My Talented Friends

I mentioned in a previous post that I might do a masterpost of a few documentaries that have been uploaded online by my classmates, so this is it, as promised. I'm very blessed to work with such talented people. And they're not just classmates, we're all really good friends. I'm very proud of all the work that everyone has done! There was such a variety in the styles and subjects of the films and that was really cool to see. And now you can watch their work too, in no particular order. Now when they all become famous filmmakers you can say you've seen their work here first. I've just managed to find four films altogether, but hopefully there will be more soon. Give them your love -

A Kind of Sleep - dir. Eilidh Mitchell

This was definitely the scariest documentary out of all of ours. It is a study into the state of sleep paralysis, focusing on the mythology surrounding it. A really interesting and gripping film. 

The Weight - dir. Rasmus Räni

An interesting character study on amateur bodybuilder Gavin Smith, as well as an exploration of the idea of bodybuilding as a lifestyle. Rasmus has always been very talented with a camera, and this certainly shines through here. 

Trouble - dir. Kathryn McGrane

Another character study here, this time on an ex-IRA member. Being from Northern Ireland myself I really enjoyed this film, but those unfamiliar with the Troubles will also be intrigued by this man's stories. 

Mors Sceptra Ligonibus Aequat  dir. Kyriaki 'Sandy' Sigala

Sandy's film is a good example of how varied the styles are within our small class. This is an experimental film focused on death, and death rituals in various religions. It's a very fascinating film, keep an eye out for the sky burial scene, it's my favourite part. 

2014 Spade List

It's that time of year again... this is a list of 50 things I'd like to achieve in 2014. Every year I usually acknowledge that I'm not going to get all of them done, but there are always a few that are extremely important to me to complete amongst the not so important ones. I'll blog about those important ones later! In the mean time, enjoy -

1. Make a short film
2. Go to America
3. Get a new job
4. Read the LotR trilogy
5. Enter a film/photography competition
6. Host a party
7. Go to jazz bar
8. Learn basic Irish phrases
9. Buy a printer
10. Do something I've never done before
11. Hustle!
12. Release 'Unboxed'
13. Make a snowman
14. Go to something at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival
15. Have a friend/family visit me in Edinburgh
16. Have a friend visit me in Northern Ireland
17. Have a photograph published / exhibited
18. Go to a concert
19. Get a tattoo
20. Learn Adobe After Effects
21. Give blood
22. Run 5k
23. Take up a personal photography project
24. Unplug for a week
25. Achieve a 'merit' in university
26. Build an amazing pillow/blanket fort
27. Write 40 blog posts
28. Watch the sun rise on Murlough
29. Feel competent in my painting/drawing ability
30. Bring a friend to church
31. Journal daily, even if brief
32. Take instant pictures
33. Do something to be proud of
34. Host a film screening of one of my own
35. Enter my final year of uni
36. Fast weekly
37. Fill a sketchbook
38. Go to France
39. Pull an elaborate prank
40. Read 30 books
41. Introduce my flatmates to Irish food
42. Celebrate my 21st
43. Spend a night stargazing
44. Get a flat stomach
45. Write a letter to someone telling them how much I appreciate them
46. Rearrange my bedroom
47. Watch 100 documentaries
48. Complete a YouVersion Bible study plan
49. Volunteer somewhere
50. Have a great year

Thoughts From The Irish Sea

Fun fact: I am currently writing this post from the middle of the ocean. I finished semester one of my third year of university on Monday and so now I am relaxing on the Stenaline Superfast, on my way back to Northern Ireland to spend Christmas with my family, boyfriend and friends. I could not be more excited right now! It's been a long semester, and I'm ready for what I feel is a well deserved break after all my work in the past few months. After a lot of work including a presentation, a 3000 word essay, two photo stories and a documentary film I am finished! Huzzah!

