Johnny Goes To Film School

I then guess this will be the part 2 of the journey.

About 7 years ago, maybe a bit less, I sat around the dinner table and I said to my family that I wanted to go too the premier of the last Harry Potter film in London, and it would be alright to go there since I would be much older, like 20 or 21. Just to clarify I’m 21.
My parents smiled nicely and said “sure…”

Lately I’ve been thinking about this, and realising that it wouldn’t really happen, but at least I’m in London.

2 days before the London premier, I had just stayed up all night to recover rushes from the feature film we shot at school. Red one hard drives is not always the best once, especially when you shoot continuously for 10 minutes and the red starts dropping frames.

Out of the blue a good friend of mine sent me a text, asking me what I was doing on Thursday, 7 July, and if I was possibly in London and not on holiday or anything? I said no I’m still in London, hopefully staying for another year or two or five…

He texted me back asking if I was a Harry Potter fan… “Aren’t we all?” He invited me to the Harry Potter premier in London, at Odeon Leicester Square and tickets to the after party… I had no words…

It was one of the best moments in my life, I had a great talk with David Yates, who is one of the nicest people I’ve ever met, and taking the time to just chat with me for a few minutes was really great. He had some really interesting ideas coming up and he was so kind to give me a few advices for my graduation film, which is currently in development/pre-production.

I can’t thank my friend enough for inviting me to this… show… a great show.

I will never forget the day… but I have landed and the next day I went to school, and after school I went to Met Post to work…

I’m also doing a favour for a good friend of mine. Him and three others did a great short film, and I was asked to colour grade the short film, and I just finished today. It looks really good, and the premier for the short film is on Tuesday, called “DoReMi”. Look it up…

-I take off…. I fly… and I always land….
Norwegian Jon

I believe this is a two-part blog post, where I’m rapping up what has happening the past months. Here goes…

My documentary was accepted to the Norwegian documentary film festival, and I therefore travelled to Norway for the screening. It was an amazing festival and a lot happening while I was in Norway. While I was in Norway I was doing my schoolwork, an experimental film that I was going to screen later that month. The idea for my experimental film was: “Every tone or rhythm in a song is represented by shapes and colours.” I got the amazing experimental electronic band “Swankmajer” in on the project and they kindly allowed me to use one of their newly composed songs for the experimental music video idea.

This is how the video turned out:

While all this was happening in Norway, I was under talks to direct a music video for a newly signed Sony Music Norway artist. With a lot of back and forth I got scheduled to direct the music video in Oslo a few days before my flight back to London. There was a lot to get ready, and while I was planning all of this I still needed to do my schoolwork. I flew over to Oslo a week after the documentary film festival and directed the music video over a short weekend, one-day film shoot. Landed Friday, filmed Saturday and flew home Sunday, it was one hectic and stressful week, but so worth it. The film crew was my camera operator, and I.

The whole editing process was shorted then I normally had done before, but we managed to get the edit done, with special effects and colour grading. I did the special effects and colour grading myself as we didn’t have much money. Everything went according to plan, and this is what we ended up with:

After finishing the music video I had my schoolwork to finish off and then we had the experimental screening a few days after I landed in London. We then started working on the feature film module, which just finished, and this is the point where I now will stop this part of the blog post.

I’ll post part 2 in a few days.

Karma…
- Johnny…

Hi “Who ever is still reading my blog”

I’m so sorry for not writing in many months. I’ve been terribly busy with school related stuff and other film thing. there has been so many things happening and I just don’t know where to begin.

I’m currently working on a commercial for a Norwegian based company that does computer data security. it’s going ahead nicely and I’ve recently assigned a brilliant producer to the project, so can’t wait to get to the filming of it all. there are two commercials to be filmed, hopefully around April.

Just this weekend I was up in Leeds filming a music video with a friend. the band is called Buffalo Bones, you’ll be able to catch them on twitter, Facebook or myspace. give them a search and have a listen to their songs.
the filming went very well and I just came back to London.

There has been quite a few other things going on as well, but I’m unable to talk about it I’m afraid.

Other things I’ve been thinking about and working on is my grad film and experimental film. the experimental film I’m going to shoot in Norway/Bergen with my friend Kristian Skogen. hopefully the idea I have will work.

I recently sent in my documentary to “The Norwegian Documentary Film Festival” hopefully it’ll get in. Crossing my fingers.

Tomorrow I’m starting a new module, advance screenwriting, can’t wait to start writing more again. I’m not that good at it, but it’s always fun and relaxed when I’m writing. so wish me lucky tomorrow and I’ll start updating my blog from now on.

Maybe a new design would be good as well.

Norwegian Jon

- Is it safe?

Let’s just talk a bit.

I’ve been working hard on the Take 2 production. First I was different things, director and producer etc. I like Directing best, because I’m able to let something I’m imagining come to life, which is an awesome feeling and wonderful to see.

Producing wasn’t that fun and I know now that I’m not going to become a Producer. Although… I know how important they are, I’m going to tell you why soon.

I got a lot of good feedback from my directing, I directed two episodes, Episode Pilot and Episode 6. Episode 6 was the best one I directed, and how I direct is for some reason coming through and I’m not 100% sure who I am as a director jet, but hopefully I’ll know soon enough.

