APRIL? Oh dear...

Shockingly, 3 days ago, it was officially 6 months since we last posted. There's not much to say about this, other than a big "whoops". Reaming on for a few pages with apologies would be a great waste of what has now become valuable blogging space. And very boring to read. So for any of you who took the effort to tune in all those eons ago, then never heard another word...whoops! Life sometimes gets in the way of art, a sad fact that we've begun to battle now. But it won't happen again.

Anyway, onwards and upwards. In most recent news, after collecting a few very interesting narrations, mostly from those wonderful, imaginative, spectacular humans we call children, we've decided to come back to Dream Seek Once. If this makes no sense at all to you, check out http://www.cautioustrain.com/Current%20Projects/page6/index.html. Our aim is to make a series of noncommercial and not-for-profit shorts, solely for the purpose of storytelling and talent showcasing on our website and other social media sites. So we need some talent. Right now we are looking for an animator. It promises to be a fun, and hopefully uncomplicated, endeavour. All levels and experiences welcome for consideration. If you are or you know, get in touch at info@cautioustrain.com. 

In other, no less exciting news: we are launching the Promotional Video leg of Cautious Train. And we have our first project. We are delighted to announce a collaboration  with the good people of www.enniskerry.ie to create a promotional website video to showcase the beauties and amenities in and around the lovely village of Enniskerry, Wicklow. Website videos are becoming increasingly popular as an alternative to print and television advertising, which traditionally sky rocket any marketing budget. We are aiming to work collaboratively with small businesses, in any sector, who wish to promote their company in a more cost effective manner. We aim to deliver high quality, professional video at a very competitive cost. A web video has the potential to reach a  huge international audience, in conjunction with social media like Youtube. It is very effective at reaching surfers who may not have the time, or interest, in reading on line blurb. So, with a deep breath, we say...get in touch. We'd be happy to talk to any business who think they might benefit from something like this. Promotional show reel to follow. 

We'll wrap it up there for now. No sense in losing your attention just when we're trying to win it back.

Best as always (oh, and Happy First Day of Nutty Christmas Mayhem)

The Cautious Train-ers

More and more and more inspiration

There are a number of other support systems (apart from our above mentioned ever patient friends and families) who we would not be here without. And we have to mention them here; I think it’s important to share the wealth when it comes to resources. Although we have found a huge amount from our own research, it is a lengthy and painstaking journey, and I would have been delighted come across something that presented it all as one neat little blog (minus the neat in this case)...

Screen Training Ireland, you are my hero. I have attended two master classes with them in a month. One with legendary indie film producers Ted Hope and Christine Vachon, whose hours of inspiring words still ring around my head, in particularly where they personally told us all, “get out and make your movies and stop relying on someone else to come along and do it for you”. It is the only way. Another course, Refresh Your Creative Thinking, provided a wealth of idea generation and brainstorming tools. 

Last week we had a meeting with the Enterprise Board, who offer an introductory business advice session of 30 minutes - for free! A fantastic tool for new start-ups. Got great advice on grants and business plan tools (the boring stuff, you know!)

www.citizensinformation.ie and FAS and our local Citizen’s Advice Bureau have also been a godsend, and all of this is free and offers great advice on training and grants.

Just to make a quick point, or “disclaimer” if you want to get official (not often), we do not work for or are associated with any of the above. In fact it’s all state run. Our main objective for these name drops is to pass on what we’ve found to people in a similar position – those who might be too afraid, or put off by the lack of readily available information, to start up on their own. 

Ok, so that’s us, from birth to conception. Onwards and upwards. From now on we will write about our projects, development process, news, updates (and will keep the general ramblings to a minimum...promise).

Thanks for reading. Happy filmmaking/watching/enjoying.

The Cautious Train.

How #themostuninspiringmomentofmylife gave birth to the Cautious Train

I’ve been inspired by a number of things, all happening to me over the last month in fact, to make Cautious Train a reality. One of which I’m going to go into briefly here. 