Yeah, remember that documentary film I talked about making? Well... I made it.... kinda. On the 2nd December I attended the screening on my film along with the films of all of my classmates. At this point I'm going to make a side note saying that I'm so very proud of all my classmates. They all made great films and it was so exciting to see everyone's hard work pay off. Making a film on your own (as I discovered myself) is a very challenging experience, and it was probably the most challenging thing I've personally done in university or school. So to see around 15 films that people made all by themselves, but were also of a really good standard, was really great. Perhaps if enough of them put their films up online I might make a masterpost of some of the films so you can watch them, cause they were really great. Well done guys, you did good!

Anyway, back to my film. At 17 minutes long, with three interviews, my own personal thoughts, some constructed scenes as well as other things, one could certainly make the argument that my film was finished. But personally, I don't think so. When I set out to make this film I was feeling very ambitious, I knew that I could make a really interesting film with this idea. However, as I went on and kept working at it, I realised that even while making a short film, I was never going to have enough time and resources to make this the film I want it to be. That was a bit disappointing, but that's not to say I gave up. Instead I started concentrating on just trying my best to make a film that would do well at uni. I did slightly feel that I was conforming slightly there, and I'm a bit ashamed of that. But, the reason I was doing that was because I decided that I would work as hard as I can and for as long as necessary to make this film the film it was originally meant to be, the film it is supposed to be. I know that it has potential, and I want it to reach that potential. I am now aiming to be finished in Spring. Not many people have seen the 'uni edit' of my film, but the final cut will be bigger, better and hopefully will glorify God more.

And so I'd like to introduce you to my upcoming documentary film - 'Unboxed'. It is an exploration of the gifts of healing and miracles, asking questions like - does God heal today? Why / why not? What can we understand about this concept? How can we be sure it's real? and more. As well as this, part of the film reflects on my own personal journey of faith, as I begin to learn more about miraculous healing. Now to make up for the fact that you won't be getting to see the film for a while, despite many people assuming it would be finished now, I've uploaded a little sneak peek. I'll be uploading more of these as time goes on. 

Unboxed - Sneak Peek 1 from Joyful Mourne Media on Vimeo.

And there you have it. I'll try to be a better at updating everyone with it's progress, I didn't do that as much as I'd like to over the past few months. Right now, with the production of this film going on, seems like a good time to I guess officially launch 'Joyful Mourne Media', the name under which all my films will be made under. For those who are all about the social networking, you can follow what we will be doing via these sites -

Website: www.joyfulmourne.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/joyfulmourne
Twitter: www.twitter.com/joyfulmourne
Vimeo: www.vimeo.com/joyfulmourne

And if you'd like to contact me privately about anything, you can do that by e-mailing me at jo@joyfulmourne.com

On Making a Faith Oriented Film for Uni

Things are starting to happen with this film of mine which is very exciting! I talk a bit about it in this video above here. Again, those who have stories of healing and would be up for talking to me about them, please contact me, I would love to chat!! Seriously, any stories would be wonderful, you evem don't have to be in the film if you don't want to. E-mail: jo@joyfulmourne.com. Phone: 07412330665

So far making this film is proving quite the experience for me, and I haven't even begun filming yet! Never before has my faith come in contact with my university or school work like this before, and it is both exciting and terrifying. It's really quite surreal to sit with your lecturer in a tutorial discussing Jesus' teachings and fundamental Christian theology. Surreal, but pretty cool too. I have to admit, every time I have to get up in front of that class to discuss how my film is getting on, I'm terrified. I'm so aware that people could think I'm crazy, believing in stuff like this. At a few points my lecturer has made me speak about my own personal faith in front of the class. I've spoken about my faith to crowds before quite happily, but speaking about it to a Christian crowd feels quite different to speaking about it in a room full of athiests. I can't remember the last time I stammered so much in anything! But God has been gracious, and my friends have been very supportive, even expressing interest in my film. And if they do believe I'm crazy, well, they haven't said it to my face anyway haha! My hope is that through this film I'm making my friends might be able to see more of this God I talk about. 

