A ScreenHI Retrospective

Mon 14 Jan 2013 / News

In January we kicked off 2012 by securing a BBC Scotland Learning commission  for 5 short films, 5 minutes in length each covering the topics of either Literacy or Citizenship This opportunity allowed us to develop aspiring filmmakers while at the same time involve schools in the production process Tom Duncan, Tim Flood, Dave Hammond, Roddy Maclean and Neil Campbell had to deliver their films to a broadcast specification within a 3 month production period, a new challenge for all of them!

In early February ScreenHI Director, Amanda Millen was delighted to be asked to judge the Youth Competition, Best Individual Achiever Award by our friends at Kingussie Food On Film Festival The prize for the winner was an industry placement  in their field of interest, organised by ScreenHI We also hosted a Film Industry reception for budding filmmakers to find out more about getting into the industry.

At the end of February ScreenHI put on a Directing Masterclass in Inverness with respected TV & Film Director, Douglas McKinnon. It was open to any resident of the Highlands and Islands and boy was it popular!

Partners Visual Impact ran a Roadshow in Glasgow in March It was a techie event to get hands on with broadcast equipment and quizz the suppliers ScreenHI supported practitioners from the Highlands and Islands who wanted to travel to attend We also hosted a MEDIA Roadshow in Inverness in the same month to allow people to find out what development funding was available for film and tv projects.

March also saw the annual FilmG Awards Ceremony take place in Glasgow, with a host of Scottish celebrities and industry professionals celebrating the best in emerging talent on Gaelic Screen.

Of course April and May were busy months as we got organised for goNORTH, our annual creative industries festival that we co-produce with Go Events It takes place in Inverness in June and with over 700 delegates, 35 plus workshops and panels, a full live music showcase schedule and screening programme it meant the two jam packed days left little time for anything else However we did manage to squeeze in a Mystery Tour, several networking events and broadcast live throughout on Radio goNORTH just to make sure no-one was at a loose end.

Following the success of goNORTH we took the films submitted around Scotland screening them in our Five Minute Wonders Tent at the Tiree Music Festival in July, Belladrum Tartan Heart in August and Loopallu in September As a result of this and the Distribution Network Forum at goNORTH we compiled and supplied a number of non commercial organisations with screening programmes, which is fantastic news for filmmakers who gained more exposure for their films.

Ross Maclean finished his 6 month Edit Indiepreneur contract with ScreenHI in July after delivering all the content for goNORTH He went on to develop his camera operating skills and client base in newsgathering and sports footage, which has brought him some early success Tom Duncan joined the team in an new role as Producer/Director, developed from the Edit Indiepreneur idea, producing content from conception through post production to delivery.

August was another busy month with a number of Edinburgh based activites keeping us busy Breege Smyth and Cameron Dykes successfully applied for the Content Producer roles we advertised to work in Edinburgh during the festival with our partners Dabster Productions on their portfolio of podcast commissions Roisin Seaton impressed us at interview so we decided to offer her an intensive training role alongside Breege and Cameron Breege had worked with us at Radio goNORTH and Cameron's background training set them up nicely to take the next step into an industry commission.

At the end of August we attended the Media Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival, which saw Elisabeth Murdoch deliver the prestigious MacTaggart lecture and audiences at Keith Lemon's Live Celebrity Juice laughed nervously at his outrageous line of jokes Alison Johnston and Andrew Jeffrey took part in The Network programme, a scheme for new entrants that runs alongside the Television Festival Both of their places were sponsored by ScreenHI Alison left such an impression that she was offered a paid Runner role on the top entertainment show Strictly Come Dancing in London as well as work experience at CBBC in Manchester Andrew gained a much clearer idea of how he wanted to work in the media and has been busy networking while working on a school production in Abu Dhabi!

We launched our long awaited ScreenHI website in September as well as HI Wireless - a drama writing collaboration. By November we held the first workshop where all 12 successful writers met their mentors and industry professionals, pitched their ideas and developed their writing skills throughout the day. Now they are set the task of writing the first draft of their drama by the end of January Watch this space and read their monthly blogs for an insight into their writing process! We also launched our new look website for goNORTH in November and released the all important festival dates for 2013, which are the 5th & 6th June.

In December we looked back at all we achieved and looked forward to planning the calendar for 2013 After a short break to enjoy the festivities we are back in full swing and ready to go!  Of course we would like to thank all our supporters, contributors, friends and creative practitioners - we couldn't have done it without you.