The making of Pelicans of Guana

Production of Michael Slowe's Film Pelicans of Guana

One of the joys of being an independent film maker (I prefer this description, rather than "amateur") is that we are free of commercial pressures and have full editorial control. Taking advantage of this enables me to use the medium as I wish with no sponsors to satisfy and no writer to query my interpretation of his script.

I have always enjoyed combining music and sound effects with pictures in such a way as to create impressionistic essays on a given subject. The editing process allows limitless choices in controlling the speed of the piece and the mood created. In this type of film I avoid using the spoken word which tends to intrude and also places limitations on the pacing since words use a lot more time than pictures. One only has to look at a good commercial advertisement to see how quickly pictures can make a point.

With Pelicans of Guana I was not trying to tell a story or even impart information. I just wanted to give the audience the opportunity of enjoying pictures of these odd but graceful birds, flying and fishing in the idyllic surroundings of a virtually deserted Caribbean Island, closely linked with carefully selected musical phrases to heighten dramatic effect.

Something visually exciting ...

I got the idea five years ago when I first saw pelicans on another island where I was on holiday. With the blue sea and sky and the birds' unique and dramatic diving action, I thought I could do something visually exciting.

Transporting a very heavy digital video camera with its equally heavy tripod on two flights and a boat trip, along with holiday baggage is not to be undertaken without thought but after seeing the birds again on Guana Island some two years later I knew I had to give it a go.

Seeing a notice displayed at the tiny airport on Beef Island warning that anyone wishing to film in the British Virgin Islands had to have written Government permission did not deter me too much and I tried to combine making the film with having a holiday, by definition, an impossibility!

I had with me a large supply of digital tape (Sony DVCAM is the format I use) so I was not constrained in that respect, as I would have been with 16mm film. I had envisaged various shots when going around the island on previous visits without the camera, but getting them was not as easy as I had thought. Doing still photographs in earlier years should have warned me. Getting a shot at 1/500th of a second of a diving pelican was one thing. Holding the shot in frame for a spectacular three seconds was quite another.

I came to learn the body language of the birds, how and when they decide to plunge into the sea, and to anticipate the dives in order to give myself the best chance of success. Using a long telephoto lens narrows the depth of field considerably and makes it far harder to hold a rapidly moving subject in frame. Distant shots tend to lose the dramatic effect although I include some in order to put the scene in context.

For two weeks I trudged around the rocky, hilly, overgrown island carrying the heavy camera in a rucksack and an equally heavy tripod in my arms. Ironically most of the best material was obtained from an easily accessible wooden platform by a bleak stretch of ocean and from a lovely sandy beach.

There were no real problems photographically apart from the focussing one referred to. I always focus manually so that I control what is in or out of focus but am quite happy for the exposure to be handled automatically, especially when the conditions are as consistently good as they were. Besides I can adjust colours, contrast and brightness when I edit. The only filter that I use is the UV that I keep permanently on all cameras for protection more than anything else.

A massive editing task ...

I did not yet have any structure planned for the film or any idea of a soundtrack other than that it would be musical.

I shot around fifteen hours of tape (the final running time is five and a half minutes) so I knew I had a massive editing task. I always approach an edit like this with the question "What material do I use?" not "What do I discard?"

My problem was that I had no framework within which to show the birds going about their daily lives. I had to try and avoid the mistake of just stringing together a series of nice shots without any meaningful progression. I was hoping that the key would lie with the music. It had to lead us seamlessly from scene to scene and at the same time to provide drama when needed.

I often get asked how I select music for films of this type and what comes first, pictures or music.

I listen to an awful lot of music, bearing in mind that I may need it at some time for a particular sequence in a film not yet envisaged. I also make a point of obtaining a CD then and there of something that catches my attention even though I may not have any use for it at the time. However in this case I did not have anything suitable and it was a question of research. A lecturer on music to whom I was talking mentioned Olivier Messiaen. I got a CD of some of his work and lo and behold much of what I finally used was there! I already had some brass music for a short comedy sequence and I had some material by Copland that I thought might complement the Messiaen.

I find it difficult to explain my editing process because the piece evolves gradually, sometimes from a pre-determined idea, sometimes by trial and error. I feel rather as I imagine a writer feels, namely that if one seeks to analyse the way one works it may never happen again!

I did have to use many of the facilities that editors now enjoy to give the visuals special effects such as slo-mo and staccato movement. I often had to slow the action, to varying degrees, in order to match the music. You can't really alter the speed of music and get away with it as you can with pictures. Some sections, particularly the quickly cut dive sequences, have up to three or four music tracks laid down simultaneously with their volume set individually as required.

Sometimes I may have a section of music that I want to use uncut and then I try to cut the pictures to it. On other occasions I may have a particular visual sequence and then I cut the music to that. It is surprising that you can cut music about and get away with it providing that you adhere to the rhythm. Music, or speech, when laid on a computerised time line, can be very precisely cut, even to the extent of removing a speaker's intake of breath. It is also surprising how individual tracks of music can be laid alongside the primary one at varying levels of volume in order to facilitate an effect.

The final cut, although very popular, does not entirely satisfy. It is not structured very well apart from starting with the dawn and ending with the sunset. The birds' day is haphazard and there was no obvious way to depict it. Some sections are a bit repetitive but I was keen to include as much spectacular diving as the film would take. I did have to omit some wonderful material but I really thought that five and a half minutes was quite long enough (too long?).

I returned to the island with an NTSC (American system) copy of the film for the owners and they loved it. Ironically, on that trip, I found that all the fish were concentrated on the main beach and I would have been able to get most of my material far more easily with the pelicans diving and feeding in a very confined area.

If you are not sure ... it doesn't work!

My rather indisciplined way of working is not always to be recommended but working alone and beholden to no one, I can do as I wish. The really creative task is the editing and one has to look again and again at what has been assembled and if a sequence doesn't work it has to be scrapped, no matter how long it took to cut. If you are not sure if a sequence works or not then it doesn't! Get to know all the material available so well that you can always think of alternatives at every stage.

For the technically minded I shot on a Sony DSR 300P digital camera and edited on the Media 100 digital editing system on a Mac G300 using two 17" screens, a Sony 14" pro monitor and a Sony DSR 20 digital tape deck.

There is nothing that we can't do today with modern equipment and I'm sure that the younger ones amongst us will bring far more imagination to the craft than us older folks. It does need quite a lot of dedication and time but we're starting to see younger people's films and if they are prepared to take the trouble, not only will they enjoy it, but may well end up by earning their living by it as there seems to be a never-ending appetite from cable TV worldwide.

People often ask me where I get the ideas for a given subject. My answer is that all around us there are subjects for a film. It is not the subject but the treatment that sets a film apart. Obviously I was struck by the pictorial possibilities of the pelicans since I always prefer my films to look good above all, but interesting movement is a great help. However, movement need not always be confined to the subject. I am currently working on a piece where the subject is stationery throughout!

- Michael Slowe.

[Webmaster: This film depends so much on movement and music that it has been extremely hard to illustrate despite the loan of a superb print from the film maker. The frames here do not do it justice.]

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