video projects
Sorry there has not been much happening here recently.
I have been researching for a new series of videos, the script is mostly complete, we are waiting for better weather before we can do any filming!
There are also a couple of other video series ideas in early stages of production.
There is even another extra episode of “Summer Wine Decanted” to come!
Meanwhile, the “Summer Wine Decanted” book is available from Amazon and many other online book stores.
Alan J.W. Bell has died on 19 October 2023, aged 85 after suffering from dementia.
Having just finished a series of videos documenting “Last of the Summer Wine” we thought it only right to honour him in a short video. This video takes a brief look at his career in television production from 1958, including producing and directing 250 episodes of “Last of the Summer Wine”.
The year 2023 marks 50 years since the pilot and first series of “Last of the Summer Wine” were broadcast. This series of videos is filmed in many of the well-known, and some less well-known, locations seen in the programme.
All Upstaged by a Dog videos on YouTube have subtitles.
Sometimes they are already on the videos when they are released, but sometimes you might have to wait a few days for them to be checked and uploaded.
Many thanks to Rick Anschutz in North Carolina US, for creating the subtitles for the “Summer wine Decanted” video series.
I was interested in tv and theatre production from as early as I can remember. As a child if I was drawing something it would be a tv studio or theatre set with lights and cameras. At school I studied drama and often acted in school plays. Due to the lack of interest in the technical side of theatre production at school another student and myself were primarily responsible for most of the lighting and sound for school productions under the occasional supervision of a random disinterested teacher.
When the headmaster was directing a play for the local amateur dramatic society, he approached me to join as they needed a younger person for one of the roles. By the age of 18 I was running a mobile disco with the other student, and we had become responsible for all the lighting and sound for the drama society. This led us to provide technical services to several schools and drama societies in a semi-professional capacity. In addition, I was also acting in some of the productions.
I was now also a part-time reporter for a local newspaper, primarily writing local stories and reviewing amateur and professional theatre productions.
In the late 1980’s I bought an 8mm video camera and shot various events, but the affordable technology was not practical or adequate quality for making anything generally presentable. I did create a few finished videos, one of which is my tribute to the highs and lows of my home town, that I recently managed to get digitised to upload to YouTube.
We both had full-time jobs and then my colleague joined BBC TV in London as a sound technician, which meant he was not able to continue the school and drama society shows due to his work schedule. I continued as long as I could, but eventually work and home commitments meant that I also had to end the drama work.
Many years later, and still interested in anything related to art, media, and theatre I started helping with set design, lighting, and operating cameras to create videos for other people on video platforms.
My interest in the inner workings of theatre and tv production have not diminished, so I started writing a script for what I anticipated would be a short series of videos for my YouTube channel. After months of researching and writing the project has grown into many more episodes than anticipated and spawned ideas for many other similar projects.
The initial filming for this particular project should start in early 2022.
