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Taking More of Ren’s Secrets: 5 Tips for Successful Pick-ups (Article/Tutorial)

Posted by on Mar 22, 2016 in Articles, Behind-the-Scenes, Featured, Lighting/Gaffing, Retrospectives, Tips | 0 comments

Recently I’ve been involved in pick-ups shoots for a couple of projects I lensed last year: action-comedy feature The Gong Fu Connection and fantasy series Ren. Both pick-up shoots were strange experiences, featuring some very familiar aspects of the original shoot – locations, sets, costumes – but noticeably lacking others – certain actors, crew members and so on. The Ren pick-ups in particular were like re-living principal photography in microcosm, with stressful crowd shoots followed by more relaxed, smaller scenes and finally night shots with flaming arrows again!

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Behind the Magic: How to Cut a Behind-the-Scenes Featurette (Article/Tutorial)

Posted by on Mar 15, 2016 in Articles, Behind-the-Scenes, Event Coverage, Featured, General, Industry, Specific Projects, Tutorials | 1 comment

Despite my big plan to quit editing last year, I somehow ended up cutting nearly all the behind-the-scenes material for Ren, including a dozen YouTube videos and 30-odd exclusive set diaries which have just been released for sale. Guess I just have a fondness for BTS stuff.

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A Season To Remember: DP’ing Ren – The Girl with the Mark (Article/Retrospective)

Posted by on Mar 1, 2016 in Articles, Behind-the-Scenes, Featured, Lighting/Gaffing | 0 comments

This coming week the core team from Ren, the fantasy adventure web series I lensed last autumn, will meet for a de-brief. We’ll discuss the challenges of season one and how we can meet those going forward to season two and beyond. And we’ll probably drink wine. So I thought now would be a good time to reflect on what I personally learnt from Ren: Season One, and where I’d like to improve for season two.

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Gender Differences: Creating Masculine & Feminine Lighting in Ren – The Girl with the Mark (Article)

Posted by on Feb 19, 2016 in Articles, Behind-the-Scenes, Featured, Lighting/Gaffing, Specific Projects, Tips | 0 comments

A few days into my tenure as DP on Kate Madison’s ambitious fantasy series, Ren, we filmed a shot/reverse for one of the opening scenes. The scene introduced us to the eponymous Ren (Sophie Skelton) and her friend Karn (Christopher Dane).

Kate described Ren to me as “pure innonence”, while Karn is an older, more worldly character with a difficult past. It seemed to me like classic femine and masculine lighting were called for. Classic feminine lighting is designed to create a soft, flawless, often shadowless face. Classic masculine lighting enhances jaw definition, embraces lines and skin texture and generally creates a rugged look.

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A Car Park in Cambridgeshire: The Making of Ren – The Girl with the Mark (Article)

Posted by on Feb 12, 2016 in Articles, Behind-the-Scenes, Featured, Retrospectives | 1 comment

On March 1st, Kate Madison’s new fantasy action series will premiere free online. Ren: The Girl with the Mark is an ambitious show full of custom-made sets, props and costumes, yet it was made on a crowdfunded budget of just £36,000. We talked to Kate and her team to find out how this seemingly impossible project made it to the screen.

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