Thursday June 24 2010 – Airplane Journal, Glasgow to Halifax

It was an early morning to rise at 4:30am in Glasgow to catch the BMI flight to Heathrow and transfer with a duty free bottle of Scotch and crystal goblets to an Air Canada flight direct to Halifax (via the Maple Leaf Lounge of course!). I have been in the UK since Monday. The night before was Sunday – which was also Father’s Day.

Rewind 4 days earlier, we were winning the gold at Banff , had a great after party, slept for 3 hours and flew back East across the whole country – from Rockies to Haligonia. When I arrived in Halifax it was quite late at night, is my baby was already asleep when I got home. Jessica and I spend 30 minutes awake with each other then crashed hard. The next morning I said goodbye to my beautiful family again and drove to Fredericton for a New Brunswick Arts Council board meeting Friday night and Saturday morning.

I left the Saturday meeting early because I had to drive to Saint John the next day to perform the duties of wedding MC at my dear friends Chrissy and Jake’s wedding. That was a grand ole party. A lot of my old school friends were there which ended up being a fun reunion dance party as the band Big Fish cranked out the classics! Sunday I drove back to Halifax to spend 1 hour with Jessica (Kaiya was asleep) then drove back to the airport for the red eye flight to Heathrow. None of my Aeroplan upgrade certificates worked to upgrade me to the glorious blue pods of business class…oh the sweet sweet pods. I find that the upgrade certificates never actually work; it’s just a scam to get suckahs like me to keep flying Air Canada. Oh alas.

The flight was alright, I slept the whole way really. Arrived at Heathrow very late and had 2 minutes to spare to catch the train to Scotland at Paddington Station from the Heathrow Express…dang, tight spots.

The train ride took me past some of the nicest window views ever of the British country side and eventually the ragged and swelling coastline of Scotland.

I ended up in Stirling and checked in to the best little Inn South of the River Spey! (see my 2006 blog to dig what Inn to check out next time you are in Scotch Whiskey Heaven North of Aberdeen!).

I completely recommend this Inn if you are in the area, it is called the Auchyle Stirling and is operated by Mandi and Tom Dick, and their dog Harry…no kidding, Mandi, Tom Dick and Harry. How perfect!

The Auchyle is located right on the edge of the infamous and ignored quarter of Stirling; Raploch. Raploch has had a reputation that spans hundred of years of being kind of a sketchy spot. Others in Stirling just don’t go there apparently. Interestingly enough I thought the place was quite nice actually, neat and tidy, modest homes, community housing…and anywhere you look up you will either see the Stirling Castle

or the William Wallace Monument,

both great climbs! The hospitality that Mandi and Tom gave me, and the warmth and authenticity of the community is unparalleled.

I shot footage for our Sistema documentary (CBC) at Sistema Scotland’s “Big Noise” for the day

after enjoying some solid shwallys with Mandi and an extensive tour from the Stirling Bridge (go watch Braveheart and you will be on the same page), the castle and other battlegrounds…Scotland first hand.

Sistema Scotland is true proof that other countries can adopt Venezuela’s El Sistema and make radical social change with it while creating world-shaking classical music professionals. Sistema Scotland has only been open for a year longer than our Sistema in New Brunswick , so it was a great experience for me as a board member of the New Brunswick Youth Orchestra and Sistema to see where we could be in another 12 months!

I filmed some solid footage, the kids were great, the Big Noise was helpful and I had a great day only to be followed by a Scottish steak dinner up at the castle, some more Highland Park shwolly then a short sleep before hitting the train to Glasgow to pop back on a flight to go home from the quickest overseas trip of my history. Glasgow’s a fine city, jazz fest was going down, as was the World Cup. Britain won and I witnessed a frenzie of happy Brits at the pub I was sipping at.

Scotland is a magical land. If you end up in Scotland climb the Wallace Monument, check out the Stirling Castle, the Bridge where Wallace defeated the English, and of course, Big Noise in the heart of a broken but healing community – Raploch.

Minister of New Brunswick, Hedard Albert, sends his letter of congratulations for our pilot awards at Banff.

Thank you, Minister Albert, and all of those who help support our work here in New Brunswick!

