Today we had a lesson in the do’s and don’t of being a jurymember. One of my co-jurors hasn’t arrived yet but the other one is Wendy Morris, a Namibian/South African who lives in Belgium. She’s having an exhibition in Leuven at the moment.
We also had our first screening about which of course I can’t say anything.

The filmfestival is the biggest festival on short film in the world but it hasn’t lost the festival atmosphere . If you like short film, try it.

Robin Noorda decided to visit La Grande Serve, our ‘Gypsy wagon resort’ in september to find some well deserved peace and quiet tafter finishing Red-end, his latest short-film which he made together with his colleague .  Apart from a standard 35mm version, they made their film in 4K resolution. A very brave thing to do, new techniques always lead to new troubles. His film was to be shown at the HAFF in a special 4K program. Because they where lacking footage for the 4K program, I proposed to Robin to transfer the leader for Chase into a teaser and render it in 4K resolution. Robin agreed immediately. So I started my first 4K experiment.

The Waag Society was responsible for production and technical support.

CH_TRAILER_4K_P01O_PAL

To obtain subsidies, you have to fill out an application in which you specify the project and the budgetary needs. The problem with my films is that they’re almost abstract. There is no apparant storyline in the sense of going from a to b, no apparant characters and so on. In other words, how do I synchronize the images I see in my head with the images in the heads of the subsidiairies?

What we normally do is that Liesbeth interviews me and turns my pictures into words and writes that part of the application. But Chase was more complicated because I haven’t so far made a film with a clear storyline. Even I wasn’t sure I could transform a n exciting liveaction scene into an exciting abstract scene. So we first applied for a subsidy to make a test.

The dutch film fund wasn’t easily convinced and wanted only to give a part of the money to make a test and they demanded a more elaborate script. In retrospect I was very glad with their last demand because while developing the script I had to sharpen my ideas in order to develop logical storyline but also in a technical sense. Liesbeth, the french scriptwriter Sebastian Ors and I managed to write the script and together with the test I made and the budgetary explanation of the  producers, we convinced not only the Dutch Film Fund but also the Filmfund of the Auvergne (where I live) and Arte that the film was worth making.

The use of simple geometric shapes combined with a strong use of light and shadow will give Chase a graphical identity. Constant change of color will play an important role in display of emotions not only by the different ‘characters’, but in their background as well.

Slow change of colours and shape will give Chase, despite its graphical look, an organic feel. A sudden change into stronger colors and motion can stir the ambiance into a completely opposite, more hostile and aggressive environment. These continuously changing colors and shapes could be seen as a kind of respiration that will be perceptible throughout the film.

One of the main issues will be to establish the best way to have the spectator identify himself with an abstract world. The lack of means to identify oneself with this abstract world will be balanced by the emphasis on camera movement, montage and music. To ease the identification, scenes or shots from well known ‘pursuit’ movies can be translated into an abstract version of the original.

The dramatic effect of music and soundscape will be essential in amplifying the emotional power of the film. This also includes research into the use of soundscape in pursuit scenes. For example: squeaking doors, squealing tires, rattling chains etc. It could be interesting to look for abstract translations in music for these somewhat cliché soundeffects.