Time to end the wait
After months of work, we are excited to release the newest Nowadays passion project, Waiting List, into the world.
Written and directed by Phoebe Brooks, Waiting List is a narrative about Jenny, a young trans woman bravely taking the first steps in seeking gender affirming healthcare, only to be swallowed up by the system and the future that she could have had, ripped out from underneath her.
Our film is highlighting the very real problem trans people are facing every day in the U.K. According to a recent BBC report, the average waiting time for an initial consultation for gender affirming medicine is around 3 - 7 years. The reality of this is tens of thousands of people are being denied the opportunity to live their lives authentically and as a result of this, too many trans lives are lost because they’ve been waiting so long for care.
Jenny, played by Mary Malone, is a real talent - as you will witness in the film, she has a fantastic ability to convey very intense emotions with incredible subtlety, and we were grateful to be able to cast her as our lead. You’ll be seeing a lot more of Mary in the future - we’ve heard through the grapevine she’s been cast in the end-of-year Doctor Who special. We can’t wait to see more from her!
Mary was supported by accomplished actress, Lucy Russell, who played Dr Hardy. Lucy will be a familiar face to some, having recently starred in ITV’s mini series, A Spy Among Friends, and Disney’s Andor. Lucy brought a complex humanity to bear in the form of a medical professional who is outwardly helpful but represents a dehumanising system. A special thank you to Tom Payne for casting.
The whole film was shot over a single weekend. Our team was composed of a collection of industry professionals, as well as work colleagues, friends, and family all invested in bringing this film to life. We jumped around various locations in North and East London - from a doctors office, to a queer club, even to the directors own bedroom (a bit of set direction, and throwing up a temporary wallpaper and it was basically unrecognisable!).
Long time friends of Nowadays - DoP Charles Mori and gaffer Stephen Allwright - worked hard to make every frame rich and beautiful, and their expertise on set was greatly appreciated. Matt Valentine was our maestro - giving us the music and sound mix for the film, Karol at CHEAT finished it off with an beautiful grade, and the whole shoot was meticulously planned and pulled off by producer, Jenny Garrett. A special mention to Dalston Superstore, the thriving east London queer club that has been looking after the LGBTQ+ community since 2008. They gave us their space to use free of charge for this film, which was used during the dance club scenes.
Waiting List was made in collaboration with the charity, Gendered Intelligence - a trans-led UK charity that supports young trans, non-binary, and gender-diverse people, specialising in supporting people under the age of 21. Since 2008, they have worked tirelessly across different sectors, educating, training, and raising awareness to increase understandings of gender diversity and improve the lives of trans people.
Recently, they were one of the charities to take the NHS to court over these extremely long waiting lists that trans people face when seeking gendered affirming healthcare. While the judge has ruled in favour of the NHS, they aren’t giving up and are looking to appeal.
Thank you for watching our film. To help spread awareness, we’d love to encourage you to share and learn more about the issues trans people are facing in the UK.
Creative Resources to Live and Die By
Hi there! It’s Sandy - Director at Nowadays and, more importantly, for the purposes of this blogpost, a firm believer in sharing and talking about literally anything that I love.
I don’t believe in gatekeeping. And why should I? It’s hard enough getting into the creative industries. When I first started, the mountain of obstacles seemed paralysingly intimidating. But it was due to the helping hands, the recommendations and the conversations people were willing to have with me, that eased me into it all. If I could do one thing now, it’s to be that person who’s there to help others too. Now, I think it’s time I gave back in the same way.
Recently, I’ve started seeing a shift - content creators on TikTok, IG Reels and Linkedin are putting forward their knowledge, resources and tools, for anyone and everyone to learn from. At Nowadays, we’ve been doing our little bit by hosting Ask Away Thursdays - an open invitation for those aspiring to work their way through the production industry, to come and ask their burning questions and get our honest opinions!
Seeing all of this inspired me to put together a list of tools and resources that have certainly saved me (and my work). For the more seasoned creatives who’ve been around the block a few hundred times, you may already be familiar with some old favourites like Shotdeck, Filmgrab, Pinterest, Short of the Week and even Deck of Brilliance. These remain a brilliant and an important part of my everyday toolkit, however, here are some additional gems that you may not have clocked!
