Friction Five: Dancing in Transylvania


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Josh Williams Friction Collective Videographer and Creative Director

Josh Williams (above), one of Friction Collective’s Videographers and Creative Directors went to Romania last year to film with the incredible charity, People Against Poverty. Josh also made this little film; an improvised dance piece filmed on the top of an absolutely beautiful mountain during sunrise. We had lots of questions so asked Yasmin (who heads up all things marketing for us) to catch up with Josh for a quick #frictionfive interview to find out a bit more. You can watch the edit HERE.

First Light sunrise filmYasmin: Where did you shoot First Light – Transylvania?

Josh: This has been asked before and the truth is I don’t think we ever actually knew the name of the mountain, though it is in Transylvania, Romania, which is a Beautiful part of the country. *Goes on a google investigation* I’ve had to just try and work it out, apparently it is called the ‘Ceahlau Massif’.

Yasmin: What project were you working on at the time?                                                            

Josh: I was there to follow the progress of a project building a small farm which will support an orphanage in a small town called Perische in Transylvania, Romania. I’ve been on similar trips to make different videos for People against Poverty, the charity behind the projects. The projects have developed so much over the years (definitely check out the videos). After the building is finished the groups then explore some of the more picturesque parts of Romania. Going to this mountain is a new addition and involves a roughly 2 Hour hike each way. We are normally only there from sunset to sunrise. It’s so worth it for the view.

the attila project- a manPhoto: The Attila Project – which you can check out here.The Attila Project - Romanian boysPhoto: Some of the Children Josh met when filming The Attila Project.

Yasmin: How did First Light come together?                                                                                  

Josh: I had been up the mountain before and seen the sunrise, which was actually the first time I got to fly my drone. Just incredible, but I have never particularly been into just filming places, I think I need something to be happening in that place otherwise it doesn’t really interest me enough to spend the time editing it. I was on the lookout for a subject and became aware that Brad (Bradley Cull), who was part of the People Against Poverty program, was also very into his dancing. I asked him about it and he was keen from the get go, so we just had to find a spot, make sure it was cool with the man in charge, then just get up and do it.          

Yasmin: How did you film it and where did you get the soundtrack?                        

Josh: I don’t want to spoil the magic too much but it was actually one of the presets from the drone app, to circle around a subject. I had the control to speed it up or down, or bring it in closer but other than that it just did it itself. It felt like cheating but there is no way I would have been able to get it that smooth and consistent otherwise. The only difficulty was that it doesn’t allow you to be close to the ground whilst doing it, so I managed to get around this by taking off 50 meters away from where my altitude was – about 10 meters lower.  So I tricked it into letting me! 

One of my ‘go-to’ guys for music is an artist called Josef Efi. I found him on Soundcloud a while ago and after getting chatting with him he realised we were actually in the same tutor group in school which was nuts! He has a radio show on Balamii Radio and he seems to always be up to lots of cool stuff, one to follow! 

Yasmin: Awesome! And finally what are you up to at the moment?                                                     

Josh: I’m working on a documentary based on a Venezuelan skater called Jarpy. There’s a lot of crazy things going on in Venezuela at the moment so I’m trying to show a bit of that whilst also following Jarpy, his skating and daily life. It’s been really fun to work on but also incredibly difficult trying to edit a lot of footage which is in Spanish. I don’t speak Spanish at all but I am getting some much-needed help. Very excited to get this video out there soon!

Watch this space! Thanks Josh!