Agewell Social Network at The Lawns.

What’s Your Story?

The “What’s Your Story” project has finished, and this is the website …

From meditations on culture and identity, to tender portraits of love and loss, through stories of pleasures and passions, the What’s Your Story? series is the culmination of eleven weeks of hard work on the part of participants from four different parts of London, most of whom had never before even picked up a camera. The lasting outcome of the training programme is not only the finished films, but sustainable filmmaking skills for communities to continue sharing their real stories.

Look for the four Hackney films!

URL: http://www.whatsyourstory.uk.com/ .

We Are What We Do.

We Are What We Do is a global movement that believes it’s not just politicians, institutions and big businesses that can change the world — ordinary people can do it too.

URL: http://wearewhatwedo.org/ .

Some of your fellow Hackney Silver Surfers are learning documentary film techniques at the Documentary Filmmakers Group in Shacklewell Lane.

We have four small teams, each responsible for making a five-minute video.

One of the teams is making a video about memories of the music brought from Jamaica to Dalston in the 1950s and 1960s.

If you remember those days, if that music was important to you then, or if you remember the Four Aces Club in Dalston Lane back in the 1960s and 1970s — we would like to hear from you.

If you can help (or if you know anyone who can), please send an email to acc@lawns.org.uk .

A message from Jemma Buckley, Rio Cinema …

A message from Sarah Fairbairn, Geffrye Museum …

A message from Emma Kerr, East London Dance …

A free course for older people.

Be involved in writing and performing comedy sketches for an internet radio show to be recorded at City Hall on the South Bank. A special course presented by the Capital Age Festival and Silver Comedy for anyone aged 50+.

The course is made up of 8 daytime afternoon sessions where you will learn everything you need to know about writing and performing comedy sketches for the radio, and how to put a show together.

There will then be a live recording session at City Hall as part of a special Capital Age Festival event, followed by a final follow-up session with an introduction to editing. The finished work will be put on the internet as a short series of podcasts and CDs or MP3s will be produced for everyone involved.

Workshops will be held every Monday afternoon (1 to 4 pm) at Oval House Theatre (tube: Oval, Northern Line) from 11 January 2010.

For more information or to enrol, call Capital Age Festival on 01895 675 389 or email chris.head@yahoo.co.uk .

Make your own short documentary film.

When you look at old photos from a hundred years ago, do you want to know more? Why are they dressed like that? What were they doing before the picture was taken?

‘What’s Your Story’ is a way for older people to pass on their stories. Professional filmmakers will teach you how to use a video camera and make a short film about your story or someone else’s. The course will take place January to March 2010.

DFG (The Documentary Filmmakers Group), the leading training provider for professional documentary filmmakers in the UK, is supported by the Transformation Fund to offer training on this special pilot project. Similar DFG courses cost £1000.

Sessions will run for four hours a week on a Monday morning in Dalston. Fifteen participants will be chosen to learn filmmaking skills and to produce a video art work.

To find out more about how to apply, come and meet us at:

• Made In Hackney,
  Screening of New Short Documentary Films.
• Saturday 28 November 2009, 1 – 3.30 pm.
• Hackney Museum (Ground Floor),
  1 Reading Lane,
  E8 1GQ .
• Light refreshments will be served.

This is the first public screening of the best of DFG graduates’ short documentary films about Dalston people including:

• Anthony – Street Cleaner and Philosopher.
• The Grave Digger’s Story.
• And several films about Ridley Road market stall holders.

To find out more details about this event and book your place, please email amber@dfgdocs.com , or phone Amber on 020 7249 6600.

A message from Cheryl Bowen, Hackney Museum …

The Rio, Hackney’s last remaining cinema, is celebrating its 100th anniversary with an ambitious new community project that will make archive film more accessible to local audiences.

As part of the project, the Rio is especially interested in any home movies local residents may have hidden away. These films are a rich source of memories, and key to unlocking and accessing our pasts.

Towards the end of the year the Rio will be hosting a special ‘Home Movie’ screening day, where residents will have the opportunity to bring along their film reels and view them on screen. Furthermore, the Rio is able to digitise this material — so it can be played and enjoyed again and again at home on DVD.

If you have any old film footage at home, or would just like to know more about the project, please contact Jemma at the Rio …

• Email: jemma@riocinema.org.uk .
• Phone: 020 7241 9419 .

Rio website: http://www.riocinema.ision.co.uk/ .

Do you want to be part of an art project that documents Dalston during this period of change?

