Frame by Frame

I’m starting to get a lot of emails and questions from people who are considering applying to the National Film and Television School this year or next, asking for tips and advice on the application procedure.

I can’t really say anything specific, mostly because I just don’t know. They’ll be looking for different things each year, depending on the general skill level and interests of the applicants (there’s no point in having a class of 8 people who are all at completely different levels of experience, technical knowledge etc). I have a fairly limited knowledge of the procedures outside the post-production section, and the knowledge I do have is three years old. Some of the things I’ll say may be more relevant to some courses than others, and the knowledge I have related to the applications procedure comes from having been at the school for two years and talking to the other students rather than being involved in or enquiring in-depth about the selections.

However, I’ll pass on some notes expanding on the points I try to mention to everyone else who asks me, so that I can direct people to this page in the future. This is more of a guide to things you may want to think about before you start your application than what to actually write – above all, be yourself. Don’t assume that what I’d write is in some way more likely to get you a place than what you’d write. Not only do things change, but you’re the one who’s going to be going through the stages of the applications – and potentially up to two years at the place.

—

1. Do your research

The school’s website is at http://www.nfts.org.uk . From there you can view course information, an online copy of the prospectus, information about the school’s history and alumni (famous and recent), details of the application procedures for each course…. just about everything you need.

By having found this page, this probably isn’t something that I need to be saying to the people who are reading it – but the number of job interviews I’ve been to when I’ve casually mentioned something I’ve seen on the company’’s website that interested me and the astonishment it has sometimes caused…. I’ve learnt to not just assume that it’s taken for granted that I’ve taken even 10 minutes out of my Facebook/ Twitter/ sleeping time to read up on a company or specific role before an interview.

This isn’t just a tip for the applications process – it’s to make sure that you know that you want to go. The majority of courses last two years. That’s two years in which you’re not earning money (and have to pay fees), two years in which you’re handing your life over to the projects you’re doing at the school on some very intensive courses, and for some students at the school who I knew, two years in which you may not be able to even visit your home country or see your family (international students are a huge part of the NFTS, don’t let the ‘National’ in the name put you off!). This the structure of a typical UK undergraduate arts degree where there are two hours of lectures and then a lot of time in a bar – this is a 5/6/7 days a week 8-20 hours a day undertaking at the really busy periods for some courses.

2. Why do you want to do the course you’re applying for?

Why do you want to do cinematography/ directing/ producing/ sound design etc. rather than anything else? How did you find it? Where would you like to end up in your career? What would you do if you didn’t get into the school? What steps have you taken towards your goals so far? How is the NFTS course suitable for your specific needs? Do you have any concerns or questions about the contents of the course and how suitable it is for you?

3. Why do you want to go to the NFTS?

The research you’ve done into the school will help here. Consider which other options were open to you – other film schools, employment, even waiting a bit longer and applying another year. Have you considered the implications of the time/ financial/ personal/ residential commitment?

Again – this is something you should be able to answer for yourself, and as a secondary consideration as part of an application process. Film School isn’t the be-all and end-all of working in film or television. There’s no obligation to go. A lot of the courses run week-long selection workshops during which it’s stressed that it’s as much for you to find out about the school as it is for the school to find out about you. This is a graduate degree programme, and a degree of maturity is expected. If you see the course solely as a means to an end then you’re going to have a very rough two years, and you definitely won’t get the best that you can from the experience.

—
…. and that’s all I can really think of to say. You can read the rest of my blog for some of my further experiences at the school (specifically the most recent ones for the overviews). I’ve met some great people there, and had some good times. Is it for you? That’s not something I’d want to comment on for anyone. But hopefully I’ve given you something to think about before you make your application.

Good luck!

… at least that’s what the certificate says. If you remove certain words.

My time at the NFTS culminated in 3 days of graduation screenings at the British Film Institute on the South Bank in London. Wednesday and Thursday were industry days – where various members of the film and television industry were invited to see the graduation films and some other selected films from the two year course, and then we could discuss them over drinks afterwards.

Of course, this also means that we got to see each other’s films for the first times in many cases – when the films were shorter in the first year with more regular deadlines, we used to all attend reviews and screenings to give feedback and see what everyone else was doing with their brief. But in the second year we all got a bit too busy and had our own films to be concentrating on, and the tradition lapsed – but it was great to see how they’d all turned out after hearing varying amounts during the filming and editing processes.

In addition to the four graduation films, I had two other films which I’d edited in my first year (a fiction – Brixton 85, and a documentary – Davey’s Last Order) screened at the industry days, which gave me a new audience reaction to notice and a chance to evaluate the editing decisions I’d made over a year ago… which was both illuminating and painful in certain respects, as self-examination tends to be!

