WISH YOU WERE HERE
Directed by MICHAEL DAKS, Starring CHRISTOPHER J OVEREND, JUDE, ANTON OSTROVSKY, Director of Photography TONY WADE, Edited by ANTON OSTROVSKY, Original Music by BRETT HAMMOND.

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The classic love story takes a surreal twist in Wish you Were Here, Directed by Michael Daks. The fashion film is Starring: Christopher J, Jude, Anton Ostrovsky & Ernie The Wonder Dog. Director of Photography: Tony Wade, Editing by Anton Ostrovsky with a remix by Elizabeth Jones for XXXX Magazine. Original Music by Brett Hammond, Hair and Make-up by Amber Sibley, Styling by Maria Bonet.

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CONTRIBUTOR BIOS

MICHAEL DAKS

http://www.nyaxe.com/michaeldaks

Michael Daks is an English photographer recently returned to London after 15 years in NYC. His book of nudes JUST GOOD FRIENDS (photographs of his friends naked) is being published in November 2009. He has worked for the past 25 years as a fashion, portrait and Fine Art photographer in London, Milan, Paris and New York, with clients including The New York Times Magazine, The Sunday Times magazine, The Observer, Tatler, Cosmopolitan, VIBE, The Source, Blender, SONY/BMG, and The GAP. He is currently working on ‘INHINDSIGHT – A personal landscape’: A retrospective of his landscape photography. His portraits of Dennis Potter and Kenneth Branagh are in the National Portrait Gallery permanent collection. The Sunday Times magazine just selected one of his nudes for their best of World photography feature, January 18th issue.

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TONY WADE

“Wish You Were Here” is Tony Wade’s first venture into DSLR filmmaking.

‘I was really excited when Michael Daks asked me to film this project, as I had already shot several projects in HD (including Southampton Solent University’s pioneering live outside broadcasts from the Dance East stage at the 2008 and 2009 Glastonbury Festivals). I’d been hearing and reading about shooting HD video with top-of-the-range DSLR cameras but I had never tried it. ‘Of course, I knew I would be working alongside some serious talent from the fields of photography, music, make-up and styling. So, no pressure.’

Tony has had a lifelong interest in photography. He developed his first black and white film aged 11, and went on to study for a degree in photography at the London College of Printing in the early 1980’s. Tony then joined ITV as a video engineer, and continued to work in the broadcast industry for over twenty years, specialising in TV lighting, studio management and location production management. But he never lost touch with his childhood roots in SLR photography, collecting SLR cameras and lenses, taking high quality production stills of the TV programmes he worked on, and moving into medium and large-format photography. The digital age finally beckoned, and this was accompanied by a major career change, moving into Higher Education.

Tony is now a Senior Lecturer in Outside Broadcasting in Southampton Solent University’s Technology Faculty.

‘The digital age has brought the convergence of so many craft skills and technologies, finally bringing about the merging of SLR photography and High Definition Video. Working with the Canon EOS 5D Mark II was huge fun. We used some deliciously fast high quality prime lenses, including the 50mm F1.2 USM and the absolutely gorgeous 85mm F1.2 USM optics. The full-frame CMOS sensor produces beautiful image quality, with exquisite shallow depth-of-field when required. This chip also handles highlights very well, producing a very natural, dare I say film-like bloom effect when the image is very slightly overexposed, or when shooting contre-jour into strong backlight.

Working with the LCD screen soon became second nature. You automatically see the effect of your chosen exposure settings, and you are always viewing the image at the actual depth-of-field relating to the lens aperture setting in use at the time. This gives the cameraman an immediate feeling for the look of the images. I quickly learned to use the camera as an extension to my own eyes.

And working in live-view mode puts you back in touch with the craft skills of old-school manual photography, using the focusing ring on the lens barrel to select the centre of interest for the viewer, and trimming the lens aperture as you shoot.

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AMBER SIBLEY

Make-up and Hair

www.ambersibley.com

www.ambernaturally.com

Amber is an Academy Award Nominated Makeup Artist with a gift for reading peoples energy. Her professional journey has taken her from the New Forest in England , via Bollywood and Hollywood, and all around the world.

She has also done prosthetics for feature films including Sam Neill for Event Horizon, Martin Short for Merlin, and Willem Dafoe for Shadow of the Vampire (for which she was Oscar nominated). She also was HOD for Joyeux Noel.

Over a 20-year career she has worked in beauty, fashion & advertising doing everything from front covers to Internet campaigns. Clients include Marie Claire and Vogue Brides, and photographers and directors including John Swannell , Lord Litchfield , Ridley Scott and Gerard De Thame .

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BRETT HAMMOND

brett@studio11211.com

Brett Hammond is a composer and songwriter who owns Studio 11211 in Brooklyn, NYC where he is involved with audio post production and score for film and TV. Brett started his professional career in Birmingham UK as a musician performing in rock bands, notably Orion (with Tony Martin of Black Sabbath fame) and Push UK. He developed his skills as a songwriter and moved to New York to tour and record with the band Bigmouth where he worked with talented producers, of note Neil Dorfsman (Grammy award winner for Dire Straits ‘Love Over Gold’ and Paul McCartney). In the late 1990’s after Bigmouth, he decided to focus on Film, specifically score and sound design and since then has been involved with very successful film projects that have found their way to Sundance film festival, Tribeca Film festival, Cannes Lions festival and The Brooklyn International Film Festival.

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MARIA BONET

Fashion Stylist

Maria Bonet has worked in the fashion industry for over 20 years as a stylist for magazines, advertising and pop promos including Sophie Ellis Bextor’s  ‘Take Me Home’ and ‘Murder on the dance floor’. She began her career as Fashion Editor of Country Living magazine and quickly moved on to become Editor of M&S Magazine. Since turning freelance she has contributed to publications such as GQ, Seven, and The Sunday Times. Maria has enjoyed styling numerous celebrities including Olympic Gold medallist winner Kelly Holmes, Ray Winstone, Sienna Miller, Heidi Klum, and Helena Christensen. Her career has spanned into PR and Advertising where she has worked alongside the likes of Tyler Brule at Winkreative, and Helen Storey the British Fashion Designer. She continues to work on special creative projects and is inspired by finding beauty in the ordinary.

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ANTON OSTROVSKY

Email: electrostep@gmail.com

Throughout his career in Media, Anton has shown that it is possible to combine an original artistic approach with almost clinical precision and attention to detail. This applies to both his video editing and sound design work. He has worked on a variety of short films with up-and-coming directors. No matter what the medium  – sound or vision – Anton’s work always grabs attention, evokes emotions, and turns spectators into active participants.