James came over and we shot some live action elements for the videomatics. This involved James taking a piece of cardboard with a smiley face on it hostage. Then we sat down and recorded interviews with each other, as part of our ongoing effort to document the process of getting this film off the ground. I plan to edit a short featurette and upload it to this site soon.

While the rest of the filmmaking community was in Cannes, we were in Canon Pyon. We were visiting Maggie, our development producer, in her natural habitat, deep in the Herefordshire countryside (ie. about a mile outside the city centre, ho ho). We got our first reply this morning to the letters we sent out last week (Channel 5), the first of many rebuttals, I’m sure.

Today I played with Lego. I’d like us to meet with potential miniature FX wizards soon and so I need to film videomatics of the relevant shots. Suffice to say this involved spending two hours in my parents’ attic, scrabbling through big buckets of bricks in floor-bound positions which made me ache much less when I was 10, then setting the (very crude) model up in my flat and shooting it with my trusty Canon XM1. And it’s not over yet, since some of the shots require bluescreen elements and/or a more involved miniature set, possibly including someone’s garden pond. Still, James was telling me that George Lucas used Star Wars action figures to block out the fight sequences in Return of the Jedi.

We sent a few more letters off, and are meeting the development producer again on Wednesday for an update. Meanwhile, down in sunny (I assume) Cannes, Tom Muschamp is engaged in a slew of meetings pursuant to the distribution of Beyond Recognition, the film I DOP-ed on in New York last year. All the best to him.

Busy Soul Searcher day. Our very helpful development producer friend sent a long list of financing options and contact details to us, so James and I spent the day going through this, making phone calls, sending e-mails and typing up our pitching materials. So far we have sent a treatment, character designs and crew info to two sales agencies, a TV station (with mention of a possible series stemming from the film) and also Screen West Midlands. We are also working on getting a mentor on board, an executive producer with a track record in fantasy films whose support would greatly improve our chances of securing finance.

We are continuing our efforts to raise private investment as well, and to that end we have sent out press releases today to all the local newspapers.

We met with a development producer who provided us with some useful contacts and general comments on the commercial viability of the project. Her background is in conventionally financed, theatrically released films, so her take on the whole thing was refreshing, James and I having lived in the land of no-budget/public-funding for so long. Her suggestion was to think about it in much bigger terms, ie. a budget of around UKP850,000, shooting on film. I just want to make it. I really want to make it. This journal’s been going for a year now and we don’t have a single frame of video to show for it. Still, on we plod…

Things have progressed very slowly of late. James has been finishing up his latest book on Francis Ford Coppola, and I’ve been working on a few different things. We finally got it together to have a meeting tonight. We talked Soul Searcher for about five minutes. Then, ahem, we talked about other stuff. When discussing with James what I should write in this entry, he said: “We were both suffering from romantic confusion,” then hastily added, “but not between ourselves.”

We do have a meeting on Friday that may prove useful, however.

James and I had another meeting. Topics discussed included: a couple of small changes to the script; getting together some artwork for our Soul Searcher stand at the Borderlines Film Festival; concept designer Maya Thevendra’s latest sketches; meeting up with potential miniature-makers in the near future. James had also received up-to-date application forms for the Elmley Foundation and Awards For All, so he’s going to fill those in this week.

Finally, I decided I want to shoot a videomatic of part or all of the end sequence of the film. For those who don’t spend all their spare time watching the extra features on DVDs, a videomatic is essentially a moving storyboard. Used primarily for FX sequences, they combine camcorder footage of the live action, mocked up in no-budget fashion, with very rough versions of the FX. This will serve three purposes: (1) an aid to cast and crew when the film gets off the ground, particularly the FX wizards, (2) another piece of material to show investors/funders where we’re going with this movie, and (3) it will scratch my need-to-start-making-this-film itch.

Last week I bought a great big 5,000 watt fresnel lamp from an ex-BBC guy in Evesham. This will come in very handy for the big night exteriors. Chris took one look at it and nicknamed it “The Dustbin”.

The fish and chip shop next to my flat. You weren’t expecting that, were you? That’s where James and I met with a local businessman for whom I’ve shot and edited several corporate videos. I asked him last year if he would be interested in investing in Soul Searcher, since he had offered at one point to contribute towards the budget for The Beacon. He’s still interested, and we discussed contracts with him over the fish and chips.

That’s pretty much it. Jim McKelvie, the comic-loving, sock-hating wee scallywag who’s responsible for the cool character images which form this site’s intro, is in the process of drawing some large storyboard frames of key moments in the movie, to use in our portfolio.

I’m about to start work as DOP on a no-budget horror movie which is shooting in Worcester from Sunday. Should be fun…

Doodies was very empty when James and I walked in to begin our little SS meet (not to be confused with an S&M meet). We talked mainly about money, of course, and James was keen to pursue a private/commercial cash-raising approach, ie. finding investors, be they dentists with some dosh to spare or production companies looking for stuff to finance. We also discussed the concept designs, and talked about a possible look for a supporting character who we never got around to designing last year.

In other news, I’ve been filling in some of the gaps in my storyboarding file, sitting in Maylord Orchards again with a pen and paper, and planning out a major sequence in a multistorey carpark.

The Idiots’ Guide To Writing a Soul Searcher Journal Entry: “We had a meeting today in Doodies/The Courtyard/Deep Pan Pizza (delete as applicable), where we bumped into Rick/someone who was in a film we made once/Sasha the waitress (ditto), blah, blah, blah (insert gratuitous reference to Back To The Future here).”

Okay, so on this particular occasion it was Neil and James, in Doodies, with the candlestick. And the big folder of artwork. And the funding application forms. This was the first official meeting since James came back on board, and I had brought him up to date, we made a little action plan (anal, I know, but whatchagonnado?). As discussed at Christmas, we’re going to apply for public funding under the banner of Catcher Media. In the mean time, we’re going to put together a nice-looking portfolio to take to Screen West Midlands and a smaller leaflet to distribute at the Media Market Place at Hereford’s upcoming Borderlines Film Festival.