I'll admit there's stuff I'm too scared to say still. On getting asked why I want to make the film, which I get asked a lot by my lecturer, the answer 'I believe God wants me to make this film' has always been replaced by '*shrug* I guess I'm just interested in finding out more about healing because I don't know much about it' (which is true also to be fair). I'm also scared of asking people to help me out with it. Most of all I am terrified of screwing up the film. I'm scared that everything's just going to fall through and I will have nothing to show. And I'm scared of it turning out just a badly made film haha! But I trust God, and I'm excited to see how it will turn up.

If you're the praying type, I would really appreciate prayer while I make this film. It's going to be a big challenge for me, one that I know I'll never be able to do without the support of God and also people like yourself. Cheers.

Be Careful What You Pray For...

I want to get back into blogging regularly again. Looking back on my posts from earlier this year, I think it was really good to get my thoughts on God and stuff written down like this. Now that I'm back at university and attending my church again, with student communities starting again soon, I'm hoping I'll have plenty of things to write about! But today I'm gonna write about some things I experienced near the end of summer.

There's a saying that goes like "be careful what you pray for, because you might get it". It's an odd one, and one you might not fully appreciate until what it's talking about happens to you. And it happened to me in the last week of summer. I'll recount that now.

So as my blog has been recounting a bit, 2013 has been a 'year of fear' for me. Not in that I have had a fearful year, but that this is the year God has been pushing me gently towards getting over my fears. It started with FOMO, which I documented quite thoroughly with this blog. And I got there, in a lot of ways I am over my fear of missing out, and that makes me so happy! I've come so far from even the start of the year. And I think if I hadn't have gotten over that fear, this could have been a very difficult summer for me, due to some circumstances regarding friends, but thankfully, FOMO did not keep me from having a good summer. I enjoyed myself regardless of what I was missing out on, and that's amazing! I also started to get over my fear of a certain person (who shall not be named for their own sake), having truly feared them for years and years and years. When even being in the same room as this person was once so uncomfortable, even painful, for me, I can now quite comfortably sit and chat and even have a laugh with them. Painful memories are being replaced by good ones, which is fantastic. I'm not sure anyone could comprehend what a massive step forward that is for me. God is good!

With those two fears, both once major strongholds in my life, becoming a thing of the past, I started wondering what God wanted me to face next. Something kept bringing me back to 'failure'. It seemed to be what I feared most at that point. I thought to myself 'maybe I should ask God to help me get over my fear of failure', but something kept holding me back. Guess what that something was... yep! It was fear. I thought to myself, for these other fears, it's always got worse before it got better. Right before I started to get over the fears, I would find myself very bitter against the things, or really the people, who brought on the fear. And for that while, the fear was heightened. And so I was scared about what would happen when I asked God to help me get over this fear. But, I knew I had to do it. And so I prayed, my heart beating fast, 'God, help me get over my fear of failure. I don't what's going to happen now, and I'm scared, but I trust you.'

That was when everything fell apart. 

The morning after I prayed that, I got a phone call from my boss. He didn't want to keep me on anymore, despite me thinking I was going to have the job until at least December. That was upsetting, to say the least. It was the perfect job for me, but I failed it. I was almost brushing it off as coincidence until I got a letter in the post a few days later; a letter that told me I'd been kicked out of my university because of problems with an essay resit (leaving out the complicated details of why this happened, because they're not that important, all you need to know is that this was a total surprise to me). 

What. 

Just like that, all I knew seemed to crash around me. A few days earlier everything was fine, I had a job that was perfect for me and I was getting ready to head back to Edinburgh to begin my third year of studies. Then all of a sudden and out no where I was unemployed and degree-less. I have never felt like such a failure as I did that day. I cried out to God constantly, 'Did I ask for this?! Is this your answer?! I want to face my fear of failure but not this way!! I hate this, God!! Please fix this!!' I begged forgiveness for my failure, I just wanted to be able to go back to university, I couldn't fail like this, I couldn't fail my parents and my friends like this, not after everything. 

