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As many of you will know, Covid-19 has been an extraordinary challenge for us at the London Screenwriters’ Festival. I am sure it has for you too.

Like so many businesses, we have suffered greatly and the team has had to be let go and the offices closed, in order that we survive.

On top we ended up running a month long online festival at the start of Summer. So yeah, it’s been real.

So we have a cut. It’s a tad long. But it’s in great shape thanks to Giovanni our talented editor. Tomorrow we begin the journey to bring the films together in the best quality available, from the supplied drives. We have been working in a kind of ‘offline world’ for the edit as there are so many films in so many different formats.

One major challenge we face now is the end of the film as we don’t really have a satisfactory conclusion.

We are deep into the edit of Impact50 now and hoping to have a completed cut by the end of the year.

More ‘concept album’ than ‘playlist’, the building of a feature film from all the films submitted is taking some management, creativity and occasionally flashes of inspiration.  

But it’s looking really great!

Every film made for a Create50 has two potential lives. First and foremost, each film takes its place in the final Create50 film, making its way to a big screen alongside the work of other filmmakers in a celebration of creative collaboration.

The second life is as a standalone film, allowing the filmmakers to send their film out into the world through festivals, social media, short film platforms - whatever. Watch the original version HERE.

An asteroid is about to hit earth, destroying all life. With only 97 minutes left until impact, Chloe and Daniel decide to lose their virginity to each other.

Unfortunately, it doesn't last as long as expected, and they must endure a rather awkward 5 minutes as they wait for the final bang. 

We wanted to try juxtaposing this challenge by writing and creating a comedy. We had a few different ideas, but this seemed the most simple and relatable. We were able to really explore the characters in just a few moments of dialogue because the impact of what these two had done makes them so vulnerable.

We are a small group of film makers, creating low/no-budget shorts in our spare time.

Our core team (of Kevin, Patricia & Matthew) met while working on a low budget scifi feature film in NZ several years ago. Working together we have made 3 shorts so far, bringing in other cast & crew that we meet along the way.

‘The Survivalist’ was a collaboration between The Glitch Collective (‘Mariana 627’, ‘What’s Wrong With Morris?’), Period 8 Pictures (‘A Beautiful Death’, ‘Too Many Cooks’) and the newly-established Oakhaven Films, members of each having worked together on previous projects. Oakhaven was the fictional company for which the main character of our sci-fi short 'Mariana 627' worked, and is now the main trading name for our director Matt George Lovett. 'The Survivalist' represents the first short film officially shot under the Oakhaven name, but with upcoming period horror 'Nun's Cross' in the works, it certainly will not be the last.

In January 2019 I became aware of Impact 50 and its impending deadline. Inspired by the story and concept, I resolved to write a script. It seemed a great opportunity to challenge my writing skills, get feedback and fingers crossed, someone would want to make my script into a film. What did I have to lose?

I ended up writing four scripts; Where are you?, Always, Once and We just want you to be happy. The intention behind each of these is that they are blueprints and flexible enough to be interpreted by anyone in the international spirit of the challenge. 

Producer and writer Stephanie Ginger who divides her time between the Algarve and the UK, formed Gingersnap Productions specifically to make one of her own scripts Blood Sweat and Tears for Phase Two of the Impact50 incentive.

Recognising the potential of re-creating Africa in Portugal, she enlisted the help of director Kristjan Knigge and retired Production Designer BJ Boulter who know both Portugal and Africa intimately and are well-versed in ‘film-making by the seat of your pants’!

Have you done it yet? Have you clicked on the “register” button? What am I talking about? Well I am talking about registering your participation in your life goals. Say what now?

You have been talking and dreaming for ages now about making your film and sharing your stories with the world. In order to do that though, you have to take those first steps to fuel your rocket ship and we are giving you that opportunity in the guise of the 48hour film challenge

With the end of the world imminent, Danny has only a short time to "do it" ..for the first time.

I found the concept of the end of the world very depressing, so wrote something that I thought would add a bit of fun.

