Into the woods with Michael Caine

I recently grew a beard with the idea of doing a parody of Educating Rita (Frank the English lecturer has a beard) but then I changed my mind and took myself off to some local woods to do a short film about Michael Caine being (fictionally) involved in the making of the new Hobbit film as a giant.

The woods are part of a local parkland area and so I had to deal with not being bothered by dog walkers and I finally settled on a ladybird walk to film. The most convenient thing was there were some wooden ladybird shaped stools to put my lap top on.

 



I do not have video camera so all the Michael Caine Brief Encounters  films get made by pointing my webcam creatively in my direction. This particular project took two takes. The rejected take showed some of my rucksack and other camera equipment in the background as well as the stool shown above. I had not noticed these distractions, so intent was I in getting the filming right.

 

Previous to going into the park I had put together some rough ideas of what I wanted to do and say as the pretend giant. This helped me to concentrate on what I was doing and keep the amount of takes to a minimum.

 

 





 I wanted some movement in the film so I moved subtly around to given the impression of circular tracking.

 



Keeping the eye of the camera at eye level seemed to have the desired effect. Whilst I was filming a goat was bleating in the far distance so I improvised with the loose script including the noise as a live animal being slaughtered by the catering staff.

 

 



 

Coming away from the video filming I took a couple of appropriate still shots for fun. And I even stumbled across at Hobbit Cottage in the village of Ruddington on the way home!