Category / General

by Gareth

Getting things sorted

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The doodledoMOTION office.

After six months of us moving into our office, we’ve finally (almost) finished sorting it! I say ‘almost’ because we’ve still got a few little jobs to sort with the edit suite like some internal skirting boards, and some shelves that need putting up, but now we’ve got some pictures up on the wall, it feels like a really nice place to work in.

Also, we’ve just launched the proper version of our website – www.doodledomotion.co.uk. There’d just been a single page there before now, but I think the new one looks great. Our biggest challenge with it is to make sure we find the time to update the blog, and keep our portfolio up-to-date! Also, due to some music and copyright restrictions, we can’t put examples of everything we do up there, but hopefully we’ll be able to get a good range of the kind of stuff we do.

Work’s been a little bit less hectic over the last few weeks, though there’s enough to keep us occupied. Drama Trails really took its toll – I ended up doing 63 days in a row which wasn’t ideal! Not had a chance yet to have a proper break, but it’s been nice to get my weekends back!

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George, Hazel, Jeff, Helen and Ali.

A couple of Sundays ago I went down to Reading to catch up with some old uni mates – Ali, George, Hazel, and Helen & her new blokey! It was really nice day (although the train journey down was a bit of a rubbish one – an hour late to start with, then decided to terminate at Birmingham rather than Reading!)

We went for a pub lunch, then for a nice walk alongside the canal, and it was a really sunny day which definitely helped! Then in the evening I went to Bristol to kip over at Ali’s house, then back up to Stockport on a very overcrowded train on the Monday. You can check out the photos from the day here.

by Gareth

Work’s been quite busy…

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Well my excuse for not having updated this blog since February is that I’ve just been too busy with work! And it’s pretty true to be honest! I’ve not had a day off for over six weeks now and I’m feeling pretty knackered! I’m currently in the middle of doing a load of 3D graphics for a series that starts on ITV3 this Wednesday night at 9pm called Drama Trails. I’m actually really pleased with how our stuff’s all looking in it, but it’s a 10 part series and I’ve still got 5 more episodes worth of graphics to do, so it’ll probably be a few more weeks until I get a day off!

The show’s being made by Tiger Aspect, and we’ve also just completed graphics for another of their programmes – a Blackadder special which is going out on UK Gold in September, so I’ll probably blog about that a bit closer to the transmission date!

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Our new office.

I mentioned a while ago that we were going to be moving into an office – well that happened at the end of February, and it’s great have a proper space to work in. It’s not 100% finished yet… we’ve still got to put the finishing touches to the edit suite, but I think me and James have done a pretty good job with it!

The picture here shows mine and James’ desks, which is currently where we spend most of our time. To the right of the bookcase, we’ve got a little seating area, and to the left of the shot is an edit suite that we built ourselves using lots of wood and plasterboard! Check out my photos to see how we did it all!

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by Gareth

I’m an uncle!

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Late last night, Brandon David and Chloe Amy were born into the world!

My sis was 27 hours in labour, which sounds like a heck of a long time to me – I think it was a pretty rough one. Brandon was 5lbs 6oz and Chloe was 5lbs, so those are pretty decent weights for twins born a month early!

I’m going down on Saturday to see them – and hopefully they’ll all be out of hospital by then (not a big fan of hospitals myself!)

by Gareth

Amazing

Just got back from my mum’s – Vikky has been in hospital since Friday night because she wasn’t feeling well, and also because her blood pressure had pretty much doubled!

I went to visit her this afternoon at Good Hope hospital, and by the time we got there she’d been moved into a delivery room, going through the final stages before getting ready to give birth! By that point, she was only supposed to have her birthing partners there – Damien and my mum – but they got permission from the midwife for me to visit because I’d not seen her since the beginning of January.

I couldn’t believe how big her bump was when I saw her – it was massive! She’s supposed to have 4 more weeks to go, but there’s no way she could go much longer with 2 babies in there! Her blood pressure has now come down a bit, but I think she still feels quite uncomfortable.

Anyway, they hooked up some pads to her stomach to monitor the babies’ heartbeats, and the whole thing was just amazing. It sounded like a train with both hearts beating just out of sync with each other, then for short periods they’d match up making a really strong beating sound. And it was really weird seeing them kicking really hard – I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like that before – seeing something living, moving so much just under the skin… really freaky to watch, but brilliant at the same time!