I was registered to go to Cannes, but in the end didn't go as the music producer Mike Bennett wanted me to do some filming,which left me some spare time to shoot this. We cast and shot in a week.

It occurred to me that North Korea is probably the only country in the world where the news wouldn't be published and I thought that would be an interesting situation for British Consulate employees to find themselves in. I believe our government would try to inform all employees so they would be some of the few people in the know. There is a curfew in many parts of North Korea I understand so as relatively minor employees in their own home in the middle of the night, they would be stuck.

As the asteroid approaches, a young girl, Amy, about to be robbed of her womanhood, is faced with the choice of either staying with her family or spending her last hours with Dan, the one she loves - but he's also the one her father despises.

Rather than die surrounded by her father's religious dogma, Amy decides to follow her heart and choose life over death.

"When the Earth faces an extinction event like no other since the dinosaurs, where is the hope?" Inspired by the Neil Young song, After the Goldrush, Silver Seed suggests that against all odds even the slimmest hope always survives... Ever since the 1940's a secret project has been preparing for this very day.

9 Point Productions Silver Seed Team is made up of seasoned professionals who all share the idea that there is always hope even when it's not obvious. We gathered in a local church and shot our film in one day.

It was going to be the biggest rule breaker!

I had loved the idea of the Impact story when it first launched and even wrote a script. But it was only a couple of months ago catching up with friends and their projects that I realized the competition was open again.  I started watching the films that were already posted up. 

A fellow Talent Camper friend encouraged me to enter with a script and to film it myself. 

After the massive boost provided by Talent Campus 6.0, Helen wrote the script and submitted it to the Impact50 project. At the same time, she got involved with the contribution 'Where Are You?', collaboratively developed by the Ravenclaw group from TC6 (mentored by Lucy V. Hay). With just a few weeks to go before the submission deadline, Helen took on the challenge of getting Prime Meridian produced too. She turned to a key group of collaborators she'd worked with in the past - including her Inigo co-director Zoe Cunningham.

I contacted Zade Aerial who were excited to take up the project. I was struggling to find a Indian actor and fellow Talent Camper Omar put me in touch with an actor friend of his, Yanick who really liked the Impact idea, script and was excited about joining the project. Unable to find a disabled Indian actor, I had some encouragement from another fellow Talent Camper Bob, to get it filmed myself, it was a huge decision between spending another day on bed rest or miss this exciting collaborative opportunity.

So I took it up. Zade and I talked in detail about the project, came up with additional ideas that could help bring the story alive and feel more cinematic. The small team of 2 film makers, an actor and myself, changed small things along the way. The film was shot in one day. Despite a very tiring day we got all the shots that were needed. Zade went off to start the edit and the results were as I had hoped.

I wrote this film following an article published in the Korea Herald in 2017 which was then picked up internationally including in the UK, about the high rates of domestic violence in South Korea. The Korea Herald reported that 80% of men admitted abusing their girlfriends.

Asia overall, like much of the world, has a problem with misogyny and spousal abuse but this report was conducted by the Korean Institute of Criminology and I was shocked that so many people were happy to admit to it and didn't see their behaviour as abuse. I wanted to highlight this issue.

A small team that started in the northeast of Scotland, which uses local people to produce short and public information films.

‘Be Prepared’ explores the dilemma faced by two Guide Leaders on whether to carry on camping or to tell the Guides of their impending doom, knowing that they are miles away from their families.

School's Out follows the staff and pupils at St. Mark's (a fictional secondary school) as news of the impact breaks within a normal school day.

Producer James Skinner works as Media Coordinator at a school in London, supporting pupils to make short films in collaboration with pupils from another local school. He enlisted the help of writer Ben Marshall, who he worked with on another Impact50 film last year (Rock. Paper. Scissors.) to write a script for Phase 2.

My life, like so many screenwriters, is pretty busy between making a crust, family and the added complication that most years I feel I spend more time on planes than with my feet on the ground.  Added to which, I am British, I live in Britain, my  biggest network is in Britain but to be honest my life is so busy here I just couldn't see how I would have the time to shoot when in UK.  So I looked at my life, and decided I'd have to do my filming elsewhere.

