Maniac Films Blog Archive 2007

After filming the new Zombie feature, Zombies of the Night Stuart Brennan is now performing post production at our office with a mix of wet and dry hire on one of our FCP edit suites. We've been helping with some colour grading for the main feature and the trailers. If your in Croyde and occasionally hear manic screaming coming from our office window - then don't be alarmed!! Watch the trailers on YouTube: Zombies Trailer 1 Zombies Trailer 2 or visit the official website for the film: Zombies of the Night

Read more about our Post Production Services.

Congratulations to Laura Floyd from London, winning ticket number 76520 in this years Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) raffle. Laura has won the 2nd prize to be a 'surf celebrity' for the weekend in Croyde, staying at Baggy Lodge and having surfing lessons from Point Breaks. We will be filming Laura and a couple of her mates next spring/summer, with some support from Kind Design and Extremeboardshots of Woolacombe. Should be a fun weekend!

For more information about SAS and their environmental campaigns then checkout the sas website. See all the SAS raffle prize winners here

We've been building and testing a new mailing list management system for local surfing company Surfing Croyde Bay, in time for the Christmas message mail out. Dave Blackburn has been doing all the artwork and layouts and left us with the techy side, to consolidate several text files, databases, address books, excel sheets and other scraps of paper (!) into a new mailing system for SCB. Signup to their newsletter here

Read more about our Website Development Services.

We've been doing a new batch of DVDs for Appledore Arts - for their new digital media project. Supported by Seize the moment Ltd, The Local network fund, Appledore Visual Arts festival and Artaura productions. The film was entirely filmed and edited by young people - cool!

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

Thanks to all the local school kids for sending in artwork for the Barnstaple Museum Think Tank DVD cover. We settled on a couple of fantastic drawings and made them into the main DVD cover artwork for the new Think tank interactive DVD.

The final WRC rally trial for Visualise was held in very damp and windy conditions at Walters Arena in Wales - typical British Rally weather! It was a successful trial - with live video being pulled from the eco-diesel Art car as it went round the stage using the Provision H264-variant video encoder over wifi plus live GPS tracking from the service park using Google Earth mapping for spectators to watch in the undercover areas.
Thanks to the SPG Rally Team for letting us put our equipment in their car!

We also demonstrated live video feeds from the track side and in-car cameras to spectators PDAs and mobile phones over wifi and fed several plasma screens in the spectator area with multi-feed split-screen video. We had a radio link across the 'pond' to a big screen displaying live feeds from track side cameras and the in-car footage and played out the visualise promo quite a bit too. Special thanks to IOV members Rod Small and Ben Simmons for coming down and helping out filming in the torrential rain. We will be using some of their footage for a Visualise event at the Watershed in Bristol next March - emulating the live Rally data and video feeds to show attendees of the event how the system operates.

Read more about our Crew Hire Services.

Just in time for the Visualise WRC rally trial - the promo is complete. We completed the HD promo in DVCProHD 720p to match in with HD footage we had shot at the WRC PR day, footage from the Subaru teams testing day, footage from 2005 and 2006 wales rally events, footage from the Visualise Belmont trial plus new interviews and cutaways filmed at the University of Bristol (UoB). "we had to chop a few of the speakers in the end, to maintain the flow" said Mark Brindle "..but I think it gets the project message across"

This online promo is a slight variation on the original version which used mapping data from Google maps - on-line had to redo one section and re-key the cars with new mapping data from getmapping.com (for copyright issues) rather then using the Google maps KLM scripting developed for the rally within the UoB.

"I much prefer the original version" Said Mark, "probably because it was less work! just screen record the output of Google maps and clean it up a bit..we had real rally GPS data scripted to show cars in real time - its very cool!..the current promo had to be done by key framing car icons and GPS positioning manually...but it gives the same impression of the live system"

Read more about our Post Production Services.

Burn hand been renting out a full HD 35mm lens adapter kit with one of our Panasonic HVx200s for a new low-budget Zombie feature 'Zombies of the Night'. The rental included our custom hand-held rig with extra Sony viewfinder and Panasonic HD monitor plus a range of 35mm Nikon primes, Redrock follow focus, Vocas matt box and P2 cards, plus a Sachtler 30 video head and tripod. Stuart Brennan, the films producer, will be making the film in North Devon - around Bideford, Instow and Broom Hill.

Read more of our Camera equipment rental news and updates.

Following Moore's law were had to upgrade our edit suite yet again from dual-core G5s to 8Core Macpro hardware, adding a few extra Terra bytes of RAID storage in more Sonnet Tempo external storage devices, plus a matrox MXO DVI box for colour grading using an Apple 23" LCD Cinema display at the same time. "The G5s were not powerful enough to run the new 'Color' application and were staining a bit with rendering DVCProHD 1080 streams, so we decided it was time to move up" said Mark Brindle at maniac Films. "Leopard is usable - not 100% stable but defiantly usable..however its a pity not all the apps can yet make use of the extra processing speed..were running a few BOINC applications to use up the spare capacity in the interim.."

Contact us about wet or dry hire of our FCP Studio edit suites for HD colour grading or general editing - we also rent out a macbookpro dual-core 17" laptop edit system for P2 captures and assembly edits.

Read more about our Post Production Services.

We are planning a series of Film Nights in the local village hall for winter 07/08 - screening local surf films, documentaries and interesting films from outside the region. If you have a film you think we might want to screen then please get in touch to discuss. Chris Burrows who runs the local Sk8 and youth club is organising the bar and the popcorn and were supplying the films.

More information coming soon! Check out the Croyde Hall website for dates of the next Film Night.