The house Hemmings built
Published Tuesday July 20th, 2010
Telegraph-Journal
Saint John, NB

By Zoe McKnight
(Pictures by Kâté Braydon/Telegraph-Journal)

It’s mid – afternoon on a Friday in July. The sun warms the Kennebecasis River and shines on the back porch of Greg Hemmings’ cottage. His one-year-old daughter Kaya chews on his cell phone, his parents just arrived for dinner and his wife, Jessica, is inside getting ready for the evening.

It’s a family affair at Hemmings House.

Greg, 33, and Mark Hemmings, 36, are the brothers behind Hemmings House Pictures, a Saint John media company. Mark was an established commercial photographer in his own right and Greg operated a film and television production company. The two merged in 2009 to create a multimedia enterprise. It is the largest of its kind in New Brunswick, but still in the expansion phase. Unlike many small ventures that might hope to make it in the big city, the Hemmings are rooted firmly in place.

“We’re always looking for more ways to bring work here. We want to become, and I say this in a nice way, a media empire … simply because we want to hire people, keep people in business, keep Saint John vibrant, and to have people doing what they love here. Plus make a decent living for ourselves,” Mark says.

“Why not go to a market that is a cool place to live, like Saint John, that has very low overhead … and find your niche there? I’m glad we did because we’re actually expanding while other companies are decreasing.”

The 12-member staff divides its time between advertising photography, television production, short films, documentaries and ‘filmmercials’ for the web. They have licensed shows to CBC, Bravo! and Rogers Sportsnet, and have filmed professional wrestling, arctic climate change, classical music in South America, New Brunswick bluesman Matt Andersen and the New Brunswick Youth Orchestra. Just to name a few. The company has won numerous awards, most recently at the nextMEDIA Interactive and Pilots Awards at the Banff World Television Festival in June.

The Hemmings brothers fell into the media business separately but together. In 1997, a summer job took Mark to Japan with his grandfather’s slide-film camera and he came back with remarkable pictures, even though he had no experience with aperture or shutter speed.

“So I said, ‘OK. I will become a photographer then.’ And a couple of weeks later, I was working in the movie industry as a photographer. This hardly ever happens, but I was thrust into working as a professional almost immediately.”

Around the same time, Greg ran into an old sailing buddy during first-year university. That buddy happened to be Andrew Tidby, who was attending film school at Niagara College in Welland, Ont. He inspired Greg to join him.

“I got in and I found my passion,” Greg says. Later, he and Tidby formed Hit! Media, a precursor to Hemmings House Pictures before it was incorporated in 2005.

Today, Hemmings House has ad clients all over the world including car companies, Olivier Soaps, NB Power, Irving Oil Ltd. and Saint John 225. Mark alone has worked in 15 countries, and has made countless return trips to Mexico, Hungary and Japan, where there is a satellite office. But most staff are from New Brunswick and trained in-house. Producers even make an effort to use local composers in soundtracks.

These days, Greg leaves much of the actual filming to Mark and other videographers. As CEO, he focuses most of his energy on attracting new clients. A recent graduate of UNB’s exclusive Wallace McCain Institute entrepreneur and leadership program, Greg says he has learned how to properly run a business.
He credits his “true-blue entrepreneur” father with instilling in him an independent spirit.

“I never in my life ever thought I would work for somebody (else),” Greg says.
When asked if he has ever considered leaving the Maritimes for more bustling locales, Greg was emphatic.

“This is where we all wanna be. That’s it.

“If there’s a need here, which there is, then we found our niche and there’s no reason to go to the big cities,” he says. Everyone at Hemmings House feels the same commitment.

Steve Foster, 26, producer and manager at the Saint John office, agrees.

“We’re in this for good, one way or another. I don’t mean in this industry. I think we’re in Hemmings House for good. There is a certain culture here that can’t be replicated that is hard to define. But there is certainly something special here and all of us share it,” Foster says.

Hemmings House Pictures recently moved into newer, more professional digs on Wentworth Street.
The space still has that new-office smell with a freshly-painted black, white and lime green colour scheme.

Framed prints of Mark’s photographs lean against the walls and are stacked on tables. A large print of a cameo silhouette rests by the door. Awards and trophies are displayed on a side table in the studio. Light stands and softboxes are carefully arranged as if a photo shoot were just interrupted.

There are lots of windows, tiny potted plants, and Macs with 20-inch screens. The outside is nondescript. The inside is warm, practical, arty.