Yesterday, my two-page screenplay ‘Ultimate Cosplay’ finally found its way on top of a very high tower block in Tower Hamlets to become a short film. The story is about a group of friends that like to dress up in costumes (cos-play) who on learning a meteor will bring an end to life on earth, decide to meet for one last hurrah by having their photo taken with the meteor streaking behind them.

A new 48 hour film challenge like no other. As we draw Impact50 to a conclusion, we are ramping up a global filmmaking challenge to make a film in 48 hours. Sign up here to get details when released.

I don't know what might have gone in the cull of the First Phase tranche as a result of the mindset applied to it or the lack of breadth of response to the brief, but taking on board Chris's call for more left-field approaches for Phase submissions, I recommend the following three...

One of the things that has struck me – both writing and reading for this project – is how quickly we all jump to grand, sweeping gestures which may or may not be out of character – obviously we never get to see this for ourselves – but so many of the characters are looking for some form of last stand, like a last-ditch attempt to deny the inevitability of their demise.

The impact 50 is a hugely ambitious project, and as a writer I can only imagine the difficulty in pulling together a feature length portmanteau of 50 shorts, to produce a complete and coherent story!

I became involved in this project a few weeks ago having submitted a couple of scripts into the mix, so I’m only just steering the tip of the ice berg; I stuck in my oar and waited for the ice to melt!

I have been a screenwriter for almost seven years and I didn't go to any film school.

The only way I knew to learn how to write a screenplay was to read screenwriting books and, more importantly, a lot of scripts.

Impact50 has given me a chance to read beautifully written scripts and I would like to suggest A LOT of them because their quality level is awesome, but I have chosen three.

I'm delighted to have been asked to choose my favourite Impact 50 scripts. To make my selection I made my best effort to get into the mind-set of a director and ask myself whether the script would be fulfilling to bring to the screen.

Ultimately, the one thing about all of my picks is that when I read them I feel something on an emotional level. It takes a lot of skill and craft to achieve that within 2 pages.

Full disclosure: I love Create50, because they made me scale down.

I’d started with novels – historical fiction at that – and then came Singularity50, which was too enticing to ignore.

I’m lucky enough to be included in the anthology, but even without that, it’s such a joy to tell a complete story in a few pages.

The aim of Impact50 is to weave fifty short stories from around the world about the last moments of civilisation before the final big bang and create a cosmic belter of a feature film. And there’s still time to pick one of the many 2 page scripts from the website. It’s a fantastic opportunity so why not get involved, shoot a short film and see if you can make the final cut. There are so many great scripts available, but here are a couple that caught my eye.

There are no more tomorrows, no more today's. An extinction event sized meteor is heading for Earth. The President of the United States (not Trump) announces that all life on the planet is about to be wiped out in approximately two hours. It is the ultimate Wrexit.

That’s the premise of Impact 50. A feature-length film comprising of around 50 short stories from around the world set during those final, precious moments. Each script represents a unique snapshot of how humanity might choose to face the music. Will they dance, will they go quietly into the night, or will they rage against the universe? 

One of the best things you can do as a screenwriter is write short scripts.  Trust me. 

One day I submitted to a micro-short festival, the next I had a Skype call, an option and a director asking for script edits! Me! The nobody who thought something up sitting on the sofa listening to a cat snore! My producer is lovely and we're now at the stage where we have thirteen cast and crew and are looking to shoot our short in summer but... and here's the kicker... finding a producer and director is often more luck than judgement. I am lucky...

The screenwriting community in phase two of The Impact50 is really vibrant, with some terrific screenplays just waiting to get married to amazing filmmakers. You can read the scripts HERE.

Over the next two weeks, we are planning, prepping and building the final push for filmmakers.

One Last Outro was directed by Rebecca Hardy and stars Grace Dixon (Cruel Summer, DisPossess) and Luca Malacrino (Coronation Street, Greys Anatomy) and was shot in Wales.

The story focuses on broadcaster Claire Jones who decides to spent her final moments alive on air, until an asteroid blast kills her signal and the rest of the world with it.

