2009 Portfolio

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NB: Pages are in a 2-page landscape layout.

Resume 2009

LOUISE DAVIDSON
ludavidson@gmail.com
www.louisedavidson.blogspot.com
Canadian cell: 1-647-502-3985
AVAILABLE FOR WORK ANYTIME


ACADEMIC RECORD
TERTIARY
University of Otago, Dunedin, 2003-2007
PGDip Natural History Filmmaking and Communication, 2007, Distinction.
BA, Majoring in Design Studies, minor in Film and Media Studies, 2007
BSc, Majoring in Ecology, 2006
SECONDARY
Wellington Girls’ College ‘99-’02; Singapore’s Tanglin Trust School ‘96-‘99
PRIMARY
Singapore’s Tanglin School ‘95-’96; Eastern Hutt Primary School ‘90-‘95


JOB HISTORY

Film and Design Work

– Red Sky Film and Television Ltd.: Art Dept. & Wardrobe – Feb-Mar 2009, Contract
Responsibilities: production skills, props and wardrobe design.

– Independent Graphic Designer: 2006-2009, Contract
Clients: ASM (logo design), Softshoe (Poster Design)

– Red Sky Film and Television Ltd.: Assistant Director, Edit Assistant, Production Manager, Art Dept. – Jan-Sep 2008, Contract
Responsibilities: Helping to make two docu-drama series for TVNZ, various
filmmaking and production skills, Graphic design.

– Independent filming projects: 2007-2008, Contract
Clients: Te Tiaki Mahinga Kai project, Mary McFarlane, Video NZ Ltd.
Festival of Colour, Wanaka

– Natural History New Zealand Ltd.: Tape-logger – 2007, Contract
Responsibilities: Interview transcribing, Shot identifying and timecode logging.

– Flicks In The Shadows: Film Festival Coordinator – Sep-Oct 2007
Responsibilities: Advertising for entries, setting up free screening in an alleyway.

– Travelwise, Charming Bed and Breakfast guide – Apr-Sep 2007
Responsibilities: Graphic designer, publicist, data entry, customer service.

Environmental Work

– Calgary Zoo: Field Technician, Grasslands National Park, Canada – Jun-Sep 2009, Contract (in association with Parks Canada)
Responsibilities: Working with Black-Tailed Prairie Dogs, Trapping, Animal handling, Pit tagging, data collection and entry, GPS, Vegetation surveys.

– Long-tailed bat research (New Zealand’s Department of Conservation): Field Researcher – Nov-Dec 2006, 2007, Contract
Responsibilities: Radio tracking, Harp trapping, Animal handling, Orienteering, Data collection and entry.

– A.R.G.O.S (Otago University & C.S.A.F.E.): Field Researcher – Nov 2005-Mar 2006, Contract/Bursary
Responsibilities: Use of scientific research methods, Orienteering,
Flora & fauna identification and surveys, Data collection and entry, Report writing.

– Native Landscape Restoration: Tree Planter – Oct 2005, 2006, Volunteer
Responsibilities: Transportation, planting and care of native species in a remote valley.

– Dept. of Marine Conservation: Office assistant – Holidays 2003 & 2004, Temp
Responsibilities: Kit preparation, Training Assistant, Data entry, Office Assistance.

Hospitality/Customer Service Work

– Zero Degrees Microbrewery, Bristol: Barmaid/waitress – Oct-Dec 2008, Temp
Responsibilities: Customer service, bar skills, cleaning

– AHM catering, Bristol: Catering Assistant – Oct-Nov 2008, Temp
Responsibilities: Customer service, food prep, cleaning (at Frenchay Hospital)

– Lemongrass Café, Eastbourne: General helper – February 2007, Temp.
Responsibilities: Till work, Customer service, Food prep., Cleaning

– Bayleys Real Estate, Lower Hutt & Eastbourne: Office Assistant – Jan 2005, Dec 2004, Temp.
Responsibilities: Running reception, Writing contracts, Various tasks

Other Jobs:
– Harvest Café, Dunedin 2006;
– Wait Staff, Kingsgate Catering, Dunedin 2005-2007;
– Vineyard maintenance, Queenstown 2003;
– Dunedin 24-Hour Book Sale, 2004;
– Market Researcher, Reeds Research, 2003;
– Office Assistant, Leaders Real Estate, Eastbourne, 2003 & 1999;
– Stock and Store Assistant, Farmers Queensgate, 2001-2003;
– Store Attendant, Pizza Hut Petone, 2002;
– Check-out Operator, Pak’n’Save Petone, 2001;
– Language tutor, Actress, German Educational Video, 2000


ACHIEVEMENTS (since 2005)
Six film festivals world-wide for our Post-Graduate film, ‘A Moment of Clarity…’ (including American Conservation Film Festival 2008 and WildScreen 2008).
Teaching filmmaking in Ladakh’s SECMOL campus in 2009.
Band-member of SoftShoe, popular in Auckland & Dunedin, began 2005.
Royal Society of New Zealand’s Big Science Experience Filmmaking Mentor, 2007.
48HOUR Furious Filmmaking Competition, 2006 & 2008.
Otago Wildlife Photography Competition 2005 nomination.
Own scientific study of New Zealand mud snails, Potamopyrgus antipodarum, 2005.