The fifth week of Take 2 was my last week, and I spent it in the post-production room, and I learned a lot about post-producing, which was brilliant and much fun, and long hours.

The sixth week of Take 2 I spent in France, Provence, to be exact. That was awesome, but at the same time I was working on the creative stuff for my upcoming, first ever, music video for The Fellow. Trust me that was scary, Tom did such a good job on the production and produced the hell out of that music video. Tuesday Lisa Stokke called me up, and invited me to the premier of “The Karate Kid” directed by Harald Zwart, and I had so say no at first, since I was in France, but my family told me I couldn’t say no to that, so I bought a new ticket to London on Thursday morning.

Thursday morning was spent on the move. I was always moving. First up early taking the plane to London, later train back to Victoria and then taxi to Ealing. Then a quick shower, getting ready to pick up my ticket from Lisa Stokke, with bus then a long walk to Lisa’s house.

After that it was a long train to Wimbledon and then to Central London, Odeon Cinema for the premier. Then it was to the cinema, walking down the red carpet, seeing a film that was awesome and totally changed the way I thought about Jackie Chan. We then went to dinner with Harald Zwart and his family, which was so very strange for me. I met him and I told him how much I liked the film. During the dinner we met a wonderful composer, John Graham, and his family. He was the composer for “Lange Flate Baller 2”, and is one funny guy!

Knowing that I sat around a table with a Director, who I’ve always looked up too, was amazing. I felt really honoured and, well frankly, I didn’t know what to say at the time, the night ended to fast and after flying in the clouds that day I had to land quickly back on the ground, because the next day was a new day. One day I’ll pay Harald back though. After that it was back home at 2 AM in Ealing.

Next day I had to work hard with Tom to find a location for our music video, and we spent the whole of Friday to find the location, which he found, which I loved, which he the got, it was a wonderful location. You got to have a good producer in any production, and Tom is one of the best I know. Keep an eye out for him; he is going to be very big some day.

Saturday came and more creative stuff had to be sorted, which I, for some reason wasn’t able to do that day, maybe I didn’t feel ready or something. Sunday came and the band came from the airport, things were happening.

Tom managed to deal with all the pre-production stuff and finished everything that Sunday. I had a nice rehearsal with the band, which was very important, after that I staid up trying to figure out my shot list. I managed to get a floor plan ready that day, ehmm… night. The Monday shoot went all right, some problems occurred, as I didn’t have my shot list all that well written down. Second day Julia, my AD, helped me create a shot list and the second day went very well, except the fact that the crane broke, but all in all a very good and professional shoot.

The rest of that week was all about chilling and not doing anything, which I did. I’m now waiting for the editing of the music video to start. Let’s hope for the best.

And I’m sorry I haven’t been around lately, but more good things coming soon.

Slow Johnny Out…

This module is CRAZY! Chris Bould is our teacher, oh sorry Chris I mean, ‘Executive Producer’.

So this module is 6 weeks of ‘making something for the small screen’, so we are making a web series for the small screen. Now what is small screen? Well easy, mobile phones, TV, Internet and all that is not cinema. The web series creator is Luis, he came up with the idea that we all voted on. We did a lot of testing the first week until Friday, which was the first shooting day. We are now all making one episode each, in a “writers room”.

We are making a Web series about young filmmakers in there twenties who want to make a horror film. Now Chris Jones told us: “Make a horror film, you can never fail, it’s damn easy. Blood, dead people and some sound effects.” So that is what these young filmmakers are doing, but they are doing it very badly, VERY BADLY.

From Monday on we will post Take 2 – Pilot. I directed half of this episode, staring Lisa Stokke, Ryan, Alicia, Sam, Ollie and Michelle. I had the privilege to direct Lisa Stokke for a few scenes and that was awesome, being able to direct in my own language was something I was missing. I’m very happy about the performance I managed to get from the actors, and I’m looking forward to seeing your comments about the first episode.

I have already seen the first two episodes already, and I can say that it’s all just getting better and better.

The rest of the second week I was doing small stuff, sitting at HQ and doing some stunt/acting for an actor. Basically I was the stunt double/ body double. I also did some ‘VOX POP’, which is basically interviewing the public and then using it on the web series episodes.

Very good two weeks, next week I will be directing and producing.

Other then that I’ve had some problems focusing, being creative and such, so this module is really making me force my self to do something creative. If there is one think film school is good at, it is draining you of all creative ideas. Which could be both good and bad.

Other then that I’m working on my own web series, with my sister. She has been writing two episodes already that I written the screenplay for, which could be both good and bad.

Other then that I’m working on my own web series, with my sister. She has been writing two episodes already that I written the screenplay for. I’m hoping to get some money for the web series, six episodes, and then filming it on Norway up in the mountains. I already have casted the big parts, Mats Ellingsen Nygaard and Aslak Van Der Lubbe. I have worked with Aslak before, and that went very well, and Mats is a very good friend of mine that wants to become an actor, this is his chance to show himself in a web series that Norway yet has not seen before. It’s new, it’s creative and Norway is ready for it!

I’ll tell you guys more about it later, I might even post a teaser trailer for the web series when we start filming, but filming might not happen until middle of May 2011.

Stay In The Mile
- Chris Bould

Johnny out again..