During phase one of The Impact50 we found that there were some patterns in the completed films, and on balance, we needed some other types of stories.

Generally, we had a lot of moving, but ‘nice’ stories. Sometimes comedy, sometimes drama that hits you in the feels.

We need more stories that hit us in the feels, but we also need greater diversity in characters locations and genre. Let me expand…

Last November Vicky began the job of getting filmmakers who made it in to Phase 2 to send their films – raw footage, sound, projects, VFX, renders, exports – the who shebang.

And so now the job REALLY starts.

Here are some of the things we are now contending with as we conform everything into a single project…

We are now building Phase Two of The Impact50 and some people have been asking about Phase One.

The original idea behind The Impact 50 was based on our success with 50 Kisses. We had writers submit two page scripts, we selected what we thought were the best 50, then released them on the internet and any filmmaker could then make a version of the script. We had around 350 films submitted and selected the best and made a feature film.

Unlike other screenwriting and filmmaking initiatives, Create50 builds in peer review so that the submissions can be the best work possible.

With films this often centers around the edit, sound, music and possible reshoots.

One film we really liked but felt needed more work was T Minus. Have a look at the first edit below.

Following Blue Sky day where we discussed marketing, Ben Marshall took the bull by the horns and contacted his local newspapers and ended up with a magnificent full page spread in the Sheffield Star.. You can read below and get it in hi res by clicking the PDF link and download it locally.

We really encourage this kind of local media outreach as it gets GREAT results and raises the profile of the whole project.

Ok have a read and leave feedback…

First of all my apologies for being ‘off radar’ for a week, the whole team has been running Talent Campus 4.0.

On that note we have also been running a Crowdfund for Cancer research as one of our past Talent Campers, Kim Wheeler,  has been diagnosed with Leukaemia (Kim is also a Create50 writer and Producer, so a member of this community).

It would be great if you could throw something into the hat to help find a cure for Kim.

Congratulations to the filmmakers and writers whose work has reached the shortlist for the #Impact50 feature film.

It’s been a challenge to select these films and there remain challenges in the future as there is clearly come crossover within these stories, and duplicates. And some late comer new edits that still need to be updated on the site.

Enni Red and her team have submitted their version of ‘Sing Mummy’ to #Impact50 and have taken it one step further by designing a film poster.

This is what I love so much about The Impact50, it’s a real world lab and self taught film school in bite sized chunks.

The more you do, the more you learn.

I saw the Facebook thread from Enni when she had several versions of the poster, all offering feedback to get to this piece of art which I love. This feedback is central to community, collaboration, growth and experience, and represent the real prize at the heart of Create50.

Whilst most enjoyed the sun last Sunday, I spent it with the Create 50 team and other end of the world enthusiasts. Blue sky indoors. The plan, to help the team assess where the Impact film is, where it is going and suggest ideas about how a Phase 2, if adopted, could look. The group included a mix of those involved at day one to those newer to the project. We discussed how a Phase 1 film will look as it is; its strengths and weaknesses; where it could be added to and how viable is a Phase 2 vision.

It was always going to be an interesting shoot.

The script, “And Then There Were Two”, follows two older people who, having heard that an imminent meteor strike will end humanity, enjoy their remaining time together by playing with abandoned beach gear – having first released the bonds of everyday life by removing their clothes…

I learned a fantastic little trick during post that I plan to use on all future jobs. Once we were nearly happy with the cut we knew we had to get the actors back in to redo quite some of their dialogue, as so often happens. We wanted to change the sense and tone, more than the actual words. But to save time and money we sent our super cast the lines and they recorded them at home on their phones and emailed the sound files back. 

Hi Vicky from Create50 here… Can you help support #Impact50 by supporting our two social media Thunderclaps?

The first is to announce the Phase One Shortlist of films. The second is to announce Phase two, with the Presidents Clip on the 4^th of July. That’s assuming Phase two happens, but we do need to line up the Thunderclap just in case.

It will take just a few minutes and will make a HUGE difference to the project and help everyone involved.

