I've enough breathing space to go back to it with a clear idea of things.

Thomas and I are also talking about another project that's been on the cards for a while, top secret of course! But it's the best thing we've ever come up with and we think it's about time to breath some new life into it. The name of our production company and our logo are a huge hint as to what it is. But more on that project when the time comes. So stay tuned!

Bye for now.