FREQUENTLY USED APPLICATIONS
Final Cut Pro (and several associated programmes), Adobe Creative Suite (several), Microsoft Office

PERSONAL INTERESTS
Art; sketching, painting, sculpture, photography and film
Music; percussion, Indie, live, Indonesian Gamelan, digital composing.
Sports; snowboarding, trekking, orienteering, running, swimming, netball.
Dance; hip-hop and contemporary jazz.

AT THE MOMENT…
I recently worked in Grasslands Nation Park, Saskatchewan, Canada as a field research technician collecting data on Prairie Dogs for the Calgary Zoo. I have a Work Visa, Canadian bank account and a SIN number. I also have a U.K. Work Visa. At this stage I hope to continue to find environmental/design/film work in Canada for as long as possible as my Visa is easily extended. I also have a clean International Drivers’ License and a lot of experience driving 4-wheel-drives, small trucks, small boats and scooters.

Although a lot of my job history may not seem directly relevant to an ideal job, it has taught me valuable skills which can easily cross-credit into other positions, such as management skills, self-motivation, attention to detail, ability to work well with others and most importantly fast and effective problem-solving skills.

My latest work experience is in the film industry as my passion for the environment and science communication is my reason for becoming a Natural History Filmmaker. I recently spent three months in India where I volunteered at a Campus in Ladakh teaching basic documentary filmmaking. I wish to spend the next few years working on environmental and wildlife, film and design projects and continue to exercise and expand my knowledge and experience. I also hope my skills and experience gained in New Zealand can be of some use in whatever work I am offered.


REFEREES:
Natasha Lloyd: Supervisor for Prairie Dog research project, Calgary Zoo, Canada.
Mark Haggerty: Ecological Field-Research Manager for A.R.G.O.S., NZ.
Bryan Bruce: Managing Director of Red Sky Film & TV Ltd., NZ.
Tom Ralls: Bar Manager of Zero Degrees, Bristol, U.K.
Lloyd Davis: Head of Science Communication Studies at Otago University, NZ.

I can provide written references from previous employers.

'A Moment of Clarity...'

Link to our blog for the Diploma Film by Louise Davidson and Sarah Cowhey (2007).
'A Moment of Clarity...'

Festivals include:
Green Screen, Germany 2009
Montana CINE International Film Festival, USA 2009, Honourable Mention for Creative Approach
Planet in Focus International Environmental Film & Video Festival, Canada 2008
Wildscreen – International Wildlife and Environmental Film Festival, UK 2008, nominated for Jury's Special Selection
American Conservation Film Festival, USA 2008
SCINEMA, Australia 2007
Aotearoa Film Festival, NZ 2007 - Runner-Up for best NZ Documentary

WELCOME TO SECMOL
– The Students' Educational and Cultural Movement of Ladakh –

Video can be found on Youtube.com: "Welcome to SECMOL"
or type in/copy-paste http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-JRnYVkSAU


Huge thank-yous go out to all those who supported this project and donated equipment or funds; Bryan, Fraser, Helen, Chris, Katrina and, of course, The Folks.
And a massive cheers for the support and encouragement; Natural History New Zealand Ltd., Henrik, Stan, my family, and most of all, Gaya and Jazza.

In less than 10 days, 1 1/2hrs a day, 5 students learnt how to use cameras and make a short film. One of the most popular responses from people when I mentioned my plans to teach filmmaking in India was, ‘but India has the largest film industry, I’m pretty sure they know how to make films’.

These students may be privileged enough to live on a campus such a SECMOL (Ladakh, India) to help them study and pass their national exams, but none of them have ever heard of youtube, played with filming or even seen a short film. The students made this short film in the final 3 days of the course, hoping to give the outside world a tour of this dusty, spellbinding part of their world.

Gaya, Jared and I had put aside one month of our Indian travels for Ladakh, and two weeks of that was all that SECMOL could afford us. My goal was to teach some students how to express themselves through film and share the way they see the world.
Right from day one I knew there were going to be more hurdles than I could anticipate. I had done everything I could to prepare, but it was near impossible to know what was waiting for us in the Himalayas. Email responses were rare, info on the students and available equipment was vague and no one had a solid idea of when would best suit this new course. The campus was much of mystery to us right up until we arrived at its doorstep, still not sure if we were in the right place after a flight from Delhi to Leh, a bus to Phey in the middle of nowhere and a 7km walk along an unmarked dirt road in the middle of a dry moonscape.

Here are a few shots to give you an idea of what it was like to teach at SECMOL, some of these were taken by the students as my camera was on a free-for-all basis.


WELCOME TO SECMOL
The self-sustainable SECMOL campus from afar.


Two of my students, Deachen and Tashi Lamo.



Tenzin and Tashi Lamo with two of the doanted cameras.



Dorjay filming the winter greenhouses.



Tashi Lamo trying her hand at editing.



Jigmat rehersing the oven spiel.



The rubbish sorting system.



