Shades Of Bad was a departure into the web for us. Maybe we won't turn back!
We shoot a number of things from movies to web content, but we have just sold our Epic Dragon cameras and now are concentrating on web content. Our main web series are ‘Doris Visits’ the travel shows, and ‘Doris Shades Of Bad’ the drama series. For both web series we wanted to keep the quality at 2k, which is the quality of most current televisions bought and sold. That is certainly as good as most TV shows if not much better than daily soaps and lower level TV which are often shot at 720 lines and they are interlaced. If I have lost you there I apologize, but most shows are now HD which the retailers are currently calling 2k.
The camera had to be small and I did not need fancy add-ons like slow motion. I just needed a camera that is used widely on the professional market and the cameramen that came in would be able to use. So, I asked them and Black Magic came out tops. I have seen recent blogs where the BMPCC goes up against some newer cameras and it wins hands down.
The kitchen that Shades Of Bad was all going to be shot in is small by filming standards and none of the walls fly away or have traps. I mean none of the walls are force and can be removed. What you see is the space we had. The BMPCC was ideal and there were few other coices. Stills guys compremise, but we never needed it to take stills, we just needed a dedicated movie camera.
It can shoot 2k raw but that means huge files and is over kill and would certainly be well beyond our Apple based edit suit, so we shoot at 1080 uncompressed. The edit still struggles when the shows get to 30 minutes, but we manage as most of the travel shows on line are around five minutes. The episodes of Shades were always going to be around three minutes.
All stop... it changed. As film makers our ambition was bigger and before long we were testing outside night shoots, filming in the woods and then going abroad. Just because we could and web series did not normally go to that expense. For us it was all a test, and adventure. It has generated a new series, the travel show Doris Visits which in 6 months has produced 100 films, over 80 of which are loaded. Now we have groups of actors and financiers coming to us to ask about the next step; shooting a movie this way.
If you are looking for a camera to shoot movies, take a look at some of our films on Doris Visits. This camera does not shoot stills. It is a movie camera. I will address more of our kit in later blogs.
As we head to the end of season 3 it is quite odd that the Barcelona sections shot last June have cut into the footage shot just months ago in the UK. In Barcelona we had the chance to use actor Gary Keates who works his character Manuel Martinez in international cabaret. Gary, a senior member of the Magic Circle has been talking to us for some time about doing a series on street magic, but as with most entertainers and actors who are working, they are always working. The goos in his calendar as about as bad (or good) as the dates in the Status Quo calendar. We know because we have been trying to find a gap that works for both with absolutely no success.
So, Gary takes us into Barcelona, episode 58.
Then the interiors of Barcelona are shot in the domestic office of Nick's in Chorleywood, almost a year apart exactly. And for a web series crew that has never used a costume or a make up department but acts as if in the theatre and expects the talent to look after themselves, can you spot any difference in Doris ???
In episode 59 Nick Simons plays the evil jeweller. Having directed this episode myself I wanted to make it feel different. I want to feel like Doris was away from her normal safe haven and in someone else's back yard. So I turned off the lights.
Then in the magic of cinema, to use such a pun with a qualified magician, we jump back a year, into Barcelona and see Doris leave. Now, when we shot this we had not written the script inside the office but I suspected that Doris might kill the jeweller and run. At least she would have stolen some or all of the nanobots, because let's face it, having been jilted and now being offered the chance to take over the world .... so, does the story flow seamlessly?
The web series has been a huge success and someone in the office came up with a great idea. Well, is it. Who knows. A young actor had just spent £450 making a showreel on video to use on line. They had also spent the same making a voice reel. I guess if you are entering a profession it is no different to spending thousands on training, but the ethics aside, it was not very good. Not only that it looked rather cold and vacuumous (my spell checker hates that word, which is why I like it even more).
We give new cameramen and directors a chance and produce pretty good episodes. So the idea was that an actor could suggest an episode to fit in between any two and become an 'a' episode ... like 56a, a policeman stops Doris after she has killed the refuse collector Ben Manstead (Bin Man's Dead) in the woods. They could set up whatever they need to play a 4 to 6 page episode with Doris for £350. Now that is cheaper than the other guys were charging. We would work with them on the script, and finish the episode and put it up in sequence as a showreel of .... and an episode, which we keep usage rights to and allow you usage rights. Same/same.... Owning content and having your own platform for PR is going to be essential for any actor in the future.
Having spawned the idea the others here said it would never fly, and I must say the money does not entice me to do lots, because the money just does not cover the effort and equipment. However, it is an idea and you just never know what it brings. It might just bring the best ever episode of Doris Shades ever. Episodes in a web series can be entered into festivals, you could win a Best Actor Award.