What do Steven Soderbergh and Sundance have in common? They've both championed the iPhone as the ultimate indie-filmmaker's tool. So, on a busy Bank Holiday weekend in May 2018 a micro-crew set out to see if we could make a cinematic masterpiece in glorious 4k with just an iPhone 6s. As a result, Create50 has its very own iPhone entry in the shape of Life’s A Beach, shot in true guerrilla style on a stunning beach in Byron Bay, Australia Norfolk.

Here’s how it unfolded…

So it’s Blue Sky day this Sunday.

Around twenty five people who have been deeply involved in the Impact50 will gather at Ealing Studios to discuss what phase two could be, and how we execute it if we choose it.

It does feel a little Mission Impossible… Your mission, should you choose to accept it…!

So the big question for Impact50… What is it and what do we do now the filmmaking challenge has closed?

One member of the community sent me an email saying in their view that The Impact50 ‘is a competition specifically for amateur writers and film-makers’ and trying to make it more than that would be a mistake.

Others have shared this view, to varying degrees, and of course with varying opinions of what is good enough, or not, to be inlcuded. In many ways it's moot as it's now up to the judges who will, I am certain be fearsome and direct in their choices.

Having been very pleased with our version of ‘Sing, Mummy’, I started to think about filming another short for Impact:50. I've always felt more comfortable with comedies and Dave Stevenson’s ‘I’m Afraid it’s Bad News’ caught my eye. I was tempted by the idea of playing with humour, especially within such a dark theme.

Could it work?

Now that filmmaking challenge phase has closed, and yes there will be some latecomers we know about, we enter a month of reworking.

We are going to leave edit notes on as many films as we can, and would love you to do the same too.

It’s all part of the learning curve and the real and deep value of being involved in the Impact50 experience.

The idea of apocalypse was an intriguing one and a chance to tell a story of humanity within it, very promising. This world is waging a battle right now, which is not between Good and Evil but between one set of belief vs another set of belief. Confronted with death, belief will collapse.

I liked the script because it dealt with such issues. Two men driven by their belief, having caused unmentionable harm to each other, question - Who was it for?

‘Arry Black Maskers (*), more likely known to you as Gaffer Tape or Duck/Duct Tape, is probably the most critical, versatile and adaptable piece of kit in the military.

It was a running ‘joke’ that the long serving SeaKing helicopter was mostly held together with the black stuff, (as much of our kit was), but still we trusted our lives to our ‘Landrover of the skies’. (**)

If there is one complaint I hear from Sales Agents over and over, it’s that filmmakers simply don’t provide enough good stills from their productions. And we are going through that right now with Impact50.

Most teams are getting shots, but only a few are getting killer shots.

And the game is changing too, we no longer need just photos of the actors in character.

At best, Phase 2 is now on hold. At worst, cancelled altogether. After yesterday I have decided to reassess our vision for Impact50.

I am going to post a number of short blogs so that we can deconstruct where we are and what will happen next.

Rules and Guidelines

It has become very clear that many people did not and have not read all the rules and guidelines (HERE).

We stand at the end of a phase, the edge of a decision.

In around one week’s time, the existing filmmaking phase of Impact50 will close.

ADDENDUM... I am adding this line a day after this went live. All of my suggestions here are about ADDING to Impact50 and NOT taking anything away. Any changes made are entirely in the interests of elevating phase one for all involved so far, both writers and filmmakers.

As my script ‘Norah’s Ark’ was in the Second Chancers, I decided to make it myself but for it to be considered as a Wild Card I had to make one of the 50 finalist scripts.

So I became a producer.

As a member of Surrey Border Movie Makers I asked if they would like to get involved. They agreed and formed the film crew.

Looking back to learn lessons from the past...

As part of 50 Kisses, we invited filmmakers to act on feedback from the community.

One filmmaking team, Sweet Home Films in LA, made their film over 20% shorter, fixed some audio problems and overall radically improved their work. Watch the first submitted edit below...

