A love letter to the city!

“Experience the world famous sights and events of Bristol, carefully crafted to give the illusion of smallness!”

The distinctive aesthetic style of this film is partly due to the tilt-shift effect. The term derives from the use of tilt-shift lenses, which offer selective focus and can give compositions the illusion of being in miniature. I have painstakingly recreated this look digitally, using realistic camera blur along with a few other techniques.

I filmed most of the shots for this production throughout 2015/16. All the elements had to be perfect to create this little story, carefully planning out and capturing shots at some of Bristol's familiar locations, events, and happenings, when the conditions were just right.

There was extensive post production involved to piece everything together and get the look-and-feel as I'd envisaged. You'll notice many shots have subtle parallax movement and extra work was involved to sneak elements in front of the background camera blur, which enhances the sense of miniaturisation.

Some of the shots were complex to achieve, making each of those a project in their own right. For example, I shot 4214 images for the airport sequence and spent around two days on the post production! I also rotoscoped various elements to make them appear in front of the background. A good example of this can been seen in the Balloon Fiesta sequence, where the balloons are in focus as they rise.

I also spent a great deal of time building layers of sound design to deliver audible effects that help bring the story to life.

I really hope you enjoy this project. While incredibly time consuming, it was a lot of fun to make. Please share the video by using the Vimeo and YouTube links & keep an eye out for the postcards I've left all around the city!

Keep being Bristol.

Big love ~ jb