One shot. Four minutes. Fifty cast. Five locations.

This shoot was always going to be a challenge….But it turned out to be immensely enjoyable! The hugely talented Craig Roberts came up with this crazy idea for his directorial debut. A music video consisting of one continuous shot, leaving no room for error. No armbands and floats, he dived straight in at the deep-end. We were of course very happy to help make it happen.

The success of the video comes down to an immensely capable crew. Art director Carla-Jayne Wattley managed to transform several baron spaces at the Pop Factory in Porth into some very surreal sets, using little budget and time. Costume designer Sarah-Jane Perez and assistant Sarah Harrison made our array of cast look fantastic thanks to Marigold costumes. Sadie Thorne delivered quality make up to the cast, an incredible feat considering she was working alone.

The set was lit by Matt Durgon from Spartan Audio, under the guide of expert DoP Luke Jacobs. He and Craig mapped out the action with the cast all morning, planning each move and turn. When it came to a full take all eyes fell on Steadicam operator Matt Allsop and focus puller Christopher Jacobi. The amount of variables and marks were ludicrous, but thankfully with lots of concentration it took Matt, Chris and the cast just three takes to get it right. The one you see is the third and final take.

We’re extremely pleased with the final product and especially happy it only took three attempts! Thank you to all of the cast, crew and extras who patiently devoted  hours of their time to make this video happen!  It was an absolute pleasure to work with Craig Roberts and Los Campesinos! on this project, we look forward to working with you again. Here is the finished video below.

“Take this it’s yours… An anthem for a lost cause..”

The third installment of the ‘Manic Street Preachers – Rewind the Film’ music series was for the song ‘Anthem for a Lost Cause’. The emotional story follows the young lovers from the ‘Show me the Wonder’ music video, which won a Q music Video award this week. Time has passed; the pair (Meryl & Darren) have married but find themselves struggling through the 1984 miners strike. It all becomes too much for the man of the house, who leaves without a trace, leaving Meryl to fend for herself. A story that was all too common in the mining towns at the time.

Meryl is forced to sell all of her possessions to keep the oncoming bills and vicious debt collectors at bay. Instead of wallowing in a pitiful heap at all she’s lost, Meryl gathers inspiration from the ‘South Wales Women’s Support Group’ whoshe sees on television.

The tale of the women’s support groups that formed during the strike is such an amazing story, filled with the most courageous women. On collecting the archive footage for this video we were fortunate to meet two groups of women who filmed these inspirational groups.

The first of which, ‘The South Wales Womans Film Group’ learnt their skills from a Chapter Film Workshop in Cardiff in 1983. As a collective they wanted to give women a voice in front of and behind the camera. They soon began documenting the struggles of women in the South Wales valleys during the 1984 miners strike. Their films ‘Something Else in the House’ and ‘Mam’ offer amazing insight and both make for interesting viewing.

The second group we came across is called ‘The Swansea Women’s History Group’. Founded in 1981 by Ursula Masson, Gail Allen and Jen Wilson, the group researched and documented the history of women in South Wales. In 1984 they realised the need to cover contemporary issues and filmed the 1984 miners strike from the point of view of the South Wales Women’s’ Support Group. Their film, entitled ‘Smiling and Splendid Women’ is fantastic and documents the miners strike from a completely different angle.

The video shoot took place over two days in the vivid hills of the Rhondda Valleys and the timeless market in Pontypridd. Once again we teamed up with director Kieran Evans, DOP Luke Jacobs and Tori Lyons who brilliantly continued her role as Meryl.

Special thanks to costume designer Sarah Jane Perez, make up artist Sadie Thorne, set designer Carla-Jayne Wattley and everyone else who helped. We’re immensely proud of the video and everybody who helped make it. Once again it shows the wealth of film making talent that South Wales possesses.

Here are the previous two videos we produced for the Manic Street Preachers.

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‘Ynysybwl is a special place. There’s lots of them in Wales. They’ve been messed about for decades.’

At Like an Egg Productions there’s nothing that we relish more than making films and helping our local community. When we were asked by a Pontypridd writer to join him on a special journey with a local primary school about a coalmine, we leapt at the chance.

We are immensely passionate about our community filmmaking work, as we believe it has hugely positive effects on the local area and it’s people. Our role is to use our skills to make the experience enjoyable but also ensure that quality is maintained in the final piece. We ensure that local history and stories are filmed, documented and shown to the world and future generations.

Here, local playwright Larry Allen tells the story.

“Ynysybwl is another valley village without a vowel and one where the tarmac doesn’t quite run out but fractures, ruptures, then winds to a pub and a church with a breathtaking view. It was the end of term and time was running out to do anything with the kids at Trerobart Primary School and they were already mentally running down the road to the big school in Ponty.  But they were a bright and lively bunch in a vibrant school in a real community clinging on to a sense of itself. The pit had been grassed over and reduced to single dram as a memorial and there was hardly a single job left in the village. But still embedded in the fabric were the remains of a thousand strong work force waiting to tell their story. Round them up, bring them together with the school kids and make a film. Simple.