A masterlist of various filming, animation and editing techniques - Eyecandy includes a breakdown of each technique, and a whole list of gifs for reference too! I’ve definitely used this tool as a way to not only figure out what the hell that one shot is called, but also as a little inspo tool to think of different ways of doing things!
An AI image search engine - simply click on an image you like the look of and travel down a clickthrough rabbit hole to reveal more images of a similar style. Same.energy has come through so many times when I’ve needed to collect moodboard imagery.
A search engine that uses AI collate and presents a list of stills and shots that depict whatever you’re searching for. You get a couple of free searches, or you can subscribe to their Basic plan for 14.90 euros a month. Even with a limited free use, Flim’s been pretty handy in helping me figure out what films and references have the look I’m going for.
A handy tool for image searching and moodboards. This tool collates images from around the web and categorises them based on your selected colour palette. As a previous designer, this tool has been handy for any moodboards and colour schemes I’ve pulled together. Particularly useful for art direction!
Ever wondered where you heard that one line from that one thing? Yarn.co comes through! Simply search a phrase and you’ll get a collection of clips from film and TV that have said that exact line. I’ve so far only used this for fun honestly, but you can see the appeal should you need to check whether your lines are overused or not!
A handy tool for those in advertising - Spectacle sorts ads into different categories. You can filter results based on the style, mood, industry and more! I’ve used Spectacle for more specific advertising and commercial reference searching, the filters definitely help!
I’m hoping any creatively road-blocked people out there can breathe a slight sigh of relief as they stumble upon these resources. There’s loads more out there too - feel free to drop your rec’s as well! And hey, if you’ve got more questions, maybe check out our next Ask Away Thursday that’s coming up in November!
Over and out!
Sandy xoxo
Lights, Camera, Accolades!
Dust off the shelves folks, we’ve got awards coming out our ears!
Well, not really, that would hurt. But we have had a few significant wins for our work recently and we’d love to take a moment to share with you all.
Firstly, our film ‘Hidden Opportunity’ for Impetus was entered into the EVCOM Clarion Awards under two categories, and came away with awards for both. The EVCOM Clarions celebrate true excellence across cause-driven corporate film, live events and experiences, so it's fantastic to be recognised for our work in this field. ‘Hidden Opportunity’ picked up a highly commended in Brand Communications, and a gold in Social Welfare.
We also picked up quite a few trophies at the Telly Awards. This one is a global award competition which honours excellence in video and television across all screens, and we've collected not one, not two…but 7 awards for our films! As well as winning big at EVCOM, ‘Hidden Opportunity’ picked up a silver in Directing and two golds for Social Impact & Cause Marketing at the Tellys.
Our side project, Wigmakers, was recognised with two Silver trophies for Videography and Short Form Documentary. First premiering at our Nowadays relaunch/15th birthday party, Wigmakers is a short form documentary about how two individuals’ experience of loss led to an unexpected change in career direction. It was directed by Jon Beagley, Nowadays Editor-turned-director, and the result.. Well, we are pretty big fans of it! Check it out below.
Last but certainly not least, our film with NSPCC about online safety picked up a silver in Public interest/awareness and a gold in Cause marketing.
In this campaign, we worked with the NSPCC to start conversations about the dangers of abuse to children via online portals, whether that be through gaming, chat rooms, or social media. 1 in 5 children are internet users and NSPCC recognises how extremely important and urgent it is to make those online spaces safe, especially when tech companies are prioritising clicks over child safety.
That’s it from us! As always, a huge shout-out to the crew/talent/team whose hard work made it happen.
If you’d like to see more from us, you can see our latest work here.
Ask Away Thursday is Back!
A few years ago, we launched Ask Away Thursday, an event at the Nowadays office for anyone at the outset of their production career who wanted to ask us anything. Unfortunately, big and unavoidable global events happened and we had to put it on a small hiatus. But now we are back & running them every three months! Find out below when the next one will be.
So, why are we doing this?
Well there’s a few reasons but the main things are a) we’ve been there b) we could have done with some help and c) we’re getting more and more people asking us how they can make progress in the industry.