By this time tomorrow, I might well have a new nephew and niece!

by Gareth

Work’s going really well…

It’s been a couple of months since my last post, so I thought I should bring my blog up-to-date with stuff that’s been going on.

The big project we worked on at the end of last year was ‘The Vicar Of Dibley’s Greatest & Top 40 Moments’, made by Tiger Aspect for UK Gold.

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We did the titles, interview background graphics and studio backdrops, plus the animated stings to appear before each clip as they counted down – basically anything graphical in the two 90-minute shows! Our work got a really good reaction, and UKTV said the show was one of their highest rating original programmes which was good to hear. And the show was repeated loads over Christmas, so it’s sure to have been seen by a lot of people! And we should have another show from Tiger Aspect to work on from March – this time a series for ITV, so a busy time ahead!

Also before Christmas, I spent a lot of time working with Rob editing the Cannonball 8000 programme. It was a pretty big job because we had to deliver an hour long episode for ITV1 and ITV4, as well as re-cutting it all into 4 half hour episodes to go out on the Extreme channel later this year. There were a lot of late nights, and I was even editing on Christmas Day and Boxing Day!

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‘Channel M Breakfast’ titles shoot.

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by Gareth

Dad’s funeral

Just got back home after being down in Tamworth today for my dad’s funeral. He’d been ill for a very long time but it’s still weird when it actually happens, because no matter how much you’re expecting it at some point, you don’t know how you’ll react.

I guess I still feel a bit numb over it all… today was really hard, especially the funeral service itself. There were a lot of people there – loads that I didn’t recognise, and some faces from the past that I hadn’t seen for 10 – 15 years. As part of the service, a song that my sister recorded with him a few years ago was played, and it was difficult hearing him sing at his own funeral.

I don’t know if I’m going to have some proper reaction further down the line – it feels a bit bottled up at the minute. In the last few years I’d not really been close to him and we’d had a lot of disagreements, but at the end of the day he’s my dad, and he’s now no longer with us, and I know I should react in some way.

Just not sure how at the moment.

by Gareth

Ste & Julie’s wedding

Julie and Steve.

Thought it was time for one of my not-so-regular blogs! A couple of weekends ago, my brother Steve got married to Julie, so that leaves me as the only one not married!!

It was a nice day – they’d asked me to film it for them, so it kept me busy and gave me a job to do! Not sure when I’ll get a chance to edit it though… I still need to do Vikky and Damien’s one from last September! It was a bit weird, because apart from family, I didn’t really know anyone else there – Vikky knows a lot of Ste’s mates, but being up in Manchester means that I lose touch with all stuff like that. There are photos of the day here.

It kind of makes me think about my own life a bit though. Both my brother and sister are now married, and I’d always hoped that the same would happen to me, and that I’ve have my own family and all that, but as I’m getting older, I see all that slipping away from me which makes me really quite sad at times. Also, I suppose as you see your mates around you getting married and having kids, it just reinforces it to you all the time. I know I’ve wasted my life a bit over the last few years… I’ve let my head get totally screwed up twice by someone I really liked (going back for more heartache obviously wasn’t the wisest thing I could have done – but sometimes you don’t act rationally!) It’s a bit weird how much your emotions can switch from having really strong feelings for someone to then never wanting to lay eyes on them again, especially when at the end of the day, the problem is mine not theirs… there’s no law that says they have to feel the same way! Even now though, I’m still struggling to put all that behind me and move on, but by never having to see her again, that should at least mean I can just wipe that period of my life away, and try to move forward. It is totally rubbish though – 5 years of spending your time thinking about one person is such a waste – but it’s a lot easier to say you’re over it than it actually being true!

Wow – that was all a bit more open and honest than I planned… though sometimes it’s good to get things off your chest!

by Gareth

Well, that’s the summer done!

Wow – I can’t believe so much time has passed since I last blogged on here!

It’s been quite a busy summer – I’ve just got back home after being away working for a couple of weeks down at Soul Survivor. I spent 10 days in the Underground venue doing visuals for the venue, so spent most of the time either down the side of the stage or in our make-shift edit suite!

This year I had Tom Steward helping me – it was pretty last minute because both Andy and Kate weren’t able to come this year – but I was really impressed at how quickly he picked it all up, and the stuff he was shooting on stage every night was brilliant.

Some of the video features we did can now be viewed on Youtube so check them out!

