Letters to the Dead is complete

Finally, 9 months after it's inception, the Letter's project has completely wrapped.
The final version of the DVD was mastered and sent off for reproduction last week and we are now eagerly awaiting the release of the Vinyl+DVD package to be released through Antithetic Records on December 30th.

The DVD was tricky, as I hadn't authored one professionally before. It was a difficult learning curve, but a vital one. I was under the impression that creating a DVD for reproduction was a pretty simple process, but boy was I wrong. It took a few failed attempts and about two weeks of trials to get the formatting and specs right, but we finally got there.
I'm now very pleased to say that ugli.film can now add DVD authoring to my standard production package.
We are set up with the correct skills and technology to create unique bespoke DVD's.

The final performance also took place at Saint Mary's church in Brighton, where Nick Hudson and his band performed the soundtrack live, while I created a live multi-media cut of the finished film, carefully editing the film live to fit in with the performance.
It was a grand event and it went down very well with the audience.

Here is the live show in it's entirety.
It's pretty long, but you can see the film playing throughout.
Also, as I was stood behind the stage controlling the video output, I couldn't man the camera, so it's a pretty dull single frame shot from start to finish.
However, I maged to spice it up a little during the edit with pans, crops, and a ridiculous amount of cross fades to give it a look more appropriate to the musical performance.
Future performances will probably be filmed again, with more camera's (hopefully) so we might see another live video of this show with more dynamic camera work by Summer 2012.

I'm also very pleased to say that we'll be taking the show on tour in 2012, to the United States.
Details of exact dates and venues to follow as and when we get them (should be soon)

Very exciting times coming up.

Here is a final short clip of the Letter's film.
'Letter Number One'

Letter Number One from Chris Purdie on Vimeo.

Letters to the Dead - Premiere

Well, the show finally happened.
It was cold and wet and dark and perfect for what was about to occur inside of The Duke of York theatre in Brighton.

After a lovely shoot and a MAMMOTH final editing session (22 delirious hours!!) the project was complete.

Letters to the Dead had finally wrapped and was ready to screen.

All in all, it was a great night. We managed about 50 tickets (of Brighton folk, sadly nobody from my circle could attend :(
We all waited in the lobby, drinking champaign to ease the nerves before showtime.
There was a photographer outside taking photo's of us all while we entered - glitzy stuff, being papped ;)

Once into the theatre itself, we took our seats and I decided to sink as deeply into mine as possible. Fortunately, due to my not living in Brighton, most of the crowd were oblivious to who I was which meant I could sit back and enjoy the buzz in the room.
It was Nick Hudson that had to handle all of the chatter, which he seemed to be revelling in.

The lights went down, at last, and the film started.

60 minutes later.

Silence...........

..........

...... Applause!!

And a great big applause at that. I felt great relief that the crowd not only seemed to understand the densely surreal narrative, but also that they all enjoyed it.
Suddenly, before I could take it all in, I was ushered on stage with Nick and selected members of the cast  for an awkward Q&A session. Despite my jitters at being introduced to a room full of people that didn't recognise me, I enjoyed myself and remember having lots to say.

Before I knew what time it was, my phone rang informing me that my taxi had arrived to take me back to London. As I sat on the train home, holding on to the bunch of flowers I had been given, I thought of how lovely it was to see all of the cast members that gave up their time to help us creating this beast. I thought of the crowd that supported the film on it's opening night.
Most importantly of all, I thought of the film itself. I thought of how much I enjoyed it. How great it sounded.
How the narrative, however surreal, ties up beautifully by the end titles.

And above all else, I thought about how proud I was of the finished film.

Letters to the Dead - Trailer 2 Official from Chris Purdie on Vimeo.

Arnocorps

Last month I was honoured to be given the chance to shoot the Ballsy Heroic Studs of Arnocorps during their London leg of their recent UK tour.

To describe what Arnocorps are all about is a tough task... only because they do it so much better than anybody else ever could.
So I'll let them explain themselves.

Initially, one might perceive ArnoCorps as merely a group of six highly trained militant Austrian action-rock heroes. Big mistake. The motivation behind the band is far too complex to be defined by such superficial characteristics. Inspired by the ancient heroic lore and mythology of the Austrian Alpine communities, the content of ArnoCorps music carries on their homeland's sacred tradition of tel

ling stories of great deeds and fantastic adventures through song. As such, the band has been singularly responsible for restoring integrity to the many Austrian tales that have been bastardized for cinematic exploitation throughout their lifetimes. 

Thats right, we're in Ahnoldt Schwarzenegger territory now. And these guys Live It.
Their accents and mannerisms never drop. Theyt have great tunes. Great memory for classic one liners and even encourage body building to go on while they play.

