The Grand Budapest Hotel is the front runner of this year’s awards with 11 nominations, including Best Film and Ralph Fiennes for Best Actor. I personally love this movie.  Director Wes Anderson and cinematographer Robert Yeoman, both also up for nominations, have created, in my opinion, one of the most beautifully shot films of the year and I have my fingers crossed that it’s highly stylised execution will be met with as much appreciation as its excellent script writing and acting.

Photo Credit: Martin Scali

Falling just behind the Grand Budapest Hotel with 10 nominations is Birdman; a film I have not yet seen but is currently at the top of my to-watch list. The all-star cast includes Michael Keaton who is in tough competition for the Best Actor category, as well as co-stars Emma Stone and Edward Norton, who are up for Best Supporting Actress and Actor respectively.

In joint second place, again with 10 nominations, is The Theory of Everything which I absolutely cannot wait to see; partly because I worked briefly on it during pre-production camera tests, and partly because I am a great admirer of both Professor Stephen Hawking and the incredible acting of Eddie Redmayne who is quite deservedly up for Best Actor for his portrayal of the living legend himself.

As with the Golden Globe nominations, Eddie Redmayne is yet again vying for the Best Actor Award with Benedict Cumberbatch and his portrayal of Alan Turing in The Imitation Game. The Imitation Game is nominated for 9 awards including Outstanding British Film.

Credit: Liam Daniels

Rounding off the Best Film category is Oscar favourite, Boyhood, with 5 nominations. Perhaps a disappointment with its film-makers but still, Richard Linklater is at least up for Best Director. Boyhood is being re-released to UK cinemas next week and I for one will be checking it out.

Other films up for awards include Whiplash; which sees nominations for JK Simmons for Best Supporting Actor; as well as entering into the running for awards in the directing, original screenplay, editing and sound categories.

Surprisingly, Interstellar and Gone Girl were towards the bottom of the list with them being nominated for just 4 and 2 awards respectively, though thankfully one of Gone Girl’s nominations is rightly for Rosamund Pike as Best Actress.

Sandwiched between Interstellar and Gone Girl, and another one on my to-watch list is Pride with just 3 nominations, including Imelda Staunton for Best Supporting Actress. Pride is based on the true story of the ‘Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners’ movement (LGSM) and is full of inspirational and feel-good vibes that begs the question of why the story hadn’t been brought to cinema faster.

Finally, I’m disappointed to see Guardians of the Galaxy only nominated for 2 awards though non-surprisingly it’s for its incredible hair and make-up and visual effects. If only there was a soundtrack category.

Credit: Me!

Check out the full list of nominations below and make sure you watch the winners announced on Sunday 8^th February with returning host, Stephen Fry!

Best Film

• Birdman
• Boyhood
• The Grand Budapest Hotel
• The Imitation Game
• The Theory of Everything

Outstanding British Film

• ’71
• The Imitation Game
• Paddington
• Pride
• The Theory of Everything
• Under The Skin

Best Actor

• Benedict Cumberbatch – The Imitation Game
• Ralph Fiennes – The Grand Budapest Hotel
• Jake Gyllenhaal – Nightcrawler
• Michael Keaton – Birdman
• Eddie Redmayne – The Theory of Everything

Best Actress

• Amy Adams – Big Eyes
• Felicity Jones – The Theory of Everything
• Julianne Moore – Still Alice
• Rosamund Pike – Gone Girl
• Reese Witherspoon – Wild

Best Supporting Actor

• Steve Carell – Foxcatcher
• Ethan Hawke – Boyhood
• Edward Norton – Birdman
• Mark Ruffalo – Foxcatcher
• JK Simmons – Whiplash

Best Supporting Actress

• Patricia Arquette – Boyhood
• Rene Russo – Nightcrawler
• Keira Knightley – The Imitation Game
• Imelda Staunton – Pride
• Emma Stone – Birdman

Director

• Wes Anderson – Grand Budapest Hotel
• Damian Chazelle – Whiplash
• Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu – Birdman
• Richard Linklater – Boyhood
• James Marsh – The Theory of Everything

Adapted Screenplay

• American Sniper – Jason Hall
• Gone Girl – Gillian Flynn
• The Imitation Game – Graham Moore
• Paddington – Paul King
• The Theory of Everything – Anthony McCarten