I spent a week living in constant terror of what was going to happen, my gut aching and heart pounding, trying desperately to contact my university to sort out what went wrong and see if they would let me back in. In the middle of that week, I had to move back to Scotland, not knowing if I'd be returning home again shortly or staying on. Though my friends were amazing (looking at you especially Michelle and Patrick) and did their best to keep my mind off it, any time I started thinking about the uncertainty of my future I verged on crying. It was a rough week. I certainly felt the failure I had been feeling. 

I'll cut to the chase, many phone calls and e-mails later, after my case being seemingly passed from person to person to person, about a week after I got the letter I found out they were letting me back in. Praise God for his goodness and mercy! And now what? I'd be lying if I said this has helped me get over my fear of failure. It gets worse before it gets better right? I'm pretty sure I'm even more scared of failure now. But I don't subscribe to coincidence, God had to let me feel that utter failure for some reason, and I'm hoping I find out that reason soon. From experience, I pretty sure it's going to help me. Just right now, I'm still living on the edge a wee bit, and I definitely need to pray more about this to work it out. And I've certainly learnt a few extra lessons along the way anyway! I'm not there yet, but I know I'll be able to face this fear soon. There's a reason for everything, God is up to something, and though I don't understand it yet, I will some day. I'll just say it again - Be careful what you pray for, you might just get it, but not in the way you expect.

Back in Edinburgh

Woah, this has been a pretty long post, thank you for reading this far! It's not like me to blog about something I'm still struggling to understand, I usually like to write it all out once I have my eureka moment and discover what God has been teaching me. Not today I guess. I think I just wanted to write it all out, get it off my chest a bit. And now I've done that. I think it's time to return to prayer about my fear of failure, and see what God's up to. For now, I'm just going to be grateful that I'm here in this beautiful city, studying what I love once again. There's definitely a reminder here that God gives and he takes away, and I'm very grateful for what he has given right now. Even if that's all I'm to learn from this whole crisis, that's a pretty darn good lesson to walk away with. Thank you God!

Hope everyone has a great year, let's get stuck in.

Jo x

Help Me Make A Film!

Hey there,

for those who don't know me, my name is Jo McClure and I am a student filmmaker. I'm about to go into my 3rd year studying Photography & Film at Edinburgh Napier University and I have big plans for the next year! I want to place a particular focus this year on documentary filmmaking, and I have a film in mind that I would like to make. This is where I need your help. 

I want to make a short film about people being healed through prayer. (This is probably where I am going to lose half my audience who are reading this. "A film about religiousy stuff? Nope. See ya." And that's okay! But for those of you who are still with me here, thank you!) I'm not entirely sure how the film is going to pan out yet, that's something that will become more clear as I get to work alongside my tutors and peers at uni, but I do know a few things. I would really love to get a collection of stories from people who have been healed through prayer, or people who have witnessed it, or maybe you have the gift of healing, really anything to do with it! Seriously, I want to hear about anything and everything. I feel like a lot of people don't realise that this is something that actually happens, and the purpose of this film is to tell them, yes, God is alive and real, he does work and he does heal (tehe unintentional poetry). 

I'll say this - right now this is more about research and getting to know the subject more. Telling me your story doesn't mean it'll necessarily be put in the film. I'm aware that this is a sensitive subject and I don't want to put people in the spotlight who don't want to be. I'm sure in good time God will make it clear what stories he wants spread and it's quite likely I may ask you for a formal filmed interview, but in the mean time all I want is a chat :)

So if you have any stories please don't hesitate to get in touch with me. Or if you know someone else that does, perhaps you could forward this to them. This would mean a lot to me, I would really really love to see this film come to light, and the best way I can do that right now is just by starting to chat to people about this sort of thing. My e-mail address is jomcclure73@gmail.com, or if you see me ever just pull me aside, I would love to talk! I'm also on Facebook and Twitter for those who like the social networking sites. 

Thank you for reading, and I hope to hear from some of you soon!