These guys are legendary.

I shot the entire show, but due to a few mistakes made during the set, the band asked me to keep it under wraps and just put together a promo instead, which I have happily done.
Its a shame though, as the full show was incredible and my edit for it was pretty impressive too, clocking in at just under an hour with lots of cuts and different shots, all in sync and with good clear sound.

Anyway, it was still good work, even if it stays in the vault.

Hope you enjoy the promo.

Arnocorps, Live in London

Seriously, these guys are an amazing live band, check them out.

Supernormal 2012

Its been a very busy couple of months here in the ugli.film universe.
As well as shooting numerous music promo's, and my continuing work with Nick Hudson, I was also invited to shoot Supernormal Festival, in Oxfordshire.

Supernormal is based at a lovely destiniation called Braziers Park, and is run almost completely voluntarily. Unlike many other music festivals, Supernormal focusses less on showcasing commercial acts, and more on bands and artists that devide the line between music, performance and art.
The result is a very intimate affair where all artists and musicians mingle freely with the audience.

I applied to play at the festival earlier this year, as my band takes on this exact same approach by creating narrative films to play live while I perform. I applied too late sadly, so I was stoked when I was invited to shoot the event instead.

I was interested, not only in shooting the live music acts that were performing, but also the art installations, shows and demonstrations that took play over the weekend. I also wanted to splice all of this footage into the shots I took of the bands that were playing.
The idea was to paint a picture of what the festival stands for and to re-create the feel of the event in a way that isn't force feeding you information, like an average documentary would.

I tried this approach once before when I filmed my friends in the band Code500 last year at the Northampton Umbrella Fair. That was very much an experiment though, despite being quite successful. I really wanted to push this approach more this time around.

Unfortunately, three days was a little too much for my camera to handle and I started running out of space on my memory stick's, so I had to cull certain footage, and in some cases had to just not film certain events. This was frustrating and will definitely be taken on board as something to improve upon next time.

And there will be a next time, as they've kindly invited me back next year :)

Anyway, here are the films that were created during the three days.

I will probably be putting together a final cut comprising all of these films soon, including the other footage I haven't used yet. But as stand alone films, I think you get a good idea of how it feels to be at the festival.

It was tremendous fun, and hopefully I'll be allowed back next year to push this style of filming even more.

Letters to the Dead

Here is a trailer for my new film project (and probably only film project of 2012)

Letters to the Dead - Official Trailer from Chris Purdie on Vimeo.


Over the Last few months I have been having regular production meetings (drinking sessions) with my friend Nick Hudson.
We became acquainted through Stuart Dahlquist after I put together 'Birds' for the band Asva

ASVA - Birds (OFFICIAL) from Chris Purdie on Vimeo.

We both share a mutual love for various stems of Avant-Garde/Experimental music (although I am definitely on the heavier end, more akin to Heavy Doom Metal.
Nick is a musician who performs solo, and also as part of a troupe called Academy of the Sun.
He's putting together a new concept album called Letters to the Dead. Its going to be an ambitious project that will eventually be released on Alter Clef Records and Antithetic Records as an LP/CD/DVD & Book multi platform release in Winter 2012. Its a massive project that I'm excited to be part of.
Being a musician myself, I have been producing and having people produce short films for my shows.
The project with Nick is basically the same thing but on a much larger scale.

The story to the album is complicated and progresses through many themes. But the basic gist of the story centers around a mother who abandons her child to the sea as a sacrifice to the God's, and then her subsequent trial for said crimes.
We also spend time with the childs father, who in an attempt to contact the child posthumously, inadvertently awakens three lost spirits from the sea.
Finally, the mother is convicted and also banished to the sea, where she is reunited with her child.

All very eerie stuff, not to mention the stuff I haven't mentioned, including a seance/possession that's not far off looking like something from The Exorcist.

We took two days off in Brighton to film some scenes and they turned out beautifully - some of which can be seen in the above trailer.

Here are some screenshots of our fun.

Shots taken by Lyndsey Muller

Screengrabs from the finished Trailer, taken by myself

Obviously, we all had a great time working on this and the shoot was definitely a success.
We will hopefully be linking up again soon to shoot further scenes, which will be chronicled on this blog as and when there is any news.

I feel this is a very exciting project to be involved in and I'm looking forward to sharing more with you all.

Nebukadnezza & Ghee

I've been filming more Heavy Metals at The Unicorn in London. Its a cool little venue I go to sometimes. Between Camden and Holloway.
I filmed some bands there not so long ago and this is how they turned out.
I might be doing some else with the guys in Nebukadnezza sometime in the future if we can arrange the time.