Original Screenplay

• Birdman – Alejandro G. Inarritu, Nicolas Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris Jr, Armando Bo
• Boyhood – Richard Linklater
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Wes Anderson
• Nightcrawler – Dan Gilroy
• Whiplash – Damien Chazelle

Animated Film

• Big Hero 6
• The Boxtrolls
• The Lego Movie

Documentary

• 20 Feet from Stardom
• 20,000 Days on Earth
• Citizenfour
• Finding Vivian Maier
• Virunga

Foreign Film

• Ida
• Leviathan
• The Lunchbox
• Trash
• Two Days, One Night

Cinematography

• Birdman – Emmanuel Lubezki
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Robert Yeoman
• Ida – Lukasz Zal, Ryszard Lenczewski
• Interstellar – Hoyte van Hoytema
• Mr Turner – Dick Pope

Costume Design

• The Grand Budapest Hotel
• The Imitation Game
• Into the Woods
• Mr Turner
• The Theory of Everything

Editing

• Birdman – Douglas Crise, Stephen Mirrione
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Barney Pilling
• The Imitation Game – William Goldenberg
• Nightcrawler – John Gilroy
• The Theory of Everything – Jinx Godfrey
• Whiplash – Tom Cross

Make-Up and Hair

• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Frances Hannon
• Guardians of the Galaxy – Elizabeth Yianni-Georgiou, David White
• Into the Woods – Peter Swords King, J Roy Helland
• Mr Turner – Christine Blundell, Lesa Warrener
• The Theory of Everything – Jan Sewell

Music

• Birdman – Antonio Sanchez
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Alexandre Desplat
• Interstellar – Hans Zimmer
• The Theory of Everything – Johann Johannsson
• Under the Skin – Mica Levi

Production Design

• Big Eyes – Rick Heinrichs, Shane Vieau
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Adam Stockhausen, Anna Pinnock
• The Imitation Game – Maria Djurkovic, Tatiana MacDonald
• Interstellar – Nathan Crowley, Gary Fettis
• Mr Turner – Suzie Davies, Charlotte Watts

Sound

• American Sniper – Walt Martin, John Reitz, Gregg Rudloff, Alan Robert Murray, Bub Asman
• Birdman – Thomas Varga, Martin Hernandez, Aaron Glascock, Jon Taylor, Frank A Montaño
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Wayne Lemmer, Christopher Scarabosio, Pawel Wdowczak
• The Imitation Game – John Midgley, Lee Walpole, Stuart Hilliker, Martin Jensen
• Whiplash – Thomas Curley, Ben Wilkins, Craig Mann

Visual Effects

• Dawn of the Planet of the Apes – Joe Letteri, Dan Lemmon, Erik Winquist, Daniel Barrett
• Guardians of the Galaxy – Stephane Ceretti, Paul Corbould, Jonathan Fawkner, Nicolas
• Aithadi
• The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies – Joe Letteri, Eric Saindon, David Clayton, R Christopher White
• Interstellar – Paul Franklin, Scott Fisher, Andrew Lockley
• X-Men: Days of Future Past – Richard Stammers, Anders Langlands, Tim Crosbie, Cameron Waldbauer

British Short Animation

• The Bigger Picture – Chris Hees, Daisy Jacobs, Jennifer Majka
• Monkey Love Experiments – Ainslie Henderson, Cam Fraser, Will Anderson
• My Dad – Marcus Armitage

British Short Film

• Boogaloo and Graham – Brian J Falconer, Michael Lennox, Ronan Blaney
• Emotional Fusebox – Michael Berliner, Rachel Tunnard
• The Karman Line – Campbell Beaton, Dawn King, Tiernan Hanby, Oscar Sharp
• Slap – Islay Bell-Webb, Michelangelo Fano, Nick Rowland
• Three Brothers -S Aleem Khan, Matthieu de Braconier, Stephanie Paeplow

Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer

• Elaine Constantine (writer/director Northern Soul)
• Gregory Burke, Yann Demange (writer and director ’71)
• Hong Khaou (writer/director Lilting)
• Paul Katis, Andrew De Lotbiniere (director/producer and producer Kajaki: The True Story)
• Stephen Beresford, David Livingstone (writer and producer Pride)

Rising Star Award

• Gugu Mbatha-Raw
• Jack O’Connell
• Margot Robbie
• Miles Teller
• Shailene Woodley

The post 2015 BAFTA Nominations appeared first on Aimee Spinks Photography.