Jo

Living on a Prayer

Well, as of about 24 hours ago I am back in Northern Ireland for my summer holiday. Second year of university is over. We're half way there! And now I've got 'Living on a Prayer' by Bon Jovi stuck in my head. Anyway... looking back on the year, it's been pretty crazy! I payed bills for the first time in my life, that was very scary and grown up and I didn't like it at all! I made a few films with university, one of which I'm pretty proud of and you can watch and read about here. I took lots of photographs too, and wrote a good few essays. It's been a big learning curve in university, I've discovered what I'm good at and what I'm not good at, which has been a very interesting experience. I did lots of fun stuff like go to the zoo, visit people in England, take a surprise trip home, host a messy flat party, go to other messy flat parties and lots more stuff! Hmmm... what else did I do? Oh yeah, I started going to Central, a church in the centre of Edinburgh, and there I got convinced to sign up for Potential, only the best fellowship I've ever had... like ever!! 

Now any one who knows me well knows that I am a very sentimental/mushy person. And if you didn't know that, well, you're about to find out. You've been warned. 

When I first signed up for Potential, I have to admit I was skeptical. It was an all girls Bible study, and yes, the Bible is great, but all girls? That's a bit risky, eh? We all know what girl groups can be like, there's all the potential for cliques to emerge, for cat fights to break out etc etc. It seemed only natural! Like many I imagine, I personally have not had a good history of being in groups of girls. I'll not bore you with all the details but I have pretty much always found myself on the outside of groups of girls, never quite sure where I stood, feeling pretty left out. So when I signed up for Potential I assumed it would be much of the same story. To use the phrase made famous by Thorin Oakenshield in The Hobbit: I have never been so wrong!

As soon as I turned up on the first week I knew that I was going to get along really well with these girls, but still for the first few weeks I waited for the cliques to emerge, for groups to start making friends around me, but to my delight, it never happened. Very quickly we became a giant close-knit group of friends, who were constantly encouraging and building each other up. We studied the Bible together, prayed for each other, and had an awful lot of laughs at the same time! I was welcomed into this group with open arms, and always felt so loved whenever I walked into that kitchen every Tuesday night. And I wasn't the only one! Any of the other girls I talked to about their experience of it agreed that they loved this fellowship. One thing I loved about it was that girls who only turned up once or twice were treated no differently from girls who had been every week. That's brilliant. Turns out not all girl groups have to involve a negative experience, in fact, they they can be quite the opposite!

I'm very grateful for Potential and all the girls there right now. Through all that support and community,  I believe I have grown a lot this year, in both confidence, maturity, and my faith. I've begun to face a lot of my fears, some I didn't even realise I had before, some that have been really dragging me down for years and years. But all that is starting to get better! Without them I don't think I would have had the courage or determination to get up in front of 400ish people and tell my testimony and get baptised. I feel I have a lot better of an understanding of what God wants me to do with my life, and I'm slowly beginning to sort myself out, to start changing for the better, so that I may do that. 

To the Potential girls reading this right now, I guess I just wanted you to know how grateful I am for you. You guys are are amazing, God is doing awesome things through you all! You all have become very important to me. Keep being those wonderful ladies you are. I love you and miss you! Thank you for a great year and I'm excited for starting a new one with you all as my friends!! Now trust me, I could write pages and pages more on how great you all are and how much you make me laugh and how you've helped me etc etc but there's only so much cheesy stuff I can write in one post before I just turn into a massive block of mozzarella or something. So I'll leave it here. But yeah, I love you guys. Thank you.

“You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven." - Matthew 5:13

The Facebook Generation

Facebook. Facebook Facebook Facebook. It's one of those things we love to hate, yet cling unto desperately. I personally would love to just delete my Facebook account and be done with it, but unfortunately it's just too useful for keeping in touch with people I wouldn't other wise be able to keep in touch with. However, last night I did get my friend list down from over 650 people to less than 130, making it only coursemates, church famiy, close friends from home, and relatives i.e. the people who I do use it to talk to regularly. I was just getting distracted by having so much unnecessary stuff on there. 

