Merrold

As an East London filmmaker myself, I thought it only fair to share with you all that the Eastern Edge Film Fund is open for applications.

The Eastern Edge Film Fund aims to support new film-makers taking their first steps into film-making. Up to 4 grants of £1,000 are available for film-makers aged 16 or over, living, working or studying in one of the 3 boroughs of Barking and Dagenham, Redbridge or Waltham Forest. Successful applicants will also receive training, get access to office space, editing facilities training and hands on one-to-one mentoring from an Executive Producer.
 
For further information contact: Barking & Dagenham on 020 8227 2482 or email artsadmin@lbbd.gov.uk
 
Visit the Film London website and scroll down to the Eastern Edge Film Fund section

According to the publicity, "Jamendo is the world's #1 platform for free music downloads under Creative Commons licenses."

Independent artists from around the world – none of whom are members of any collective rights society (such as ASCAP, PRS, BMI, GEMA, SOCAN, SACEM, etc.) - have made their work available for free download and sharing. OK, so you won't find Prince on there if his YouTube antics are anything to go by, but for mood and background music in film it's cheaper even than library music, given that you can purchase a licence for an introductory rate of 2 euros per track (excluding VAT).

"This means that the licensor will have no performance rights fees to pay for any music licensed from Jamendo. We guarantee that all tracks are 100% free of performance rights, worldwide. This “one-stop” shop means saving considerable time and money for the licensor."

The website is fairly well laid out, with a simple creative commons key detailing the licensing conditions set by the artist.

"Our licensing branch Jamendo PRO can thereby grant licenses for all types of uses (film, TV, DVD, advertisement...), acting as sole intermediary between the artist and the client, ensuring fair and direct payment for one, and low licensing rates for the other."

Could be very exciting - now we just need to see if more filmmakers will make work available on a creative commons licence...

Again, nothing to do with documentary, but I'm a massive fan of Frank Turner and for a niche artist he does a fantastic job of building on his fan base to sell records and gigs. His latest single is a challenge: both to raise money for a good cause and to see how well he can do against the pop kings and queens - and, well, the X Factor single I suppose - by getting it into the Top 40.

So for both these reasons, I am pasting details here. Do with it what you wish...

‘Long Live The Queen’ is a heartfelt, poignant story of a close friend passing away from breast cancer. Lexi tirelessly campaigned and fundraised for breast cancer charities and it’s with this inspiration that Frank and Xtra Mile Recordings will be donating proceeds from the sale of the single to the Breast Cancer Campaign charity.

As October is Breast Cancer Awareness month – this single couldn’t be released at a more important time and together with Breast Cancer Campaign, Xtra Mile will be working towards raising as much money and awareness as possible.

Already, the single has been picked up by XFM, 6Music, and by long time supporters Mike Davies and Zane Lowe on Radio 1. Jo Whiley (and now Sara Cox who is covering Whiley’s maternity leave) is also a recent Frank convert, playing previous single ‘Reasons Not To Be An Idiot’ a couple of times on the Radio 1 daytime show leading to plays of Long Live The Queen over the next few weeks.

The video is also gaining some attention. It was a New Entry at Number 3 on MTV2’s Myspace Chart and its getting played on NME TV, TopShop amongst others.

The single is released on the 20th October 2008 so get yourself over to Itunes / 7 digital or whatever digital download service you prefer. Remember to do it only from the 20th and make sure you download the single rather than the album track or it wont go to charity or towards the chart!

All your help is much appreciated and for a good cause.
Plus it would be pretty hilarious to get FT in amongst Duffy, Winehouse and Rihanna.

http://www.frank-turner.com
http://www.breastcancercampaign.org
http://www.xtramilerecordings.com

Says Frank: "We're basically in the middle of sneaking into the mainstream music world, which is hilarious, and most of it is thanks to you guys doing what you do best: getting organized and pestering people. So it occurred to us that it would be genius to break the Top 40 with this single.

I know that a download-only single of a song on the album already isn't necessarily something everyone's going to rush out and get. But at 79p, it's not a massive ask. If we can get over 4000 people to download the song in the week of release, then we'll have done it. And the best part is, we'll be raising some serious cash for charity in the process. We're going to sort out a pre-order thing for y'all as well. The important thing is that the downloads are all in that week.

So, are you with me?"

I experienced a moment of perfect serendipity while watching The Qu'ran last night on C4. As I watched a a trail for that night's edition of Big Brother and chuckled at the frankly bizarre juxtaposition of that piece of fluff following the conclusion of this absorbing and intelligent documentary, I picked up my copy of the Guardian Guide and flicked over to Charlie Brooker's Screen Burn, ever a weekly highlight. His excellent article on the surprise inclusion of an intelligent - and two-hour long - documentary in the 8pm slot seemed to echo precisely what us documentary filmmakers are always on about.

"On the one hand [the 'traditional' documentary style] means you steadily gather a wealth of information and insight throughout the programme, eventually coming to view the Qur'an in a new and healthily reflective light. But on the other hand, you won't learn shit, because you'll have switched off well before the first ad break.