Casting/Looking for Contributors for US TLC docu-series: ‘Crazy Love’

The producers of Untold Stories of the ER are now conducting an international search for stories of sexual mishaps that have ended up in the hospital!

We are seeking funny stories from folks in the UK, Australia and New Zealand.

Did you have an oopsie while making whoopie? Do you have a funny story about a sexual misadventure that landed you in the hospital, doctor’s office or clinic? Have you had an intimate misadventure that tops all others?

Do you have an outrageous story that you and your partner(s) love to share?

We want to hear your stories!

Looking for fun, lively couples 18+ who are dating, married, or broken up…

Compensation will be provided for selected stories!

Email Us: CastingFunnyStories6@gmail.com

Call Us: 1+818.563.4131 ext. 216 (Ask for Erica)

Crew Training Opportunities with BBC Academy

The BBC Academy is set to offer six new Creative Skillset-funded initiatives for TV freelancers in the UK creative industries.
Aimed at addressing key industry skills shortages, all of the initiatives will run over the next six months and funding is available for up to 90% of the course costs.
The courses are:

High End Craft Training
A series of five day studio courses for freelance craft practitioners in studio sound, studio lighting, studio camera craft and vision mixing.

Comedy Studio Craft Skills
A comprehensive training initiative that includes an intensive three day studio course for studio craft freelancers wanting to specialise in studio comedy productions.

The course will take place in Salford on the 28 to 31 March and deliver high end craft skills in directing, lighting and sound. The BBC Academy is partnering with Dock 10 in Media City to deliver this course. Dock 10 is also co-funding this initiative.

The New Story
A series of different courses in storytelling delivered at various locations across the UK. The courses will increase storytelling confidence and abilities, offer a set of golden rules relevant to any genre, and show how to put storytelling at the heart of the production.

Courses on offer include Introduction to Storytelling, Story Structuring for Factual Short Form, Story Structuring for Factual Long form, and Writing for TV. The Academy is partnering withDV Talent and the Indie Training Fund to help deliver these courses.

Creative Pop-Ups
A one day course for freelancers working in the creative industries or in creative roles across the UK.

The course gives an understanding of how creativity works, different creative styles and ways to maximise creativity and creative collaboration. There will also be an insight into creative leadership methods to influence, persuade and inspire others to believe in artistic ideas. This course will take place across the UK.

Factual Showrunner Live Events
This is a unique and intensive four day course targeted at first time potential freelance series producers or day producers of live factual. It will also be suitable for those who come from observational documentary series or fixed format backgrounds and who have not worked on live output. The course will take place in London and Wood Norton.

Two-Week Shadowing Development Programme
This will offer freelancers the chance to work in sought-after genres and departments across the industry. The Academy will be working in partnership with the Royal Television Societyto place 30 freelancers with production teams across the UK. Individuals will receive a fixed fee of £500 per week during their placement.

The courses are open to TV freelancers who are either:

• Employed in the creative industry on a fixed term contract of less than 364 days;
• In employment in the creative industry but able to prove that they have been given a date fortermination of employment and will become a freelancer;
• Unemployed but have previous professional experience working in the industry within the past two years.

Other eligibility criteria may apply for the different courses. To find out if you are eligible, learn more about the courses or register your interest, please contact the BBC Academy course co-ordination team:

Our advisors are available to help from 09:00-17:00 (Mon-Fri).

Email: bbcacademy@bbc.co.uk

Telephone: Tel: +44 (0)370 010 0264 Fax: +44 (0)370 010 0265

Address:

BBC Academy

BRITISH BROADCASTING CORPORATION

Room A16, BBC Wood Norton, Evesham,

Worcestershire WR11 4YB

Crew Development/Networking Opportunities with BAFTA Crew 2014

Last year, Creative England partnered with BAFTA and Creative Skillset to bring you the BAFTA crew masterclasses. Bringing you speakers such as Eve Stewart, Ben Davis, Anita Overland and Sean Bobbitt DOP of Oscar winning “12 Years a Slave”. This year the scheme is back, its bigger and is giving crew more opportunities to network and meet Feature HODS.

