Great Hall Installation
The past year has seen us transform Dunham Massey’s Great Hall into an immersive space for sight and sound. The current film ‘Remembering Stamford Hospital’ uses letters and oral histories, along with new interviews and archive footage, to bring to life the house as an auxiliary hospital in WWII. This installation, along with more films […]
Lost Years Stop Motion
Here’s a look behind the process of animating Dunham’s Lost Years for the National Trust. Using a lightbox with an overhead camera, we used traditional filmmaking methods to give a fairlytale quality to this story. It was such a pleasure to spend a couple of months working with these techniques.
The Web School
The Web School began when web designer Pete Murray, and filmmaker / workshop practitioner Annie Woodson decided to join forces and develop a workshop that combined web design with film making in a creative way for primary school pupils. Realising that the new curriculum calls for children as young as 5 to develop coding skills, […]
Manchester International Festival – Volunteer Film
I had a brilliant fortnight interviewing, filming and generally following the wonderful volunteers of Manchester International Festival. Myself and Jim Dawson are working to make a film that shows the festival through the eyes of the volunteer, the best perspective as far are they (and we) are concerned. The festival couldn’t happen without the volunteers, […]
Community Arts Unwrapped
In early July I had the chance to be a part of a very busy day which was set up to explore the community arts, those from the movement of the 70s and those going on in today’s community groups and centres. Alongside Mat Norman, I filmed interviews and workshops that were held as part […]
Animating with Our Lady’s
I recently had the pleasure of working on an animation project at the Royal Exchange Theatre in which pupils from Our Lady’s High School responded to Scuttlers, a play based on the gangs of Manchester in the late 1800s. Using the themes of the play as a springboard, the group spent a week at the theatre, devising characters with an illustrator […]
You, The Audience
This film was made to promote the Royal Exchange Theatre’s 12 month programme; You, The Audience. The theatre are inviting audiences into the building for one-off performances and experiences, with the aim of involving the voices of the audiences in future decisions and performances. Have a look at the link for more details on how to get involved… http://www.royalexchange.co.uk/you-the-audience
Backstage? Me? Royal Exchange Theatre
It’s been great to work with the Royal Exchange again, collaborating with Soup Collective on a series of short films, documenting the theatre’s three-year partnership with the Booth Centre: a service offering advice and activities for homeless people in Manchester. These films are now part of an open source learning resource, aiming to share information […]
Personal Museums – Digital Utopias
Last week I took a trip to Hull, along with some others from Soup Collective, to present Personal Museums at the Arts Council conference Digital Utopias. Whilst most of the day was spent showcasing the installation (we carted it up from Manchester), I also managed to sneak into a couple of the talks. I was really […]
KS1 – The 6 frame blink
The Web School has another workshop with St Agnes primary school on Monday and so I’ve been testing a few really quick exercises to show the year 2s how easy it is to bring their characters to life. Trying this simple 6 frame blink before they work on their storyboards should get them excited about […]