That is a serious remark because twice Jean Heard was voted best actress in a world web series by We Love Soaps / Indie Series Network in the USA.
News about episode 61, the last episode in Season 3, and where the series is going will come soon, but we are trying to clear the decks ready to head off on a cruise to the Canary Islands to shoot episodes for Doris Visits... which is the spin off series you must have seen.
So will you be episode 62 ???? or 55a.... have you got what it takes to win an award and have faith enough to put energy behind the belief in your talent.
PS if anyone out there knows how to wrap text round a YouTube film in Blog spot, do tell....
see our new adventure www.dorisvisits.com, and make us a film ....
Doris Shades is a woman, she has needs. Revenge is amongst them.
There is a tipping point which makes most people turn bad. Doris met hers when her husband left.
The picture below is from episode 56 when Doris dumps a dead body in the woods.
Another dead body.
Doris knew when show woke up to an empty bed that he was never coming home. She knew when her best friend and neighbour came by for coffee that morning that she would have to breach the subject, that she, Wilma was sleeping with her husband. But hey, that shouldn't break up a good friendship. He is the shit, not her, and he should die. Wilma her friend should kill him for her.
Now you can see this is a dark strange series, and we have now put up 61 episodes and although Doris tried to kill Brad she failed. She just happened to accidentally kill a lot of other people along the way. She accidentally became a serial killer and we accidentally had a series on our hands.
GUEST STARS
Guest stars have included James Whale from Celebrity Big Brother (ep 32), Olympian Derek Redmond (eps 43 to 54) and child star now a little older, Richard Beaumont (ep 20 to 40).
From Coffee Break 3 min eps to full length Programs
There is a class system in the UK almost as strong as India. Ask any director or actor who works in TV. Those constantly trusted with 30 minute programs find it hard to move to the hour slot. Those in the hour slot often can't make it into the specials and multi parters. There are exceptions and these are normally exceptional people, however, the number of times actors leave say a soap to try and move on, then return two years later after they could not climb higher.
I spent 26 years on Emmerdale as well as the films and TV shows I did, but as an action coordinator we seem to be immune from that which is unique. Actually for us in effects and action we are trained on big product shows and the smaller shows love to have the huge accident. I joined Emmerdale to plan the Plane crash and stayed on retainer for a quarter of a century.
Shades OF Bad was a suggestion of my wife and co owner of INDYUK Films which has made features and never before ventured into TV of any form. I had sat at the British Screen Advisory Council meetings and lectures for a few years and the web was being extensively researched. So, I agreed and we started a coffee break show that was meant to always be three minute episodes.
I did cut the first 5 together to make a mega introductory episode but after the followers were way into episodes in their 40's, though new viewers may have watched or started via the longer episode it was still only 11 minutes.
However it was obvious it worked better, was more powerful and drew you into the story more. I have just just episodes 56 to 61 together and they make, even with some harsh cuts, a 27 minute episode. I have not released it as it is for discussion with our distributors Opera and Daily Motion before we decide what to do with the series.
However it is very interesting because you can cat more harshly as you have so much more product. However the grading and mixing done for three minutes needs to be rematched across the longer episodes.
I guess because we wrote the series from longer form ideas and cut them down, they do add up back together, but the exorcise is hugely interesting. I have just come out of a screening and two notes that toped up in the long form were never mentioned in the short form. In other words, the three minute coffee break episodes are not scrutinised as harshly as the show is in longer form.
One note that bugged a few in the longer form was the time between two incidents happening seemed wrong in the longer form. I can see that, but in the short episode as it stood alone, that never mattered. Long form is more demanding and the edit will be fun, what comes out of it will be interesting, but Shades Of Bad has way over 4 hours of material which we know can cut, work and play totally different. It is like a master class in editing.
However, after what is almost a two year break from work he has now directed few episodes of Shades Of Bad in a move to get back in the swing. Shades hardly represent the big toys he normally organises and takes responsibility for, but he has started to down size and put his two Red Weapon cameras and the Scarlet up for sale on RedUser.
Shades Of Bad has evolved a lot as he has taken more notice. He pushed Buster to shoot outside at night, then in the woods. Then challenged the girls to write and direct. Now, he has taken a trip to Barcelona with actor Gary Keates and Jean who plays Doris. Starting at 10am, in 4 hours he had shot the 'to and from' the Jewellers shop and was having lunch in a bar. His attitude has changed a lot in two years. But as Stuart says, when you have nearly been killed you think differently.
