The making of My Passion

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My Passion won a 4-star award at BIAFF 2008

My Passion
- or should that be The Trials Of A Virgin Film Maker

My Passion took 9 months to complete, during which time I had to take many periods of time out.

I had many technical problems - after all, this was my first stab at making a film - but also because I am dogged with mental and physical exhaustion caused by chronic fatigue. I have M.E.¹. So my editing and filming is dictated by the liveliness of my body. So long as I obey the rules of my body I'm ok, but if I overdo things (and how many of us don't burn the midnight oil getting that sequence 'just so'?), I'm unable to go near my film for weeks at a time.

During that 9 months I was also sidetracked by making a 2 minute short for a competition. Being particularly dogged with technical problems at that time, I decided to make the film as a well needed distraction from My Passion. The film was for The Way Forward competition and I called it A Step in the Right Direction? I didn't win anything for The Way Forward but won an award for Creativity at a local competition², which I was really chuffed about as it was my first completed film. Having been quite consumed with making Steps it was weeks before I was able to return to My Passion.

Technically I suppose I produced two 'first' films simultaneously.

How and why I developed the idea

A couple of months prior to the conception of My Passion, I had been looking at the VHS tapes I had taken of my family over the past 20 years. I mentioned to my son that I would like to get them onto DVD but that they needed drastic editing (although I love my children dearly, there is a limit to the number of hours I can now watch them dribble, toddle and pull funny faces). Being a graphic and web designer, my son uses a Mac for his work and he introduced me to iMovie. He got a friend to convert my video footage into miniDV so I could edit it and then showed me how to perform basic editing.

I spent a few hours deleting loads of clips of when the children were tiny and then got bored, so started to edit together some of the more interesting clips when they got older and added some music and titles. And that was it, I was hooked - I never did finish the family editing, I went right off at a tangent wondering how I could make a real film. Knowing that I throw myself into things 110%, I had to be practical and consider my M.E. I had to make sure I didn't take on anything that would put pressure on me or had time constraints, i.e. had to be done for someone's birthday, or Christmas.

I eventually hit upon the idea of making a documentary for my friend's son. His name is Jamie and he is obsessed with trains. Jamie is 17 and has learning difficulties. I knew that he would be so grateful for what we were going to do that he would not pressure me or insist on deadlines. Although he had learning difficulties, I knew I would have no problem interviewing Jamie. He would never be lost for words as he talks non-stop about trains, and would be comfortable with me as he had known me for years. I also knew that if I wanted to arrange a shoot, he would drop everything to be there - even if he shouldn't be, i.e. he should be tidying his room or doing homework! It was the perfect solution. He would have a film about his passion and I would be able to work at a pace that suited me

Immediate problems that arose

We started during the Christmas break and immediately there were practical problems that just hadn't entered my head. First off, we had a couple of trial interviews in my living room but I soon realised that the inbuilt camera microphone was not going to be up to the job, so I had to go out and buy a couple of cheap lapel mics from Maplin3. I then found that the lighting in the room wasn't good enough. The resulting footage was really grainy and it was obvious we could only shoot indoors if there was sufficient sunlight coming into the room, or we would have to shoot outdoors. Once we got outdoors however, I learnt that it still wasn't going to be plain sailing. I had assumed that a bright sunny day would mean a perfect scenario for filming, but in fact it created major shadows on Jamie's face or completely bleached out his features making him look like he had been embalmed.

Eventually we set off outdoors on our first proper shoot, to film Jamie walking to his favourite spotting place. Next problem - how do you film someone walking? Do you have them walking towards the camera or away? I did both. And then legs wide, I tried a pan from the left to the right with him walking past. Very elegant. I also tried to hold the camera steady and slowly followed him forwards and backwards, but I was effectively walking blind as I had my eyes glued to the viewfinder. There were problems all round. Plus the lapel mic that had proved to be so wonderful indoors was now causing problems because as Jamie was walking, the wire kept coming to an abrupt end and the mic would suddenly be yanked off his sweater. Once we got home I uploaded the tape immediately, and do you know what? - 90% of the footage was useless.

As I knew no other way of doing it and I didn't have anyone to ask, I had no choice but to cut very cleverly and use what I had. Judges subsequently commented on some jump cuts, but hey, I didn't even know what a jump cut was, let alone try to prevent one. I had yet to learn of the value of cutaways, and not deleting ANYTHING remotely useful. I spent hours trying to make a decent sequence from really crap clips - if I had kept all the original until I was positive I wouldn't need it again, it would have been a doddle. The next problem was when I finally had Jamie on his favourite bridge. As he was talking, a family with two young children joined us. I told him to carry on, but on viewing the footage later, they were really intrusive and the kids kept screaming - I hadn't noticed either of these problems at the time, so intent was I on filming what Jamie was saying. But luckily, working on instinct rather than on knowledge, I had taken some 'cutaways' of trees and random trains. So later on when I had learnt how to extract audio and move it about, I was able to cut to the trees when the kids came into view, and I just muted the screaming.

I also learnt that some problems are totally out of our control. One day when we were filming and Jamie was on a roll, I could hear a train approaching although it was out of my viewfinder. It caused Jamie to be distracted but he carried on speaking. When he could stand it no longer he broke off to look and point at the train and tell me what make and type it was. I had to make a split second decision: do I keep rolling do I pan with the train as it goes underneath us or do I stay with Jamie but move slightly so that I could see the approaching train and stay on his face while it passed? In that nano second I chose the last and I'm so glad I did, because I particularly love that clip. It is so natural. Once the train had passed, not needing any prompting from me, he just carried on talking from where he left off. Classic!

