A little something for you...

Hi,

Tim here. Now that the sound is with Ean and the visuals are with OnSight, Miriam and I are currently working on other background things such as festival submission preparations until our presences are requested.

So, instead of news we thought we'd provide you with some exclusive Selective Listening iPhone wallpapers featuring Harrison & the toys...

iPhone 5:

iPhone 4:

 

 

 

Apologies if you don't have an iPhone, but hopefully they will also work on your screen too!

"We'll sort it in post..."

...that's a phrase that I heard myself saying a few times on-set during the shoot of Selective Listening.

(Hi, Tim here)

I have heard from certain folks in post-production that people use the fact that things can get sorted in post as too much of a buffer. The fact is, that when the sun is going down or you're otherwise pressed for time, it is comforting to know that things can get sorted in post. However – note (from self Editor/Visual Effects Apprentice) to self (Director) – it can save a lot of time and effort to get it right on the day.

To be fair to myself I was aware of this, and the things that we are now having to do in terms of VFX were somewhat unavoidable. Still, I'm having a lot of time to sit and deliberate with myself, currently at 3am on a Sunday night / Monday morning, while ploughing through a few VFX shots.

We are very happy to once again be working with top-notch post-production house OnSight for the colour grade and majority of our visual effects. Miriam and I previously worked with them a few years ago on our short film The Special Effect (click here to view). 

The three visual effects I am working on are under my purview because it would have significantly increased the amount of days that we would have needed to be with OnSight and so I resolved to do them myself.

Unfortunately, I'm not au fait with moving visual effects packages such as After Effects (nor am I equipped with them) and so I am having to go through the painful process of altering frames one-by-one in Photoshop for re-importing back into the sequence later on.

To give an example, here is a shot that we had limited time with on the last day of principal photography. We were losing the light, had issues with traffic and I did see the problems that we would later encounter, but picturing how I would resolve it, the call was made to move on.

The issue we had was that our long-suffering puppeteers had to crouch and move at speed behind a hedge. Through no fault of their own, their heads occasionally popped into shot...

...I am therefore having to remove heads and puppets...

...and carefully put the puppet back into the frame...

With this shot and a couple of others with similar issues, I'm currently working my way through approximately 700 frames. 

Off to bed now – more to do tomorrow!

It's been a while...

Hello!

Tim here.  It's been a while since we last wrote a blog entry, but that's because we've spent every waking moment editing, re-editing, re-re-editing the film, seeking a quality post-production house with whom to work on the grade and the visual effects, recording sound effects, re-recording certain voice moments, tracking down those who are providing our "additional voices", keeping an eye on what the voices are saying on each of their Twitter accounts and recording one more Smiling Herbert video diary for "Star Wars day". 

Here are some illustrations of what's been going on...

Photos from some of the voice records:

Meanwhile on Twitter:

 Smiling Herbert's "Star Wars day" video diary:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJcZIr0neZE

Smiling Herbert celebrates Easter...

A new video diary from Smiling Herbert...

1,2.. Testing, testing...

Hello! Miriam here.

With the first phase of the edit almost complete, today we watched the film in order to keep finding ways to improve it. This led to a discussion about the voices and the effect that we hope they'll have on the audience. When researching for the story, I came across different videos that voice hearers had put together in order to show how the voices can be perceived. I found these videos very effective as they not only gave me an idea of how the voices might be heard, in some cases they made me feel anxious. Often it was hard to understand what was being said and, at times, the voices were speaking at the same time.

In Selective Listening, we are able to hear the voices and they are present through the majority of the film, except from the moments in which Harrison manages to control them. Each voice has its own personality and agenda within Harrison's life and they want to be heard. As filmmakers, one of our challenges is to make a feature-length film that portrays the realities of what it is like to be in the position of a person who hears voices and balance that with a sound mix that will remain watchable and enjoyable for audiences. It takes judement without agenda and isn't quick to do so although it remains interesting and enjoyable! Of course, we had the choice of words and timing under control and so now it's a matter of having Ean Currie, our sound recordist, sound mixer and score composer, contributing with his expertise. Can't wait!

Meanwhile, on Twitter...

Celebrities may not be hearing voices, but they are interacting with them on Twitter.

First, Smiling Herbert said something that actress Rosario Dawson thought was worth a "Favourite":

Then Bean started schmoozing and got a reply from Olympic gold medal-winning heptathlete, Denise Lewis OBE:

And then Bean got involved in quite a conversation with supermodel Angie Everhart:

...and it continued...

...then Molly joined in...

...

...

Follow Smiling Herbert on Twitter: @SmilingHerbert

Follow Bean on Twitter: @BeanInHarrison 

Follow Molly on Twitter: @Mollys_Voice

Follow Conrad on Twitter: @Conrad_Speaks

Last leg of the edit...