3D World
- Magazine Review.
Posted - 11th December
A huge two page spread in 3D World
magazine now travels the planet. If you have some quids
then buy it because it's a fine magzine in my unbiased opinion.
There's loads of great info about the industry from all
angles as well as tips for your own work and some lovely
free stuff on a CD. In this months issue (January 2007)
there's also a nice write up about the new Studio Ghibli
film 'Tales from the Earthsea', this time directed by Hiyao
Miyazaki's son, Goro.
The lovely folk at 3D World have
made the video available for download from their speedy
servers at:
www.computerarts.co.uk/downloads/3d__and__animation/the_fool_looks_at_the_finger
Thanks
go to Steve Ogden for getting in touch... and presumably
writing the review, which is ace.
Avalon Film
Festival - Finding a virtual
seat.
Posted - 9th December
Having eagerly waited through October
and Novemeber, when the festival was supposed to begin,
I finally received an email in December on the day the festival
opens with the guide of forthcoming attractions.
After installing the software and
filling up on a whole host of buffet delights we enter the
world of Secondlife and typically call someone a dickhead.
After this we think about how many Linden Dollars have been
spent that day, how all the other people are actually real
people and then where the festival might be. The festival
website still has last years information on it, which leads
you to believe that no-one else in the world knows about
it, and when we finally find the place after two hundred
years we realise that they don't.
The Avalon island is very swish
with lots of posters and interactive guides about the place.
We follow a path to the box office and after getting into
our free avalon t-shirt we are transported onto the zeppelin
where all the films are showing (fancy). The cinema does
look amazing and the films are streaming at an amazing quality
completely embedded within the virtual space. There are
hundreds of seats just like a real cinema and no-one sat
in any of them. I don't know if we turned up at a quiet
time but if only they had put as much effort into publicising
the event as they obviously have making it happen.
Nevertheless we have great fun sitting
right in the corner and spinning the camera around and standing
up and looking around. After the screening we even teleport
to Amsterdam with big aspirations and a dirty nightclub
with a few ideas.
Pictures coming soon.
Thanks go to Rob Marchant for organising
the event.
City-Zen
- Open floor screening.
Posted - 7th December
The first showing of The Fool...
in its home town of Derby is in a small but unique setting.
"City-zen is a monthly not-for-profit
event serving up art, information, entertainment, brain-food,
soul-food with diversity and free-expression being the main
dish of the day."
The inspiring event was held at
The Bell on Saddlergate in Derby and is on the first Wednesday
of every month. There was a massive mix of things going
on including speakers from action groups spreading awareness
about the Faslane Anti-Nuclear Blockade and live art performers
BET4 MOTION getting lost in creative loops between sound
and vision. The Fool... was shown during the open floor
session where people are invited to get up and express their
ideas and feelings about whatever they want to. The evening
was nicely concluded by Buckshot Soup, a ye-ha whiskey trio
playing songs from the bottom of a barrel somewhere in the
1800's... Awesome.
Thanks go to Jonesy for being captain
positive and addressing a group of people using the collective
noun 'man'.
Pictures from BET4 MOTION - Synisthesia.
Brussels Short Film Festival - Film
Market Viewing.
Posted - 4th December
Festival du Court-Métrage
de Bruxelles 2007
Bruxelles - Belgium
The Fool... will be viewable in
the film market section of the festival. It could not be
entered into the competition as the festival requires 35mm
or 16mm transfers for screening which are unavailable due
to cost.
Avenue Maurice, 1
1050 Brussels
Belgium
Tél: +32 2 248 08 72
Fax: +32 2 242 67 61
E-mail. info@courtmetrage.be
Web : www.courtmetrage.be
Kendal Mountain
Film Festival - A 306 expedition.
Posted - 22nd November
After battling with many demons
on route to the festival we found ourselves in the middle
of nowhere, no signal, no energy and no clue why. Our sat
nav buddy dragged us through alien landscapes, accross rocky
terrain and through streams... streams...( in a peugeot
306) to get to this fear infested plot of bat country...
but where is the festival? After a pleasant chat to an intoxicated
gentleman local leaving the pub at midnight, all became
clear... We had arrived at the Festival Directors house,
50 miles from the festival, who just happens to live in
the most absurd and terryfying place in Cumbria and possibly
the world (if you're in a peugeot 306 and exaggerating).
