“Simon edited a sitcom and several corporates for me and is on of the most talented editors I’ve ever worked with.

I was able to trust him to make his own mark on the project and had incredibly patience with me when I changed things back and forth. He has great comic timing and managed to fix my mistakes using effects and editing tools I will never be able to understand.

An absolute gentleman who is very polite and professional someone I’d be very comfortable with clients and is able to deliver with tight deadlines. I can’t wait to work with him again.”

Karl Rooney (IMDB) – worked together on ‘Falling Flat’ sitcom

After creating the trailer for Imogen Heap’s improvisation sessions, known as “The Gloves Are On” (a reference to the Mi.Mu gloves that Imogen helped develop and performs with), it was decided to reduce the amount of performances as Imogen was finding the process draining, and she had received creative inspiration from them and wanted to work in the studio.

I was asked by Marco Napolitano whether I’d be up for being involved with something else, a way to give Imogen some time off, while raising some money for The Creative Passport – and it would be called “The Gloves Are Off”.

Details

1×1 minute (trailer) & 1×197 minutes
Directed by Marco Napolitano

The Gloves Are Off was a fan curated live event for The Creative Passport and Imogen Heap. Over the past few months Imogen Heap had been running live Improv sessions to raise money for The Creative Passport, which had resulted in myself creating a trailer to advertise the events.

Imogen had decided to slow these sessions due to the amount of energy each one was taking. Marco Napolitano, a fan who had made a large impact on these events decided to give Imogen a night off and also continue to raise money.

Fan’s were asked to submit musical and artistic performances, while Emma Zinck and myself were asked to come on as editors to arrange the performances. In total 20 artists took part.

Louis Tribou created a series of promotional graphics, which I then took and animated in After Effects. A test of these animated graphics was adapted and turned into a trailer for the event, released on Imogen Heap’s YouTube channel, and other social media of the Creative Passport.

For the show I created the final timeline, pulling in an XML of the work that Emma had done, then bringing in my own artist edits, graphics, adjusting the sound, in some places colour and in one instance tracking and blurring an item in a scene.

Watch the trailer

Watch the full show

YouTube Version

Facebook Version

Twitter / Periscope Version

As of writing this, the latest edit I’ve done is a promo video for Imogen Heap. Being a fan of hers this was quite an exciting edit, but I possibly underestimated how much time this snappy 60 second promo would take.

Imogen Heap has recently been playing improvisation sessions to raise money for The Creative Passport, a way of utilizing blockchain technology to allow musicians to keep their details in a decentralised database allowing for royalties to find their true owner.

Imogen has an app to interact with fans, and on it she requested for some help editing a promo for these sessions. The deal was that she would do a personalised cover in return for a sixty second promo, this is something that had a value of £500, but for fan, to have a song of your choice sung for you – it’s priceless.

Details

1×1 minute
Directed by Simon Gibbs

This promo was to promote Imogen Heap’s Improvisations that she was performing during the lockdown period of 2020. The idea was to raise money for the Creative Passport, a new system designed to help join musicians with their royalties. To do this fans were able to submit requests along with a £100 donation to get one of Imogen Heap’s songs dedicated to themselves or a friend, or alternatively £500 which would get a cover.

Fans were also encouraged to participate in other ways, such as chats, jams and sending lyric fragments, which resulted in some funny and emotionally powerful moments. Much of the time was spent seeing Imogen create new song ideas in improvisations.

Built from the webstream, the promo’s idea was to capture some of these moments and was requested by Imogen herself. The deal for the promo was to do a personalised cover, which for a fan is priceless.

Watch

Use on Social Media

The video was used in a few different places on Imogen Heap’s social media channels such as:

• Instagram (17th August)
• Facebook (18th August)
• Twitter (18th August)

It was also used on the stories feature for Imogen Heap and other artists she was covering, such as Caroline Polachek.

It’s all too common when working with digital footage, particularly large and uncompressed, that something gets damaged. When filming, steps are undertaken to avoid the loss of any recorded frame. Camera ops will do their best to handle their cameras correctly, even in difficult conditions, and DITs (Digital Image Technician) will make sure that the memory cards are correctly backed up into multiple locations – but still the unthinkable can happen.

When disaster strikes there is a wealth of software that claims to be able to recover lost footage from corrupted files, but in those desperate scenarios I’ve seen few that are able to actually do the job. The only software I dare put any weight in is called “Video Repair Tool“, but even that will often struggle to provide the needed results.

The next step is to get professionals who will charge extortinate amounts to get the file back to a working condition.

A few times I’ve used my own computer programming knowledge to create software that will bring videos back from the dead.

There are many routes to find out that you have a passion.

Sometimes it’s obvious, and people capitalise quickly. Many people interested in film do media courses and goto dedicated schools out of a desire to replicate shows and features that they had seen.

I didn’t discover my passion for editing until well after University, however it was a skill I had already started to put in place. The necessity to tell a story through video was something that had cropped up much earlier and I had found ways to do it.

Ethiopia, particularly Addis Ababa, is a place very close to my heart and each of the three times I’ve visited have been truly formative. I first went when I was 14 and the experience changed my mindscape; I saw people with nothing who relied on faith alone, political struggles, different cultures and had experiences that no 14 year old should have – like having a gun pointed at my face. Through all that I watched as my Dad helped film video footage and took photos, as I helped carry the equipment.

For a first post I thought I would start at a recent milestone. An event that meant a huge amount for me – the premiere of ‘The ParaPod Movie‘.

On the 7th January, at the Prince Charles Cinema in London, fans of the ParaPod queued around the block to be the first to see the film that had taken just over two years of my free time. Officially I’m listed as the Editor, Colourist, an additional camera operator, and an original backer, but the truth is that my list of credits could have doubled the length of the end roller (for example, post-supervisor, additional VFX, additional sound, DIT, runner, additional graphics, technical support… you get the idea!). Ian Boldsworth, the director, and I decided that we wouldn’t list everything as it would just start to feel odd to see our names on everything.

“From the moment Simon came on board with The ParaPod Movie I’ve been consistently impressed and staggered at his work ethic. He has an intuitive attention to detail which goes not just for his pro-active approach, but also in listening and responding to my notes on often non-linear and random footage. His natural abilities in making a silk purse from a sow’s ear are nothing short of exceptional.”

Ian Boldsworth (IMDB) – Worked together on ‘The ParaPod Movie‘

“Simon was kind enough to work, with incredible diligence and follow-up, on a” (passion project). “In the process, he displayed an amazing array of skills – not just the technical mastery of various formats and digital media but vfx and narrative editing. I consider myself very lucky to have had a chance to work with him.”

Chris Weitz (IMDB) – Worked together on a personal passion project