For a LONG time, whenever I was introduced to new people through friends I was known as the "Night is Day" guy.
I'll explain...
Back in 2004 I was accepted onto a talent pool at BBC Scotland, ran by the brilliant Annie Wood. I was only there for a handful of months because in the autumn I'd be leaving to study HND TV Operations and Productions at James Watt College.
In my short time there I learned a lot - one, always be a pleasant pest and two, never over-drink at a free bar at the BBC summer party (I'll tell you more about that another time).
A competition came up whilst I was at the BBC and they were asking people to shoot a trailer for a film that they could go on and potentially make. Annie encouraged me to write something different, something that not most people would do, as a way of standing out from the crowd.
Having grown up on the 90's animated Spider-Man cartoon, comics and starting my journey of discovery watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I knew I wanted to go down a superhero route.
Recruiting members on the course with me, we shot half a teaser. Yep, even then it was difficult to get things finished! Regardless, it inspired me to keep going. In 2004 I attended college and left after my first year. Frustrated at not being able to shoot the things I wanted to (I've always been slightly stubborn, I'm better now though!), I would then go onto write "Night is Day - Dusk".
A 20 minute short film introducing us to Jason Mackenzie (played by Ross Maxwell), his friend Sophie who knows his secret and tends to his superhero-inflicted-wounds, and crime boss McDade, Karis - his lover looking to escape, and his henchman Aspirin (he's a painkiller, get it?)
We shot the film over a week in Greenock and it went out into the world. My first time writing and directing. It was a blast. Everybody was amazing and it gave me a taste into not only the world of filmmaking, but about creating an original superhero in my city... Glasgow, not Greenock.
Sadly, there was drama during post-production which I won't go into, which soured the experience slightly, but I would go onto to shoot a further 13 episodes of "Night is Day" as a web-series with a brand new cast, and then in 2010 we'd shoot the feature film to wrap it all up.
Recently I've found my old hard drives in storage and I've been going through all the old projects that never were and the ones long forgotten. Unfortunately I didn't future proof "Night is Day - Dusk" and so all I've got is an .AVI file that plays sound, but no video.
Fortunately, this trailer of the movie DOES work, and I hope it gives you a taste of the story.
We didn't really have a budget, like everyone else back in 2004, but we were creative and everybody pulled up their socks to make something fun.
Also surviving is the cast interviews video for the original short film!
You can watch it at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSwYRv4WXB8
I'm uploading a few pages for the follow up short film, "Night is Day Darkness", as it was intended to be a trilogy of short films.
I've also found original drafts of two pilot episodes I wrote back when I wanted to pitch the show to BBC Scotland. Oh how things have changed.
So, in 2 years time it'll be 20 years since "Night is Day" blasted into existence, and much like Jason Mackenzie, I've learned a lot in that time. Am I completely finished with that world?
No... of course not.