6 Pocket Filmmaking tips for this Christmas!

Want to improve your family films over the festive season? Check out my top 6 tips for snapping on your cell phone, to help you make some mobile movie magic to impress your family & friends!

Feature film 'Olive' shot entirely on a Nokia N8!

A full-length feature film titled Olive and shot on the Nokia N8 aims to become the first smartphone movie to be shown in theatres.

Olive was independently financed and has been posted on Kickstarter in the hopes of raising enough money to get it shown in more than 2,000 theatres across the US. It was shot with a Nokia N8, with a 35mm lens attached to it to give it a shallow depth of field.

The film is about a young girl that goes into the lives of three people and changes them without saying a word.

It stars Gena Rowlands, John Scurti, Chris Maher and Ruby Alexander. Mark Zuckerberg’s sister and former Facebook employee Randi Zuckerberg.

The movie was directed by Hooman Khalili, who also wants to submit the film to be in the running for an Oscar.

Full story: http://www.siliconrepublic.com/digital-life/item/24767-full-length-film-olive/

Introducing the iPhone (rotary) lens dial!

Check this one... an aluminium case complete with very retro trio dial of lenses, featuring  Fisheye, Wide Angle and Telephoto lenses. You can order it from the good folks at PhotoJojo, or check out the photos and write up here...



Buy the The iPhone Lens Dial at the Photojojo Store!

I threw away my film camera at TEDx!

Well, sort of! It was such an awesome experience to be asked to present at the inaugural TEDx Newy at Newcastle's Civic Playhouse Theatre on Saturday. I delivered my idea based around 'I threw away my camera and became a filmmaker', and had lots of fun with the audience as we went down a little time trip on my cooky creative teenage years and then an exploration into serendipity that brought me to pocket filmmaking.

It doesn't matter how many times I play Mankind is no Island - it seems people are constantly amazed at what that little film did and how simply it was produced. Even when I recall the story of the making of that film, it sounds like an out-of-body experience to me... 2008 seems so long ago now!

I finished my presentation with a sneek-peek at the DSLR lens adapter plate for iPhone... and yes... mine is currently in a FedEx bag inbound - very excited!

Buy the The iPhone 4 SLR Mount at the Photojojo Store!

GoPro like you've never seen before!

Ok - this one you must see....
Simply stunning use of 30 GoPro cameras used to film Rip Curl's Mirage shoot in Fiji, giving a slo-mo 3D experience that has to be seen to be believed.

The pocket film that started it all...

I can't believe our little short 'Mankind is no Island' is still traveling the festival circuit globally, 3 years after we filmed it on a very tired Nokia N95. For those keen to know a little behind-the-scenes on this one, we shot just over 1200 words on signs around the streets of Sydney and NY... then blue-toothed them to my MacBook, then cut them in Final Cut Pro to the amazing sound score by John Roy.

I can still remember Shane writing up lists of nouns, verbs, adjectives and us sitting around a table with blank stares, trying to fashion some kind of script out of the random assortment of words we'd filmed.

It started to come together with a line in the middle of the film, then gradually, day by day, the other lines came to us and the story (as you see it now) took shape. It was a painful creative extraction, but so worth it.

By the way, for those of you super keen to spot it, there's several shots throughout when i'm shooting signs in windows, and you can actually see our reflection holding the Nokia... further proof (for the doubters out there) that this was genuinely filmed on a mobile phone only.

This film won 'Best Film' and 'People's Choice' at Tropfest NY in 2008, then scored an IF Award for 'Best Short Documentary' in 2009 along with numerous other gongs at film festivals both in Australia and overseas. It's been used in colleges, universities, film schools and even exams I'm told!

For old time's sake...

Anyone shooting a Tropfest (mobile) film entry?

For the 3rd year running, Tropfest's Telstra Mobile Masterpieces is back. In Trop's 20th Anniversary year, the traditional balmy sunday in Sydney's Domain will be expanded to feature 3 days of filmic action.

I'm keen to see how many people are using the new iPhone 4S - with HD video capacity - to shoot their entry? If you need some inspiration, here's a short I shot on my iPhone3 2 years ago... it's titled 'Design Crimes'... enjoy!