‘SUBTITLE’ screened in Restrospective programme in 20th Singapore International Film Festival 2007
April 21, 2007
‘SUBTITLE’ screened in Restrospective programme in 20th Singapore International Film Festival 2007. Nice to meet fellow filmmakers again.
S’porean wins “Asia’s Best Video Director” in a regional contest
- Apr 16, 2007
AsiaOne
Independent filmmaker Gavin Lim, 40, of Singapore is the regional winner of Nokia N93i “You Make It Reel” Contest, beating six other finalists from other countries.
His grand prize – US$10,000 and a Nokia N93i. His work will also be shown on regional television.
The winning video featured a four-member cast that included local actress Ericia Lee.
Gavin’s win was announced at the Nokia N93i’s Indie Artist Showcase, held at the St James Powerhouse discotheque and nightclub here on 5th April.
The Nokia N93i “You Make It Reel” competiton was launched in January, together with the Nokia N93i, which hit stores on Jan 8. According to Nokia, it is an ” Asia Pacific-wide initiative”, intended to pair the Nokia N93i multimedia computer with consumers to “unearth the latest directorial talent in the region”.
Nokia touts the N93i as its latest high-performance device with a 3.2 megapixel video camera, Carl Zeiss optics and other videography and photography features.
Greyskull, a Dallas-based punk rock band that provided the music for this initiative, chose Gavin’s entry as the winner. It was set to the track “Pretty in ink”, a song by the band.
“This competition has been a huge success for Nokia Nseries, and it is all thanks to the untiring effort of the participants, especially the seven finalists who had to create another video from scratch after being chosen for the second and regional round,” said Ruhne Fiala, Multimedia Marketing Director, Asia Pacific, Nokia.
Remarking that the videos were “nothing less than professional”, Mr Fiala added that the competition has proven that the ability to make music videos and films is now possible by the average consumer, without need for complicated professional equipment and software.
According to Nokia, Greyskull chose Gavin’s for it’s ability to “capture the true essence of the song”.
Chris Smyers, the band’s lead vocalist said: “It’s interesting to see how people from different countries interpreted a song. All the seven participants who reached the final round are winners, as they were the best among many in their own countries.”
All the finalists also used their Nokia N93i devices to capture creative interpretations of Greyskull’s performance at the Nokia N93i indie music showcase. The footage will be collated and edited by the pros into a “unified showcase music video” to be aired on a regional music channel.
The event also featured Malaysian singer Pete Teo and Singaporean band Summer’s Over.
All the finalists’ videos, including the winning video by Gavin Lim, can be viewed at www.nokia-asia.com/youmakeitreel. Also available is more information about the Nokia Nseries indie music showcase video montage.
Nokia ‘You Make It Reel’ website
April 15, 2007
Nokia ‘You Make It Reel’ website.
youth.sg interview
April 15, 2007
Written by Calvin Yang
Saturday, 14 April 2007
Youth.SG was given an opportunity to meet with the winner of the Nokia N93i “You Make It Reel” Competition, Gavin Lim. And of course, we took advantage of it!
The winner of the competition was announced right at the end of the Indie Music Showcase featuring performances by Texas Punk Rock band, Greyskull, Singapore’s homegrown pop punk band, Summer’s Over and Malaysia’s leading independent recording artiste Pete Teo.
The Singapore finalist walked away with a cool US$10,000 that night and won the honour of being Asia’s freshest videography talent.
Let’s have a look at the winning video for the competition.
Here is the interview with Gavin Lim, winner of Nokia N93i “You Make It Reel” Competition.
1) What do you plan to do with the US$10,000?
I will channel it to film making. I will be doing a feature at the end of the year and it is a difficult shoot compared to short films. So this money is much needed. But of course, this amount is not enough to cover the whole thing but ya, it is better to have the extra.
2) Will you ever venture into greater productions such as the directing of movies?
Ya, I will be doing a feature at the end of the year and it would be a collaboration with another film maker.
