The Apple and the Man (and the Chair and the Tree) was a 5 minute peice created for a 2nd year film project by “Team 19″ – myself, Graeme Mitchell, Jon Clarke and Matthew Ames.

The brief of the project was “Contrasts” and we decided turn the idea on its head and contrast our project with everyone else’s. We did away with a proper script (there were no lines anyway) or storyboarding to created an art film, littered with different contrasts. Peace vs Anger, Good vs Bad, Reality vs Unreality and White vs Black (Graeme’s hair at this time was two tone white and black, unfortunately its only seen at the end).

The film was a challenge in some areas, mainly the editing. As there was a “live action, stop motion” style to a lot of the film, with Graeme and other objects flittering about from frame to frame, it meant there had to be some very tight editing to get a frame to sit correctly on the beat of the music. Another challenge was the weather, the time of year we filmed meant filming had to be put off because of rain, and the rest of the time there were very cold conditions – good practice for filming projects later on.

Ultimately, the lack of story did lose us marks, and lecturer comments did say that the music (by Jon Clarke) and the “This is Spinal Tap” style mock directors commentary we added for the DVD did save our project. Even so, it was held in high regard and even shown to the year below when they came to do the same module – perhaps as a how-not-to-do-it warning!

I was one of the two cameramen, and was also one of the two editors of the piece. I may even have got a sentence in on the commentary.

The stills below are taken from the final piece, and then if you reach the bottom, you can watch La Pomme et L’homme in all its glory!