The M Word

Technology is getting really mobile. We are providing training on line which can now be accessed by a mobile phone, on the move or on the job. This is really handy for people like BT engineers who need some specific information while out on a job, even up a pole. Take for example this blog it been written and uploaded from the back of the TMM van while traveling down the M6 to a meeting with Openreach regarding training.

I look a bit gay.

You may or may not know that I teach at Staffordshire University. In fact I’ve been passing on my technical and creative skills since 1991. As a Senior Lecturer in Advertising and Commercial Film Production I have the honour of attending my students degree ceremony. It’s a defining moment for many young people and is the culmination of 3 years hard work. Of course there’s a lot pomp but what better way to display thier success to parents, tutors and each other. I probably will not see many of the students again but many will go on to be the film makers of the future.

We’ve launched the new website after a few tweaks. Thanks all of you who gave us feedback with our beta trial. I hope you like the changes. The Portfolio has over 68 of our programmes on it so there is still a long way to go. So keep an eye on the up dates. It’s a big task to try and upload all of the programmes we have made over 21 years. We’ve seen an incredible change in technology so going back to early programmes made on Low Band U-matic tape and converting them to the latest Flash media is a time consuming operation. But no doubt one day it will be finished. I’m going to be putting up some of our old christmas videos as well so keep an eye out for ‘Barry White and the seven dwarfs’ and ‘The Maclagan Men Christmas single’

Hey I’ve got a new toy! I like gadgets and this is a gadget to top them all. Sat Nav, phone, bluetooth, radio, tv, internet, stills camera, video camera, conference call speaker and best of all it makes a sound like the star ship enterprise! I’ve even written this blog on it.

Yes I know I’m sad.

Rachel watches the Gannets on Grassholm

In March I went to St Davids in Pembrokshire to film John Quilter surfing and cooking on the beach. The weather was awfull so this June I decided to go back for Rachel’s birthday. The first night we had a amazing thunderstorm and in the morning we got up to grey mist and rain. By lunchtime the sky was blue and our trip to see whales and dolphins in the Irish sea was fantastic.

Making films on film is an expensive occupation. Generally everybody works for free. But the problem is we can’t get free film or processing. In addition when the film is processed it has to be transfered onto video for us to edit. So this is where the TMM Film Fund comes in. If we can do small jobs here and there like the odd duplication or short video we will bill it to TMM FILMS. Sometimes The Maclagan Men Ltd donate. When the kitty gets big enough to buy the film stock and pay for the Telecine we can make a film!

Recently Tim Orchard and Anderson West - two talented 3rd year students at Staffordshire University copied 37 8mm home movies onto DVD for £300 - that will pay for two 400ft rolls of 16mm film, telecine and process that will make 22 minutes of a film. Fantastic! Shooting starts in August.

Anderson telecines 8mm film onto DVD in the TMM studio

Now that I’m also a Senior Lecturer at Staffordshire University I’ve also been fingered as a bit of a Health and Safety professional. Part of me feels “that’s rubbish” but when I reflect on the number of training programmes I’ve produced it’s inevitable that some of it will stick. So when I start talking about slip, trips and falls or working at height I sort of know what I’m talking about.So producing an on-line induction Health and Safety Training package is kinda second nature.
We’ve only just started so I’ll keep you informed of progress.

All new and shiney our new website. It’s taken a while to get it up and running and we’re still adding to it. There’s still loads of work to do on it mainly uploading videos and refining the text but at least its up there. Just waiting for feedback now.

Screen grab