15 years ago, when Nowadays was in it’s adolescence, we rattled around London, shooting the odd promo here and there with little to zero idea of how to set up a production company and no idea who we could ask without being a right bother. The people we did get to ask questions are still heroes to us.
Today, with the industry being more popular/crowded than ever, we know the competition for jobs is fierce and the routes to success are less and less straightforward. We’d like to do what we can to help start the filmmakers of the future off on the right foot.
What are we offering?
We want to open our doors for a couple of hours to whoever, to share our experience and opinions. If you’re trying to start out in the industry and you have a question, we’ll try and answer it as honestly and helpfully as we can. If you want us to look at your CV, we will. If you’ve got a showreel to watch, we’ll take a look and let you know what we think. If you’ve got ambitions to start your own company, we’ll tell you not to bother (jokes).
At each Ask Away Thursday we’re going to try and have at least three of us around to talk to. Could be one of our producers, an editor, a director, or one of the founders of the company. And with any luck, there’ll be more than one of you, so you can have a natter amongst yourselves and compare battle scars. There might even be a cold beer or two if you’re lucky.
What we aren’t offering is jobs. And we’re not going to commission you to make your next passion-project. We’re not even offering work experience. We’ve got an intern scheme that we’d love people to sign up for but that’s a separate thing you can apply for here if you’re up for it.
Why should you listen to us?
Great question. One thing's for sure, whatever we say shouldn’t be taken as gospel. We’ve muddled our own way to where we are but we’re not sitting here thinking our way of doing things is for everyone. We can’t tell you the one way forward because chances are there are a few thousand and, clichéd as it sounds, that’s your call to make. In fact, every person in our company has got to where they are via completely different routes - some traditional, some not, some meticulously planned, some entirely haphazard.
We’re not even saying we’re the perfect model of a production company (what is that in this day and age anyway?) but we do get paid to make films for real clients and we do employ people to do it and we’ve got better at doing that every single day since we set out.
When’s the next one?
The next one is going to be on 30th May 2024. It will be at our place and probably go on for a couple of hours between 7pm and 9pm. You can follow the link here to register your interest, tickets will go live on the 16th May 2024!
See you soon!
Team Nowadays
Welcome to Nowadays
Hello. We have some fairly seismic news to share with you.
After 15 years of making films as 3angrymen Productions, we’ve decided to rebrand and change our name.
Naturally, this isn’t a decision we’ve taken lightly and it’s been some time in the making. Like many, we’ve seen the turbulence of the last few years as an opportunity to take stock, to rethink and to re-evaluate - about who we are, what matters most to us, how we’ve already changed and how we want to move the company forward.
Some things haven’t changed. We have always and will always put ‘making films that matter’ at the heart of what we do - hence that tagline is here to stay.
But at the same time, we’ve expanded our horizons, matured and evolved as a team, which led us to the conclusion that we had truly outgrown the name 3angrymen, and that the time was right for something new. Something better.
That’s why we’re rebranding: to better reflect who who we are and everything we want to do. And that's why we've chosen a brand new name:
Nowadays.
Nowadays is the way we work - it’s a name that is implicitly adaptable, that will forever move with the times.
Nowadays is our brilliant in-house team and clients - switched on and sensitive to the issues of today.
And Nowadays is the content we create - socially conscious and culturally relevant, produced with a modern audience in mind.
Over the next month or so we will be making the leap from 3angrymen to Nowadays and we hope you’ll come with us, as we roll out a whole new look for the company, a new website, and, most importantly, lots of lovely new work.
Welcome to Nowadays. Making films that matter. Always.
15 Years of 3angrymen
We’re only two years from being able to get our driving licence!
Well holy macaroni, we’ve only gone and gotten 15 whole years old. What on earth is all that about? Indulging nostalgia, that’s what that’s about.
That’s right - after all the films, for all the clients, made with the help of all those people - we thought we’d take the opportunity to take a saunter down memory lane. To give this some sort of order, we’ve asked Thom and Guy to reach all the way back to 2007 and write up a list of #15filmsthatmatter most to them.