It’s almost as if there is an esoteric quality to the Hemmings House culture.

“No one here went to school for this industry, except for Greg, yet we all do it professionally. It feels like there is something more, something worthwhile here… I think there is a reason we are all here,” Foster says. They are more like a family than colleagues, he says. It’s not unusual to find them at the office on holidays.

One cameraman used to hitchhike to New Brunswick from Prince Edward Island to volunteer on shoots.

To Greg, workplace culture is a huge part of creating and retaining talent. All his life, he says he has encountered the attitude that “you can’t get good quality production here.”

“I’m talking about my industry, but there are so many other industries that suffer because of this attitude … and that has to stop. If our customers dry up because of that attitude, then we will collapse and there won’t be any creative workforce left.”

At the cottage, patriarch Don Hemmings says brain drain is a problem in this region.

“Those willing, keen bodies have been exported out of the Maritimes since the Maritimes was invented,” he says.

“It doesn’t take rocket science, in today’s wonderful digital era, to operate out of the Maritimes.” And there is not enough of that, he says.

Ten years ago, Mark says he heard “the faint whisperings of digital,” the mobility of which allows anyone to transfer images and sounds instantly. Saint John’s lower cost of living and smaller media market means that Hemmings House Pictures can be a bigger fish in a smaller pond than Toronto or New York City.

And with the advent of digital cameras that shoot both still and moving images, the market is changing to the advantage of small shops that, at one time, would find it impossible to finance a television-quality camera.

This gives small production companies a foothold in the TV and advertising industry and makes the “big guys” nervous, Mark says.

Digital technology means that Hemmings House can, and does, make pictures with one foot in Scotland, Japan, Transylvania, Venezuela or the arctic and one foot in the Bay of Fundy.

And despite all the globetrotting, there is no intention of leaving home for good.

“I love Saint John. I don’t know what it is … I never want to live anywhere else but here,” Mark says.
“My destiny is here. And I don’t know what that is yet. But something is pulling me here and keeping me here and it’s a good thing.”

The day of the Originals Awards Lauchlan and I were filming more in Moncton for the “Sistema” documentary. It is always smile-inducing hanging out with these little shining stars as they learn their instruments. After filming a lot of the kids playing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” I think I want to change the name of the documentary to “Twinkle Little Stars”, or “Shine Little Stars”, or “These Little Shining Stars”, or “Shine On Little Stars”. Thoughts? Please place a comment if you like or dislike! Anyway the kids inspire me, this program has given them ownership, pride, passion and talents in an area where they may never have exposure to otherwise. REVOLUTIONARY! There is nothing but dripping positives with Sistema. Unfortunately however there are dissenters out there right now from the elitist camp that feels that money and resources should keep classical music in the middle to upper class, not into the hands of children with lesser opportunities. Ignorance is not bliss. Love of music will prevail as anything attached to love usually does.

Lauchlan and I realized that it was exactly a year ago that we were filming in Venezuela. It has been a revolutionary year on many fronts, but mostly for Sistema New Brunswick. Stellar. I will be heading to Scotland next week to film their Sistema program. Where will we be in another year? More and more kids joining the circle of Sistema similar to “The Order” circles that I have just been inducted to. The more the stronger.

I am now listening to Jason Mraz, there is no immediate connection to these lyrics and Sistema, but I’ll throw them out there anyway. “I won’t hesitate no more, it can not wait, I’m yours. Look into your heart and you will find love love love, listen to the music of the moment, people dance and sing, we are just one big family, its our God forsaken right to be loved loved loved. I won’t hesitate no more, theirs no need to complicate, our time is short, this is our fate, I’m yours.”

Jon Williams is one of our freelance photographers, and I thought it would be a cool idea to display his images of our home town Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada. I love these photos . . . they are very gritty and raw, and show a very intriguing side of our downtown core. Here is one of the images, my favorite:

Please take a look through them, there are a lot of gems there for residents and those who have never visited our city:
http://site.hemmingshousepictures.com/Albums/jons_saint_john.php
One photo is of a building wall with an old faded Coca-Cola sign painted on the bricks. Our city has many painted signs that are just barely legible. It would be great to make a collection of these old signs, before they fade forever.
Great work Jon, thanks!