We have added to our rental kit with a 150mm bowl Ronford-baker baby tripod and spreader (medium weight) plus a fully-serviced Sachtler Video 30 II head with 3 stages of counter weight plus dual pan-handles, and a tall Sachtler aluminium 150mm bowel tripod and spreader. Ideal complement for our Redrock M2 35mm lens adapter rigs which need extra counter-weight and support when fully rigged with an HD monitor on-board.

Read more of our Camera equipment rental news and updates.

The Barnstaple Museum think Tank Interactive DVD has been tested at quite a few schools in Devon and is now finalised and ready for roll-out to over 1000 students. Julian Vayne from the Museum of Barnstaple and North Devon will be visiting schools throughout the region from now until the end of March 2008, taking along the 'Think Tank', full of interesting objects from the Museum.

Watch a trailer for the Sci-fi Think tank alien video now YouTube.

Video © 2007 Maniac films ltd

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

We have been up to Wales again - Walters arena, to do more testing of video transmission from cars at the special stage of the forthcoming Wales WRC rally - we met up with Steve and Tony Graham from team SPG with this years WRC 'Art' car winning livery see www.walesrallygb.com for full story.

We managed to test some successful wireless video transmissions from the Eco-diesel rally car as part of the VISUALISE project. We will be back to Wales for the WRC Rally event at the end of November and will be doing further demonstrations of wireless video transmissions to spectators and to the big screen at Walters Arena. More information about the Visualise project can be found in the latest Visualise press demo leaflet from 3C research

Read more about our Crew Hire Services.

We've been doing a bit of green-screen filming for the latest Creation fest festival promo with Phil Pechonis of Calvary Chapel Woolacombe. The Free Music event takes place in Woolacombe in August and draws spectators from all over the UK. The main promotional film is being produced by Cutting Edge Productions and we have provided some pre-cut green-screen footage of Phil to overlay onto the main music/event backgrounds.

Read more about our Crew Hire Services.

We have been filming some more interviews for the latest Visualise promotional film, featuring project partners from Provision Communications, 3C Research and staff from the University of Bristol. Promo coming soon! More information about the Visualise project can be found in the latest Visualise press demo leaflet from 3C research

Read more about our Video Production Services.

We've been doing some DV tape transfers for local design company North Devon Design - producing viewable DVD rushes with time code and DV data DVDs for one of their recent video projects.see www.north-devon-design.co.uk for more information.

Read more about our Post Production Services.

We've had back-to-back work placements from Pilton Community College and this week its Tom Stribley getting his hands on a variety of software including Final Cut Pro, Motion and Daz 3D studio. Tom is a keen Animator and does stop-motion work in his spare time as well as scripting short action films based around popular shoot-em-up games. Tom spent the week learning some photography skills and DVD authoring using DVD Studio Pro - converting a VHS film from some of his work at Animation Exeter into a DVD with looping menus.

It's that time of year when the nights start to draw in and the darkness takes over more of the day..its Halloween Horror challenge time again! This year we have Bethany Davison from Pilton Community College on a work placement and thought it would be good to get her involved in front and behind the camera. SWATS trainee Dan Andrews brought in his Uni mate Paul Jackson to help script and film a new short horror film based on a theme of 'the final five'. More details of the competition and rules can be found on the Halloween Challenge website (www.halloweenchallenge.com)

Thanks to Mike Cotton at Baggy Lodge in Croyde for letting them use his garden, overlooking the surf at Croyde Bay and to the local actors who came in and helped complete the film. Paul and Dan are editing the film - so keep an eye out for the finished film..

We've added another Redrock M2 cinema lens adapter to our rental kit, plus a few more Nikon prime lenses. We have rented out a few kits this month to Edinburgh and London for a music video shoot (details and links soon) and a short film. We have Nikon prime lenses to rent including 14mm, 20mm, 24mm, 28mm, 35mm, 50mm, 85mm, 105mm, 135mm, 180mm and 80-200mm. The Redrock M2 helps create 'the film look' by projecting a 35mm size image and when coupled with cinema lenses or Nikon primes, can be used with SD or HD video cameras to give a very shallow depth of field. We also have some great HD monitoring solutions for rental, plus Panasonic HVX200s and P2 cards, Firestore and mobile FCP edit packages. Contact us for kit list and rates.

Read more about our Camera and Grip Equipment Hire.

We have been updating the ChilliTV website with more QT and WMV videos for the Billabong Pro Mundaka and Jbay South Africa plus the Boost Mobile Pro live from Trestles beach California. Catch all the action live on Chilli TV via vodaphone (www.chilli.tv)

Read more about our Website Development Services.

We have been taking more product photography for Genesis surf shop Ilfracombe and have the new Roxy womens surf wear collection online. New ladies Roxy hoodys and fleeces plus a range of winter beanies and matching Roxy scarves and gloves. More Quiksilver and Animal mens surf wear coming soon to Genesis surf shop (www.genesissurfshop.com)

Read more about our Photography Services.

Trev has finally opened up the long-awaited Eyeball HQ Internet cafe and general meeting place with lots of cakes and cups of tea - if your over in Woolacombe then drop in and see Trevor - over the road from Mariscos. We've been helping Trev by setting up the Internet cafe for him using some new Dell Vostro laptops - we had a few early teething problems with Vista, but its now all working fine back on XP! So if theres no surf you can surf the web instead..and sample some great chocolate cake and hot pies!

Read more about our Crew Hire Services.

More DVD printing and duplication for Artaura productions. This time its a double bill of History Hunters and Study Support DVDs produced earlier in the year, plus a new Tiverton school play 'Gullivers travels in Space' produced by Artaura productions, Bideford.