For more details and to apply please go to:

BAFTA Crew 2014 Info: http://www.bafta.org/about/supporting-talent/bafta-crew,3554,BA.html

BAFTA Crew 2014 FAQs: http://www.bafta.org/about/supporting-talent/bafta-crew-questions,3556,BA.html

http://www.bafta.org/about/supporting-talent/bafta-crew,3554,BA.html

Creative England Crew Night (Bristol)

Creative England Crew night – Thursday 13th March

Creative England are pleased to announce that the team will be returning to Brighton for one of their ever popular Crew Nights, on Thursday 13th March 2014 between 6-8pm.

As always it’s a great opportunity for your members to connect with other crew, production companies, facilities houses and filmmakers in your region as well as meeting the Production Services team. We are also delighted to announce that we will be joined by some of Creative England’s Film Team, so it’s also a great opportunity for them to hear about the Creative England film offer for Writers, Directors and Producers.

Our hosts for the night will be The Brighton Centre http://www.brightoncentre.co.uk/ and we will be supported by our Film Friendly partners Brighton and Hove City Council.

To book a place your members will need to visit: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/creative-england-crew-night-presenting-the-film-team-brighton-thursday-13th-march-tickets-10510560369

The post BBC Academy, BAFTA Crew, Creative England & Casting appeared first on Aimee Spinks Photography.

On Tuesday 23rd April, 7 – 9 pm at, The Council House, Victoria Square, Birmingham, B1 1BB

Come and find out what’s happening in the City, meet Film Birmingham and register on their crew, facilities & locations database. Meet the people who are hiring and find out how to put yourself in the best position to be hired.  This event is just one Film Birmingham are hoping to generate a conversation and action around how we can all collaborate toward a sustainable production base in Birmingham

The evening is aimed at crew, facilities and production companies.

Please register below to attend.

http://www.productioninbirmingham.eventbrite.co.uk

The post Film Networking Birmingham appeared first on Aimee Spinks Photography.

It was a fairly quiet turnout both from exhibitors and visitors but then again I did go along on the final day (hoping to see what last day deals were on offer)!

First of all, I paid a visit to the guys at SmugMug. Smug Mug is a company I have recently started working with as they enable me to create an interactive client area that allows clients to view all the photos taken during a particular session as well as managing the order process.

The staff at SmugMug were extremely helpful and gave me a one to one tutorial on how to custom design my client area so that it fit with my current branding. I would highly recommend SmugMug to anyone in the photographic industry looking for an easy way to manage client galleries as it’s a fully customisable service that manages every aspect of post-shoot image delivery including; providing thumbnails and proof images; as well as handling printing, delivery and sales; complete with trackable statistics.

After chatting with the SmugMug team, it wasn’t long before I found my favourite camera manufacturer: Nikon

As usual, Nikon had arranged for a whole host of presentations from discussions on their latest kit to demonstrating the ‘Matrix Effect’ as achieved by the 50 D800s hanging from a crescent of scaffolding above the main stage.

I had a bit of a play with the hardware on the stands but my main loves were the Nikon D4 and D800 cameras. The D800 is an unbelievable studio camera that I have since gone on to purchase, which, coupled with my favourite piece of glass; Nikon’s 70-200mm f/2.8 lens makes for some mind blowing studio work. With a bigger budget though I would love to get my hands on the D4. For shooting in low light conditions with the power of 10fps it’s perfect for unit stills photography and is at the top of my wish list!

Also at the expo were rental houses, Calumet and The Flash Centre. Though I have dealt with both in the past, The Flash Centre has the edge over Calumet price wise and has come out top previously when I have needed to get my hands on a large range of kit for an advertising shoot with British actor, Ralph Fiennes.

The only let down for The Flash Centre is the location of its Birmingham branch, as it’s not as easy to reach as the more central Calumet branch. However they make up for this with their excellent customer service and it’s here we need to give a shout out to Brian – thanks for putting up with all my calls and providing me with all the help and advice you have imparted!