Join artist Larisa Blazic and add your view to Mezzo Moderno, Mezzo Distrutto (Half Modern, Half Destroyed), a unique project that uses mobile and digital technologies to record and document the ways in which people view and interpret their built environment. Larisa has been working with local community groups to capture images of Dalston and share them through a new website that acts as a collaborative, living archive curated by local residents. Larisa invites you to take part in this project and, as she looks at the area, share your thoughts and ideas with some of the residents of Dalston. Bring your camera or mobile phone to capture your views and record of the area, then upload your work to the project’s website and see it evolve into a unique portrait of a diverse and characterful area.

Project Events on Wednesday 5 August 2009.

Walk with us.

Larisa will be leading two walks around the area on Wednesday 5 August 2009 starting at 2.30 pm and 4.00 pm.

Meeting place for both walks is The Ochre Works Café, Gillett Square, N16 8JN (underneath the Vortex Jazz Club). Bring your camera or mobile phone.

N16 8JN Googlemap / N16 8JN Streetmap.

Talk with us.

Larisa and software programmer Startx will be presenting and explaining the project, the website and the software behind it at a special presentation at Studio 5,  Arcola Theatre, Arcola Road, E8 2DJ, at 6.00 pm.

For further information please contact Emma Jones, Arts & Events Development Manager for Gillett Squared (phone: 020 7993 3644, email: emmajones@hced.co.uk).

A message from Deborah Kingsland, Documentary Filmmakers Group …

Deborah will be at the Agewell Computer Club next Monday 6 July (from 2.30 pm) to discuss her ideas and how we might participate.

At the next Agewell Computer Club (Monday 15 June, 2 – 4.30 pm) we will have two workshops in one session.

a) How to upload files to a server.

Practical help in uploading files — for example, sending digital photographs, video clips, documents — from a computer, mobile phone or digital camera to the World Wide Web.

Why?

Because it is something we need to do often. It’s what we do when we attach a photo or a document to an email, if we want to upload photographs to photo-sharing sites like Flickr or TinyPic, or to Facebook, or one of the many Internet dating sites.

Uploading a file is a key World Wide Web skill — and it is really quite easy, yet many people believe it is something highly technical. In fact, we only need two items of information — the name of the file and where it is. If you know that, there is not much else to do. So at the workshop, we will try to crack this persistent problem.

Also, because it fits in precisely with the project we have started doing with Hackney Co-operative Developments. Participants in the project (‘Mezzo Moderno, Mezzo Distrutto’) will be uploading short video clips to a special website (code name: Dalston YouTube). We need to prove to them that the uploading is easy. People not involved in the project will also learn something very useful. The second workshop (see below) will be help and advice on using the video capabality of you mobile phone or digital camera.

What to bring to the workshop.

Mainly yourself.

If you would like help with uploading directly from your mobile phone or digital camera, please bring it — and all the cables that came with it in the box. If you need help uploading from a flash drive or CD, bring those too.

But you don’t have to bring your own files to join the workshop. We have plenty of practice files for you to work with.

Where will we upload to?

We have set up a temporary file upload area on this web site — a place where you can upload any file, and then see for yourself that it has been uploaded. If you have digital photographs of your own, we can get you started with TinyPic (it looks simple, it’s free and you don’t have to register to use it).

b) How to use the video functions of your mobile phone or digital camera.

Most digital cameras, and possibly most mobile phones too, can make short video clips. It’s not difficult to make a short video like this — but very few people know how to do it properly.

If you would like help on making an interesting video with the very simple controls on your camera or phone, this workshop is for you.

Larisa Blazic and Emma Jones (from Hackney Co-operative Developments in Gillett Square) will be here to help us get started.

We hope participants will be inspired to join in Larisa’s ‘Mezzo Moderno, Mezzo Distrutto’ project — recording this area as we see it.

A message from Jo Seagar, Olympic Youth Project …

Volunteers’ Week 2009 has arrived!

Please look at our Volunteering page for ideas about how you can use your lifetime knowledge, experience and understanding to help others.

By the way — Hackney Silver Surfers (and its parent organisation Age Concern Hackney) always need volunteer help. There are many ways in which you can contribute your time and energy. You do not need advanced computer skills to be a valuable volunteer at Hackney Silver Surfers — people skills are much more important!

If you would like more information, please contact Sadia Hussain …

• Postal: Age Concern Hackney, 22 Dalston Lane, London E8 3AZ.
• Phone: 020 7248 7149.

A message from Emma Jones, Hackney Co-operative Developments …