We finally arrive at the festival
at 1:15am and get some free tickets to the party which goes
on until 2, somehow mannage to get completely drunk in half
an hour and go on the search for food in the cold and pouring
Cumbrian rain. We meet some people on our food mission trying
to brake into their house and others also looking for food
but no-one will offer a place to stay. After 30 minutes
of getting drenched and hungrier we return to the car (the
peugeot 306) and realise it's winter and we have no blankets
and we're soaked. A restless night followed... we nearly
died.
The festival itself was unbelievable,
it was a lot bigger than we had realised and there were
hundreds of people in a mix of 'North Face' and 'Berghaus'
jackets, trousers and socks milling around constantly throughout
the day. We didn't realise just how mountainy the festival
would be either. The films were amazing, in quality and
content. There was a great mix regarding mountain life from
documentaries climbing K2 to comic shorts about ski lifts.
The question remains as to why the
festival director put his home address on all the corresponding
emails with 'Kendal Film Festival' under his name but the
consequent nightmare and extreme conditions we managed to
survive, somehow reflected the festival. The awesome power
of nature can at a sigh take your life away but if you can
respect her and not push her to far, she can be tamed and
her overwhelming beauty can be exposed in all its glory
(if you're in a peugoet 306 and exagerating).
On a serious note... Kendal Mountain
Film Festival is truely amazing. It has two large cinema
screens, a huge theatre with a cinema projection and an
additional 'Malt Room' with multiple projections, which
was great to see the films you might have missed in the
cinema. There's a bar and an outdoor BBQ and the whole venue
is nestled in the beautiful town of Kendal. Lovely.
Thanks go to Abigail Willis for
being on the other end of the line when you find yourself
in a dark place and for organising the festival to perfection.
Halloween
Short Film Festival - Successful
submission.
Posted - 17th November
Halloween (HSFF) is an annual short
film festival that shows short films, alongside multi-media
events in the lovely capital of England. The Fool... has
been accepted to screen in the TRICK OF THE LIGHT programme
at the Curzon Soho on Sunday 7th January, 12 midday.
www.shortfilms.org.uk
Halloween Short Film Festival
c/o Curzon Soho
99 Shaftesbury Avenue
London W1D 5YD
Apple Profile
- Animation Academy Profile
on apple.com
Posted - 10th November
Apple have included 'The fool...'
as part of the Animation Academy profile section. As a visiting
artist and 3DS Max consultant for Animation Academy I have
worked closely with them and Arts & Technology Partnership
where it's all based in Loughborough for a few years.
http://www.apple.com/uk/education/profiles/loughborough
Animation academy profile page.
http://www.apple.com/uk/education/profiles/loughborough/movies/a_bradbury.html
V iew the film alongside 'Loetzinn' a short film by Aaron
Bradbury and Chris Gooch.
Imagine Magazine
- A review without words.
Posted - 1st November
As part of their graduate film pages
'The Fool...' gets full credit from animation magazine 'IMAGINE'.
Pics coming soon.
Festival
Winner - Two awards from
Cinematic.
Posted - 26th October
The Fool Looks At The Finger That
Points To The Sky wins two awards at the Cinematic Film
Festival in Birmingham.
Overall Festival Winner.
Audience award on the second night of the festival.
The festival was hosted by UCE Birminghams
Technology Innovation Centre in the grand IMAX cinema. A
wide variety of great films were screened and a huge audience
turned up to take part in the evening. The combination of
awesome films, free wine and a great atmosphere made it
an excellent evening for all who attended.
Thanks go to Nina Parmer who organised
the event.
Kendal Mountain
- Successful submission.
Posted - 18th October
Every autumn, Kendal, on the edge
of the English Lake District, hosts one of the most prestigious
Mountain Festivals in the world. - an extravaganza of films,
books, art and photography, debates, presentations, film
making, entertainment, humour and drama from the mountain
communities of the world. It is a great international gathering!
http://www.mountainfilm.co.uk
Full details of the films using the link below and their
scheduling in the special evening programmes and the main
weekend 17-19 November will be posted on the web by Oct
20.
http://www.mountainfilm.co.uk/film-competition/index.html
Avalon -
Screening Invitation.