Like Nikon , The Flash Centre were also putting on a range of demonstrations, mainly focusing on showcasing the latest Elinchrom lighting and accessories as well as some creative studio lighting techniques. After watching these, I wouldn’t mind playing around with some gels and a smoke machine!

It’s probably worth noting at this point that alongside collecting my fair share of catalogues, brochures and freebies, I was armed with a substantial amount of kit in order to take photos of my tour of the show. After spending a while looking both online and at various exhibitors, I decided to purchase Lowepro’s Flipside 400AW camera bag. The main motivator for this is that I realised that with my ever expanding kit, I just couldn’t fit everything I needed into my current camera bags and had found myself taking assignments on location armed with several smaller bags – which is never a practical solution! The other consideration is my recent purchase of an Aquatech Sound Blimp – a mammoth camera housing designed to act as a silencer so that my shutter clicks don’t interfere with the sound department on TV and film productions. The Flipside 400AW not only provided me with all the space I needed, but my favourite feature is the flipside access – perfect for securing my valuable equipment in a crowded tradeshow! By the time I had finished touring the Focus on Imaging show, laden as I was, the bag provided great comfort for the entire duration and I went home without any of my typical back complaints!

Finally, my last shout out goes to the guys at Hasselblad and Broncolor, who recently held a hands on open day at Birmingham’s White Room Studios for visitors to check out their latest gear. Since the event, our close friends at the studio have gone on to invest in some of the best lighting a photographer can hope for. The studio now boasts:

1x Broncolor Scoro 3200W Power Pack with INSANE recycle times!
1x Broncolor 3200W Ringflash
2x Broncolor 3200W Unilites
1x Broncolor 220 Parabolic Reflector

Unfortunately the Hasselblad cameras were out of my price range but it was a great opportunity to give them a test drive! Any photographers out there looking to shoot with some of the best lighting available can hire the White Room Studios 2500sqft photography studio for just £35p/hour, a half day for just £120 or a full day for just £220. Photography studio hire rates include full use of their cutting edge kit with enough studio space to shoot almost anything. The White Room Studio also boasts a range of equipment to support video including continuous lighting and mics should your shoot not be restricted to stills alone!

Remember when I said our final shout out was to Hasselblad and Broncolor? Well, I lied. I couldn’t promote all these big brands without one look at one of the photographers exhibiting at this years’ Focus on Imaging show: George F Williams.

Automotive photography isn’t something I claim to know anything about. What I do know about however is what makes a great image and George’s photos on display absolutely blew me away. Based in Surrey, Williams has provided creative photography for a range of clients, most recently shooting McClaren’s exquisite P1 Prototype. In closing, I thought I’d share some of his images with you. The first image below is one of my favourite from the exhibition:

Check out more of Williams’s amazing work on his website or follow him on Twitter @GFWilliams!

So there you have it – my experience of Focus on Imaging’s 2013 tradeshow and my favourite exhibitors. See you there next year?

The post Birmingham Event Photography – Focus on Imaging 2013 appeared first on Aimee Spinks Photography.

As I mentioned in my previous entry I had a couple of exhibitions coming up and I am pleased to announce that they were a huge success! After a cock up with the accompanying publication to the exhibition, I was relying on people to find my nicely stacked pile of business cards for contact details and it looks like all of them were taken from the first show in Manchester!

Last night was the opening in London, which although didn’t have as a big a turnout at Manchester, did see a lot of industry professionals through the doors. Ben Trebilcook; screenwriter and producer who I am looking forward to working with on his new script for ‘Candy,’ popped along to check out the work (and pinch the free beer!). Ben also introduced me to some of his actor friends whom I also look forward to working with later this month. In all it was a successful night from which I may have gotten a few jobs as well as print sales and I look forward to the next time I can exhibit my work.

Currently I am in the process of doing a spot of market research (keep checking back for future blog entries for your chance to participate!) for a niche service for the acting industry that is at present unavailable anywhere. I am also looking to update my portfolio with work more relevant to the path I want my career to take so keep an eye out for gradual changes on the website and new work emerging!

The post Photography Blog: Update on Events! appeared first on Aimee Spinks Photography.