Guide to Self Management in Cancer Rehabilitation

The last few months have been spent creating a DVD for Velindre Hospital in Cardiff, which deals with the care and treatment of all types of cancer. Sue Acreman, consultant AHP for Velindre NHS Trust cancer services, wanted to use the DVD to help promote self management after leaving hospital.

As they already had a booklet, we came up with a treatment which involved filming various scenarios with ex-patients, a voice-over and music.

DVD Menu highlighting the Practical section

We then put together an interactive DVD detailing the 8 points in their care plan.

1. Physical
2. Nutritional
3. Psychological
4. Informational
5. Spiritual
6. Practical
7. Social & Relationships
8. Financial 

The project was delivered on DVD in English and Welsh, with an additional 5 minute subtitled version for use in doctors' surgeries across Wales and eventually the UK.

We'd like to take this opportunity to thank all the people involved, who helped make this DVD, especially the ex-patients and staff at Velindre Hospital, and the Croupiers Running Club in Penarth for donating some of their runners for use during filming. Thank you, and good luck to all of you.

Kiwi Knights are set to go!

Max & Dave - The Kiwi Knights

For the last few months, we've been preparing for one of our biggest adventures yet. We are sending two Kiwi guys off on an epic journey that will see them take in 14 countries, cover 5000 km, and take almost a year to complete, all on foot!. That's right... they're walking the entire 5000 km.

Their journey starts this Sunday (15th August 2010) from outside the Templar Church in London, where they will be setting off for Portsmouth, walking the same footsteps that the original Knights Templar did over 800 years ago. They will be blogging daily about their entire journey so we've set them up with a website, which they can publish to directly from their mobiles just by sending an email with a picture or video attachment. The guys will also be filming the entire trip in HD, sending back footage weekly for editing and uploading to the blog. This footage will also be edited and purposed for TV.

We are also looking for co-production partners to join us on this multimedia adventure, so if you are interested in getting involved, please contact Viv via our contact page.

Why not click the link above, or here, and give them a visit.

The Great Pyramid Beckons

We sent a team of people out to Egypt to get some footage of the Great Pyramid for a project we are working on (more news of that later). Viv led the crew with Sheena (producer), Andy (photographer), Rob (Soundman), Danny (Producer) and Sue (publisher) and we spent 5 days shooting up and down the Nile, around the Pyramids, in the Coptic Churches and loads more. We even had time to party on the last night. The footage and photos are for a number of projects we have in the pipeline all based around the Pyramids, and involving a best selling author. Intrigued?

TWF Cymru wants you to pass it on!

Capell Creative, an ad agency here in Cardiff, approached us to deliver an advert in time for Xmas. It was for Twf Cymru, to encourage people to pass on the Welsh language, from father and mother, to son and daughter.

We created the advert with a series/montage of photos of a man growing from a baby to an adult, with a voice-over saying how his parents gave him everything, but the thing he was most proud of was that they gave him the "gift of the Welsh language". We then finished the advert with him saying the same thing to his own newborn baby. Ahhh... how sweet.

Stop Motion & CGI in Romanian ING TV Ad

In the animation world, we've just finished a 30 sec stop-motion / CGI commercial for ING, the international banking and insurance conglomerate, for use on Romanian TV.

With just three weeks to turn it around, we had a twelve strong team headed by Mike Mort (Gogs) working flat out to bring it in on time. The entire commercial was shot on digital SLR cameras at ~4k resolution, downsized to 2k for workflow, with most cgi elements rendered at one or two times SD TV resolution, and final delivery was to be standard definition 4:3 PAL.

All of our studio space was utilised with two working setups alongside each other, and a third being made ready for when one of the others finished. Two disk recorders were used to allow the animators to step forward and backward, to ensure their animation was working correctly. Then the frames were brought in on CF cards in RAW format, converted, and the compositing process began. Having the compositor on hand at all times to check camera angles with test frames, and to see whether or not a composite will work before any frames are shot, removes a lot of guesswork from the whole process. The camera guys and animators were very impressed to be able to walk in and say "Can you quickly check if this will work?". It's not often that post-production processes can be used to check the workflow before actual production takes place, but it does save an awful lot of time.

All compositing was done right here at Broadstroke using Digital Fusion, and editing was done on Final Cut Pro with its fantastic Blackmagic Decklink HD card. The entire workflow was completed at uncompressed SD, and the final frame sequence was conveniently uploaded to the client's ftp site for near immediate delivery. In fact, some minor adjustments were able to be made right up to the night before airing, something that would be pretty much impossible with the UK clearance and broadcast regulations.

The London producers (Joyrider Films), and Romanian agency (CAP), together with the client (ING), all expressed their delight with the final result.