Posted - 7 th October
The Fool Looks At The Finger That
Points To The Sky has been invited to be part of the Avalon
Online Film Festival. The Avalon Film Festival 2006 in aid
of Cancer research UK will take place in October/November
this year. Movies are streamed virtually within Second Life™
to a global schedule and community.
Avalon Film festival is presented
by Rivers Run Red: http://www.spacethinkdream.com
Second Life™ is a virtual
world phenomenon - a 3D online space totally created by
its user base. With a rapidly growing population of almost
a million, this could be the shape of our future internet
environment. Find out more about Second Life™ here:
http://secondlife.com
Cinem@tic -
Successful submission.
Posted - 5th October
The Fool Looks At The Finger That
Points To The Sky has been accepted into the Cinem@tic Film
Festival in Birmingham which takes place in the IMAX on
the 24th and 25th of October. Admission is free and there'll
be plenty of great films to watch.
cinem@tic is part of ‘Creative
Week’ hosted by UCE Birmingham’s Technology
Innovation Centre (tic). An exciting week of free, public
performance-based events dedicated to showcasing leading
Midlands’ creative talent covering the areas of Music,
Film, Animation, Visual Expression and Live Performance.
www.tic.ac.uk/cinematic
Technology Innovation Centre
Millennium Point
Curzon Street
Birmingham
B4 7XG
Cardiff Film Festival
- Successful submission.
Posted - 14th September
The Fool Looks At The Finger That
Points To The Sky has been accepted into the Cardiff Film
Festival and will be screened sometime between the dates
of the 8-18 November. Further details will follow.
www.cardifffilmfestival.co.uk
Cardiff Film Festival
1-2 Mount Stuart Square
Cardiff Bay
Cardiff
Wales, UK
CF10 5EE
BBC Film Network
- Online Now.
Posted - 13th September
 |
| Watch the new animation by Aaron Bradbury The Fool
Looks At The Finger That Points To The Sky
online now at the BBC Film Network.
Set to the music of The Little Explorer,
the life of a simple wooden puppet
is changed when he is drawn into a fast
moving world played out on a mysterious
stage.
WATCH NOW!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/filmnetwork/A13778256
Please leave your comments about the film and we hope
you enjoy it.
You can also browse through a selection of stills from the
film, download it for your ipod and
check out the production process from concept
through storyboarding and modelling, all
the way to the final edit notes. Please
visit: www.borgasm.co.uk/thelittleexplorer
If you have any comments or questions that you would like to
ask directly to the film-makers please contact:
explorer@borgasm.co.uk
Thank
you! |
|
| |
BBC Film Network
- Successful submission.
Posted - 25th August
The Fool Looks At The Finger That
Points To The Sky has been accepted by the BBC Film Network
and should be live within a couple of weeks.
Submissions
- Festival submissions
begin.
Posted - 18th August
Submissions have begun. Individual printing and packaging
and sealing and sending. The Film festivals await their
deliveries.
Finally
Complete -
The Final Edit.
Posted - 12 th August
A couple of small changes and the final video is now complete.
It is now ready to start sending to festivals and dishing
out to any folk who would like to see it. It's going to
be a bit of a task to sift through the thousands of fil
festivals to find the right ones but the remaining summer
days are long indeed. A new printer is on the cards, maybe
a DVD surface printer... and lots of envelopes and DVD cases
and printed sleeves and postage stamps and DVD-R's... yes
the days shall indeed be long and the coffee shall be plentiful.
First Viewing
- The Little Explorer viewing.
Posted - 7th August
We recorded 'The Fool Looks At The Finger That Points To
The Sky' a long time ago. We released it ourselves on a
label we set up with the help of Tom at Reveal Records (who
has since set up his own label and signed us!). The single
was to be limited to 1000 completely handmade packages that
included the two tracks on 7" vinyl and a cd (as much
for portability as for catering for those without turntables).
As it turned out it was far too big an undertaking to complete
and release in any normal way. But still, things happen
for a reason.
Aaron has just finished making
a film to the song and it blows me away. It captures perfectly
everything we talked about when the idea for the whole thing
came up and I feel proud that we are all involved in each
others ideas in some way, and that we keep making things
that not just us lot enjoy.
Richard J. Birkin
The Little Explorer
