OILYFILMS

Here it is - moon over sombrio - exercise #4 of 2008. It was shot on 16mm Black and White film on Sombrio Beach. I spent this afternoon in the basement, toning it with yellow, brown and blue, and am quite pleased with the results. It’s a little slow, but I find it mesmerizing. There were no digital tricks - this is what the actual film looks like (well, I inverted it with the computer, because I shot it on neg film, and slowed it down a bit) - but all of the detail and texture and colour is on the film itself. I’m thinking about sending it to the lab to get an actual print made….we’ll see… Thanks to Mike Wolske for the music.

It has been an exciting weekend. I spent Saturday at the Victoria Symphony for their Reel Music performance…It was incredible; I’m still glowing from the experience. Four incredible scores by Peter Mundinger, Marc Baril, Dino Giancola and Gilles Bellemare, set to the short film “Lily”. I’m honoured to have such talented people composing for my work. And the orchestra was stellar. Top notch. Here’s a pic I snuck at the show - I hope that it doesn’t upset anyone - I really wanted some video, but that wasn’t going to happen.

Tobin Stokes, the composer in residence at the symphony was a great host and all-around super guy, and I finally got to meet Ann Marie Flemming, a fellow British Columbian Filmmaker, whose short film “Running” was also screening with 4 different composed scores. Fun stuff.
And now it’s time to get ready for the Victoria Film Festival that’s starting this on February 1st. Woohoo!

And here’s a better quality downloadable quicktime version of Moon over Sombrio:

 

 Moon Over Sombrio, an experimental film by Scott Amos, music by Mike Wolske [0:49m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Week 3 of the Film-a-Week Project.

This is a short film excercise called “Tomorrow.” It’s 24 seconds long, and was filmed on a low-end Sony miniDV camera, using the slow-shutter in a dark room. It started as an experiment with the trails of a cigarette heater captured using slow shutter, and I tried my best to spell out letters, but it just wouldn’t turn out how I wanted. The flashes and abstract lines were just distracting, so I re-filmed it with writing on the cigarette and kept it simple…There’s nothing thing new to say about smoking, but I tried…Mike Wolske and Darryl Tamney made the original music, and I tweaked it a little.

Got back from the Vancouver Island short Film Festival yesterday, great screening and met a couple Island filmmakers, include Paul Whittington, who makes incredible animations which you can find here: www.carrotkid.com - check out “L19 Disposed.”
Getting ready to go to the Victoria Symphony this weekend for their “Reel Music” Screening, where Lily will be playing. I’m excited to see what the composers came up with, and thrilled that the Victoria Symphony will be paying 4 live scores to my film. Wow, what an honour.

 

 Tomorrow, a short film by Scott Amos [0:26m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Feed Shark

Week 2 of the Film-a-Week project:

This is a loop I made this week for the Victoria Film Festival’s Pre-Fest Bash. It is made from an old 16mm educational film, altered with chemicals and hand-painted frame-by-frame. Paul Wilson designed the logo, and I put some of Mike Wolske’s music on the web version. Did a little digital colour adjustment to keep with the festival’s pink colour scheme too.
Hopefully the YouTube video compression won’t mangle it too badly, but you’ll get the idea. Inspired by Brakhage (of course.)

Heading out to Nanaimo next weekend for the Vancouver Island Short Film Festival, where both Grass and Sometimes are playing along with 19 other island-made films. Should be fun.

 

 Victoria Film Fest logo [0:45m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

I decided that 2008 would be the year to make a film every week and post it to my blog. Each of them will be less than a minute, and will give me a good excuse to experiment. This is the first week, and first film of the year. It was shot on 16mm B&W film, scratched and toned. The lovely and talented Rozalind MacPhail made the music.

 

 Birds, a short film by Scott Amos, with music by Rozalind MacPhail [0:28m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

A friend of mine, Gerald Saul, in Regina, is doing the same thing, a film a week in 2008.
You can find his blog here: http://geraldsaul.blogspot.com/