Nebukadnezza are a great thrash punk band. Choppy razor sharp riffs that never stop. Great fun and great sound live. I think I've captured the energy of their live performances on this video.
However, it occasionally looks like the vocals are out of sync. I can assue you it is all in sync, I think it was to do with the sound in the room being picked up on the camera maybe a fraction of a second late. These things happen when you're using the live audio rather than a direct recording from the mixing desk.
Point learned.

I also filmed another band on the night called Ghee.
I had some trouble with this band, and two others on the night. Because the vacalist wouldn't stay on the stage.
This isn't uncommon at Hardcore Shows, but it's a real pain in the ass for me if I'm only shooting from one camera. I can only stretch my coverage so far before I have to start deliberately editing things out of sync, which I HATE.
Anyway, I opted to just put some atmospheric effects over the screen and enhanced the lights and darks.
Luckily the band were sounding good enough and were interesting enough to watch that the video is still enjoyable.

I didn't cut together any of the other bands on the night because it wasn't interesting to watch a video that consisted of the singer standing in the dark with the audience.
For these kind of shows, I think I'll try and incorporate two camera's to make sure I can get coverage of the band, and the walkabout vocalists.
Another point learned.



I filmed The Atrocity Exhibit again too on the same night, but I haven't had time to cut those pictures yet.
Should do soon though.

Milton Keynes XSCAPE Spring Fashion Show

I recently Directed and Edited a series of short promo's for Aplitude Media a few weeks back.
The aim was to create a 'Flash Mob style event, consisting of Models, Breakdancers and BMX's Wizards suddenly performing in a busy shopping complex for a few minutes, then vanishing almost as quickly as they appeared. We did 10 performances in total, with a different fashion brand each time (including DC Clothing, Quicksilver, O'neils, Trespass and plenty of others) I wont post all the video's here, as they are variations on the same model, below.

This shoot involved three camera's. 2 handheld and one set up on a tripod - for maximum coverage.

I was also asked by the head honchos at XSCAPE MK, to shoot a behind the scenes Documentary. It was very last minute and thrown together quickly, but it works very well as a promo. Hopefully we'll be shooting a similar event in the the near future, and we can prepare a video shoot that's bigger and better.. It was a massive learning curve for all creative parties involved, and an invaluable experience.

Links to Amplitude Media can be found at the bottom of this blog.





AMPLITUDE MEDIA
http://www.amplitudecommunications.co.uk/apps/blog

Madame Electrifie........... is not even French

Here's a video I shot for the good folks over at Madame Electrifies Discotech - I've done one for them before, and there may be more on the horizon.

This promo was created to enter the night into a competition to play at Glade Festival in June.

The ladies got into Glade, so I am very proud of the video.

The track has been recorded, but was performed and captured live. ie, the track you can hear IS the track that the performer is mixing. On all of the arial shots, its the actual track being played. Most of the other footage has been shot as closely to that as possible.

It was a fun video to work on as I got to use the stage at The Picturedrome Venue, and I made full use of its lights and curtains. We also made use of costumes and make-up and props. Overall it was a very fun and messy shoot.

Do it yourself fast donkey Promotions

I was recelty asked by 'Do it Yourself' promotions to film some shows from the bustling London Underground Metal Scene. We start with this, from a bunch of guys I've had the pleasure of shooting once before. They're more brutal this time though, and the video was too.

The Atrocity Exhibit, Live at The Grosvenor, London 2012

Noise Complaint

Noise complaint are a mental band. end of story.

Hopefully catch them again for more filmage soon.

William English

This band are awesome though, really nasty sludge mixed with hardcore. They were an intense act, and I think the video just about captured that

Again, thanks to Do it Yourself, Fast Donkey Promotions for letting me film on the night :D

Cure for the Common Cold

Blowjob Sequences

The Billy Shears Project

Dancefloor Dreams

I shot the lads on the same night as Dave Vegas. It wasn't planned, but they are a great band also and nice bunch of lads. Video turned out pretty good too.

Dave Vegas Project Part 2 & 3

Mosquito Girl

Streets of Berlin

As I said earlier, this is a great band and are deservedly getting a lot of attention at the moment. These video's were a pleasure to work on and hopefully I'll shoot another show of theirs very soon.

Dave Vegas Project

Last week I shot a live show of a band called The Dave Vegas Project.
They're a rock'n'roll band based in Northants and I know them through some friends.
It was a good show and I got some decent footage, enough for two decent music video's
Here's the first.



There was also another band at the show called The Billy Shears Projects. I know, two 'Projects' at one gig. They were also a rock'n'roll band, and they were also quite good! Lots of similarities there.
Anyway, I caught some footage of them too, I'll add the video's to this blog soon.