Some local graffiti.



A lovely blurry shot of the film's first audience.



Dinner time.



Jared and Gaya in the dining hall.



Myself, Jared and Gaya catching rays in front of the solar cooker.



Our one night away, we hiked 9 hours up the valley to a remote village called' Diskit'. The altitude was outrageous - we could only walk about 10 minutes at a time before collapsing, but there is no stopping the mini-harmonica action.



The grandfather and grandson of the family we stayed with were more than photogenic.



A quick pan of what the landscape is like.


SECMOL is made up of a handful of volunteers and at least 50 Ladakhi students who want to better their English, pass their exams and live as sustainably as possible. They all live on campus, and travel into Leh for school. English is their second language in a land where they are raised to speak in Ladakhi, schooled in Urdu and used to sit exams in Hindi. I tried to learn as much Ladakhi as I could but this proved pointless as everyone wanted to speak in English with us.

It only took a day before we were good friends with many of the students. In class, they have an incomparable respect for their teachers and a hunger to learn anything anyone is willing to teach, which made my task far too easy and fun.

My lesson plan had to kept basic, as most of the time was spent double-checking that everyone knew what I was saying and what the point of all this was. It took them a while to believe that these cameras now belonged to them and the campus, that they could take them everywhere with them and that they could film whatever they wanted.
I handed over 3 small digital cameras that had a movie filming option and took AA batteries, 12 rechargeable AA batteries and two wall chargers (and two more that broke one by one), 6 memory cards, a card reader, computer cables, a directional radio-microphone that can also plug straight into the computer and a basic movie-editing programmed.

Day One: camera care, how to charge batteries and what all the buttons mean.
It turns out Ladakhis have a thing for taking photos of each other, hundreds and hundreds, however one of my students was strongly against this trend and only took photos of surrounding landscapes, plants and wildlife. They guarded those cameras day and night, not even removing it from their wrists when trying to shovel food onto their dinner plates.

Day Two: taking still shots and all the different styles you could use.
This seemed to get the students away from the snap-happy shots and experiment a bit more.

Day Three: making your still shots tell a story and how to make a stop animation.
This was difficult – breaking down a 3D moving world with no beginning or end and finding a short sequence to portray with a beginning middle and end. The best analogy I could find was to imagine you are writing an essay – what do you want to say exactly? Too many vacant expressions moved us onto stop animation; fun, simple and has an instant result.

Day Four: Computer class – adding music to your still shots.
I made the mistake for showing them a slide show from my diploma film, so from then on they spent all their free time on the computers lining up the hundreds of photos of them and their friends with local pop tunes.

Day Five: Using that movie option on your camera and all the different styles of shots.
Batteries found a whole new challenge and they learnt pretty quick that it was up to them to keep one set charging overnight and to be sparing with camera usage.

Day Six: Story telling with shots, making a sequence and putting on a timeline.
Storyboarding took a while to get the hang of but they got the gist eventually. However, with homework of filming their basic storyboards the message was lost, they simply went out and took more still shots or made more slide shows.

Day Seven: Filming our short film about SECMOL using an audio recorder, two movie cameras and one stills.
With time running out, it was time to dive in and learn from mistakes. It took only an hour before it all made sense to them and they learnt what worked and what didn’t. They were their own bosses; I simply followed them around to make sure everything worked smoothly. They nominated who would talk in front of the camera, who would take stills, who would do the locked-off filming and who would do all the cut-aways. We always used an audio sound recorder to avoid problems with the changing sound from the digital cameras. To practice, they sometimes spoke in English, and other times in Ladakhi so we could write out subtitles.

Day Eight: Filming and editing the short film
They came alive and worked well into their tea and meal breaks, turning up to class early and taking turns at fetching each other snacks and chai. This was the passion I saw in the New Zealand students I helped out a couple of years before. It gave them a new self-confidence, with each of them having a certain specialty. Tenzin was a natural Director of Photography, Dorjay was the mic-master and kept everyone laughing, Deachan was an efficient organizer and loved editing, Jigmat was a natural in front of the camera and Tashi Lamo helped to keep everyone motivated and the filming/photographing ticking over.

Day Nine: A whole day of editing and final bits’n’bobs for the short film.
They coined the term ‘short but sweet’ as a reminder every time they went out to re-film things or do pick-up shots, practically running all over campus.
Day Ten: The Premiere of ‘Welcome to SECMOL’ in front of all the students and volunteers.
Jigmat stood up for the traditional pre-screening speech, first in Ladakhi then in English, apologizing for the amateur nature of their first film and how they hoped everyone would like it. It was such a hit they screened it twice. Rebecca, the volunteer coordinator, had been away for our whole two weeks at SECMOL and returned just in time for our leaving and the film's first screening. Apart from a few misinterpretations in the subtitles, she seemed impressed which was a huge relief.

My fingers are crossed the students’ film can be used on their website to help explain the mystery of SECMOL to the outside world.
I learnt a lot about sustainable living and options that I will give a go back home.

I can’t wait to try this project again with another group of students, maybe elsewhere in the world *FINGERS CROSSED*