Grad film ONLINE

My graduation film The Man Who Was Afraid of Falling made at Newport Film School is now online for everyone to watch.

For more info check out www.themanwhowasafraidoffalling.com

Conviction Trailer

Guilty Party, a new theatre company emerging from the Bristol Old Vic's Made In Bristol scheme asked me to create the trailer for their new show Conviction. The piece is about young convicts escaping from a maximum security prison and finding refuge in an English seaside town.

I made the trailer in about three days; one day shooting in Bristol and Weston-Super-Mare and two days of processing footage, editing and sound. The company composed the music and a great guy called Ky Witney made the pumping second tune.

Conviction storyboard

I shot the film on my Canon 60D with a 50mm lens and a zoom lens, we did all the tracking shots using  Jack's long board - low-fi. Lots of footage shot on a high frame rate and slowed down in post. The bird in the first shot was a lucky accident!

I highly recommend the show. Lily Drewry was my shoot assistant on the day and took a few pics:

Filming water

It was freezing

Almost like we were on holiday

Rehearsing for the 'go in the water' bit

The money shot. Photo by Kitty Wheeler Shaw

Merry Christmas

Myself and visual artist Becca Rose decided it would be nice to make an animated film to send out to friends an colleagues as an alternative Christmas card. I'd been away from animation for a while so it was great fun to make another short. The film is low-fi, playful and silly and very Christmassy (it even has snow). Click on the still below to watch the film.

Star of Wonder from Joseph Wallace on Vimeo.

We wanted to make something immediate and simple and I saw the project almost as an extension of my 2007 short Showdown at Yohoko Valley. I started by sketching out a really quick storyboard illustrating the main beats of the story. I then scanned these in and made a rough animatic to work out timing but I didn't want to let this dictate the shoot too much as there are always new options presented whilst animating.

We sourced and borrowed the toys from various people and made the set really quickly from cardboard, fabric and paper. We shot the film in one day in Becca's studio using basic posable lamps and shot on my Canon 60d with the brilliant Dragonframe. Here are some photos of the process:

Becca Rose cutting out tiny letter for the credits

Me animating the sheep

The set up

Making the star appear above the shepherd on some very stable string rigging..

Teeny weeny words

Working with Dragonframe

Animating the credits

Merry Christmas and a happy new year!

Death and Treason

We have just finished Death and Treason Rhyme and Reason a theatrical gig at Bristol Old Vic. The show, led by my wonderful collaborator Elizabeth Westcott, looked at the origins and historical contexts of nursery rhymes. After playing to enchanted audiences, the gang had a lot of great feedback. I think there are exciting possibilities in store for the future.

I worked on the show as Set and Costume Designer and created a dusty sprawling installation on top of Madeline Girling's excellent set for Hey Diddle Diddle. I also made a series of paintings which accompanied the different sets of songs in the show. We spent lots of development time talking through historical and thematic influences on nursery rhymes and I created the paintings based on that research as well as listening to the amazing music the performers created.

Sketching initial thoughts whilst hearing the music

Sharing design ideas in the rehearsal room

Working on more final imagery. Photo: Flavio Perez

Working out the feeling and scenography

Rehearsing one of the songs from the show

The show was created by and performed by:
Elizabeth Westcott (violin/voice)
Hannah Martin (violin/viola/voice)
Jessica Macdonald (cello/voice)
Robbie Burgess (percussion/voice)
Nuala Honan (voice)

I had a great time working with this bunch and bringing together illustration, visual theatre and design to . Check out the Venue review and the Bristol Post review.

Production shots by Daniel Narayanan:

And here are some of the paintings I created which appeared in the show:

'Yesterday' for Theatre Uncut

Rehearsals for The Life After - the full version on the main stage at Bristol Old Vic with over 100 young people - are underway. As an antidote to working with that many people I decided to direct a short show with two characters for Theatre Uncut Festival in Bristol. Uncut is a political theatre festival where writers from around the world write brand new scripts about current and relevant issues and theatre makers put on the shows in venues internationally. This article explains more about Theatre Uncut Bristol.

I read through the various scripts and chose a piece called Yesterday by Spanish writer Helena Tornero. The piece is a deceptively simple two-hander about a woman who sees her lover, a Spanish Police Officer, dressed as a civilian instigating violence at the 2011 Barcelona riots so the Police can take a harsher line with protestors. The script is based on actual events and the economic yet passionate dialogue presented some interesting theatrical options.