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

Independant feature film Peacefire (Mayfly Entertainment) will be shot in Lurgan near Belfast and Maniac Films are supplying the HD camera, 35mm Nikon prime lenses and HD field monitoring kit as part of a six week rental for producer Chris Martin. Award winning writer and director Macdara Vallely is part of the talented crew on the first Northern Ireland feature to be shot using the Redrock M2 35mm lens adapter and the Panasonic HVX200. We went over Lurgan to help train the crew using the camera and Redrock setup and were too busy to sample any of the local Guinness...honest.

Based on true events, Peacefire takes place against the Northern Ireland peace process. It is a horrifically funny account of one teenager's personal experience of crime and punishment on his local housing estate and his struggle to survive with his life - if not his legs - intact.

Peacefire website coming soon www.peacefirethemovie.com. See recent Press information on 4RFV website.

Read more of our Camera equipment rental news and updates.

Weve added the new Panasonic BT-LH80W 7.9inch HD monitor to our HD rental kit. The Widescreen multi-format HD electronic viewfinder & production monitor with pixel-to-pixel mapping at 1080 and 720 plus built-in waveform monitor and focus assist features is a solid performer and comes with a custom-fit portabrace case and a set of IDX V-mount batteries and charger in a pelican hard case.

Ideal for getting critical focus in HD on the HVX200 via analog component HD, it can also be fitted with an HD/SDI interface and an optional cable link to be used as an EVF replacement with Panasonic cameras like the HPX500. Available for rental from maniac films.

Read more about our Camera and Grip Equipment Hire.

World premier for DRIVEN. The new big wave surf documentary by MrB productions featuring Croyde local boy Andrew 'Cotty' Cotton and 'Al' Alastair Mennie surfing some epic waves in Ireland. We had a fantastic night watching the film at the cinema in Ilfracombe with digital projection of the DVD.

DRIVEN is available direct from MrB Productions or from extreme video who are distributing the film. We have a trailer for Half-Life on the DVD.

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

We will be running a few more free Ecommerce seminars for the North Devon Enterprise Agency (www.ndea.org.uk) in Bideford. Anyone can attend the free workshops but you must register first with NDEA and have been running in business for at least one year. Contact the NDEA - they are located: Studio J, Caddsdown Business Support Centre, Caddsdown Industrial Park, Clovelly Road, BIDEFORD, Devon EX39 3DX or by telephone: 01237 426416.

Read more about our Website Development Services.

Dan Andrews joins us as part of the South West Screen Attachment Training Scheme (SWATS). Dan will be with us for a while, as a part-funded trainee and hopefully picking up a lot of production and post production skills along the way.

Saunton Beach Eyeball webcam is the final webcam upgrade for Eyeball surfcheck, using the latest Axis pan Tilt Zoom web cameras to allow Trevor Lumley from Eyeball to track the surf as the tide changes. There were a few delays while Trevor was teaching Paul how to wire up the mains plug, but its finally in and working and the restaurant manager is happy again.

We've been back to the WRC rally stage at Walter Arena in Wales to meet up with some Subaru and Hyundi WRC teams to test our wireless car camera video transmission for part of 3CResearch/Bristol University/BT/Provision/Turner/ISC/U4EA/Manaic Films consortium Visualise project. With help from some of the teams training at the Walters Arena stage, we rigged up in-car video cameras and tested wireless transmission and local video recording to plan the main Visualise trail to be held at the live Wales WRC event in December.

We were helping out with the testing and filming shots for a new video to be used to promote Visualise and explain what its about and what its trying to achieve. The video will be played out to spectators at the Wales WRC event and on the website. More information about Visualise can be found on the 3CR website.

Read more about our Crew Hire Services.

Look out! There's an Alien on the roof! We've been on the roof of the Museum of Barnstaple filming a gag sequence for the intro of the Think Tank interactive DVD. "We are trying to make the alien funny so that we don't scare any of the kids" said Mark Brindle from Maniac Films "The DVD is designed for a wide audience range - basically all school ages and so we've had to incorporate enough comedy to try to make the alien clumsy, silly and a bit of a comedy character"

We've been filming in the museum attic 'the museum store' with only a few lights to set the tone of the film and we've been doing some HD green screen to mix in with the 2D and 3D animation sequences. More alien antics from Galactonaut 2012 coming soon!

Read more about our Video Production Services.

Mendella are a five piece band from North Devon managed by Braunton based Crazy Fish management. We caught them live at the Aggie in Braunton playing to a packed audience of flip-flop crazy guys (it was cheaper to get in if you wore flipflops..) with main act Junction27. It was a bit of a last minute request for filming and so the lighting wasn't ideal but it was a good exercise for the band and they learnt a lot from reviewing the footage. We also got to test out the Panasonic HPX500 in a live environment and recorded a good desk mix via 2 its 4 XLR ports.

Checkout Mendella on Myspace or Bebo or via the Crazyfish site www.crazyfish.biz for more information and sample Mp3 tracks to listen to.

Read more about our Crew Hire Services.

We have been given a shiny new Panasonic HPX500 to use (for a short time!) in return for a full write up on its features and functionality. The HPX500 is a P2 card based 2/3inch shoulder mount broadcast-style camera with bayonet mount lens and no tape drive. We gave it a big thumbs up with great low light handling, superb format with DVCPROHD multiformat 1080/720 plus all the PAL and NTSC variants. Taking more P2 cards then the HVX200, it certainly goes a long way towards making the P2 media cards a viable shooting option for long-form like live gigs and events. Read our full review of the Panasonic HPX500 in the IOV Focus magazine - article reproduced here by permission.

Checkout the Panasonic micro site for the HPX500 at www.hpx500.eu

We've been commissioned to film and produce an interactive DVD for Barnstaple Museum as part of its Think Tank project. The Think Tank was created at the Museum of Barnstaple and North Devon, in partnership with the Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter. The idea is to get kids more involved in the Museum and to take artifacts out to schools and engage the children in learning about the items, where they came from and who might have used them in the past.

