New College Lanarkshire: Film & Television

…so penned Lou Reed in his liner notes for his seminal masterpiece “Metal Machine Music”.

In some ways this also sums up the Film & TV department at Cumbernauld. Last week the students worked on 5 different project including the latest Shift video, a presentation for a partner college in South Africa and music promo for one of the Music Business Record label artists. The next two weeks will be equally busy with the upcoming events taking place at CCA where the HNTV will be filming a music business event on the 23^rd and music promo being previewed alongside the launch night for the Record label, Become One.

“A lot of the projects the students have been planning are now all coming in at once. The latest Shift filming consisted of three film days and a mammoth editing session that took Cameron Shaw a full day’s work to turn around.

HNCTV students, Emily Devaney, Sean Fraser, Darren Livingstone, Maxine O’Hare and Jim Reid were on hand to film across three locations and we managed to deliver the product to NTS within the deadline once again. The students were also on hand to film the building of the set on site at Summerlee for the event they will be filming over the Easter Weekend”

– Michael Grant, Film & Television Lecturer.

At the start of the week 3 of the “Shift” project, our students were asked to return to Summerlee Heritage centre and interview two key people for the project. Clare Weir, Collections and Exhibitions Manager was on hand to talk about North Lanarkshire’s rich industrial heritage and Justin Parkes, Industrial History curator spoke at length about how this impacted on communities and how it continues to inform local identity.

 On Monday evening, two HNC students, Colleen Bell and Darren Livingstone, journeyed across to Whifflet community centre where they filmed the first rehearsals between the professional actors and community volunteers. The students also filmed and recorded 3 interviews with some of the members of the cast which included students from the HNC and HND Acting course at NCL’s Coatbridge campus.

Two of our visiting students from Galway Technology Institute (Barra and Fionn) were tasked with turning around the edit in one day and they responded to the instructions set out by Kim Beveridge magnificently.    

 “As part of the warm up exercise, Simon Sharkey gave a rousing welcome to all and recounted the myth of Sisyphus. (For those who work in New College Lanarkshire, they’ll be only too familiar with this story!!!)

The TV and acting students were an absolute credit to the college and their individual departments and I was particularly impressed by the confidence of the acting students. They were especially brilliant with the members of the community who were also taking part in the project”

 -Alan Moffat, Film &Television Lecturer.

The second week of the NTS “Shift” project began with both TV classes reviewing the previous weeks work and identifying the main strengths and weaknesses of the final short video which went live the previous Friday.

The feedback the students received from NTS was excellent and it set up the second week’s filming nicely.

Two students from HND Television (Jack Carey & John Pittendreigh) and one student from HNC Sound Production (Pamela Arnachellum) went out to film at the “Shift” Exhibition on Tuesday evening at Cumbernauld Town Hall.  The exhibition  included portrait photography by John Farnan and a collaborative, community art project led by artist Alan Greive. HNDTV student Scott Fraser was also on hand to film his own  documentary on the student’s involvement with the Shift project.

On Wednesday and Thursday, HNCTV student Conor Purvis took on editing duties and worked with artist Kim Beveridge to ensure the second week’s film was delivered on the Friday. This included reviewing content from the exhibition and footage shot the previous week of the Summerlee Singers recording at the studio Facilities at Cumbernauld campus.

Conor was instrumental in ensuring the edit was delivered on time and to a high quality, showing some really nice creative touches, like his decision to  use the choir’s singing in the credit sequence to end the promo on a high note.

“Everyone who took part in this week’s filming and editing impressed Kim with their can-do attitude and commitment to the project. One of the great things about live projects is that there is a degree of initiative that the students have to employ.

As well as demonstrating some essential hard skills, the students were also able to demonstrate some really important soft skills such as communication (dealing with members of the public), decision making (how to identify and fix potential problems with technical set-ups) and working with each other to ensure the project was delivered on time.”

-Alan Moffat, Film & Television Lecturer

Monday the 5th of February saw the very first day of location filming on the Shift project for HNC Film and Television students Laura Gilbert and Shannon Munro. Simon Sharkey, Associate Director of NTS (National Theatre of Scotland) was filmed talking about the project on location at Summerlee Heritage Museum.

On Tuesday night Radoslaw Wnuk, Maja Engnell and Savannah Cobb filmed sound production students working with the Summerlee Choir, who were recording a number of traditional songs that will be used in the multi-media art project.

Wednesday evening’s shoot covered the Future Forecasts event at Airdrie Town Hall, filmed by HND Film & Television students Garry Thomson and Cameron Shaw. All footage from the three location shoots was then given to their classmate Albert Lucas who  had the task of reviewing and editing it into a short promotional video, now featured on the National Theatre of Scotland’s YouTube and Vimeo Channels. The first in a series of Shift Transmissions.

“2018 is the Year of Young People and there are many interesting projects being delivered this year across Scotland which will aim to highlight the skills and talent that the next generation have to offer.

The students within the Film & TV department demonstrated this week that they are no strangers to a bit of hard graft and they really impressed the project team at NTS with their dedication, commitment and passion for filming.

The students worked into the evening across three nights in order to meet the Friday deadline and the final cut was delivered to the client with an hour to spare. Not only was the deadline met, the client was delighted with the result and the students valued the experience.”

– Alan Moffat
Film & Television Lecturer.

HN level Film and Television students met with the National Theatre of Scotland on Friday the 2nd of February for a briefing session on the live location filming they will be undertaking to document the theatre group’s Shift project.

Shift is an arts project for the people of New Lanarkshire, a large scale, multi-media theatrical event created in partnership with Culture NL, and North Lanarkshire Council, which will be brought to life by a cast including members of the community.  Shift will document the ever changing nature of work  and the many “Shifts” put in by workers who built the world and created our future.

“Working with The National Theatre of Scotland on the Shift project gives our students a valuable opportunity to film and edit content to industry standards over a nine week schedule.  Shoots are lined up at various locations including; Summerlee Heritage Museum, Airdrie Town Hall, Whifflets Community Centre and  NCL, Cumbernauld campus recording facilities.

Shift is a real time project which will enable the students to experience the challenges involved in working to tight deadlines. Over the next nine weeks we’ll be updating the department blog to reflect the development of the project. “

– Michael Grant,
Film & Television Lecturer.