The graduation films themselves all went extremely well – the animation Cherry on the Cake had laughs and ‘aww’s in all the right places and looked fantastic on a huge screen. The Love Bureau went down extremely well with the right humour – and perhaps in retrospect an overabundance of cats… although it was fairly representative of the rushes! Park Close again went down very well in front of a new audience, although I was double-booked with the screening of  TV or not TV which was unfortunate as the cast and writers were also in attendance and I thought it would be more useful to get the fresh audience reaction there.

Friday was the friends and family day and the actual graduation itself – which may have been more nerve-racking in many respects! Although in true NFTS tradition it was all rather informal… we corrected Nik’s (the director of the school) speech en masse, got called scruffy by Michael Kuhn, had official photos taken with the stage party, and given sparkly certificates.

So on with the search for further employment! Whilst waiting for the less official ‘wrap’ party…

An Avid dongle USB key

http://www.savethedongle.com is a site hosting a petition to save Avid’s dongle-based authentication for the users who rely on being able to transfer their license from one machine to another in the course of their work.

They seek to give the user an option – to follow the software-based authentication proposed for MC 3.5 and not have to worry about losing their dongle and having to buy a brand new system if they lose it, and/ or keep their dongle for authentication.

Plus, you know, it’s called a dongle. We can’t let go of that.

See their website for more information and for the petition.

When I was around 10, my parents took me to Stratford-Upon-Avon to see a Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) production of Twelfth Night in an effort to get me exposed to plays and especially Shakespeare before going through the trauma of secondary school English Literature lessons. I ended up going there several times with them and my school to see Romeo & Juliet, The Merchant Of Venice, All’s Well That Ends Well, Sheridan’s Rivals, Henry IVi, and many others.

Now  that I live in London, I’ve continued to see plays old and new by the National Theatre, Royal Court, RSC, Almeida, and many others…. and I find that it stretches the part of my brain that I use for editing in a most pleasing way.

The Editing Process

During the course of becoming familiar with certain works – especially Shakespeare – a certain amount of work not dissimilar to film editing becomes apparent. The works of Shakespeare themselves are published in many different versions even whilst Shakespeare was still alive, and any given production may use aspects of a certain quarto or folio. The recent RSC run of Hamlet directed by Greg Doran moved the “To be or not to be” soliloquy back significantly to the first time we see Hamlet after he has conversed with the ghost of his father, having discovered that it made more sense for their interpretation to follow the first quarto version at that point rather than placing it in the more traditional place between the arrival of The Players and their performance. They also chose to end the play as Fortinbras entered after the death of Hamlet, rather than fully concluding that particular political sub-plot.

Audience Engagement

See any modern production of a  play more than once in the same run which involves the same cast (more on that later), and the chances are that you’ll notice some differences – even if you can’t exactly pinpoint what they were. Changes can be made during previews and even the run according to audience response – much like test screenings for films. Even one night to the next, audiences will react differently (and often unexpectedly) to lines and events, and the mark of a really good company is in how they’ll adapt to their audience response and make the evening even more memorable for those who are there.

Choice of seat can also have a marked effect on the experience a member of the audience will have. A balcony seat at the end of a row 100 feet away from a proscenium arch stage can imitate an extreme long over-shoulder shot for the duration of a pivotal conversation, whereas a centre stalls seat a few rows back can be an optimal position from which to choose whose reactions to monitor –  a sort of self-edit. A thrust stage side-on view can almost place an audience into the play itself, whilst a round situated below audience level gives an eerie uncomfortable CCTV feel to an audience witnessing scenes which become even more intensely private.

Performance

The most recent RSC production of Hamlet made the headlines in 2008 for the speed in which the London run (taking place after many months in the RSC’s home of Stratford-upon-Avon) sold out once the tickets went on public sale. This was largely due to the casting of David Tennant in the title role, rather well known for being in Doctor Who since 2005 – and generally seen by many as a good time to introduce the wider public to Shakespeare because of the casting.

Then, during the run, he got sick. Several weeks of a severely limited run were led by the understudy Edward Bennett. People still went, although empty seats were very noticeable in stark contrast to the lines outside the theatre overnight waiting for returns when Tennant was still in the role. Accusations of ’star casting’ had been largely vindicated by the press once the play had opened in Stratford (as I knew they would be, having seen him on stage several times in the past), but I took the opportunity to see the difference that casting can make.