The script is being written by Jon Croose from Means of Production with a lot of input and game development by education consultant Iona Dowling. "We decided on a Sci-fi theme for the DVD" said Mark Brindle from Maniac Films. "I'm a bit of a Sci-fi fan and it seemed a good way to engage the children in 'learning games' - being led in the class by the 'supercomputer' on the DVD"

Julian Vayne from Barnstaple Museum will star as the Alien 'Galactonaut 2012' (although you won't see his face!) and Alison Mills from the Museum will be the voice of the supercomputer."Its been loads of fun building the alien Galactonaut costume" said Mark "although people are asking where i got the black spandex body suit from!" More updates coming soon.

Think Tank website now online www.museumthinktank.org.uk

Read more about our Video Production Services.

Our Scottish surf documentary Half-Life has started to take on a life of its own - we've managed the start of a rough cut to the edit and put together a trailer in time to make it onto the new MrBproductions surf DVD Driven.

We've also instigated some re-edits of the not-very-scary Sandside Experiment short we produced in 2006 for the Halloween horror 14 day challenge."I think with more time and more thought, Sandside Experiment could be turned into something a lot better.." said Mark Brindle "..so we've asked a few friendly editors via shootingpeople.org to make thier own versions of it for the Half-Life DVD". Watch this space for more information on Half-Life and Sandside Experiment.

We have some great music for Half-Life including music from The Hives, John Browns Body, Pete Bruntnell, The Gluespots, Mintie, Doug Powell and many more..

Read more about our Post Production Services.

We've started building a new ecommerce website for Norman Parker - to showcase the Devon Surrealists artwork. The new site will replace the old normanparker.com site which did not have any payment facilities and wasn't very easy to maintain or update with new artwork. Ant Parker who runs ex33 magazine has engaged Maniac Films to rebuild the site along with his brothers photography site chrisparkerphotography.co.uk plus build a new parent site for 'Ps-in-a-pod'.

"The site will be built using Oscommerce an open-source ecommerce system which allows easy integration with a variety of payment gateways and has some great search engine optimisation features" said Mark Brindle from Maniac Films. "Plus its easy to administer, so Ant can upload new artwork, add cards and prints and look after all of the day to day running of the new website." Surrealist Art - own the originals, prints or cards - Coming soon www.normanparker.com

Read more about our Website Development Services.

Enter the SAS Annual Raffle for just £1 and you could win a fantastic 'GREEN' prize... and SAS can continue the campaign for clean and safe recreational water for everyone. We've teamed up with Point Breaks Watersports, extremeboardshots, Kind Design and Baggy Lodge in Croyde to offer one of the top raffle prizes in this years SAS Green raffle.

Star in your own surf film at Croyde beach, with water based and land based HD filming, action photos and prints plus surf tuition for any level to advanced competition level - plus a couple of nights B&B stay at Baggy lodge in Croyde - this could all be yours for just £1 !! amazing value! But you've got to be in it to win it... top prize this year is £1000 cash. Get over to the SAS website and buy some raffle tickets now!

We've started renting out some of our production equipment - this time to Rob at North Devon Design for a Pro tennis corporate video shoot.. DVCAM camera, tripod and basic sound package.

Contact us for rental rates and rental equipment list including Redrock M2 35mm lens adapter, a wide range of Nikon prime lenses, Panasonic HVX200 with firestore, P2 cards, titanium crane, track dolly, Mobile Final Cut Pro edit station with raid all up for short and longer term rental ... and much more..

Read more about our Camera and Grip Equipment Hire.

A weekend of adrenaline action at the Fat Face 2007 Night Air series World freestyle mountain boarding championships, held at the South West Mountain boarding centre in Bideford. We were there all during the muddy weekend filming the ATBA UK freestyle competitions and bordercross plus the extreme action of the Night Air jumps. If you know your double back flips from your rodeo to switch rodeo then you will know how big these guys were jumping. An international group of the worlds best freestyle mountain boarders turned on the style - men and women boarders from Russia, France, USA, UK showed us some big air tricks. The weather didn't manage to dampen the spirits of the crowd even when the main event moved from the Saturday night to Sunday night.

We filmed in a mix of HD 1080i and 720p25 plus some DV filming of the ATBA freestyle competition. Watch out for frame-grab stills and a few digital photos that will be put in the image gallery soon and more on the SWMC website (www.swmbc.co.uk).

A short promo Video will be posted online soon featuring the winning runs from the night jumping action plus plenty of crashes! Some of the ATBA freestyle and bordercross footage will be used on the ATBJunikies competition DVD.

Watch the Fat Face Night Air mountain boarding action video on YouTube now

Read more about our Video Production Services.

View a very short clip from the new Steve Tucker All Star Jazz band Live DVD. Filmed Live at Croyde Bay in June by South West Audio at Goldcoast Oceanfest 2007, the Live DVD features 7 classic Jazz tracks including 'We got Rhythm', 'S'Wonderful' and 'Slow Boat to China'. We were brought in to clean up the audio and video a little and cut in some local water and landscapes footage into the mix. We are also providing DVD duplication and print services for Steve. MCPS Licensed under new low volume DVD manufacturing license.

Steve Tuckers All Star Jazz band are gigging all over the place this summer so you've plenty of opportunity to see them Live - but if not then you can buy a copy of the DVD from their website (www.thestevetuckerallstarjazzband.co.uk) .

