Spending Time With…Craig Conway and Shaun Robert Smith as they talk about Broken ( @broknmovie ) |

One morning in September 2016, I took the bus to Manchester and headed for a ‘meeting’ that I had been looking forward to for quite a while. It wasn’t just that I was meeting up with a filmmaker (writer,producer, actor) that I had been a fan of for years, but it was also that I was filming the second episode of my Spending Time With… series. Craig (Conway) and I had planned to meet up, sit down for half an hour or so, and talk about his latest film ‘Broken’ which he not only produced but also had a major role in when it comes to the onscreen side of things. Craig and Shaun Robert Smith (writer-director of Broken) were attending Grimmfest in Manchester as their film was part of the screening programme.

However at the last minute due to scheduling, the location of the filming of Spending Time With…and the ‘episode’ was instead filmed inside the lovely Manchester Odeon Printworks cinema lobby whilst all the attendees of Grimmfest and the lovely staff there entered and exited whichever films were screening that morning/afternoon. They were very graceful and Im sure perhaps a little puzzled why there were 2 cameras set up around a regular table and there was I, sitting chatting like there wasn’t a care in the world to a couple of very talented individuals.

Spending Time With… was always a fun project I wanted to kick start into being, No stranger to talking to filmmakers on the audio podcast I host and produce, I wanted to enter the You Tube generation and capture the conversations on film as well as audio, and with Spending Time With..Tracey Birdsall (the first episode) done and completed, The time was perfect to have Craig and Shaun appear on the second episode. Ah but where is episode 1 you ask? (then again, maybe you dont ask) I shall tell you.

In August, a very cool sci fi action film comes out called Rogue Warrior:Robot Fighter is released on digital, and Tracey Birdsall is the star of that film, so I have opted to hold off the release of episode 1 of the Spending Time With…series to coincide with that films release. Nice of me I know isnt it? So it is with no further to-do that I release the first episode of Spending Time With… featuring Craig Conway, and Shaun Robert Smith to the online world.

Does it make me nervous releasing a film project? Well of course it does. Im not a filmmaker,I just do pretty well when it comes to talking with talented people like Shaun and Craig and for some reason they let me take up their time to have a great chat with me and allow me to film it and help people learn about their work. Im not a creative director by any means, and as youll see from Spending Time With… I am okay at plopping a camera down, pressing record and capturing a one time event. An event that I will always cherish. To be able to sit down with filmmakers and spend time with them was always a dream of mine and to have it now as a reality, well thats just too damn cool. Any film fan will hopefully realise just how great it is to be able to chat with filmmakers.

Many thanks not only to Craig and Shaun, but also the people at Grimmfest for accommodating me crashing their great event. Also thanks to musician Karl Francis (Fruitless Forest) for leaping in at the last minute and donating a theme track for the Spending Time With…series.

Now sit back, and listen (watch if you wish…although dont expect any wonderful cinematic camera shots. This film is all about the conversation.) to Craig Conway, and Shaun Robert Smith as they talk about their careers and the film ‘Broken’