Transcript

Hi, my name is Mat Whitecross. I’m a film-maker, director, editor, cameraman.

I come up with ideas, I go out to a location and shoot them with a crew and we come back into the studio and edit them.

I was obsessed with making films from a very early age and when I finished college, I went to work for a local TV station. Then I came to London and started making cups of tea for famous people, being a runner. After a while I started working on films, as an editor.

I do this because it’s creative, it’s exciting, it’s fun and you meet different people every day. Every single day is different, and you get to tell stories the way you want to tell them.

Filming Demos

Get a strong story, good idea and be original.

Once you’ve got your idea the best thing to do is prepare yourself for the shoot, and the best way to do that is to draw a storyboard. You don’t have to be a great artist, just get the pen out and start drawing an idea of what you’re going to do with each shot.

Once you’ve got your storyboard, you need to go out and find a place to shoot it, find your location. The best thing to do is to try and find somewhere that’s slightly out of the way, so you're not in other people’s way. Also, find somewhere that’s quiet.

Once you're on set, the main thing is to be able to communicate your ideas to your artists, to your actor, so talk them though exactly what you’re doing with the story, why you’ve got them to come down and what they’re supposed to be doing in each shot.

Today, we were trying to work out the simplest, comical idea we could do effectively, in five minutes. So we came up with an idea that someone drinks a drink which gives them kind of superhero powers for five minutes and then they come back down to earth.

The only part of film-making which is different to all other kind of arts, is editing. That’s the bit I find the most fun. You can really play about with your footage, you can try out anything. You can try making it black and white, you can speed it up, you can slow it down, do anything you like, and that’s really where you get to enjoy yourself.

For my story, what we’re trying to do is cut out all the bits where the actor is on the ground. We’re only going to keep the bits where she seems to be flying, so the idea is, even though it’s going to look very low-fi, almost like stop animation, she’s going to be flying through the air.

So when you’ve finished editing the film, the best thing to do is get everyone round who worked on the film, the cast and the crew, and make sure you have a good time watching it.

Filming tips

When I started out making films I spoke to so many people who told me that you needed to have a special camera or you needed to shoot on film, you couldn’t shoot on video . Actually there’s some of the most famous film-makers in the world right now making films on handycams, just as good as the one you’ve got, so just get out there and make them.

It doesn’t matter whether you’re using a film camera, a video camera or your mobile phone.

And remember to charge your batteries before you leave.

Before you go out and shoot, close your eyes and watch the whole movie in your head.

The great thing about video technology is you can make as many mistakes as you want, it doesn’t cost you anything. So have fun with your friends and family while you're making your film. Enjoy your mistakes – they sometimes turn out to be the best bits of the film.

When you’ve finished your edit before you send any copies out, make sure you back-up for yourself. Good luck.