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

We've put together a basic website for Joel Blackman Boards and his alter-ego 'The Lord of the Dings' (surfboard ding repairs). Joel is currently experimenting with eco-friendly surfboards boards made from Bio-foam and eco-friendly resins and is offering a brand new custom designed 'green' surfboard as a prize in this years Surfers Against Sewage raffle (www.sas.org.uk)

Read more about our Website Development Services.

We have been helping Trevor at Eyeball Surfcheck yet again with a new Pan-Tilt-Zoom web camera for Putsborough. "The old camera image didn't show the beach at its best" said Trevor from Eyeball. "When it was sunny it just didn't look sunny and appealing...the new camera is much better".

"After a few teething troubles with the broadband at Puts its now all working properly" said Mark Brindle from maniac films. "luckily there wasn't any surf at the time!". Check out the new Putsborough cam at Eyeball Surfcheck. Watch out for the new webcam for Saunton sands coming soon..

We have moved the filming dates for the advanced Instructional keyboards DVD Alien Keyboards with Mistheria in Italy to very early November. "Mistheria was getting very busy with summer gigs and preparing his new album Solo Piano" said Mark Brindle from maniac films. "We also had a few project dates clashes so the later date is better for us too..I'm looking forward to finalising the preparations".

Mistheria's latest album is finished and available for sale online now. Solo Piano is an excellent album (we have a free copy! but it really is good) - some of the music on this album will feature in the Alien Keyboards DVD. Listen to some mp3 samples online or buy a copy online now from Mistheria - Keyboard Virtuoso (www.mistheria.com) .

We have been helping out shootingpeople film maker Matt Jones to transfer a PAL DVD into an NTSC version for The Novocaines pop promo to enter into a US festival. We use a high quality transcoding method to go from PAL at 25fps to NTSC at 30fps without losing audio sync. We like the music track Heroes and Heroines so hope it goes down well in the US. Checkout the Novocaines at Clean Living Records (www.cleanlivingrecords.com)

Read more about our Post Production Services.

We have been putting the finishing touches to a new surf guide film by devilcountry films (www.devilcountryfilms.com). The Surf Guide to Brighton DVD is an in depth look at the local talent and businesses in the surprisingly buoyant surf industry in Brighton. Featuring information and interviews with locals and lots of local DJS and music talent, its a good mix of surf culture and information.

We helped provide Artwork design for the DVD disc and cover courtesy of the very talented Jamie at Azure Studio and disc and cover printing and duplication for the DVD. The DVD is being distributed by Extreme Horizon (www.extremehorizon.com) and a trailer for the film can be seen on Youtube.

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

We have been helping Trevor at Eyeball Surfcheck again with a new Pan-Tilt-Zoom web camera for Woolacombe Bay to replace the old fixed-zoom webcam. Curtis, our placement student from Ilfracombe college came along to help out too.

"..as the tide changes I can control the webcam position remotely..and when events like the Sandcastle building competition are on I can focus the webcam on the beach" said Trevor Lumley from Eyeball Surfcheck. Watch out for new webcams for Putsborough and Saunton sands coming soon..

We have been teaching our latest placement student Curtis from Ilfracombe college, a little stills photography in between editing sessions. "photography is the basis for any video filming - you've really got to learn about composition, depth of field, aperture and lens lengths" said Mark Brindle. "It also meant I could get Curtis to do some product photography for us too!"

A short version of video which Curtis edited together will be tweaked a little, rendered and put online soon - some compositing and effects using some of our unused green screen skateboard footage.

View the promo video we created for Paul Diamond of Battlefield Sports Bideford, UK. This was supplied pre-filmed on location at the Hilton Hotel, Cobham. We edited a short promotional film and put together a promotional DVD and web clips to help promote the realistic Battlefield Laser game. The film features many members of the Battlefield Live team from Australia and USA and franchise holders from Ireland, Turkey and France. Get in on the action with the Ultimate Team Building Activity Battlefield Live (now Ecombat www.ecombat.com). "Thanks so much for the Aussie version. It is great! You have done an awesome job!"Nicole, Battlefield Live, Australia.

Read more about our Post Production Services.

We have been interviewing Ralph Freeman about his recovery from the traumatic broken neck he suffered whilst surfing low tide Croyde last year. A freak accident which left Ralph initially completely paralysed. Ralph spoke about how his big wave training helped him cope during the critical moments when he also nearly drowned.

"As Ralph got closer to recovery, he was prepared to talk about the ordeal" said Mark Brindle from maniac films. "we didn't want to intrude really but Ralph thought it would help him get over the experience and get him back into the water" The interview is one of the last parts to be filmed for the Universe Inspectors Rockumentary DVD. Coming one day !

Read more about our Video Production Services.

We have been mastering a new album for Douglas E Powell - The Still and West contains 11 tracks featuring Doug and his acoustic talents plus a bonus track featuring Doug and Nicky Green. We have also been making MP3 samples to play on his website Douglas E Powell (www.douglasepowell.co.uk). Checkout the great music and now you can buy a copy of the album online. More work will be done to his website soon.

CD cover and CD disc artwork courtesy of Tabatha at Tiger Plum (www.tigerplum.com) - in keeping with the design theme she has put together for Dougs new website. "The CD looks fantastic" said Doug "a great package to compliment the great sound. Thanks guys!"

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

A little bit different then our usual website work at first glance but when we were approached to build a new ecommerce website for Yenevar Elite Lingerie in Ilfracombe, we couldn't resist! "Its all very tasteful Lingerie" said Mark Brindle from maniac films "all top quality stuff from the likes of Allure, Hustler and Dream Girl - no tat!"

"Kelly had been let down by her previous web designers and needed a new fully functional site made quickly, and one that allowed her to easily maintain the content" said Mark. "We tweaked our feature-packed Oscommerce site template and had the new site up and running in a few days. It was more a case of disabling features she didn't want yet and customising the design to fit the style of products on sale."