So we finished there on Thursday morning, and then I headed up to Bristol to meet up with Ali, and on Friday went with her and some of her friends to Greenbelt.

Claire, Julie, Ali, me and Rosie.

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by Gareth

I hate gambling…

…especially online gambling.

I got a call from my credit card company a couple of weeks ago asking if I’d been using it on various betting websites – which obviously I hadn’t(!) – so they cancelled my card and paid back the few hundred pounds that had been charged to it.

Then today, I decided to just have a look online at my bank account and I saw that two payments had been made on Wednesday to an online betting website for a total of £500! Unbelievable!

I phoned up the bank and they’ve now cancelled my card, but I’ve got to contact the fraud department on Monday to convince them that the payments weren’t mine… but it just really annoys me that I’m a victim of fraud (through no fault of my own), but it could well be up to me to prove it. I’ve no idea how this could have happened on two of my cards – I always have them with me, and I follow all the basic security measures that you can do when using them. It just seems really weird that it can happen to me twice within as many weeks.

Arghh… I’m quite angry about it!

by Gareth

Too old for clubbing!

As per the title really! Although I can’t deny that I really had a great time! It’s just that after getting back at 3am, then grabbing a few hours sleep on the floor, I feel like I should really have gone through all this 10 years ago – though I’m not saying I wouldn’t be up for it again! It came about from going with James to the end-of-year art show at Manchester Met, which had its private viewing on Friday night. I’ve been a couple of times before, and it’s a really good place to get some inspiration, and also to see potential artists who we could maybe get to do some work for us in the future.

So we spent a couple of hours at the show with James’ mum, as well as his aunt and uncle, and then I kind of gatecrashed a family meal at Felicinis on Oxford Road – a really nice Italian restaurant that had just enough English food to ensure I got a good meal!

Me and James at Sub Space.

So after that, we headed over to Greenroom to meet up with some of the other guys who work on the course that James teaches on, then when we got chucked out of there made our way over to Sub Space which was absolutely packed and really hot and sweaty! But the music in there was really funky, and it was just a very good atmosphere, and whereas normally I’d feel a bit out of place being somewhere like that, I totally enjoyed it. I’ve never really got into going out clubbing and stuff – even at uni – but I’m kind of realising that if I’m in the right mind for it, I can actually have a good time.

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by Gareth

Radio 1’s Big Weekend

Radio 1’s Big Weekend.

Well yesterday I went to Radio 1’s Big Weekend in Preston, and I have to say it was excellent!

I nearly didn’t go because it seemed like everyone already had plans for the day, but at the last minute Ajay said he’d be able to take a break from his work and come along.

The weather forecast for this weekend was pretty bleak so I was expecting to get wet and muddy, but it didn’t rain once, and though it was a bit muddy in places, we did really well weather-wise! We got in at about 12 o’clock and had a look around before heading over to the outdoor arena where Westwood was DJing. Now I’ve never been a fan of his – either him on the radio or on MTV’s ‘Pimp My Ride’, but the first thing I noticed about him was his inability to open his mouth with a string of obscenities coming out! He obviously thought it was cool, but to be honest I just thought it was pretty boring, and made him seem even more fake.

Anyway, we headed over to the Main Stage and saw the beginning of Jamie T’s set, but it wasn’t really my thing so we went to the ‘In New Music We Trust’ stage to watch The Pigeon Detectives. I wasn’t really aware of them before, but I knew Ralph likes their stuff, and I did actually recognise one of their songs. They were really good though, and the lead singer was really energetic, and I reckon I’ll take a listen to their future stuff.

Natasha Bedingfield.

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by Gareth

Manic fortnight… and the future…

Jen, me, James and Lou on a ‘Preview’ shoot.

We’re into the final stages of our manic Preview-filming-fortnight! Did three shoots for the next DVD last week (with two in London), yesterday we shot an interview here in Manchester, and then me and James set off for Liverpool this morning at 7am to film some stuff for Liverpool Council’s Sportslinx. It was an incredibly packed schedule with 11 interviews plus shooting various activities!! We didn’t get a chance to break for lunch until about 5 o’clock(!) and we got back home tonight at about eight!

So I’ve just watched this week’s Apprentice (there really are some horrible people in that!!), and now I’m packing some clothes because we’re off to London tonight to do some more Preview filming tomorrow and Friday. We were going to originally leave really early tomorrow morning, but James suggested we drive down halfway tonight, so we’re staying in a Travel Inn at Watford Gap, so we’ll only have about 80 miles to drive in the morning, and hopefully it means we’ll be a bit more awake and less arsey by the end of the day!!