I think my generation especially really needs to sit back and think about the way we use social networking sites such as Facebook. I know I'm so guilty at signing up to a million different sites like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, YouTube, Blogger; I just love being connected in various different ways. I love sharing. But is this always a good thing? I don't think so. 

Part of the reason I cut my friends list was because of conversations I'd been having through this documentary film below. Who made this documentary film? Oh yeah, I did, tehe! Yes, this is my uni film from this semester, made by me and three of my wonderful coursemates Christina, Eilidh and Rhian. All great girls. When Christina pitched the idea for the film I knew I really wanted to be part of it, and so I took on the role of editor, which I had a lot of fun doing. I'd love to work with those girls again. We got to interview my good friend Claudia and three others whom I hadn't met previously - Eoghann, Sebb and Tony. I would love it if you gave it a watch and told me what you think!

Dream Big*

*Disclaimer - This blog post is essentially about “following my dreams”. I would like to blame the cheesiness of my current state of mind on the copious amounts of ‘Glee’ I have been rewatching over the last few days. It’s been that kind of week. So be prepared for cheesy dreamy stuff. You have been warned.

Edinburgh is a busy city with a high student population, so I’m constantly meeting new people, and often the topic of conversation that gets brought up first is university. When I tell these people that I’m studying photography & film, they’re intrigued, and I often get asked “oh! What are you going to do with that then?” To this I normally respond with a shrug, brushing it off my saying that I don’t know. Sometimes I even convince myself that I don’t know what I want to do, but this is not true. The truth is I know exactly what I want to do with my life, it’s just not what maybe my university colleagues and tutors would consider the ‘smart thing to do’. My biggest interest is film, and I love filmmaking and I can’t think of anything else I’d rather do, but I don’t want to go into the film industry. Yep, I’m awkward like that. You see, I could go back to Belfast or maybe go to London, head to the studios, get a paid job in the film industry, and become a tiny part in the making of someone else’s bigger vision come true. But why would I do that when I have visions of my own?

On location at Murlough beach, filming with Adam Leahy for 'That One Time',  2011

I have a vision. I see myself making short films, music videos, informational films, short documentaries, I dunno, stuff like that, by myself with a handful of friends to help me out. Films and videos which are influenced by my Christian faith. Videos which will be put out on the internet i.e. YouTube and Vimeo, for anyone to see. Who knows? If I get good enough, and start getting recognition, I could start offering my services for commission, but this would only fund the projects themselves. If this goes even further, I could start big projects, like a web series, or a full length documentary, or something like that. This sounds perfect to me. I want to do that so badly. Is there any way for me to make a living out of doing that? Let's be honest, nah. It's extremely unlikely. But do I care? Let's be honest again, nah. I'm going to do this, whether it becomes a 'job' or not. We are called to share our faith as Christians, and I want to do this through the form of film. This is my dream! I feel like this has been my calling for a while now, and I'm so desperate to just get stuck in, but it's not that easy. I’m sitting here dealing with debt, with no form of fully functioning film equipment, only a handful of half finished ideas (but apparently the amazing ability to alliterate). I have a long way to go. I look at what I want to do from where I am now and to be honest sometimes it seems impossible, and I'm close to just giving up on the whole idea. I have been close to giving up many times; it seemed that any time I was getting somewhere, something would happen to throw me right back to square one and I would cry out in despair, wondering why God wasn't making this easy for me. But it's always at these low points where God picks me up again and reminds me that this is what he wants me to do. 

I was listening to a podcast of last week's sermon in my church, and something that was discussed was that if we can live comfortably without God, then we're not doing it right. That brings me comfort. If I was already making these films without any difficulty, without needing to pour my heart out in longing to God in prayer, then I will not have been doing it right. God dares us to dream big dreams. The speaker summed it up well - "If your dreams are humanly achievable, you're not dreaming big enough." I trust that God has plans for my dreams. I don't know how long it will take until I have a screenplay I'm satisfied with, or even a camera to film with, but I know it will happen some day. 

"Take delight in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart." - Psalm 37:4