The site is fully search engine friendly and has been integrated with Google Products search. The site also provides discount codes to link up with Yenevar's Ebay and other printed promotions.

Read more about our Website Development Services.

View the short video for the South West Mountain boarding centre Mountainboarding Girlie camp at SWMBC (www.swmbc.co.uk). We will be back to the centre to film the Fat Face Night Air big jumps and the ATBA bordercross and freestyle contest in July. More stills and video coming online soon.

Read more about our Video Production Services.

ND Surf History was voted 'Best Film' at the recent Appledore Visual Arts festival in North Devon - the film screened each day and was voted for by the audience, against six other short listed films. Visit the Appledore Visual Arts festival for more information about the annual arts festival.

A fantastic glass trophy made by Bideford glass and ceramics artist Simon Moore was presented to Maniac Films by Richard Crossman from Appledore Arts. The new trophy and the Media Innovations Award are now both on display at Barnstaple Museum where the DVD is being played with information about the original Surfs Up! exhibition.

Read more about our Video Production Services.

We have been printing and duplicating a new short film by Matt Biggs at Artaura Productions - this ones for Herefordshire Council - History Hunters.

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

This month we have Laura Martin joining us from Bournmouth Media School for 4 or 5 weeks placement. Laura is studying for a television production degree and specialising in audio, so were going to try to get her working on as many sound-related projects as possible as well as a variety of other pre and post production work.

We've been making QuickTime and Windows Media conversions for Chilli tv - Redbull X-Fighters live highlights, plus coverage of the Billabong Teahupoo and the new French language 'Pire Show' - surf and sk8 show. Checkout the clips on the Chilli tv website or via Vodaphone on your mobile phone.

Read more about our Post Production Services.

We have been at the South West Mountain Boarding centre in Abbotsham near Bideford for the weekend, filming a short promo film for the Girlie Camp held over the weekend 1-3rd June 2007. More information is available from the SWMBC Mountainboarding Girlie Camp Video now on Youtube watch it here.

Read more about our Video Production Services.

The second surf film from Braunton surfer (and Dentist) Chris Preston - State of Play is now available to buy online. A new British longboarding surf movie by Chris Preston and Ross Johns. The new movie is an examination of the new crop of British longboarders. Sliders include Ben Skinner, Sam Bleakley, Elliot Dudley, Dan Harris, Ben Haworth, Ashley Braunton and James Parry. Filmed in England, Morocco and California.

Maniac Films were involved with advice to Chris on post production, sorting out the Music License. plus encoding the main film for best quality DVD playback and the DVD print and duplication work. State of Play is no longer available to buy online from us or at other surf DVD outlets in the UK.

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

The second surf film from south coast surfer Tim Wreyford - The Journey is now available to buy online. It follows the fateful journey of one surfer (Terry Crump) following a special map to a secret spot - with lots of great surfing and many pitfalls along the way. Some great comedy moments for the unfortunate Mr Crump. Will he find that elusive secret spot ? Filmed in England, Ireland and Australia.

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

We got another great write-up in this months issue of Pit Pilot - the British surf magazine. Connect to the Pitpilot magazine website or check out some of the Universe Inspectors Live CD PitPilot review on our website.

If your over in Woolacombe this summer then checkout the Mortehoe Heritage centre just past the village of Mortehoe on the coastal road. They have a coastal exhibition and are playing a copy of the North Devon Surf History DVD for visitors to the centre. For more information about the centre and how to find it then check the Museum website (www.devonmuseums.net)

We have been doing a bit of audio cleanup for a DAT recording of the 'Musical Youth' kids performances at Croyde Village Hall (www.croydevillagehall.info). Chris Burrows borrowed our portable DAT recorder and taped the sessions and we have made a compilation CD for the kids to listen to their own performances.

Look out for the Musical Youth II event in October this year - there is lots of great musical talent in this area so catch it if you can.

Read more about our Post Production Services.

We have been making our RedRock M2 35mm adapter kit more handheld-friendly by adding a modified high quality Sony 801 viewfinder and Ikegami Shoulder pad to the Panasonic HVX200 rig to allow a much more flexible mode for shooting handheld.

"I love the shallow depth of field we can achieve with the Redrock M2" said Mark Brindle of Maniac Films "but handheld work has always been difficult with an external LCD screen for focusing...but with the new Sony viewfinder system and shoulder brace, the whole rig is easier to manage."

For more information on 35mm lens adapters and accessories from RedRock then look on the RedRock website (www.redrockmicro.com) or read our article about Depth of Field and 35mm lens adapters (pdf version).

Read more about our Camera and Grip Equipment Hire.

We have been taking more photos for LambLand in Ilfracombe - lots of cute kids toy lambs plus more from Pauls never-ending supply of leather wallets and purses.

Visit the LambLand website (www.lambland.co.uk) to see whats new in the store or visit one of the real LambLand shops in Ilfracombe. More products coming online soon.

Read more about our Photography Services.

Work has started on the new Douglas E Powell website - were providing website hosting and back-end technical services for Tabatha at Tiger Plum (www.tigerplum.com) for mp3 players, video clips and all the 'geeky stuff' that happens in the background. Tiger Plum are doing all the fancy graphics and layouts.

Visit the Douglas E Powell website (www.douglasepowell.co.uk) to listen to new acoustic music from Doug and find out gig dates, see photos from gigs and generally hang out and read Dougs blog. More features coming to the website soon.

There are some acoustic mp3 music tracks and CDs to buy online right now - from Stocks and Powell - Mike Stocks and Douglas E Powell..

Read more about our Website Development Services.