In the RSC, when a lead player is ill and their understudy takes their place, it tends to have a knock-on effect amongst the entire cast. The understudy for Hamlet was playing Laertes in the same piece, the understudy for Laertes was playing Guildenstern, the understudy for Guildenstern was part of the general ensemble in the play, and on and on until there are just scenes with fewer people than there generally should be and someone with twice as many lines. I’ve seen understudy performances before, when Frances Barber was ill during the London run of Ian McKellen’s King Lear… but having seen this Hamlet in Stratford I was able to compare between the two characters.

The results were interesting. Ed Bennett had had relatively little stage experience prior to 2008, and certainly not within the context of such a leading role on a West End stage. And whilst the performance was consciously different, it still had to fit in with the remaining cast who were still playing their usual roles – notably Gertrude, Claudius, Horatio, Polonius, Ophelia – as well as the staging extensively rehearsed by all and the motivations worked out by the company in rehearsal.

Ultimately, I was quite surprised by how different the characterisation turned out to be within the constraints mentioned above. A fairly different relationship with Claudius largely communicated by eye contact and posture, a more subdued form of madness with less conveyed via physical comedy, and success with humour within entirely different parts of the script. Of course, whilst understudies lack the chance to rehearse as much as the principals OR adjust the aspects of performance to entirely suit their own preferences, there was still the sense of watching two actors play the same role with the same director and external circumstances. Different performances will always suit different tastes, but the points at which they took control of the stage or passed it over to other characters were varied enough to be significant.

So when this transfers to the medium of video, it can never be enough to cut between actors just because of the lines they’re saying.That’s editing by numbers, and more than usually following a set format of  ‘line, cut, line, cut’ … potentially with some variation. Performance is so key. With a really good actor who’s embodying the role and properly thinking about their motivations, their footage can be both a great signpost to appropriate editing decisions within the context of the story that their rushes are telling – as well as a joy to work with. A different actor in that role – even with the same director, motivation, surrounding cast – should result in a different edit, just as much as two editors would never edit the same scene in the exact same way or two concert pianists would never perform a sonata with the same emotional level at the same points.

Today I went to a preview of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which was followed up by a really short Q&A session with the director David Fincher. How do you make a film like that? Well, you’re really meticulous in the way that you do it, working with people who are exactly on the same page as you and with the right technology for the job that you want to do. So ultimately, an ideal film for Fincher who just gives the impression of being on top of everything.

This was probably the last big screening or session that I’ll have attended during my time at the NFTS. But over the last two years, there have been quite a few people who’ve come to the school to share their personal wisdom and experience – and I do view myself as very fortunate to have had the opportunity to encounter so many fantastic people from the global film industry. I’ll try to list the ones who really stick out in my mind here – although most assuredly I’ll forget someone major.
Brian Tufano. It’s easy for me to forget about Brian, since he’s around the cinematography department so much. Idolized by the cinematography students, and justifiably so from the work experience, tutoring and inspiration he gives them.

Walter Murch. Came into school for one day only, complete with handouts and powerpoint presentations to illustrate case studies – in which we saw the view of his edit suite inside and out and his favourite mixing jumper (amongst other things). Just as insistent on the “you should stand up to edit” principle as you’d expect, and gave a really useful insight into sound at the same time illustrated by some truly classic sequences from the films he’s edited.

David Yates. Was deep in the Order of the Phoenix post at the time, but was very happy to talk at length about his previous projects and the importance of TV work. State of Play is an obvious example of this – it’s a fantastic drama, which everyone should see before the Kevin Macdonald film version comes out. He’s an alumnus of the NFTS’s directing course. Absolutely wonderful man, lovely to be around and totally unassuming.  Post-production trivia point – he insisted on taking his usual editor and composer with him if he was going to agree to direct Harry Potter. WB agreed.

Roger Deakins. Another fantastic bloke, another NFTS alumnus. Not suggesting any correlation, but you know….. He had all the time in the world for any questions from anyone, spent another day exclusively with the cinematography students (who temporarily found a new idol). He remembers details and answers questions on every shoot he’s ever done, talked through scenes from Jarhead, Jesse James… and was just incredibly giving with his time and thought processes. The forum on his website deakinsonline.com gives some insight into the type of answer a typical cinematography question would get.

