Month: April 2014

OVFM Newsreel Request – Orpington May Queen 2014

Posted on by Lee Relph

newsreel

 

As you know, we’re keen for members to get involved in filming events for the Newsreel.  Anything that’s visual and of interest to the local population would be very welcome. If nothing else, it gives your camera an outing and you some practice in using it.

 

To start you thinking you might like to consider outings to film the Mayor as he crowns this year’s May Queens.

 

The dates are:

 

Orpington Priory Gardens on Saturday 3rd May where the Mayor arrives at 1.55pm.

 Green Street Green on the same day arriving at 3.20.

The Petts Wood Queen is being crowned in the Memorial Gardens Hall on Monday 5th May,  arriving at 10.50am.

 

Members living a little further away are also invited to send events going on in their immediate area so long as they are of general interest.

 

It will be up to this year’s editor (not yet appointed!) to select the most suitable shots for inclusion and he/she would just love to be spoilt for choice, so please do have a go!

 

Annabelle Lancaster

OVFM Club Meeting Tuesday April 29th 2014

Posted on by Lee Relph

ovfm_proj

 

Okay folks it’s deadline time! The night has finally arrived where the fruits of your labours are shared with the rest of the club for our latest project evening and our first one for 2014 on the theme of GREEN!

 

Since we gave you notice about this topic many months ago hopefully you have all been busy in that time, pondering your take on”Green” and translating those thoughts onto film. We all know what a creative and inventive bunch we have among our ranks so I’m sure we can expect a varied and esoteric selection of films! to behold!

 

If you do have a film then please reply to this post below, letting us know the runtime and format, as this helps with planning out the evening’s activities.

 

Also, our chairman Simon “Snapper” Earwicker is unable to join us this week so the hosting duties will be undertaken by someone else. Who could possibly fill Simon’s illustrious shoes? A Hollywood star? A major TV presenter? A talking rabbit? None of the Above? You’ll have to come along and find out, won’t you?

 

See you all on Tuesday!

OVFM Member Wins Big at SERIAC 2014

Posted on by Lee Relph

seriac

Congrats to our very own Professor Mike Shaw and his partners in Footprints Productions for their recent big win at this year’s SERIAC Film Festival .

The film in question was Enid Blyton – The Beckenham Years , a seven year labour of love for Mike and his collaborators from Spring Park which received a record four awards!

enid1enid2

You can read the full story on the Orpington Community Website HERE

Once again our congratulations to Mike and everyone on the Footprints Productions team!

OVFM Club Meeting Tuesday April 15th 2014 – Triangle Competition

Posted on by Lee Relph

triangle

This week’s meeting is a little different for OVFM as it has nothing to do with us!

Okay that is a little glib but on this occasion we are playing host to the 2014 Triangle competition, while three other clubs will put their films up for judging while drinking our tea and eating our biscuits!

The Triangle competition, for those who don’t know, is contested between four clubs (yes I know that would make it a square but bear with me) – OVFM, Epsom Movie Makers, Shooters Hill Camcorder Club and Spring Park – and each year one club takes it in turn to host the actual competition screening of the films from the other three. Again, it’s still technically a square but only three clubs submit a 30 minute programme of their films for judging on an annual basis while one sits back and put their feet up. This year it is OVFM’s turn to sit back and put our feet up. Sort of.

At stake is the Triangle Trophy which is awards to the club who provides the best programme of the evening while a second trophy is awards to Best Film which doesn’t have to be a part of the club’s main programme of films. Last year Spring Park won both awards – can they win again this year (since we’re not competing)?

As hosts we are obliged to provide judges so Reg “Bomber” Lancaster, Sam “Choo Choo” Brown and Brenda “Spot The Ball” Wheatley have stepped up to take on this role on our behalf. Also there will be a raffle on the night too.

Because the expected size of the turnout is larger than normal this meeting will be held once again at All Saints Church in Orpington (home to the AGM on the 1st April).

We hope you will all be there to welcome our visitors and don’t forget to bring some rotten fruit and veg to throw at anyone who makes a bad film – not that they will of course… 😉

Coaching Evening April 8th

Posted on by Lee Relph

ovfm coaching

As you know, I have tried to arrange something different each year, to test your reactions of interest, which is why these evenings have changed from around Christmas to now..

On 25th March at the first evening of this session Simon showed us the different basic aspects of lighting and how to use reflectors to improve shadows etc. Sam was a willing model and also a presenter. This could have run and run, but we then had Lee’s presentation of the Celtx free programme for screenplays etc. There was a good discussion on the pros and cons of it. Thanks to those who contributed and spent time on their presentations, very useful and entertaining. You can see Simon’s notes HERE an I urge you to at least glance through it.

The members who attended appreciated the evening, the rest of you missed it!

The next on April 8th will see Mike Shaw on an evening of Music – in films, moods and sources for us to use. Should be entertaining and I might even film it for posterity, or whatever we choose to call our Archives.

Then, on April 22nd we’ll try what we haven’t before and have four members demonstrating their editing and other programmes in the four corners of the hall, to only 3 or 4 members each, with questions and answers, as follows:

David Laker will be using Pinnacle Studio for those who want to see a basic demo in action;

John Epton will show multi cam editing on Serif MoviePlus, plus the very useful (and cheap) noise reduction software Music & Speech Cleaner. Why not bring along a troublesome audio on a USB stick and he could try to fix it? May also include Animations on Serif Draw Plus, if time allows

Andy Watson will also be using Serif;

I’ll show Edius and the stabilisation software Mercalli – bring some shaky clips!

Naturally, numbers are limited for this event (as they say for all the best raves), so let me know if you wish to come.

Ian Menage