The power of editing never ceases to amaze me – actors, writers, DPs, designers, all offer incredible contributions to a story, but it’s the editor who takes that heady cocktail of ideas, creativity, drama, misfires, failures, surprises, technical problems etc etc that happened on set / location, and makes it all work as best it can.

This is a process that requires tough choices, reflection and an unwavering dedication to the audience.

We just had a film submitted to Imapact50 that shows the value of getting a GREAT location, with great props.

When you achieve this, the major benefit is that wherever you point the camera, it looks great (or at least credible). This is one reason why we found the location for the Presidents Speech that we shot a few weeks back (HERE).

The script. After many months of Rock. Paper. Scissors being open to film-makers, not a sniff. I feared the opportunity was slipping away. Think me as Gollum and my script the ring. So at the end of London Screenwriters Festival 2017 I stood like Wonder Woman (the norm for all delegates), hands on hips, and I pledged.

My script will get made…a few thoughts from a writer turned first time producer. 

At the heart of Create50 is the idea that we ALL win because we create, get feedback, create relationships, offer feedback and grow. It’s TRULY about the taking part.

We have spent the day revamping the Impact50 website so that it’s much easier to watch, rate and leave feedback on films.

We have introduced a star rating widget. Wait, what?

I have just uploaded the whole album of stills from the shoot last week, with Olivia Williams playing the President of the United States. You can see them all on Flickr HERE. Or you can see them on this blog post...

Last Friday we shot the opening scene of The Impact, written by Joe Eszterhas and starring Olivia Williams. We shot in an extraordinary White House Oval Office reconstruction in Norfolk at RAF Coltishall in the sets owned by October Films.

You will know we ran a crowdfund campaign to raise the initial finances needed (but we overspent), and so we now have a stretch goal to cover the additional costs we could not foresee. You can contribute to it HERE, and are all very grateful for anything you can offer. You rock!

You can watch the updated video for the crowdfund below... and contribute to it HERE.

The Watchers has been a long-time coming.

A very long time coming.

I wrote the first draft on June 8th 2015, it was then titled ‘The Watchers of Worlds’ - a nod to the astronauts being the only witnesses to a world both pre- and post-impact.

Since then I’ve gotten a degree in history, encountered Christ, finished three drafts of a fantasy feature - The Aeneid, one Egyptian TV pilot - Heiretic, started countless other projects, and shot goodness knows how many short films.

I just got the email confirming that Joe Ezsterhas signed the contract for his #Impact50 screenplay that will open the film. Boom!

We can finally share the script that we are shooting in the coming week, with the astonishingly awesome Olivia Williams playing the president of America.

You can read the script HERE and read all the other scripts that you can make to be a part of Impact50 HERE.

The brief was to write about peoples’ reactions in the 97 minutes after the Presidential announcement that life on earth was going to cease - in no more than 2 pages. 

What was the idea behind Norah’s Ark?

I noticed a 25’ boat sitting on stilts outside a commercial garage in a village in Hampshire, nowhere near any water.  So in the back of my mind it was only natural that when the news comes about the asteroid, a teacher called Norah has 6 children uncollected from school.  She tells them the story of Noah’s Ark, gets them to decorate animal masks and leads them onto the boat.  What else can you do when the earth is doomed?

When we entered The Impact 50, I had a clear and unwavering vision in my head. This was not going to be a big blustering film, but a small domestic glimpse into the world of a little girl who has a very different understanding of life. We knew that a lot of people were crowd-funding major productions with large-scale visions of the end of the world. Our film is set in a kitchen/diner. It is a simple setting with one ordinary mother and her extraordinary daughter.

The film is little more than a series of pleas from a desperate parent. It is a tale of a girl with Asperger’s syndrome and her total fixation on finishing her video game, a game that mirrors the chaos around her. It was agreed that to achieve this “locked in” existence we would work with tight angles and visuals that matched the setting.

When I finished post grad at UCLA, I was already working on film sets in several positions, most often as a script supervisor. However, I decided I wanted to experience the finance and distribution part of the business and so started work at Disney, Buena Vista.