Visual research

I started research by reading articles about the riots and, as with most projects, gathered visual reference to inform my thinking. I got really into the imagery I found, police vs protestors, blood, sand, anger, confusion. I pulled together a bunch of images that felt relevant to the world of the show and hit on the concept of staging the lover's tense confrontation as a bull fight.

Jessica Macdonald and Russell Hancock, two really brilliant Bristol-based performers, agreed to perform in the piece and rehearsals took place in the form of three short sessions in the week leading up to the show. We did various physical exercises in these sessions, some to explore the characters, some to physicalise the tension of the lovers and we looked at videos of bull fighting to inform the choreography of the piece.

Jessica and Russell explore the lovers' underlying tension

Yesterday, along with a few other Uncut pieces, played at The Parlour Showrooms which is a great pop up venue in the centre of Bristol to a packed audience. It was great to make something short and quick and tackle a more naturalistic text in a playful way.

Audience at The Parlour Showrooms

The Nursery Rhyme Project

I'm working on about eight projects at the moment. One of them is called Death and Treason, Rhyme and Reason and is an adult nursery rhyme musical show performing at Bristol Old Vic in December. The music is sounding gorgeous, you can keep up to date with the project on their Facebook page. I am making a series of large scale paintings for the show and doing some design work. You can book tickets here.

Dream Press Launch

I can now announce a project I have been working on with Bristol Old Vic's artistic director Tom Morris and Handspring Puppet Company, a brand new adaptation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. The press launch took place on Monday evening in the newly refurbished BOV theatre and I helped Basil and Adrian from Handspring improvise some puppetry with breeze blocks and stones (the puppetry in the show takes many forms).

Tom, Handspring and designer Vicki Mortimer have been researching and developing the project intermittently over the past year through a series of workshops I've had the pleasure of being involved in. The project is set to be a unique mix of puppetry and live performance, rehearsals begin in January, previews end of February and it goes up in March. I'll be working on the puppetry in the show and also helping to deliver the outreach programme once the show's up and running. Can't say much more than that at the moment but it's very exciting to be involved. You can book tickets for the show here and here are some pictures from the press launch.

Photos: Farrows Creative

BAFTA Ceremony

Big gold face

I attended the BAFTA Cymru awards ceremony last night which was a sparkling affair. My graduation film The Man Who Was Afraid of Falling had been nominated for the Short Form and Animation Award. It didn't win but it was an honour to simply be nominated and attend the ceremony at the Wales Millenium Centre. I managed to catch up with staff from the Skillset Media Academy Wales as well as animator Joanna Quinn. You can watch the awards in their entirety online below which features a clip from Falling.

BAFTA Cymru Programme

Graduation Film in Print

My graduation film The Man Who Was Afraid of Falling was selected to be included in a new book called The Art of Short Films. The publication, edited by Morten Enevoldsen, is a feast of artwork from animated films from around the world. Falling has a chapter dedicated to it featuring concept art, behind the scenes photos as well as musings on the process that I wrote specifically for the book. There are some fantastic films also in the book from professional productions to other student shorts from Les Gobelins in France and also Patakiskola by my friend Péter Vácz.

Cover designed by my ASF classmate Nicole Gallagher

About the book:

Authored by Mr. Morten Seung Enevoldsen, illustrated by Ms. Nicole Gallagher, preface by Mr. Kaj Pindal.
This book was written to share concept art from short films that have won acclaim and praise from both the industry and public. "The art of Short films" contains artwork and personal interviews with each of the film creators. In their own words they share their experiences on what to do, and not to do, to make a great film. All profit goes to fund more independent films like these through a film fund. Visit www.theartofshortfilms.com for more information.

An early colour script for The Man Who Was Afraid of Falling

that features in the book

The book can be ordered online from the Amazon division CreateSpace. The book also has a website and a Facebook page.

BAFTA nomination

I am very excited to announce that my graduation film from Newport Film School The Man Who Was Afraid of Falling has been nominated for a Bafta Cymru. It's up for the 'Short Form and Animation' award. I've written a bit more about it on the Falling blog.

I'm delighted about the nomination, as well as being massively encouraging it's also wonderful recognition for the film and the talented crew with whom I made the film. The awards ceremony will take place on 30th September at the Wales Millennium Centre, full details of the 2012 nominations here.