Tim Crawley's Action Sports Resources

These resources were compiled following eShed's Action Sports Workshop and film screening.

• www.skateperception.com - very useful site with filming tips, software tutorials, forums and articles on featured filmers.
• www.sidewalkmag.com - site for national skateboarding magazine, very heavily used forum often with filming tips, advice and cheap cameras.
• www.blueprintskateboards.com - regularly updated blog style site for the UK’s leading skate company. Useful for news, inspiration and fine examples of filming.
• www.skatevideosonline.net - this site hosts online watchable versions of practically every skate video ever made.

Useful vids to watch (most of which can be found at the site above)

Video magazines

• www.411vm.com - leading American video magazine. Pretty much as straightforward as you can get. Heavy on the action filming.
• www.puzzlevideo.com - Puzzle video magazine - leading European skate video magazine. Slightly more style orientated, with lots of amazing European architecture.

Artistic/Stylised

• Transworld skateboarding - any video by Transworld is worth a watch for inspiration. A fine example of stylish editing and filming. Often with whole sections filmed on 16mm film which is extremely stylish and artistic to watch.
• Pontus Alv the Strongest of the Strange - Independent video by Swedish professional skater Pontus Alv. Worth watching for a slightly alternative take on skate videography.
  
• Lost and Found from Blueprint Skateboards - Great British video, stylish skating and film-making.

Narrative driven – Some videos tend to take on a more story driven approach. Certain skaters sections appear at points relative to their involvement in a storyline.

• Chocolate skateboards’ Las Nuevas Vidas de Paco - Skateboarding team takes on the appearance of a Western cowboy movie. When each character dies a section of them skating comes on (sorry, no link available).
• Bones Brigade’s The Search for Animal Chin - One of the first skate videos to have a story to it. The Bones Brigade skate team search the city for a fictitous famous skater named Animal Chin. The skating action comes as they use their boards to search and roam the cities.

For any other questions/queries feel free to contact me (Tim Crawley) at crawley.tim@googlemail.com.

Consent form for putting your films on eShed.net

Yes, we know it's easy, and lots of fun to put together an MP3, some youtube clips, pictures and stuff off the net, But what about the people who made those original bits of art. Do they really want to appear in your video? And would you like someone else to steal your glory by copying and cutting up your work, or making you look stupid and posting it all over the world?

Here at eShed we like to do it proper, 'cos we're artists too. So we've got this Contributors' Form (click to get the PDF file). Print it out, fill it in: make sure everyone and everything in your film is OK, then you won't get into any trouble with your mates, record company lawyers or, worse still, the eShed crew!

Anyway, why not make your own film clips, music and pictures with a little help from friends? Or, if you're stuck, look at the resources page for more information about using material from the internet.

Send us your films

Would you like us to publish your short film on our films page? Or are you entering one of our film-making competitions? If so you'll need to download the contributor consent form, fill it in and send it in to us, along with a copy of your film in one of the specified formats.

Please remember we cannot publish any work that features images or music that does not belong to you. If you're looking for copyright free music to use in your film you could try opsound.org (you just need to credit the artist) or why not find an unsigned artist on Myspace and message them asking if they'd let you use one of their tunes on your soundtrack?

Looking forward to seeing all your creative genius!

Arts qualifications for young people

Arts+Business, an organisation helping artists link up with business to make work and get paid, has a special Arts Award for young people.

The Arts Award supports young people to develop as artists and arts leaders and is available to young people across England. The Arts Award is a nationally recognised qualification at three levels- Bronze, Silver and Gold, equivalent to GCSEs or A Level passes. More information.

Wildsound guides

How do you get funding, write scripts, direct, produce, pitch? What do these words mean? Go to the filmmaking notes page on the wildsound site to find out.

How to create better quality YouTube films

Get your youtube video looking the best that it can with this advice from Ken Stone. It's mainly aimed at Final Cut users, but will probably be useful for film-makers using other software.

www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/youtube_compressor_gary.html

Depict! short film festival.

DepicT! is Watershed's unique filmmaking competition, part of Encounters International Short Film Festival, which challenges filmmakers from across the globe to come up with a compelling, imaginative idea and distil it into 90 seconds of cinematic originality.

SceneWon film competitions

Scenewon is offering all videoheads the chance to make clips on topical themes with a £10,000 prize pool for the best clips and other prizes for best reviews and top ten all voted for by YOU!

At the start of each competition the theme will be announced and then its down to you to come up with a great theme around this. Be it live action, animation, or some crazy hybrid that has never been seen we want all your orginal clips.

Build your own steadycam!

Johnny Chung Lee has invented an excellent way of keeping your hand-held camera work smooth. All you need is a few tools, some bits of pipe and a weight. Find out how it's done and see some cool demos; I particularly like the running-down-the-corridoor movie and the football one. So smooth!

Or, if you've got a tripod, use that as a steadicam: Put the camera on the tripod and wind the height adjuster right up to the top. Find the balance point (by holding the whole thing horizontal - make sure that camera's properly attached!).

Now you can try it out: hold the tripod vertically at the balance point, and the weight of the legs should stop the camera shaking from side to side.

Have fun!

Film-making, internet and the law

Bristol Stories resources page

Everyone’s heard of copyright law, but did you know that copyright is just one of a whole range of “Intellectual Property Rights”?

Did you know that putting your film online counts as broadcasting it, and you can wind up in lots of trouble if you haven’t taken care about what’s in your film?

Imagine winning first prize in a film festival, then being disqualified, or being removed from film websites (like this one) because some of the material in the film is not your own. There is already software being used by YouTube.com which scans films for copied material and automatically bans them.

Did you know that you need permission from everyone in your film that they’re happy to appear in it (that’s why feature films use “extras” for crowd scenes instead of real crowds)?

Help is here!

The people at BristolStories.org have provided a resources page with links to music, sounds, film and photographs, all of which you can use without breaking copyright law. There is also some straightforward information about copyright, public domain and creative commons media licences. There’s hints and tips and links for free software. And, of course, lots of great short films about Bristol by people attending the Bristol Stories workshops.

British Film Festival Links

The Britfilms festivals directory lists over 600 international film festivals, including television and video festivals, giving details on how and when to enter these events. Don't forget us when you make your award acceptance speech!

Tip - choose UK in "Select a Country" if you don't want to be overwhelmed by 22 pages of worldwide film festies!

Encounters Short Film Festival

Encounters Short Film Festival takes place at Watershed every November. It is attended by film-makers from across the world, and screens
international short films and animations. There are also talks, workshops and discussions, led by leading professionals in the world of film.