The 2011 No Limits Student Film Festival takes place this weekend in Sheffield and is bound to set the bar even higher for student films and is a pretty incredible springboard for the amount of filmmaking talent out there. No Limits Film Festival is just that, there are NO LIMITS and filmmakers are give total freedom to bring to the festival what they want. With no restrictions on time, theme, subject this is going to make for one interesting weekend!
To celebrate the festival, which takes place in Sheffield this weekend TNC is running interviews with some of the Student Film Award Nominees. We are really excited to bring you our interview with Rachel Rayns who is nominated for 2 awards – Best Editing and No Limits awards for ‘Pulse’.
The No Limits Student Film Festival takes place this weekend in Sheffield and you can find out all the information here.
How did you get into filmmaking has this always been a passion?
Filmmaking has always been an interest. Although, I am interested in all kinds of making, from cooking to dressmaking, mecanics to sculpture, animation and films. I have only been interested in shooting on celluoid film in the last few years. I guess it came through shooting on film with still cameras and then learning to develop the film at home. Once I’d mastered that I could afford to shoot on celluoid movie film and bucket process it!
Tell us about your film ‘Pulse‘, how did this come to life? How did you get involved in making this film?
I tried to make Pulse an overload of information, that there were too many images/possible narratives to take in. Due to the way Pulse is made the interesting part for me is what images the viewers brain would pick up on, and as a result what narrative they would follow.
The method behind the making of Pulse was inspired by the Straight 8 competition I entered last summer. The idea is that you get one cartridge of super 8 and you shoot your film start to finish with no editing. Whenever you press the button, whatever is infront of the lens is in your film.
I took this idea, but swapped to 16mm so I was able to rewind the film, allowing me to jump back and fourth through the 100ft roll. It meant a lot of counting frames as the final edit is still exactly how it came out of the camera.
The film is actually made up of 2 strings of narrative and it flips between the two every 5 frames – Remember the spinning disk on a string you might have had as a child, with the cage on one side and the bird on the other? The idea was the flipping on these strings of images merged together.
This meant I was actually shooting 5 frames of one narrative, then covering the lens and moving the film 5 frames forward, shooting the next 5 frames. Then at the end of each chapter I would rewind the film and shoot second narrative on the frames I hadn’t exposed first time around. As this was on celluiod it was all done without seeing anything I’d shot, I had no real idea if it would work out and if I misscounted the frames then the whole chapter could be ruined. It was a very lengthy, stressful and complicated process!
The crew just consisted of me as director, lighting, camera operator and I’m actually in the film too (much use of a remote cable release!). My good friend Ed Sinclair did help with some of the shots in London.
Pulse was originally my second year film for BA Fine Art at Farnham, UCA. I back projected it in a cinema space made in the exhibition. Since then it’s been screened in various venues around London, including London Short Film Festival, Video is The Only Constant and the White Chapel Gallery.
The film was originally intended to be shown on a 16mm projector without sound, but due to technically difficulties a few days before the show opened I ended up showing a digital copy. The fantastic Adam Rix pulled together the soundtrack for me in record quick time!
Your film is part of the ‘No Limits’ in Sheffield, are you excited about this?
I am very excited! I love Sheffield, but have never been to the festival before. It sounds like they have some very cool stuff going on – I’m really looking forward to the bike powered screening in the park – Sounds like it’s going to be great!
What was it like once you found out you had been nominated for Best Editing?
Very happy, as the film is all in-camera editing I didn’t have to do anything in post-production – but as I described above, lots of complicated pre-editing went into making the film. It was a fantastic excerise in filmmaking, I would recommend it to anyone.
Things are going so well for you, you feeling the pressure?
Sometimes it can be really over whelming, I’m an independant filmmaker, so when making my films I often work with minimal or no crew. I consider myself an “artist filmmaker” and I feel like I’m in a good place right now – This film was originally intended to be more of an art work than a film, so the fact that film festivals have been interested in it is really fantastic. I’m really glad it’s all started now, that I’ve had experience of showing at film festivals and doing Artist Q&As whilst I still have the support of friends within the university.
What do you think people will take from the film?
I think people will likely be a bit confused, but I hope they take a feeling/experience rather than a normal narrative.
What advice would you give other filmmakers?
Make as many films as you can. Give yourself a mission to make a 3 minute film every 2 weeks.
Be friendly, no-one wants to work with arrogant people.
Enter straight8
Finally, what are you working on now?
I right now I’m in Wales, shooting the behind the scenes for on a short film called The Waters Edge. I’m also in the process of building my 6 screen video installation for my final year show.
For more information on Rachel you can find it all on here website here
*Screening of Pulse, 2010 – No Limits Festival – 2nd-3rd April 2011- Nominated for Best Editing and No Limits awards.
*Installation of Revolution, 2010 – Ground Floor Left , Hackney – 02/11
*Installation of Flicker Fruit, 2010 – Video is the Only Constant, Corsica Studio – 16/01/11
*Screening of new work & discussion with Rachel Reupke – White Chapel Gallery – 13/01/11
*Screening of Pulse, 2010 – London Short Film Festival – 7-16/01/11
*Screening of Pulse, 2010 – Ladyfest Ten, Islington Library – 12/11/10
*Screening of Pulse & artist Q&A, 2010 – Video is the Only Constant, Corsica Studio – 29/09/10
*Screening of 2D Dreams, 2010 – Rushes Soho Shorts Festival 2010, Curzon Mayfair – 28/07/10
*Installation of Pulse, 2010 – Vision, James Hockey & Foyer Galleries – 4-10/05/10