Like An Egg, a young film company based in Pontypridd, are so rooted in the community that in the recent Manic Street Preachers music video that they shot, they used a workingmens’ club in Porth and persuaded two hundred friends and family to squeeze into a hot, sweaty room for twelve hours just for the fun of it. They joined me in Ynysybwl. An act of blind faith. I pointed Rob and his camera at schoolkids, mountains, ex miners and deserted streets and told him I knew what I was doing. He smiled, sweated, and shot. We very quickly learnt two things. Never film kids in a heatwave and never point a camera at an overworked teacher.

After three weeks cutting, without scissors or tape, (film-making has changed) we emerge with a film fit for purpose and, we hope, entertainment. We are to show it at the Con Club as part of the festivities, shoehorned into an evening of music and storytelling. I have never been so nervous. I have never made a film but even more frightening I’m an outsider telling a story about The Bwl to the people of the Bwl. In the film making I have been surrounded by experts but as regards the story, I’m walking the plank alone.

In a packed hall they watch the film in silence. Everyone. Even the bar staff have left their positions for a better view of a Ponty boy falling into a sea of sharks. The film ends and the silence is broken by what sounds like a stifled sob. Then applause. The lights come up to reveal several women and a lot more men wiping away tears. We’ve managed to pull it off.

Ynysybwl is a special place. There’s lots of them in Wales. They’ve been messed about for decades. Well, you don’t mess with people from the Bwl. We hope we didn’t.”

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Tom Sparey Photography

“Is heaven a place, where nothing ever happens?”

Like An Egg have recently had the pleasure of working with Welsh rock legends, The Manic Street Preachers. After successfully producing the video for ‘ Rewind the Film’, we collaborated again to produce the video for their newest track.

The video is for the single ‘Show Me The Wonder’, which is released on the 9th of September. The video is set in a Welsh working men’s club in the seventies, which follows a boy meets girl love story. The piece stars Craig Roberts, Victoria Lyons and the band themselves who play a gig at the club. Once again we teamed up with director Keiran Evans and Dop Luke Jacobs.

The video was filmed in the Cymmer Pioneer Club, on a swelteringly hot July summers day.  We had the task of sending the place back in time, transforming it back into a seventies club. Thanks to the skills of art director Carly Wattley, the club looked perfect and was primed for the arrival of the cast and crew that numbered close to a hundred. Filming started bright and early and continued right through till late evening. The retro clothing, sizzling heat and extravagant sideburns ensured we emulated that boiling summer of 1976.

We must offer a huge thank you to everybody who helped in the creation of this video. The Pioneer Club Cymmer, cast members, make-up team and costume designer Sarah Jane Perez, you were all brilliant!

The finished video can be found below. Enjoy!

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“Rewind the film again, I’d love to see my joy, my friends…..”

The past few weeks have been brilliantly busy for the Like An Egg team. We’ve been producing three different music videos. Early starts, long days, gallons of bottled water and lots of cups of tea have been the norm for us recently. We’ve managed to capture some amazing footage that we cannot wait to showcase.

The first of the videos is for the new Manic Street Preachers track, entitled ‘Rewind the Film’. The track features the vocal talent of Richard Hawley and is the first track from their new album ‘Rewind The Film’ which is out in September.

The video was shot over two days in the South Wales Valley towns of Trehafod and Porth. These towns were once famous for producing the coal that powered the industrial revolution. The coal brought jobs, built strong communities and put South Wales on the map. These new communities created Working Men’s Clubs, a hub for the locals to visit and enjoy themselves in.

The video follows local bingo caller David James, as he strolls through the reminiscent streets, on his way to his local Working Men’s Club. Throughout his walk and evening of calling bingo he is surrounded by remnants of the mining industry. Whether it be the closed pit next to his club or the images of miners on the club wall, there’s no escaping it. Although the jobs and industry have been ripped away from the town, it still has its community and its club. The video celebrates how these clubs are just as important to today’s locals as they were to the communities of the past.

The video was directed by Kieran Evans and shot by Luke Jacobs, who used their wealth of talent to accompany the moving track with such beautiful and poignant images.

It was a pleasure to be the production team on this video with such a talented group of filmmakers. A huge thanks goes out to everybody at the Trehafod District Club, The Wyndham Club and The Cymmer Pioneer Club who helped make the filming possible.

Our client list is forever growing, we’ve worked on projects with a wide variety of different people over the last few months. Recently we were asked to edit some important videos for the Canoe Slalom World Cup event in Cardiff. The Cardiff event is the opening event of the ICF World Cup Series.