I went to my local employment authority a while back, with a grand plan in my head to start my own home Candy Bouquet business (because that was the only thing I could come up with on what I will now call #mostuninspiringmomentofmylife). So off I trot, with my latest scheme in full swing, to find out exactly what they're going to do to make this work. I spend a few grim minutes playing away on the "computers", where I'm convinced the previous occupant had to have been a 5 year old struggling with a melting ice cream cone, then I'm called in to meet my assigned officer. What follows is a swift and brutal assault on my ingenious new life plan. Thank. God. 

  - me: I want to run a candy bouquet business!

  - officer: Really?

  

  - me: No.

  

  - officer: What do you want to do?

  

  - me: Dunno.

  

  - officer: Bullshit (quote)

  - me: Maybe. But I can't tell you, you're the enemy! I'm not supposed to have creative ideas. You want to re-train me to be a skilled labourer.

  

  - officer: listen, my brother (insert famous writer's name) and my sister (insert famous singer's name) were always told they couldn't be successful creatives. Now everyone owes them a whopping "touché". Stop bullshitting (yes, bullshit again) yourself and me. Stop making yourself fit to our standards so we'll give you money (not a lie) - go out and start doing what you want to do and stop wasting my time and yours. What do you want to do?

  

  - me: Mr. Scary Employment Man, Sir. I want to be a filmmaker. 

  

  - officer: well then piss off out of my office and start living your life!

  

  - me: cool, thanks!

Ok, so ignoring for a moment some of the artistic license I took with the above dialogue (although every "bullshit" was his own), this guy, whose job it is is to turn us down and outs into respectable carpenters and clerical receptionists, saw right through me. For the first time in nearly 10 years, someone other than a blood relative or very patient friend (shout out by the way!) told me to go out there and do what I want to do, and not what the census form wants to see written under "occupation". 

Within a couple of weeks we had a website, a Twitter with over 100 followers, a Facebook with loads of friends and we’re developing a whole slate of projects that are now, finally, residing somewhere in the realms outside our own heads. This timeline is no exaggeration. It can be done, it has been done, and we will continue to keep doing it. You just need a little bit of a kick in the arse!

Climb aboard the Cautious Train

If you have come across this, through whatever means, we invite you aboard, for what we hope is going to be a really fun ride. We are a Dublin based production company, interested in developing high quality independent film - pursuing both in-house and out-house (not the lavatory) ideas. 

Follow, and join us on our journey. We are very interested in possible collaborations with like minded creatives. If you have an idea, a song, a poem, a drawing - we can draw inspiration from anything. Check us out :

1. on Twitter http://twitter.com/#!/cautioustrain
2. on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/pages/Cautious-Train-Productions/184439354935221 
3. and at http://www.cautioustrain.com/

Let me tell you a little bit more about our beginnings. We are Sara White and Tom Hughes. We've both had jobs of a varying nature in the film and media industries – always doing what someone else wanted, never working towards our own goals. We’ve learned loads, and are grateful for every opportunity, but it was time to stop sitting around waiting for things to happen. Since then it’s been a veritable sandstorm of activity on the rail line. I say sandstorm for a reason. I’m thinking of a day in the not so distant past when we were vacationing in Ulaan Baatar, Mongolia (as you do). A massive sandstorm hit the tiny city, mostly constructed of tents I might add. We ducked into the nearest hotel and waited it out with the rest of the shaken tourists. There wasn’t a lot to do, think the Overlook Hotel in the Shining...except smaller, and smellier. The funnest activity we could come up with was rubbing our feet vigorously on the psychedelic carpet and giving each other electric shocks. According to my partner in crime, it is a very specific kind of carpet that allows for this, and it is mostly discontinued now. Only in Mongolia! So right now I feel like every day we’re rubbing our feet on our imaginary carpet, and the electricity being generated is exciting as hell!

So please stick around, because we're looking for as many electricity conductors as we can get.

Bye for now.

The Cautious Train.