Long Time No Etc.

It's been a while since our last update, but that doesn't mean nothing's been happening!  In the weeks since finishing up The Local, we've submitted the film to several festivals, and are waiting to hear word back.  Who knows?  Maybe when you finally see it, it'll be on the big screen!

We also took part in this year's 24-hour Film Race, which involved writing, shooting, editing and scoring a three-and-a-half minute film in under 24 hours.  At 3am local time, they provided us with a theme (Time Travel), a prop (an egg), and an action (crumpling a piece of paper) to base the film around, and we got our entry, Time for Regret, submitted with moments to spare!

Writing and planning also continues on future projects, which we'll share with you as soon as possible!

Thanks for following our progress - we hope you like what we've done so far, and what we do in future!

The Local update #5 - COMPLETE!

Long time no update, but NEWS FLASH: the epicture is cut, the sound is mixed, and the colour is graded - The Local is finished!

Discs and covers have been printed (and looking awesome!), so the first festival submissions are getting under way.

I'd just like to once again thank our great cast (Kevin Keenan, Martin McCann, and Justin Davis), our DP Paul Christie, Jennifer Bowman for makeup, and an additional hooray to Chris Packman for the quick turnaround on colour grading.

There's no plan yet for a YouTube appearance, but we will get it released into the wild at some point - until then, watch this space for further updates!

The Local update #4 - That's a wrap!

The dust has settled now on our shoot for The Local, and we're ready to move into post-production next week!

We started off at our first location (Moyola Park Golf Club) just after 10am, got the cast made up (huge thanks to Jen Bowman!) and started running through the first scene.  The three guys worked really well together - Kevin Keenan as Dave, Martin McCann as Alfie, and Justin Davis as Brick - and it was a joy to just listen to their interpretations of the script and their characters.  We shot all 9 angles of the scene before 5pm, and then packed up to move on to our second location, for the third scene - which involved waiting for dark.

The Local update #3 - The Shoot

No updates in a while, I know, but today's the day!  We're heading down to the first location soon, to meet up with the great cast & crew we've assembled, and make a (short) movie!  This is just a brief note for now, but we'll try and have some more updates through the day on Twitter, and a proper report tomorrow.

The Local update #2

This one's turning out to be a little bit bigger than I expected when I first wrote it.  Survival was shot on a Handycam with a shoestring budget and a cast & crew of volunteers, but The Local is shaping up to be up in the lofty realms of micro-budget, and we're looking at hiring just about everything - cast, crew, and equipment.

This week, we've hired a camera to shoot some tests and get to know some higher-end gear.  Next week: MEETINGS, and an educational trip to London.

The end result of all this effort will be a film about half the length of Survival, but that'll look as good as anything else that's out there, and the extra experience we're getting will help a lot with tackling the bigger projects on the horizon.

Casting call: The Local

-- Casting is now COMPLETE --

Help us get the word out!

We're looking for 3 actors to play the leads in The Local, which we're aiming to shoot in Northern Ireland in late February/early March.

All characters are male, and in their late 20s or early 30s.  The nationalities mentioned are an ideal, not a requirement.

DAVE:

Irish, medium build, average-looking; the sort of guy who wouldn't get noticed in a room on his own, never mind in a crowd. Worries easily, and tends to overthink things.

BRICK:

Scottish, fairly tall, big build. Short or shaved hair. He takes nothing too seriously - especially not his friends - and has a fondness for action movies.

ALFIE:

English, tall, thin, smartly dressed. Alfie considers himself the intellectual of the group, and he probably is.

Happy New Year!

Well, holidays are over, and we're back in the office again.  I hope everyone had a good Christmas and new year, that you all got what you wanted and haven't broken your resolutions already.  

I've promised myself that I'll have something to share with you all soon - so watch this space!

A couple of updates

While we spent the last few days writing, shooting, and editing Santa Charles the Christmas Dog, we also saw Survival break 500 views!  

I just want to say thanks to everyone who's shown us their support, and ask you all to please keep sharing Survival and Charles with anyone you think might enjoy them!

Oh, one other thing - if anyone has any ideas for extra features they'd like to see for what we've done so far, or future projects, then please leave a comment here, write on our Facebook page, or tweet us @Ninchilla.

Merry Christmas from Ninchilla Films

Don't say we never get you anything.

ANNOUNCEMENT: The Local

Major announcement time - the next Ninchilla Films production will be a short, not-very-serious sci-fi film called "The Local".

Confession: I'm never sure how much to make public about upcoming projects.  It's a bit of a dilemma, I suppose; loving what we're doing and wanting to tell everyone, vs. wanting to wait until everything's ready.  As I get a little more ambitious with the writing, though (and I suspect this will apply to all our projects going forward), we're probably going to need some help.

Before too long (hopefully), we'll move from pre-production into production - the script is in good shape, and we're almost ready to start looking at locations, gear hire, and casting.

As I mentioned, we'll need some help - we've got three main parts to cast, and will need a few extras, too - so if you know anyone that might be interested, point them in this direction!