Filming 'Feed the Birds'

So, to follow on from our last hub (which can be found here)

http://hubpages.com/hub/Wooden-Spoon-Productions-and-the-creation-of-No-Relations

We move on to the 'Feed the Birds' shoot.

We were given the challenge to take a piece of film from one genre and root it in another. For this project Wooden Spoon Productions decided on using the 'feed the birds' sequence from Mary Poppins. Instead of having an old woman singing on the steps of a church we made subtle differences to the atmosphere, location, make up and costume in order to give it a darker, more menacing feel. The location we eventually used was Greenan Castle, an old coastal castle just outside of Ayr on the West coast of Scotland. A picture of the castle can be seen to your right.

Ok, So we got to planning straight away. My job was the location and we had already discussed the idea based on some photos I had managed to find online. So we started work on the costume and makeup. Leighanne took makeup and spent a lot of time researching ways to tie in the 'bird woman' theme. I believe she eventually settled on ageing Heather for the anticipated dull lighting (we would be using natural light because of the remote location), and going for a darkened, birdlike appearance.

For the costume Clair took charge. We spent many a happy time outside the University trampling the skirt and cardigan into mud, setting fire to parts of it and generally doing as much damage as we could. We wanted to keep the essence of the old, poor lady from the film, whilst making everything a shade darker.

And so the scheduled day rolled around. Makeup and costume of course came first, after which we had a half hour drive to the location...But we got lost...So an hour later we pulled up in the empty field behind the castle and unpacked the camera and tripod. This time we used one of the huge camera's from the university and my little handycam. It was a cold, overcast and miserable day and we were loosing light fast. We placed the tripod at the top of the cliff beside the castle and Niko (who is generally much braver than me) took the shots from up there. I went down onto the beach with Heather to get the through the grass and close up shots whilst the guys up on the cliff got the pan shots and farther away ones. I remember worrying at one point because the tide had started to come in over the rocks below, we had to do numerous retakes because of Heather or myself slipping on the beach or up the muddy hill.

Nico took over the editing for this one, I make a guess but I'd say it probably took her a day or two. It was a lot of film to put together in that time, but I'm certain by the time we got round to filming time was running out on the project! Much qudos also has to go to Niko for making the final piece fit into the music at the right time...It took us until our next few projects to figure that out!

The final Cut of our take on 'Feed the Birds' can be found below, I hope you enjoy it as it was the last project of Wooden Spoon Productions before Niko and I broke away to form 'No Relation'.

Katie and Nico

With thanks to Clair Carter, Heather Smith and Leighanne Foley.

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