I needed access to trains - getting permission was a pain

I encountered a few problems with permission to film, but nothing too major. Because a lot of filming was going to take place at railway stations, I had to ask my local station and the vintage steam railway line nearby, if I could film there. The Watercress Line⁴ steam railway people were extremely helpful but the main line station proved difficult. I visited many times with camera and Jamie in tow but was refused entry to the platform. Fortunately my subject wasn't bothered by these aborted attempts as he got a chance to see the trains from the ticket office anyway! We filmed some outside shots and continued to visit, then one day the jobsworths weren't around and a very helpful guard let us have a platform ticket.

Planning, or rather lack of it!

Having eventually shot masses of footage, I then realised I had no idea what I was going to do with it. I was going to have to work out some sort of watchable order from the clips I had taken, so that I ended up with a story that naturally flowed. I had to decide basic things like how the film was going to start, and more importantly, how it was going to end. Oh, to have known about storyboarding before I started!

I interviewed Jamie many times by just chatting and asking him questions, and as the flow of the film started to formulate in my head, I interviewed him again and again so that I could lead him to talk about things that would link the clips that I was working on. I had learnt that I couldn't tell Jamie what to say as he would repeat it parrot fashion and it sounded awful. Many of the positive comments the film has received, have been about Jamie being so natural in front of the camera. That is why - he never acted, he just talked.

By now I had been filming for a few months and I was avidly watching and taping programmes on TV for ideas and techniques. I had also joined a video club (Surrey Border Film and Video Makers⁴) which, in passing, I have to say was the best decision I ever made. Thank you so much Surrey Border, for all the help, support, fun and friendship you have given me since joining.

I think the film improved as I went on because I was now putting into practice things that I was gradually learning, but the viewer wouldn't see it improve chronologically because of the order in which it was edited. My favourite editing sequence (as a result of now studying TV and films), was Jamie walking through the fields and through a gate leading to the train track. I filmed him walking through the field towards the camera, then a shot of him walking towards the gate and opening it, another shot of his back disappearing up the path, then finally I shot from the railway line to see him appearing from the path to stand on the platform at the side of the track. I still love those shots - I think they look almost professional.

I think overall, figuring out the order of the film was the hardest part. Obviously, because of my lack of experience, I didn't realise how important it is to plan a project BEFORE you start. I am working on another film at the moment, and I've spent hours storyboarding and planning everything. As a result, it is already making it much easier to shoot and edit than My Passion. In some of the judges' comments I've had criticism that My Passion loses its way in the middle, is too long and shouldn't include certain clips. All these points are valid, but this film was only ever made for Jamie, his family and for me. It was never meant for competitions. Only pressure from friends in Surrey Border prompted me to enter it. I have also received criticism for including things about his family, but the sequence where he says how good his family have been to him and how they've supported his obsession, were put in for his parents and brother - it was Jamie's way of saying thank you to them. Also, their inclusion was crucial in the build up of how I eventually decided I wanted the film to end. The final family outing sequence is because I wanted to end on a particularly poignant note.

Judges comments Whilst My Passion has been very well received, I feel some of the judges' comments have been a bit harsh and largely irrelevant. If they had known it was my first film, would they have been more tolerant? Would their comments have been more constructive if they had known that it was only AFTER I had made the film that I heard about pace/timing/rule of thirds/ composition/crossing the line etc. and that not using a tripod was a complete no-no. The film actually adhered to a lot of these rules anyway, but that was purely from instinct. Which brings me to the thing that is a real bugbear of mine. I have only been making films for fifteen months. Apart from editing some family videos which got me into filming, My Passion was my first film. Yet, on the competition forms there is no provision for novices to inform the judges of that fact. Was my film being judged against documentaries made my film makers of 5, 10, 20 years experience? I expect so. Did I think for one minute that my film could be better than something they could produce? Of course not. But I would like a judge to see the work of all virgin film makers for what they are - a first crack at film making, and not for their filming, editing, lighting or technical expertise. A first film is always going to be special to the virgin film maker. We've spend hours on it and we are really chuffed with it whatever anyone else thinks, but it would be good to be judged with that in mind. Similarly, what about when a film maker branches out into a different genre? I am thinking of making an animation film. If I complete this ambition and enter an animation film into competitions, do I really think I can compete with Norman and Christopher Lilley's award winning teddy bear film, The Messenger? Of course not. But if I do ever make one, I would like my virgin attempt at animation to be judged for what it is - a first attempt. It would be great to find extra questions on application forms such as: "Is this your first film?", or "Is this your first film in this genre?"

Summing up, I was very pleased with My Passion. The end result turned out just how I wanted it. I spent many hours tweaking the final editing, and no-one was going to see it until I was happy with it. Of course there are a few things that in hindsight I would change or omit, but I will not making any more changes to it now, and the film achieved what it set out to do. It made a young man and his family extremely happy, and I felt a great sense of pride and satisfaction in making my FIRST FILM!

- Val Hitchman

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1	M.E. = Myalgic Encephalomyelitis - also sometimes called Chronic Fatigue Syndrome - is a severe illness which strikes people in different ways. For some it is like a permanent form of influenza. For others it is as though their muscles have a limited energy supply. When this runs out, the muscles stop functioning and need a lot of time to recharge.
2	Surrey Border Film & Videomakers (www.surreyborder.org.uk) is based in Farnham. On its website you can see Val Hitchman receiving that creative award she mentions from one Jan Watterson in December 2007.
3	Maplin is a chain of electronics shops in Britain. Details on www.maplin.co.uk
4	The Watercress Line (www.watercressline.co.uk) is a ten-mile preserved railway in mid-Hampshire, between Arlesford and Alton, where it connects with the main line. It takes its name from trains which used to deliver locally produced watercress to London.

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