3) The girl in your video appears to be Ericia Lee? How is it like working with her?
It is my first time working with her and she was quite nervous at first, cause there were some difficult shots to take. But she is very sweet and I am glad that she is gonna be in my next film.
4) What is the main theme behind the tattoo music video?
The idea for the moving tattoos was influenced by the music videos of the 80s. You know, there is always a story in the beginning, which is very dramatic. Then you will get shots of the band in the middle but overall, there were no gimmicks made in this video.
5) With the exposure, where do you plan to go from here?
I would like to start making music videos, firstly in different genres so that I can play with the visual style. And also making music videos for local or regional artistes. It is a good practice.
6) What do you think of the Nokia N93i?
Basically I feel that the Nokia N93i should be used for every other occasion. It is also good for finding locations to shoot and sourcing for new sites.
Gavin Lim’s Biography
Gavin is not new to video creation. His debut in fiction was a short film, ‘Subtitle’ where he won the Best Director Award in the Singapore International Film Festival (SIFF). His second short film ‘HELLo?’ has been screening in good festivals like the prestigious Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival (France). He was also the Merit Award winner of TheatreWorks 24 hours Playwriting Competition in 2004.
In early 2007, Gavin founded a production company, The Void Deck (http://www.thevoiddeck.com.sg/), that does commerical corporate videos and TV projects and also a film production company, Void Deck Films (http://voiddeckfilms.com/) for producing feature length film projects.
Gavin is currently developing his first feature length film due to shoot at the end of 2007.
Archive:
“You Make It Reel” – Pre-event Coverage
“You Make It Reel” – Nokia N93i Indie Music Showcase
View the full flickrset (23 photos) here.
Technorati Tags: Nokia N93i “You Make It Reel” Indie Music Showcase, Gavin Lim, Ericia Lee, Pete Teo, Summer’s Over, Greyskull
Last Updated ( Saturday, 14 April 2007 )
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Article on Nokia Make it Reel Finals
April 13, 2007
Making it reel – By SHARMILA NAIR
IT WAS their first time out of the country. Carrying their backpacks and travelling bags, the 23 Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM) students looked out of place standing in the middle of the dance floor in Powerhouse @ St James Power Station – one of Singapore’s hippest night clubs.
The troop had just arrived in Singapore after a tiring five-hour bus ride from Kuala Lumpur, and none of them had the slightest idea where they would be spending the night. All they knew was that they were there to attend Nokia N93i You Make it Reel competition’s grand finale and to show support for their colleague, Kamal Sabran, who was one of the lucky seven regional finalists.
They clapped and cheered for Malaysia’s independent recording artist Pete Teo, whom Kamal collaborated with at the national phase of the You Make it Reel competition.
The American punk band Greyskull, from Texas, also performed to thunderous applause.
Prior to the event, the finalists were required to create a video clip for the band’s latest single, Pretty in Pink.
The contestants from Malaysia, Singapore, India, Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand had earlier won the national Nokia You Make it Reel contest in their respective countries, and had all converged on the island republic for the grand finale.
Using only Nokia’s N93i mobile device, and with no set budget, the aspiring directors shot their videos based on their interpretation of the song.
The device enabled the directors to come up with a music video using the barest of equipment.
They had the opportunity to experiment with new ideas and use the functions in the multimedia device to manipulate their videos into works of art.
The videos shown that night proved that the directors used every bit of their creative juice to direct a short clip for Greyskull to judge and select as the winner.
The participants chose various ways to convey their message – the Filipino director used a stop-motion technique while Kamal’s video was rich in symbolism and metaphors. Both contestants were favoured to win the competition.
In their bid to come up with the most creative video, some of the contestants had overlooked their most important task; to shoot a music video that best embodied the band’s musical style and spirit.
In the end, it was Singaporean Gavin Lim’s narrative music video that Greyskull felt captured their song, and clinched the top prize.