I was working a 2-day shoot as a script supervisor when on the second day I got into a terrible car accident on the highway.

A few teenagers high on drugs or alcohol hit me. I was 26 years old and my life changed after that. Fortunately other than whiplash I wasn’t hurt badly, just some minor bruises, but my car was totaled.

If you’re thinking about having a go at making a Create 50 film – DO IT!

I got off my butt and produced my own script DADDY’S FORT and the process has been such an awesome learning curve.

I definitely recommend having a go if you’re serious about being in the film biz. We were really lucky to have OPC Media on set during production and they perfectly captured our shoot day in this brilliant behind the scenes featurette.

“What if no one options it?”

After the initial euphoria had waned, this was my focus. I couldn’t bear to think that my story, In Vino Veritas, had battled its way through over two thousand screenplays, only to possibly fall at the last hurdle and the more I thought about it, the more this potential outcome became unpalatable. That’s when I decided to become a producer and make it myself.

Being involved in the whole script-to-screen process of our two short films, has taught me much about translating my stories for the screen, as well as what each team member involved brings to the party, be it pre or post production or on set.

As others have already blogged, you cannot put a price on the invaluable lessons this allows you as a writer to understand what your carefully chosen words mean to a film cast and crew and, as a crew member, producer or director, how those words are used to bring the characters and story to life.

The Impact50 Trailer Has Been Launched… Get involved and make your micro-budget apocalyptic short.

Watch the trailer here for the crowd created feature film project #Impact50, about what would happen in the last few hours of humanity before an asteroid impact.

And if you are a filmmaker, there is still plenty of time for you to get involved and have YOUR work showcased in this revolutionary global project.

Watch the trailer here…

OUT OF THE FRYING PAN, INTO THE...VOLCANO?

Ok, you may be wondering why any sane person would be cooking on the edge of a volcano.

It seems pretty daft and there are certainly easier ways to fry your eggs (not a euphemism). Fact is though, that’s the only way I can truly sum up how it felt for me to take the plunge and turn my hand to both producing and directing a film for the very first time.

We have begun production on the opening scene where the president of America addresses the planet...

As you will recall, this script was written for us by Joe Eszterhas and we are VERY excited to bring it to life.

In the coming weeks we will share the script and the exciting news on who we have managed to secure to play the president.

We planned to have a technical rehearsal for Up Up and Away on Saturday 17th March with the actual shoot date on 18th - weather permitting. 

Well, weather did not permit.  With snow expected and freezing temperatures we decided to postpone the shoot date until the following Sunday, 25th March but went ahead with the technical rehearsal on 17th.

A number of challenges faced us, mainly involving the chair lifting into the air with actor (Brian O’Connell) on board. It was time for the game to commence in trial terms so we trooped out to inspect the pitch.

Guest post by Andrew McGee

Who’d have thought making a film set in space would be so tricky?

The Watchers was shot in late 2016, and through the hard work of an amazing cast and crew, the pre-production and shoot itself went extremely smoothly (even with my own laptop almost falling off the set, see below). Jumping straight into such an ambitious film straight after graduating, with professional adult actors and a fully constructed set of the International Space Station (thanks to the wonderful Jason Kelvin), was such an exciting time as a director.

As ‘Francis of Fell End Farm’ is now going through post-production, I think back over the past year since I decided to film the script.

I knew that my script presented challenges to anyone interested in filming it: Find a suitable farm location, an actor who could work with a collie - or a farmer able to work with a collie and act well enough - and a collie who would not experience ‘film fright’ when confronted by a team of people and their equipment.

As the judges for the competition said, they expected that it would be adapted.

When myself Jaye (producer) and Jonah (director) decided to option one of the Impact Scripts we instantly fell in love with Silent Ruin written by Chris Vanderhorst. We were impressed by the way it was written, and thought it quite unique that the end of the world was played out using different sounds.

The two characters in the screenplay are deaf, and use sign language. We did not want to employ hearing actors who could just be taught the signs.  To make the story really live we needed deaf actors, so the task began to find two deaf actors to play Viviana and Marcus.