We have started a new website for Dessy at Sandy Hollow in Croyde. The site uses PHP to provide an admin interface for easy updating of vacancy and pricing status and gives Dessy the opportunity to update a surf report for Croyde Bay directly onto the site every day.

Visit the Sandy Hollow Croyde website (www.sandyhollowcroyde.co.uk) to check the surf forecast or to book some accommodation in Croyde - its very close to the beach and surfer friendly!

Read more about our Website Development Services.

We went over to the Army Officers training ground at Sandhurst for the Easter weekend to film the Wales ladies National Lacrosse team (www.laxwales.com) training and team selection camp. The Wales National squad are current European champions and were training hard on the pitch and also off the pitch - making the most of the Army assault course and taking part in lots of team-building exercise. The girls were being constantly monitored in all activities to see who would make it to the final team.

We filmed a lot of the training activities and will be putting together a short promo film to help raise awareness of the sport and to try to engage spectators and encourage new sponsors for the team.

Read more about our Photography Services.

More products photos for Genesis - this time Quiksilver footwear and loads of new Animal mens and ladies watches. Checkout the summer collection at the Genesis surf shop (www.genesissurfshop.com) website

Read more about our Photography Services.

Finally its ready! - after quite a few mix downs of the audio, Giles and the Liquidators are happy with the sound and the combo DVD and CD are packaged up and ready for sale... We are now out of stock. Please contact us for availability

Watch The Liquidators trailer on Youtube.

The Liquidators Live at the White Lion in Braunton - check it out - you may be in the crowd! "Even my mum watched the whole DVD" said bass player Giles "she said it kept her attention as there was always something different going on in the video"

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

We have been providing printing and duplicating services for an audio CD for Hypnotist Chris Caress - stop smoking now! The CDs are available for sale from Christophers website (www.hyp-notist.co.uk)

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

We got a great write-up in this months issue of Pit Pilot - the British surf magazine. Connect to the Pitpilot magazine website or check out some of the ND Surf History DVD PitPilot review on our website.

We were approached by Denise Austin, Olympic beach Volleyball star based in Croyde, North Devon, to edit a DVD showreel of her video press coverage to help promote her role in the sport.

Material was supplied mostly on old VHS tapes from programmes such as Channel 4's 'The Big Breakfast' and BBC's 'Newsround' plus Westcountry News footage and event coverage of some of many Volleyball tournaments won by Denise and her partners.

"some of the material was in a bad state and needed a lot of cleaning up first, but we managed to put together the showreel, with new titles and music." said Mark Brindle.

Visit Denise's website www.beachvolleyballinc.com for more information on how to get involved in the sport - you don't need a beach, but it does help..

Read more about our Post Production Services.

We will be running a series of free Ecommerce seminars for the North Devon Enterprise Agency (www.ndea.org.uk) in Bideford. Anyone can attend the free workshops but you must register first with NDEA and have been running in business for at least one year. Contact the NDEA - they are located: Studio J, Caddsdown Business Support Centre, Caddsdown Industrial Park, Clovelly Road, BIDEFORD, Devon EX39 3DX or by telephone: 01237 426416.

The seminars are split into 3 levels, depending on where you business is in the ecommerce cycle: (1) Websites where do I begin ? (2) Ecommerce Websites (3) Making Ecommerce work.

Read more about our Website Development Services.

John at Cozy knights in Georgeham (www.cozyknights.co.uk) asked us to refresh his website and to take some new photos following recent changes to his Bed and Breakfast layout.

"We had some great Sunny days in April so we tried to show the property in its best light" said Mark Brindle from maniac Films. John Knight said "The website is perfect now".

Read more about our Photography Services.

We have been up to the Belmont Equestrian event near Bristol 31st March - 1st April, as part of the Visualise project to demonstrate multi-channel video and data streaming to a large plasma screen and to handheld PDAs for spectators at the event. As part of a consortium of companies including Bristol University, 3CResearch, BT, Inmarsat, ProVision, U4EA, ISC, UTIL4, Maniac Films and Turner.

"The event was well attended and the Visualise demonstration worked very well...with wireless video transmission from several places around the course" said Mark Brindle from Maniac Films. "It was also a good placement for the plasma screen in the beer tent!".

Watch the Belmont Equestrian Video now on YouTube

Read more about our Video Production Services.

North Devon Surf History - Maniac Films in association with Braunton Community College, Richard Gregory and Extreme Boardshots with funding from Barnstaple Museum and Tiki. "For a project that resulted from the collaboration of an entire Devon Community"

"This is a fantastic win for the film - I'm very pleased" said Mark Brindle from Maniac Films. "It was pretty nerve-racking at the Awards ceremony in Plymouth and I hadn't prepared a speech".

You can watch videos from the awards presentations (including Mr Brindle's dodgy speech!) online at the MIA website in conjunction with Silverstream TV.

You can buy a copy of the North Devon Surf History Film from our website or from the Surfers Against Sewage website.

We have been helping Audrey at Crowborough Farm near Georgeham with some HTML training, to allow her maintain and update a website for the Bed and Breakfast accommodation (www.crowboroughfarm.co.uk).

"Audrey had tried to learn HTML in the past and wasn't sure that was the right route for her" said Mark Brindle. "but after a few lessons she got more confident and was happy to create new pages, resize photos and manage the site. Audrey knew exactly how she wanted the site to look from the start."

"All software used is public domain open-source software, so this minimised the cost."

We've managed to get some outside photography done, now the weather has warmed up a lot. The new Animal range at Genesis surf shop (www.genesissurfshop.com) is now online with Tshirts and Hoodys plus new Black Salamander Tees, Billabong and Roxy bikinis and loads of new Animal shorts.