“We picked Gavin’s video because it best represented the song and our style as a whole,” said Greyskull’s drummer Robbie Estill.
In Pretty in Pink there is a line that goes, “I’ve never seen a white tank top that looked so good before, a sick girl with an attitude is impossible to ignore”, and Gavin brought that character to life in his video.
“It proved that Gavin did his homework on the song and thought of the best way to put it in a video. That’s what we need from a director – someone who understands how we work and is able to create a video based on our style,” said Robbie, who revealed that it took the band five minutes to choose the winner.
Perhaps, Gavin’s win was a triumph of experience and maturity.
“I basically stuck to the idea of the song. I just directed according to the lyrics and added a few things here and there. But the general idea behind the video was still the song,” said the 41-year-old director whose short film was recently screened at the Hong Kong Film Festival.
In the video, instead of just showing the girl getting herself a tattoo, he added some magical elements into it. The clip showed animations of her tattoo coming to life.
“It’s just a ludicrous idea that came to me. Who knew it was interesting enough to win the grand prize?” said Gavin who walked away with US$10,000 (RM36,000) that night.
In fact, he was so sure that he wasn’t going to win the competition that he was ready to leave the venue even before the announcement was made.
“I have a short film screening at the Hong Kong Film Festival right now. I missed the first screening because I had to be here and I’m on my way home to get a good night’s sleep before jetting off tomorrow for the second screening,” said Gavin, who was convinced that Kamal’s entry would emerge the winner.
“Maybe the Singaporean entry had a lot more to do with the song but mine had more creativity and artistic flair,” said Kamal matter-of-factly.
Kamal had to send in his entries twice because his first video had too many violent elements. For instance, his interpretation of the “girl pretty in pink” is a girl with tears of blood streaming down her face.
It is a tad difficult to imagine this image coming from the shy and soft-spoken 30-year-old man.
“I know that the song talks about a girl who gets tattoos and attracts men but I thought the deeper issue is about women who change themselves (with plastic surgery) and become victims of beauty,” said the Masters student in New Media and Visual Communications.
He was aware that some of the messages he tried to deliver were too heavy for a punk rock video, but decided to take the risk anyway.
Kamal spent a day shooting the video, and two days editing it – with the help of all 23 of his friends who journeyed to Singapore to support him.
Some may think that it’s extravagant to have the help of 23 people to shoot a three-minute video but Kamal felt that it was the only way for him to complete his entry.
“I didn’t have the necessary equipment to create a video. I didn’t have lighting like the professionals do. I had to make do with a friend holding a torchlight for me,” said Kamal.
He was very grateful for all the help he received during the making of his video. He intends to edit the clips that show the work that went behind the scenes, and upload them onto the Internet as his token of appreciation for all the effort his friends had put into making the music video.
“I’m not disappointed that my friends had to travel all the way from KL to see me lose in this competition. I didn’t enter this competition just to win; I entered because it was a way for me to show my creativity to the world,” said Kamal proudly.
But there’s one thing for sure. This defeat is not going to stop Kamal from making more music videos and other short films especially using the Nokia N93i. In fact, it has only opened the door wider for Kamal to experiment with new ways to express his ideas.
“This competition has given me a lot of experience and I will definitely use it to turn myself into a better director,” he said confidently.
Nokia N93 Spoof overtakes original Gary Oldman TVC
April 9, 2007
Our Fly-by-Night entry has taken over the original TVC as the more viewed YouTube video today. Our views are at the moment 22961 and the original TVC’s view count was 22940. The spoof was put on YouTube since mid December and has been steadily being circulated with Singaporeans.
‘TRACKS’ has been screened in the Hongkong Panorama Section of the Hongkong International Film Festival. We attended the screening on the 7th but missed the 4th coz of the Nokia YMIR Finals.
We won Nokia’s You Make It Reel Asian Contest!!!
April 5, 2007
We won US$10,000!!! We have been voted Best Music Video in this Nokia contest.