Not because you're stupid, but because you've grown so accustomed to being smashed round the face with staccato-paced shock docs (The Boy With Nine Cocks et al), engineered fight docs (Sweary Chef Nightmares and so on), and smart-arsed stunt docs (you know the sort of thing: the badly-shot video diary of some self-regarding male twat who's disguised himself as a woman and lived the life of a lesbian for 30 days; cue hours of tedious down-the-lens blabbering and, inevitably, a scene where he breaks down in tears somewhere around day 24 before pulling himself together and learning something, like, really profound)."

Personally, my favourite bit of the article was where he compared finding something like this in the schedule to encountering a museum in the middle of Disneyland. "Just like a museum, in fact: the whole thing looks and sounds precisely like one of those short educational films that get played in the corner of museums in front of a row of white benches where you sit down and pretend to be interested, while internally gauging just how quickly you can slip away to the gift shop without looking like a philistine in front of the other tourists." I had a guilty moment at that point because that rang uncomfortably true. I'm one of the first to bemoan the lack of intelligent programming on prime time television and yet in my desperation for something to watch, what have I most recently turned to? My friend's complete box set of Sex and the City. It's tempting here to write a Carrie-esque kind of inane question, like: if a documentary like this only manages to pull in a million voters, should we all admit defeat and move over to Police Camera Action! (ITV1, 9pm, 3.8m)?

In fact, Brooker suggests that "an insanely populist treatment of the same subject, aimed at hoovering up as many casual viewers as possible. Fifty Things You Didn't Know About the Qur'an, starring Russell Brand and Girls Aloud" might have been a good companion piece. Indeed. But instead of moaning about the decreasing opportunities, I wonder whether we need to ask ourselves some difficult questions about the places where documentary is failing to deliver. Anthony Thomas' doc, while absorbing and informative, was also a little like an illustrated lecture at times, and while drama seems to have faced up to some of its challenges and evolved in new and interesting ways, it feels like documentary is split into 'purists' who bemoan the decrease in opportunities for documentary on television, and those who embrace the new opportunities offered by formatted docs and reality tv. Please be assured, I'm not advocating this, but I'm worried that we've reached an impasse: are these the only two ways that documentary can head?

In case anyone hasn't heard the news elsewhere, Peter Dale, head of More 4, has quit to set up his own production company.

This on MediaGuardian: "The veteran documentary-maker was appointed More4's first channel head in September 2004 and was responsible for creating the channel's launch programme schedule and brand in November of that year...

Dale originally joined Channel 4 to lead its documentary team in May 1998, one of a number of well-regarded programme-makers brought to the broadcaster from the BBC by the then chief executive, Michael Jackson. He commissioned Jamie's School Dinners and Feltham Sings as well as formats such as Faking It, Wifeswap and Supernanny.

He also oversaw the launches of broadband documentary channel 4Docs and the Channel 4 British Documentary Film Foundation."

As an aside, I do find it interesting that so many rather large industry figures are leaving their positions in order to "set up their own independent production company". Is this the industry equivalent of "moving to Brisbane", the destination of choice for anyone leaving Neighbours as I recall? Discuss...

I'm still hoping that I'll get to go one day, and live it up on the Red Carpet. But if you're going and feeling a bit daunted because you don't know the Weinsteins, there's a great guide on the Six Degrees website.

Would love to hear from anyone who happens to be going - I like living my life by other people!

Well, this is my first real foray into the world of blogging. I thought I'd use it to highlight the tragic closure last week of Anything Left-Handed, a little shop near London's Carnaby Street that was the purveyor of all manner of things for us cack-handed folk. I still remember my first trip there as a kid, buying left-handed scissors and a left-handed ruler, and finally figuring out while looking at the ruler why I'd always worked backwards when drawing measured lines. If you're a left-hander then you'll know, if you're not, then for once you're out of the loop. Ha ha! Just being in the shop made me feel special and a little smug, rather than just weird. My nan had tried to teach me to crochet, but could only do it right-handed and ended up throwing the wool and the needle down in exasperation when I couldn't pick it up. The kids at school would get fed up with me if I sat on their right, because we'd be forever banging hands when we were writing. But suddenly, standing in that shop, it was OK to be left-handed. More than that, we were actually quite cool: Leonardo Da Vinci, Robert De Niro, most of the old Scottish Kerr clan... and apparently we make quite good tennis players. Martina Navilatarova, Goran Ivanesevic, John McEnroe - they're all left-handers. (Unfortunately for me, I could never even make contact between the racquet and the ball, but I don't think that makes me any less of a left-handed pedigree.) The good news is, that the shop lives on in virtual retail: www.anythingleft-handed.co.uk. As for linking this somehow with documentary filmmaking, I have to say I've never had trouble using DV cameras. In fact, I quite like the control panel on the left-hand side. Contradiction to this view is welcome though, so feel free to enter any one-handed comments...