Stuart then recreated a Jewellers office at actor Nick Simons' house where he shot the interiors of Barcelona. The other sections are in his and Jean's house where Jean makes most of Shades Of Bad. Where as Buster preferred the kitchen, Stuart pushed actor Oliver Degnan for an edgy performance style and a walk into a new area. Stuart likes scenes to be busy visually.
Whether there is visible a difference between the episodes is for the eye to see, they were both shot as fast as the older episodes. Whether Shades Of Bad has entered a new era, or signalled one, a few motivated well known actors have taken notice at the shooting possibilities. They are asking Stuart to look at advising on how they can make their own films with a micro crew. Shades Of Bad has now over 3 hours of edited drama and never had a make up or costume or continuity department. Actors work this way in Fringe Theatre, what they need is the assistance of an enabler to turn their art into film.
Actors Nick Simons and Oliver Degnan are also represented by INDYUK, they both left the profession for proper jobs and a proper wage but are both still very confident infant of camera.
INDYUK can be found on most sites and via the home/contact page on www.DorisVisits.com
The web has now made anywhere your theatre, you can film on the street, in the tube, in the woods and do not have to build a set. So, with the world your oyster and the phone in your camera, it is time to experiment. Those with a natural flair will become tomorrows enablers.
I often compare acting to football because it is such a grounding and obvious comparison. How many years is it before you allow a footballer to be either the captain, or the manager? But, do those who work that hard from the start get noticed right from the kick-off and are shaped for better things? Shaped because they are future captains? Yes, it is how our film stars are made just in the same way as footballers. Those who put the time in get the rewards.
Shows that get to run as long as Greys Anatomy, and it has now been running longer than ER, allow the team to learn and then expand by directing if they show the flair to be able to see the 'whole picture'. Shades Of Bad reached that at episode 56, because, Lynn knew she was leaving the show and there was a gap for another episode between 56 and the next.
I suggested they look at the male Hot Crazy Matrix and work out how Wilma (who has stolen Doris's husband) tells her to find a man. Now, whether you like Hot Crazy Matrix or not - don't knock success, learn from it. The main original film was shot in ten minutes for a laugh and has over 15 million views and is in discussion with Hollywood Studios about how this might progress as a film or a TV series. There have been two or three female attempts to parody this, all have failed to even dent a respectable number of views. So, that is what I threw at them..... In our story, Doris is being sent to Barcelona which was to be episode 57, I can delay that a week if they come up with an episode. Plan it, shoot it. I managed to get Buster to come back and do camera and tech crew for them, but let them direct.....
Directing is a tough job managing a huge team of workers and technicians, managing time, respecting a budget (most directors are sacked on day three of a movie because they cannot do that time/money bit). Also they work with story and a couple of actors but seriously one would hope most of that was done before walking on the set. Now is the manufacturing time. It is a tough job to get right, and not until the producer walks on the set looks at his watch and says, 'what's the hold up?' do you start to feel the need for speed. PRESSURE.
The producer might get the answer, 'no, not today, don't have a go at me today!' but, they expect that, they have done their job. As I said, directors who do not head it, find themselves sacked three days later.
I did walk on and say that after an hour of nothing, I was as un welcome as all producers doing that.
So, when you are at work, which are you?
Are you the crew member or actor that stands and chats or the one who watches every department and learns? Are you the next David Beckham who is sponge like; watching and learning. How many Wayne Rooney's are there, very few. How many hours did David Beckham stay behind every day after training to practice placing the ball with passes and shots - it is said 2 extra hours a day. Greatness is thrust upon those whose dedication knows no bounds. If you are an actor who never trains and whose first question when arriving on set is, 'when can I finish only I have a ......' You might not be director material.
So, time and experience are the enemy when you are starting and have neither, and both are your friend to use and abuse when you have credits. Here is where the web series has opened the future. You have a chance to film and film.
How many episodes before you can call yourself a series?
This is a great question and I upset a few people a year ago when I asked this. A series is at least 7 in the real world and that is a test. That is a shot comedy series like Mrs Brown's Boys. 13 episodes is a normal season for drama, 26 episode a more modern number in broadcast for US TV like Blue Bloods and Madam Sectretary. If you have only three or four, or five, that is normally called a 'five-part drama'. A four or five part drama can sit and do, in one week. It is not a series.
Now it is different. There are huge web series out there. A year ago there were fewer web series and very few who could produce content. Now there are huge numbers, far greater than Shades Of Bad which has shot 61 episodes thus far and has started a travel show with more episodes that 61 in a shorter time. Over 140 shows in a year, some great ones, some not so great. The travel show will outlive the drama, see a sample here.
When Jean started directing episode 43 episode 56 had been shot, like soaps and series we shoot out of order. The Barcelona sections of episode 58 and 60 were shot after episode 6 a year ago.