By the moment I entered the international team of Impact50 I had produced three shorts. However, I have never produced a short film, which was not made from my own screenplay. This was my first try.

I read all the winning scripts, but it was hard to choose which one to produce, as I was searching a script with an easy location, minimum actors and ideally no dialogue, as I was going to shoot it in Russia. “Sing, Mummy!” by Tracey Parsons was ideal fit for my needs. And I really loved the script from the first read.

In just over 100 days, the Impact50 filmmaking challenge will close.Closing date is April 30th at midnight UK time.

Can you make a short film from a two page script about the end of the world?

If so, invest a weekend and become part of the Impact50 feature film challenge.

Teams from around the world have begun optioning scripts and making their films now, many of which you can watch on the site.

Losing our main farm location with less than 48 hours before film day we held it together (just) through head scratching, frantic phone calls (remember those?), and seven coffees, managing to find another location just in time.

We liked the gentle humour of Zara’s script and felt that both Omar – who we had seen giving excellent comedy performances – and Simon - who had a background in comedic acting – would be great for this kind of material.

We brought them together for a full rehearsal, hiring a room at a local hotel, and it was clear that they had an instant rapport.

We Were Human wrapped production in Reno at about 4:30 yesterday.

I took everyone to Bertha Miranda for dinner and drinks. (Left to right) me, our location coordinator Adam Barrett, cinematographer Aaron Franke, and stars Tony Frenchu and Cece Dietlein.

I can’t wait to start editing!

Making 'The Travellers' represented somewhat of a milestone for me as it is pretty much the first film I have made/directed that I have NOT written myself.

This definitely presented a number of challenges for me, but made the process more enjoyable as a result!

Usually, pre-production for me is fairly straightforward as I have the whole film and concept mapped out thoroughly in my head from the writing process.

Long term supporter of Impact50 and Create50, and super talented screenwriter and actress Cera Rose Pickering is taking control of her own destiny and producing her own Impact50 screenplay.

She has a cast and crew in place and needs only raise the final £800 for production. I have just backed it and if you would like to back it too, here’s the link…

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/daddy-s-fort-a-short-film-for-create-50/

This morning at about 11:15, after a very early start, director Xander Borg called, "It's a wrap!" on 'No Connection, Try Again Later' for The Impact.

I had the great pleasure of acting as one of the producers and getting to work with him and actor Trevor Young (no relation to me!), as well as cinematographer Aaron Franke, whose footage looks amazing as I sit here reviewing it tonight.

Jaye Swift provided us with a great script to work from, and I can only hope when she sees our version of her film she'll be happy with how it turns out.

This is the first HOS project - a short film from the Lisa Parry script and part of the Impact50 initiative.

Watch the film HERE.

Although short, this script required a fantastic location, and we found one in J Reid Pianos in north London. Casting and auditions also went extremely well, and Sarah Eastwood and Ian McCurrach were a perfect fit for Jackie and Sergei.

We're also very excited to have a completely original piece of music composed by Konstantinos Lyrakis just for this film.

That's a wrap! We had an amazing last shoot for Crazy Cat Lady (written by Carrie Wachob) at Seattle Meowtropolitan.

Cats, cats, and more cats!

Our cast and crew worked hard and we're excited to jump into editing.

Draft of film coming soon...

Of all my creative projects, I find that the ones that turn out the best are the ones that I feel a personal connection to.

‘East Valley Rhinos’ is a sweet tale about some rugby players who go to rescue an injured teammate from hospital. Having played rugby myself, it instantly grabbed me … and I knew I had to make it.

More than any sport that I’ve ever played, rugby has by far the strongest team bonding; that sense of camaraderie, of ‘brotherhood’.

This is the first HOS project - a short film from the Lisa Parry script and part of the Impact50 initiative.

Although short, this script required a fantastic location, and we found one in J Reid Pianos in north London. Casting and auditions also went extremely well, and Sarah Eastwood and Ian McCurrach were a perfect fit for Jackie and Sergei.

We're also very excited to have a completely original piece of music composed by Konstantinos Lyrakis just for this film.