Who we are
Welcome to the 2011/12 season at the Staines Video Makers. We're pleased you decided to visit our site today and hope you find its content of interest.
Members of Staines Video Makers prepare for a workshop. Each member is associated with one of three groups. The challenge tonight for each group is, in 30 minutes, to make a short film based on a script devloped the week before.
We're a long established and thriving amateur movies club.Our aim is to encourage our members to exchange their experiences and knowledge and progressively improve their movie making. Full details of the Society, its meetings and activities etc. can be seen on our About Us page.
If you are interested in getting more out of your camcorder and video making then do come along to one or two of our meetings, meet our friendly members and see how we can help you before you decide to join. You can use this link to find out more about joining! Details of the 2010/11 season events can be found in the Event calendar
To send a general enquiry to the society please click here.
Fri 3rd December
Staines members win awards at IAC Regional Festival
Two other films from Staines Video Makers were also shown - Graham Large's one minute "Language Barrier" and Tim's "Battersea Dogs", both of which were well received by the audience of approximately 60 members from the North Thames region.
Fri 21st October
An evening with James Webber of FingerCuff Productions
On Friday 21st October we were entertained by a selection of films made by James Webber - one half of Fingercuff
Productions (
http://fingercuffproductions.co.uk/). Whilst James's day job is creating corporate and music videos,
he is now receiving recognition for the character based dramas which he writes and directs.
We saw a selection of films, beginning with "Commitment" which won "Best British Entry" at BIAFF in 2009 as well as several other awards, through "Dancer" (Best British Entry in BIAF 2011) to "Three", currently on its festival "run". In addition we saw a couple of comedies (again festival prize winners) and music videos. At the end of the evening James (as the writer/director) responded to a Q&A session that provided fascinating insights into his approach to filmmaking. It was an inspiring evening for us all.
Fri 14th October
Staines Wins Gateway 2011
Staines Video Makers won the Gateway Trophy in the annual competition against Reading film & Video Makers and Bourne End Video Camera Club. In this event, which has been running since 1971, each club submits one film in each of three categories, Storyline, Documentary and Open and judges from the other two clubs award three or two points in order of preference. Staines won a maximum 6 points in all three categories.
Points were scored in the Storyline, Documentary and Open categories as follows:-
The films provided a very varied evening's entertainment but were of a consistently high standard. Congratulations to all involved
Fri 2nd September
Staines Video Makers - Inaugural Meeting
Today's meeting was the first of the 2011/12 season. This meeting was special for not only did we celebrate the arrival of two, and possibly three new members, but we also celebrated the society's change of name to Staines Video Makers.
Our president, Ken Ferguson and Chaiman, Tim Stannard proposed a toast to the newly named society's success, and our members joined in the spirit of the occasion too as you can see!
Members can see a short slideshow of the event on the SVM Photogallery page.
Tues 9th August
Staines Ciné and Video Society(SVM) name change
From the start of the new season (Fri Sept 2nd 2011) the society's name will be changed from Staines Ciné and Video Society(SVM) to Staines Video Makers(SVM).
This change has been made to ensure the society's name reflects its current activities. In addition to traditional video making these include making short videos specifically for YouTube (and similar platforms).
On Thursday several club members met for a guided tour of Mercedes-Benz World at Brooklands. The one and a half hour tour was both entertaining and informative. The guide was recorded with a wireless lavalier (tie-clip) mic up and all members will have the opportunity to use the resulting high quality sound track in their own video about some of the exhibits on show, which they filmed on the day and on separate occasions.