Have chatted more with James about future ideas with regard to the work we both do together, and it looks like there might be some good developments ahead. Not going to go into much detail yet, but I’m quite excited about it and I’m really hoping it all works out.

Other news – I found out this evening that I’ve got a pair of tickets to Radio 1’s Big Weekend next Saturday! I applied online and didn’t really expect to get any, but out of the 500,000 who applied, I was one of the 8,875 who got tickets for the Saturday!! The bands there that day include Razorlight, Kasabian, Scissor Sisters, The Fratellis, The Fray, Natasha Bedingfield and Groove Armada! I definitely want to go, but I just need to find someone to come with me because I don’t fancy going on my own really.

by Gareth

Work stuff and tbwnn album launch

Been pretty busy the last few weeks – last week I had a meeting with some guys from Liverpool council about some work that me and James should hopefully be doing for them soon, and also had a lot to do on trying to get the latest Preview DVD finished (am pretty close now, and managed to get the bits they needed for New York in time!)

Emma with Leon from tbwnn.

Also, on Saturday I was asked to film thebandwithnoname’s launch for their new album and it was a really good gig. I listened properly to their new stuff on my iPod during the Reach weekend, and it really is an excellent album. Anyway, for the gig I was down at the front of the stage, and we also had a fixed camera at the back of the venue so hopefully I should be able to produce a decent edit of it… I just need to try and find some time to do it now!

Obviously one of the reasons that it’s been a bit busier these last two weeks is that James & Helen are on holiday in Australia at the moment so it’s been a bit more intense… and I’m not at all jealous that they’re on such an amazing holiday at the moment! Though I heard from James by email yesterday and they had their campervan broken into this week, and had a few bits and pieces stolen, including his iPod and his phone, so that’s not great. Hopefully the rest of their time out there will be amazing and will wipe out the crap stuff!

by Gareth

Catch up

Quite a bit’s happened in the last few weeks, so I thought I’d better do a quick catch up and write about some of them… I’m manically busy with Preview stuff at the moment – got to try and get it all done for Monday because they need it for a presentation in New York, so that should be fun!

In my last post I mentioned that I had a ‘possibly interesting weekend ahead’… well I ended up in Wales at Cefn Lea for the Reach weekend away, which I suppose was interesting in a way! The last time I went on it was back in 2004, and there were quite a few people there who I hadn’t seen for ages, which was quite strange, but I guess in a way, I am glad I went on it, though it was pretty tough at times. I’m not sure what I was really expecting from it all, but maybe that’s something I need to reflect on over the coming weeks.

One cool thing about the weekend was that I managed to catch up with Russ (from uni and who I used to share a house with in Birmingham) on the Saturday night – he lives a few miles from Cefn Lea so popped over to say ‘hello’. We had a really good chat, and I can’t believe it’s about 3 years since we last met!

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by Gareth

Dodgy wiring

I know generally posts in my blog go on about how busy I am with work, and how tired I am(!) and that’s still true, and I may touch on that in a moment!

But I thought I’d write something that happened on Sunday that was a bit dodgy… I’d noticed recently that the mains switch for my shower could get quite warm sometimes, but assumed that it was normal, and just made sure I only switched it on when I was actually using it. But when I flicked the switch on this Sunday, it made a bit of a crackle, which I thought was odd, and then a few minutes later it did the same without me even touching it.

So I turned the power off and removed the plate to look behind the switch, and discovered that the live wire from the shower had welded itself into the terminal, and had burnt quite badly, and that the earth wire had melted through the plastic covering of the live!

Now I’m not an expert on house wiring but I’m guessing that’s not particularly safe! A quick trip down to B&Q to buy a new switch, and I now have electrics that hopefully won’t burst into flames! What is a bit worrying though is why it did it in the first place, and also why the mains didn’t trip when the earth melted into the live wire… need to get that sorted really.

Work’s still incredibly busy… have got quite a few projects on the go at the moment, and I’m desperate for some time off! I want to try and get some work on my house sorted but I just haven’t had the time. Hopefully next month should be a little bit quieter.

Right – need to get on with some work that was supposed to be done yesterday! Have a possibly interesting weekend ahead… may post about that later…