2007 / our first proper 3angrymen Showreel
The culmination of our first year's worth of work, which, if we're honest wasn't much to look at... 😬 probably why we ended up shooting a bunch of shots of London with some colourful SFX pasted all over them. We’ve all been there… haven’t we?
2008 / promo videos for Basecamp Ski school
Our first international shoot took us to the French Alps, trying to keep up with the hardcore Olympic-level Basecamp instructors. Did we make some great films? Yes! Get stuck halfway up a mountain, on a black run, with all our kit after the lifts closed? Also yes! Sample Meribel’s famous apres ski? Mayyybeeee…
2010 / relieving exam stress with
the NSPCC
2010, relieving exam stress with the NSPCC. A real game changer - our first promo for the NSPCC and our first film to go "viral". With 70+ teenagers sat in a sports hall, doing Mexican waves, for 2 days straight - what could possibly go wrong?
2011 / stop motion animation for Channel 4’s Random Acts
Our first telly appearance (as far as we can remember), original Angry, James Dunlop, directed this madcap stop-motion caper with animation wizard Chris Butcher. Got us a Vimeo Staff Pick and no real soldiers (or cows) were harmed in the making of this film. 🙂
2012 / teen focussed promo for ChildLine
A two nights shoot in South London, followed by countless late nights in post-production to bring young people’s problems into the light with fizzing bright neon vfx. Our first film to break the million mark on Youtube but, you know, who's counting?
2013 / online promo for Scouts UK
The first of many collaborations with the fearless folks over at Scouts. Making this was an adventure in itself, involving leaps into the unknown, river scrambling, mountain hiking … and 10 minutes with the Chief Scout Bear Grylls 🐻.
2014 / short documentary for the Shoreditch Trust
Focused on three trainees finding their way in the intense environment of a busy London restaurant, this was our first foray into the magical world of documentary filmmaking. Three stories - Leanne, Jack and Lucca in their own words - accompanied by some luscious b-roll shot through some vintage Cooke lenses. Yum! Nearly as delicious as the food being served up.
2014 / charity gala film for Build Africa
A lesson in 1) how to do pre-production on the fly and 2) extreme battery management, with the script still being written on the long and bumpy road to the remote ultra-rural area of Masindi, northwest Uganda.
2015 / political campaign film for The Green Party
With critical seats to be won in Bristol and Brighton ahead of a spring general election, we followed the Green Party’s main representatives around their constituencies, fighting for a greener United Kingdom 💚. Pre-2016 politics, eh! Feels like a far-away fairy-tale land now.
2017 / charity promo for Crisis
After 50 years of incredible work, Crisis wanted to mark the occasion by challenging their audience to imagine a world without homelessness.
An especially memorable project for us - lots of very early hours location scouting (with an especially epic effort from DOP Adrian Peckitt), a newly commissioned poem, voiced by someone who'd recently spent 3 years living on the streets - everyone involved just going very above and very beyond to make the project work.
2018 / online promo for Scouts UK
The one where we finally learnt to let go (a bit). Directed by Danny Baldwin and produced by Kezia Clark this was the first big campaign shoot that didn't have either Guy or Thom around on set. And it turned out beautifully, what does that tell you?
2019 / profile mini-doc for Schroders
After over 10 years of working with Schroders we really struggled to narrow down our selection. In the end, we've gone for this sunny, sandy little beauty, which required Guy to get out into the blazing heat of the Sahara Desert, to film the sheer lunacy that is the Marathon Des Sables. ☀️☀️☀️
2019 / charity promo for Leonard Cheshire
For every day we worked on this project we learnt something new about the challenges facing people with disabilities, including how woefully inaccessible our shoots can be. Thankfully we had the legend that is Jack Binstead schooling us on a daily basis.
2020 / TVC for food delivery service Field & Flower
Deep into lockdown #1, with the nation obsessed with upping their home-cooking game, we visited Home Farm in the gorgeous Gordano Valley to sample the amazing food F&F offer for delivery. Our abiding memory - how good it felt to finally be out and about filming again.
2021 / fundraising film for Impetus
As the pandemic finally began to abate and production began to crank back up to something like full-steam-ahead, we went and shot this film about young people determined to make up for lost time. It felt like a real turning point for us, turning our attention to how things are going to move forward, how we want things to change.