In a time when machines are gnawing away the creative brain of men, a few techies from Technopark rediscovered their artistic-bent and entered into movie-making business. They named their endeavour Red Ray Productions.
With short films that have gained recognition around the techie circle, Red Ray will be releasing their first feature film, ‘Osyethu’ (working title) in a few months.
“Our first short film ‘The Appointment’, based on O Henry’s short story ‘After Twenty Years’, clinched the best director’s award at the short film fest conducted at Technopark. The jury included eminent directors such as Shaji N Karun,” says Aabid Salam, one of the founder members of Red Ray.
When Aabid and Kiran N S met at an IT company in Technopark a few years back, they were unaware of their common interest, Cinema. But during one of their chit-chats, both discovered each other’s dream to make films.
Aabid, who had made documentaries while still in college, found the right partner-in-crime in Kiran, who had a similar filmmaking background.
“When we decided to form a film production unit, many similar-minded techies joined and formed our little group Red Ray Productions,” says Aabid.
Their second outing, a music video named ‘Game’, for the techie rock band ‘Chaos’, garnered much attention among music-lovers. After ‘Game’, team Red Ray wanted to better their game. It was during one of their discussions to make a superior quality short film, that it struck them, “Why restrict ourselves in short films; why not feature films?”
Except for some freelance experiences they had during their college days, none of the Red Ray members had any prior knowledge in filmmaking. Nevertheless, they decided to learn by committing mistakes in their own production.
The shooting of Red Ray’s feature film ‘Osyethu’ started in December and went on till April. The post-production works of the film, based on a well-known novel, (the name of which the makers do not want to reveal) are still going on.
“The scripting was a long process. We started writing it in August, but had to rewrite it four times. As the novel has been adapted into celluloid many a time, we wanted to bring in a completely different angle,” says Aabid.
The initial budget of the film was Rs 5 lakh, but failing to raise that kind of money, they prepared the technical equipment by themselves and managed to limit their budget in Rs 2 lakh.
The audio expert in the team, Abhayadev transformed his home into a recording studio and did all the audio work by himself. “I have made my home my working arena where we could do all the audio work. Once the film work is completed, I have decided to give the studio for other techie filmmakers as well,” says Abhayadev.
The team has no intentions to release the film in theatres. However, they have big dreams for their first venture. With techies enacting the major roles, the team is planning to release it in Youtube.
“YouTube is quite big today, so we will either release it there or may be in some national film festivals. As we are not familiar with the dealings of tinseltown we are not sure about how it should be done,” says Aabid.