We were tasked with editing and putting together five separate videos that help explain the sport to spectators, a sort of beginners guide. The videos explain the differences between canoes and kayaks, the rules of the sport, different penalties and what the different judges do. Using the footage that was handed to us we had to ensure that we clearly explained the rules by using the footage and the voice of the commentator (Hywel Davies).

Rob added some colorful motion graphics and Steve Dunne delivered and epic score to add an exciting heart racing introduction to the videos. Which is sure to grab the crowd’s attention when the videos are played on the big screens around the arena at this weekend’s event.

We impressed ourselves with what we managed to create, check out an example of the videos below.

April has quickly turned out to be another hectic month for Like An Egg. Off the back of the quality and swift turnaround of the Welsh Water advert, we were soon again approached by Golley Slater to produce an online advert for the Department of Work and Pensions. Thankfully this time we had a little more than 5 days for pre-production, but the task was no less of a challenge.

The ad is specifically aimed at separated parents, and how they can continue to work together to help their child through life’s challenges. It follows two parents as they take turns to help their son overcome obstacles – both literal and figurative – as he grows up. The idea was to keep everything flowing smoothly on screen with some slick transitions as the boy ages from a six to eighteen in the space of a minute. This meant a lot of time was needed in pre-production to meticulously plan and storyboard each section.

Like the Welsh Water ad, production time was limited to just two days. Unfortunately these two days happened to fall on one of the wettest weekends for quite a while, with half of the ad set outdoors! But we carried on regardless, and its unlikely many viewers will even notice just how wet it was. Locations were also key to the project, but one of the benefits of being based in the Valleys is that we are never short of great looking settings and people willing to help.

Currently we are finalising the edit for the ad, though we are already very proud of what we’ve achieved again considering the circumstances. But we would not have achieved it without the fantastic team we had involved on this project. Everyone in every area of production were on top form and were always able to think on their feet. They also made production a fun and enjoyable experience, and in many ways that’s what its all about.

Here is the finished advert!

We know that what sets us apart from our competitors is our ability to rise to any given challenge. We pride ourselves on our ability to make any idea happen, whether they’re big or small we conquer the obstacles and pressures we face. So when Golley Slater, one of Wales’ biggest ad agencies came calling with an idea no-one else could do, we got extremely excited! Welsh Water wanted an advert to be played on the big screen during the Wales-England rugby Six Nations game in the Millennium Stadium.

The challenge that lay ahead was a tricky little seven day turnaround from pre-production to completion. But this didn’t deter us; over the years we’ve built up strong relationships with our community, the key to our success. A few phone-calls, favours and meetings later we were ready to shoot.

Production was limited to two busy days but with our hard work and the great directing skills of Luke Jacobs we were able to capture some breath-taking footage. We filmed all over South Wales and Rob got to play with the awesome Sony FS700. Post-production was a quick two-day challenge but we knuckled down and put it all together.

We’re immensely proud of what we created in such a short space of time. The advert is evidence of the high standard of work we continue to create at Like An Egg. We look forward to expanding our client list and testing ourselves again in the future.

Below is an extended cut of the advert we made without the voice over.

Like an Egg are ecstatic to announce that we’ve been named Best Enterprise for the Welsh region in the Lloyds TSB Enterprise Awards.

Last week we traveled down to the Wales Millennium Centre for the business pitch and awards ceremony. Chris even put some smart trousers on and left his shorts at home. At the ceremony we met some other great businesses such as North Wales Hydro Power Ltd and Dr Zigs who made some impressive giant bubbles.

We were proud just to be considered for the award but when they announced we’d won we couldn’t believe it!

We will receive £5,000 for winning and we’re already planning what equipment we’re going to use the money to invest in. We’ve also been given a mentor that will offer invaluable knowledge and they’ll help us as we continue to expand our company.

As we’ve won the regional award we’ve qualified for the national Lloyds TSB Enterprise Awards Grand Final held in April. We look forward to another awards dinner networking with other companies on a national scale.

This award symbolizes the hard work that we’ve put into the company over the last two years. We’ve grown from nothing to an award winning young business, but we won’t stop there. We’ll continue to evolve and we look forward to the exciting future we have ahead of us.

It’s been a busy few months to end a fantastic year for Like an Egg productions. It has been made all the more exciting by the release of a new music video that we made back in October. Bridgend band When We Were Wolves came to us wanting a video that suited their highly emotive and ferocious new single “Hounds.”

With a very tight deadline the video was shot over four busy days and edited in just one week.   The video features some of the most talented actors Wales has to offer. These include George Goding as a homeless man, Lisa Zahara and Jack Brown as a troubled young couple and Nicholas McGaughey as a grieving father.

For such a long song it was essential we got the balance right between the story elements and the performance. We also had a great crew for the performance section including Luke Jacobs, Chris ‘CJ’ Jacobi and Cyrus Mirza Shafa.

We are very happy with the result, check it out for yourselves.