A Nottingham video production company recently began on their journey of filming their first feature film. On Monday 11th November, Kelvin and Holly – creators of Aether Productions – filmed a scene of their film titled ‘Song of the Goat’ at the Ginsecco Bar at Corner House in Nottingham City Centre.
Kelvin said, “The film itself is something of a modern retelling of a Greek tragedy, focusing on the lives of two sisters who are separated at birth and are now suddenly reunited. One is now an NCA Agent fighting organised crime, the other a criminal mastermind. We are going to be filming every scene from the film in one-continuous shot, giving the film something of a ‘live’ operatic feel whilst maintaining ultra-realism so it’s all in-keeping with this theme of Greek Tragedy (and also why it’s called ‘Song of the Goat’ which translates from latin to ‘Tragedy’.). This choice is something that has gained great interest from all involved and of course this bar scene is no exception”
“The entire project has been about 10 years in the making and is a true labour of love that started life as a simple short film and grown into the feature that we’re now looking to make. I have written the feature script but we’re self-funding the scene [that we] shot in November, which will be screened to a range of producers and funders for use as part of a ‘Proof of Concept’, in order to gain funding for the whole film.”
“The shoot itself went really well, especially considering we were working with a tight budget and even though we had a total of 20 people on-set, we were still quite understaffed! I always had the aim of breaking boundaries with this film and due to the nature of wanting to film the entire scene in one continuous 6 minute shot, I knew that pre-planning was going to be key to the success of this scene being filmed within the 8 hours we had to setup, film and pack away.”
The team were assisted by some budding film students from University of Nottingham.
“All the students were brilliant, and their hard work really helped make the entire shoot run smoothly by undertaking numerous tasks such as operating the clapper board, setting up background ambient lighting, behind the scenes video/photography and providing general assistance to the camera and sound teams.”
“The hardest part during the filming was really the lighting and is why we needed such a long period of time to setup since the camera was going to be moving around in a 270-degree space. So huge kudos to Tim and Andy who had a real job on their hands trying to light the scene to look good whilst hiding the lights out of shot from a roaming camera. Some very inventive techniques were used to achieve this, such as having our main key-light hidden behind a very large vase and one of the students stepping in as an extra during filming by sitting at the bar to hide the light stand. That is most definitely the greatest improvisation I have witnessed on set in a long time! Also, a huge shout out to my partner Holly who is the film’s Producer, she planned every detail meticulously behind the scenes and kept everything running smoothly throughout the entire production and on the filming night itself.
“On the filming day, all of the staff at Ginsecco were incredible and their hospitality throughout the entire production has been a huge factor of us being able to get the scene made with a stunning background so all of the team would like to thank them immensely.”
“The plan now is to work tirelessly getting this scene as close to perfect as possible in terms of foley sound, colour grading etc before sending it off to be scored, hopefully by the Royal College of Music London, later this month. Once the scene is complete we have got a number of meetings lined up with Producers, Funders and Production Studios where we will use the scene as a ‘proof of concept’ to help them see what the film’s style would be like and help get the entire feature financed ready for next year.”
Kelvin and his fiancé Holly met at secondary school and have been together for 13 years. They both graduated University with film degrees but struggled finding work due to a lack of experience. So, they came up with the idea to setup their own video production company, ‘Aether Productions’. They now live in Ollerton, Newark.
Kelvin said, “…We now run [Aether Productions] full-time and, as well as paying the bills, it keeps our finger on the pulse in the industry – but the dream has always been to become full-time filmmakers.”