A new Visualise Trial is planned to take place at the Belmont Equestrian event near Bristol in March. We've been filming some content of Horses at a local stables to use as background content at the event, while we generate new video content at the event.

"It was a good opportunity to get used to being around Horse" said Mark Brindle from maniac Films. "They are quite big beasts (!) and I wasn't sure how they would react to having strange people pointing cameras at them....luckily they were fairly happy!"

Watch the horses video on Youtube

North Devon Surf History has been short listed for a Media Innovations Award (MIA) in the 'Collaboration between Business and Young people' category at this years MIA event in Plymouth. This category is sponsored by Business Link Devon and Cornwall and is part of the Media innovations Awards organised by Plymouth Media Partnership (www.pm-p.com) and South West Screen.

Karen Stockdale of Plymouth Media-Partnership, which is organising the awards said: "There is a huge range of talent across the region and this initiative will celebrate the very best screen based media work."

Read more about our Video Production Services.

Turtleshead.biz (now closed) goes live with a new ecommerce website selling fashion Tees, Hoodys and surf jewelery. "We had an existing website" said Dave from Turtleshead "but we couldn't update the content very easily and it wasn't very flexible.....the new site allows us much more freedom and is very easy to manage."

"We took the existing CSS and graphics from the original website and overlayed that on our feature-packed oscommerce template" said Mark Brindle from Maniac Films."This provided Dave and Kat with built-in Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), integration with Froogle (Google product search), Google analytics and allowed extra payment and shipping options plus features like voucher discount codes"

"Mark has provided great support during the whole process - from moving our domain name and new hosting services to hands-on sessions teaching us how to administer the new site and add content." said kat from Turtleshead. "Its been a fairly painless - apart from the money we spent on the first website!"

Update June 2007: Look out for new graphics design and branding for Turtleshead - more VW designs and more funky Tshirts prints..coming soon.

Read more about our Website Development Services.

We've been helping Trevor at eyeball surfcheck (www.eyeballhq.tv) with a new Webcam for Westwood Ho! The camera is an Axis Pan Tilt Zoom (PTZ) camera which allows it to be moved remotely as the tide changes.

"The image quality from the new camera is fantastic" said Trevor 'Toes' Lumley from eyeball surfcheck in Woolacombe. Watch out for new PTZ replacement cameras for Saunton, Woolacombe and Putsborough.

We provided a disc print design and DVD duplication service for DBI Communications. They needed a quick turnaround for one of their customers - but also needed each disc to be individually numbered.

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

Maniac Films Ltd has joined the UK Trade & Investment 'passport to Export' scheme. UK Trade & Investment is the Government organization that helps UK-based companies succeed in an increasingly global economy. The scheme involves mentoring, training and matched funding over an 18 month period to enable easier access to export markets.

We have been shooting some new product photography for LambLand - to go on the online shop at lambland.co.uk "Paul at :ambLand seems to have a never ending product range!" said mark Brindle. "We've also been adding some new Black Salamander fair trade Jewelery to Genesis surf shop (www.genesissurfshop.com) and updating some of the original photos of the Black Salamander accessories range"

Read more about our Photography Services.

In conjunction with Mike Stocks weve started on some production work for a new music video for Pete Bruntnell's 'Cold Water Swimmer'. Mike has been filming underwater sequences with Ken Wells and asked us to help out on the post production side - creating a 'look' to match the music and the ideas. We have been building some test animations and are waiting for the final CD audio mix from local musician Pete Bruntnell (www.peterbruntnell.com). Update February 2007 - project currently on hold until Pete's new album has been mixed in the studio.

Read more about our Crew Hire Services.

We've been over to Italy to meet up with Mistheria - Italy's top virtuoso keyboard artist at his studio near Rome, to start planning production for a new advanced keyboard Instructional DVD Alien Keyboards "It was pretty cold and snowy up in the mountains!" said Mark Brindle from Maniac films " but we got a fantastically warm reception from Gui and his family and friends...we plan to start shooting in July...to give him (Gui) a chance to finish off some of the special keyboard exercises and music compositions for the DVD...I'm really looking forward to working on this project" said Mark. For more information visit Mistheria (www.mistheria.com).

Read more about our Video Production Services.

Maniac Films helps out Indikit with DLT transfer for a dual layer (DVD-9) DVD production. Dual layer DVDs need to be sent to the replicators as two DLT tapes - one for each layer. "A lot of replicators will take DVD-R masters for single layer DVD projects, but all dual-layer DVDs must be sent on DLT" said Mark Brindle from Maniac Films. "After struggling to find DLT transfer facilities in 2005 we decided to include these services in-house for transferring all DVD-5 (single layer) and DVD-9 projects to DLT for replication. We use Apple's DVD Studio Pro for DVD authoring and to create the DLTs"

"If we are not doing the DVD authoring ourselves, then customers send us completed projects on external hard disk drives (USB or Firewire) and we can re-link existing DVD-SP projects back to the master mpeg assets and create DLT masters very quickly" said Mark. "We also provide dual-layer DVD-R (DVD-DL+) masters to allow our customers to check DVD-9 projects before being sent off for replication".

Read more about our Disc Production Services.

We've been supplying Ricks Music Studio (www.rickmusikstudios.com) with some stock sports footage - surfing and kitesurfing from the Maniac films archives. Ricks writing some new production music for synchronising with action sports and needed to get a feel for how it would work.

New Photo gallery uploads People plus more photos in the landscapes gallery and Bands Gallery. Some photos from Blackpool, Autumn pics of Devon and some fairly random stuff! Check it!

Read more about our Photography Services.

We've been indoors shooting a new Billabong and Animal range for Genesis surf shop online store www.genesissurfshop.com. Including lots of new Billabong caps, backpacks and accessories!

Read more about our Photography Services.