Darren Aronofsky. Came in the day before we could see The Wrestler in our weekly preview screenings, which he seemed genuinely disapponted about and requested that feedback be sent on to him once we’d seen it. Which was actually pretty mindblowing for a generation of film school students who almost universally hold Requiem for a Dream to the highest possible regard. He opened the session with the fact that he’d applied to the NFTS but hadn’t gotten in – quite the ice breaker! Happy to talk on all subjects even those which seemed slightly uncomfortable – such as recasting and associated budget cuts.
Other inspirational names from my time at the film school – whether it was a short tutorial or full exercise/ short film editing supervision:

Stephen Frears – tutored throughout the first year film project alongside Sean Barton during the editing stage.
Alex Mackie – first year external examiner and tutor on our Richard III exercise. Very open, and has been a great help to me.
Barry Vince – came in very early in our film school careers to provide a structured and solid background in editing processes from which to work.
Roger Crittenden –  quite literally wrote the book on editing (or a book, at any rate), and tutored on several fiction films in my second year.
Mamoun Hassan – we spent a day with Mamoun just analysing the opening few minutes of The Man in the White Suit and learnt more about filmmaking than we ever thought possible.

I suppose one of the benefits of a postgraduate degree is being able to appreciate things like this all the more fully – and whilst you still have access to them. But the next stage is to get out there and start making names for ourselves in some form. Onwards and upwards, as they say….

Having just joined vimeo (username jaaed), I’m using the handy embedding feature to self-promote. Which of course is what blogs are for…. sort of.

So here’s my new showreel, updated from the previous to include my graduation films from the NFTS and some of the animations I’ve worked on at the school:

Editing Showreel Jan 2009 from Judith Allen on Vimeo.

… and here are two of my favourite sketches from my most recent editing project, ‘TV or Not TV’:

TV or not TV – ‘Corporate Woman’ from Judith Allen on Vimeo.

TV or not TV – ‘The Facts of Life’ from Judith Allen on Vimeo.

Barring the usual paperwork, signing-offs and graduation itself, my time at the NFTS is just about over. The cafetiere and coffee bean grinder have been taken home, the relevant exports have all been done – and copies made for me to be able to advise remotely on any unclear points. The animation is still going via Avid, as each shot is worked on seperately in the animator’s After Effects and then exported in HD whenever we need to see the entire film or a sequence of shots, but I now have that on my own MacBook Pro and we can FTP new material whilst it’s still being completed.

So now comes the fear. The freelance fear, of course. I’d like to think that by having a website, showreel of sorts, and profiles on the usual networking and jobseeking websites that I’m getting a good start on the background self-promotion, but as just about everyone says – it’s the contacts that count. I’m certainly building them up – in no small part thanks to the NFTS, but they mostly seem to be the type which could be more useful in a few years’ time once I’ve had a bit of experience. Agencies all want broadcast credits, and there’s always the danger of getting stuck in a genre which isn’t where I ultimately want to be.

The first step certainly seems to be the hardest right now. But by continuing to work on my online presence whilst keeping my eyes open and monitoring job-seeking and professional development websites, I’m keeping calm and not worrying too much….. yet.

I had an interesting experience last week, when we were getting some actors (from the sketch show I’m currently editing as a NFTS TV student’s graduation piece) to do some additional voicework to help ease transitions/ smooth over some cuts we’ve had to make to the sketches.

As we were running late, I had to go to pick up one of the actors from reception whilst another was finishing up in the recording booth. I saw him, went over, said his name…. and then realised that there was absolutely no reason in the world why he’d know who I was. I may have been editing material with him in it for the past month, but he’s never seen me before in his life.

I’d read about this aspect of editing before in books, but had always assumed it to be along the lines of seeing a well-known TV or film personality walking down the street. We may watch them weekly on television, but we never think that we know them.

Except from a certain aspect, we do know the people who we’ve edited. We’ve actively studied their physical and facial reactions on several different takes in an attempt to judge one the ‘best’ or ‘most apt’ for the surrounding scene and performances. We’ve berated them (sometimes loudly in the direction of the computer monitor without acknowledgement of the futility of such an action) for an utter lack of consideration to continuity between different slates. We’ve interpreted their intentions and characterisations – and when hard decisions have been made on the subjects we’ve made them with the actor because of what they’ve given us to work with. We’ve made cuts and decisions alongside their performance - to enhance one character trait whilst diminishing another, to engage the audience as if they were there in the room when the scene was being filmed (or even within the mindset and context of the drama they’re watching, as appropriate).

It just seems a little harsh at times, when part of the job description involves getting involved to some extent in the emotional journey of the characters that you’ve been watching on screen for weeks or even months. The lack of acknowledgement can sometimes feel total. They’ll likely never know just how much we study them and feel that we know them and/or their character. But it’s probably for the best. A self-conscious actor is usually the last thing you want when they’re doing their close-ups, and so long as the finished product looks great then everyone’s done their job well.