mike[space] dot net

Hah, have just realised that I never actually posted about the release of episode 4 of Out of Office. Got caught up in so many other things it completely slipped my mind!

It's called "The Smartest Guy in the Room", and is definitely my favourite so far. It's nice to be back to the original length of the episodes, and this one has got a couple of physical effects in it which were a challenge that came off really well. It also made it a harder episode to edit, so I'm really pleased with the result!

It's

No, not some kind of rant about how the internet sucks away my time (although I could quite happily indulge in that for quite some time). 'Web Rage' is actually the title of the third episode of Out of Office, and can be found over on the site:

Web Rage

This is actually the second half of The RealBondGirrl, we decided to split the episode after we realised how naturally it broke in to two halves. We get to see Jason's passion for the internet in this one, and I think Ben pulls it off brilliantly.

Hope you enjoy it!

Something that has been occupying a great deal of my time in the last couple of weeks has been the process of trying to promote Out of Office. Friends would be forgiven for thinking that I have become a one man spam machine, with a bunch of emails, tweets, IMs and threats (I'm making the last one up). It's a difficult line to tread, between being enthusiastic for the work you've done, and just being annoying. For anyone that I have fallen into the annoying category with, I apologise - do email me and let me know!

Bloody hell, it's been two weeks since I posted on here, which I guess shows how busy I've been. That or incredibly slack! Anyway, the reason I am posting is to point out that the second episode of Out of Office is out, The RealBondGirrl.

Tomorrow, the first episode of Out of Office will be released, 6 minutes of video that represent my first foray into the world of internet video. This is the biggest project I've undertaken as a writer, and it's exciting to finally be at the point where it can be shared with the wider world. To be honest though, it's also a bit terrifying, and I've already started and re-started this post a bunch of times, trying to work out what to say.

It's almost here. It's so almost here that we now have a logo, and a website, and a picture lock on episode one of the series. It's been quite a long haul to get to this point, but I can officially state that I am now excited. And also nervous, and worried, and having strange dreams about video file conversion!

After a rather lengthy review of my running earlier in the week, I was aiming to make this a more succinct review of the other aspects of my life. But instead it has turned into another lengthy load of waffle, this time focused on the writing. Apologies for the length, but it has been useful to try and really summarise my thoughts ...

Various thoughts to mention, none of which are long enough or interesting enough to go on their own, but might just group together enough to justify it.

First off, I made the unusual decision to get the train up to my Mum's this weekend. Normally, I'd jump in the car, but the M1 just sucks at the moment with the lane widening work, getting through London is always unpredictable, and I figured it wouldn't actually make the journey longer. And tbh, even with the train being delayed, it definitely proved to be a pleasant journey.

Last week was the big block of filming that we had scheduled for Out of Office. We shot three episodes in the five days, so we now have four episodes in the can. The next big step will of course be the editing, which may take a little bit of time. But I am still hoping that we can have something ready by the end of January. The experience of the shoot was fantastic. We had a brilliant bunch of people working on the set, and (of course) a fab cast.

This weekend was the first part of the shoot for Out Of Office, the webseries that I wrote and am co-producing. We are using my friend John's flat for the set, and he very helpfully volunteered to go away this weekend, so we had the place to ourselves to sort everything out. On Friday, the crew descended to start dressing the set; blacking out the windows, rigging the lights, moving the minimal set around and and working out the practicalities of filming. Unfortunately, Tom's armchair had not fitted into Beth's car, so we decided to head back to mine to see if we could fit mine instead.