Here’s a sneak preview of a collage which Dave Gaskarth (Cyrk) is working on for our birthday do; this will be a big paste-up affair in the back-room of the Rainbow, featuring various graphical highlights from the past half-decade. As you might know, Gas has been making 7inch look good pretty much from the start; programme covers, posters, brochures, websites, DVD menus, Tshirts, you name it. His perfectionism is a wonder to behold, and we salute him. (No more Oscar speeches after this week, we promise.)

ps:: The Cyrk website also has info on their Active Cancellation show for resonance.fm, which features Marcus Schmickler live on Sunday 29 June.

pps:: Two weeks later and I think the collage is still up there. Check it out if you’re in the Rainbow, it’s out the back.

Though it’s a bit embarassing to be promoting this (honestly), you can if you choose blow an hour of your Wednesday evening this week hearing Ian Francis of 7 Inch Cinema talk about his favourite things at the Ikon gallery. I was pathetically chuffed to be invited to do this, being an inveterate list-maker and a big Desert Island Discs fan (especially now they’ve got rid of Sue Lawley). But once confronted with the long-awaited opportunity to bang on about stuff you like, it’s actually a bit of a headache whittling it down. I’ve gone for the slightly flippant/ random approach; and as always the David Shrigley postcard above my desk is a useful confidence-booster when preparing for public speaking…

A quick introduction to Jaygo Bloom, who is coming down for our birthday gig next Saturday. We first came across him at an event we organised in Glasgow, where he set up a little greenscreen playpen in the corner of a tent. A steady stream of kids and stormtroopers came to frolic in front of his camera with various props and costumes, and saw themselves beamed into various psychedelic netherworlds… It reminded me of visits to film museums as a kid when you lie on your belly in front of a fan wearing a cape and before you know it you’re flying over New York. Simple technology, but still strangely exciting. Anyway, rather than bloody karaoke we thought this would make for an excellent addition to proceedings at the Rainbow. Jaygo (that’s him in the middle, above) is based in Glasgow and has been responsible for all kinds of barmy a-v projects, like the intriguing Midi Maracas - see his retina-bleeding site or blog for more info. And if anyone out there has any particular bigscreen fantasies they want to enact, please feel free to bring along your own props and costumes.

One more birthday notice before the weekend — there’s a mini PR toolkit at the bottom of the event page, with a couple of tips on helping us spread the word about next Saturday’s event. We’d really like to make it a busy one, so if you’re able to stick up a poster or spam some friends it’d be much appreciated.

Just booked tickets for our birthday treat, a Tuesday afternoon jaunt to London to wave down the Telectroscope and then on to see Guy Maddin’s fantabulous new documentary My Winnipeg, narrated live by the man himself. Regular viewers will know that mention of Mr Maddin’s work can get us all of a-flutter, in particular his shorts The Heart of the World and The Eye Like a Strange Balloon - we even devoted an event to them once. We’re also very fond of his book From the Atelier Tovar, a collection of journal entries and film treatments full of over-heated prose and candid accounts of his creative, financial and libidinous tribulations. Anyway, BFI Southbank are hosting a full Maddin retrospective throughout July and My Winnipeg will be perambulating the UK over the summer.

In honour of our Knitflicks event at Compton Verney next month, here’s a little trailer (or animated flyer) by Kate Pemberton and Michael Johnston…

Kate (Endfile) and Mike (ZX Spectrum Orchestra) had already been talking about the affinities between knitting-machines and Sinclair Spectrums, so this was a chance to play with that a bit. It’s also a good opportunity to exploit Flickr’s new video option, which lets you upload ‘long photos’ (up to 90 seconds) at a resolution which youtube can only dream of.

Today the UK Film Council announced the recipients of their national Festival Fund award, and it gives us great pleasure to confirm (rustle of envelope) that Flatpack Festival is one of them. The fund was set up last year to support and enhance two UK film festivals of international significance (ie, Edinburgh, and probably London) and up to eight festivals of national (or potentially national) significance. They picked seven in the end, including Sheffield DocFest, Cinemagic in Belfast and Nottingham’s Silent Cinema Festival, and Flatpack has been awarded £70,000 over the next three years to build on the promise of the first two editions. (There’s more background on the festival in the projects section, or last year’s programme is at flatpackfestival.org)

So what does this mean for us, the producers of Flatpack? Well, the money will obviously come in handy, although there is still plenty of work to be done on the fundraising front. But it’s also a fantastic stamp of approval, a big frilly rosette from the national body responsible for film. To build something like this up on a really tight budget, to show that there’s an audience for this kind of programming, and then to secure the support which allows you to plan ahead and think a bit bigger; it’s a mighty good feeling. And without going all Oscar-night about it, it wouldn’t have been possible without all the filmmakers, volunteers, artists, promoters, technicians, funders, venues and enthusiastic punters who have chipped in to help us get this far. So thanks a lot, and here’s to Flatpack III in February 2009 and beyond…

(And congratulations to DeafFest at Wolverhampton Light House, who were also on the list)

Being fans of pre-cinema gadgetry and well-stocked with civic pride, we were delighted to discover yesterday that Birmingham is the birthplace of the flipbook. Well, that’s stretching the truth slightly; people had been flicking sheets of paper in quick succession to make moving pictures since at least the 18th century, but it wasn’t until 1868 that someone thought to patent the idea. That someone was John Barnes Linnett, a lithograph printer based in Smithfield St near the Bull Ring (or BullRing, as they like to call it nowadays). He called this ‘device’ the Kineograph, and the picture above is from his patent which can be found in Birmingham Central Library. Linnett apparently died young from pneumonia, contracted while taking photographs in Wales, and his wife sold the patent to an American. A classic Birmingham tale…

Big thanks to Mike Simkin for the tipoff. Flipbook fans should check out flipbook.info, and note that there will be some kineographic action at our Flummoxed event on 3rd July.

Terrific, random lineup of music for the Venn Festival in Bristol this weekend, running the gamut from A(rtamanova) to Z(unzunegui). (cheesy straplines our speciality!) Also a good opportunity to discover the world of Ergo Phizmiz, who has converted a scout hut into “an enchanted Bavarian woodland made of twigs, cutlery, mechanical birds and constant, ever-evolving sound”. Ergo will be one of our guests for Flummoxed next month, and has just released a digital single with People Like Us via WFMU.

(dang, can’t stop linking to WFMU…)

A quick doff of the cap to the amazing Bo Diddley, who died on Monday aged 79. Aquarium Drunkard has a couple of MP3s (we recommend ‘Who Do You Love’, loud) and Dave the Spazz is doing a tribute show tomorrow on the reliably ace WFMU. Or click on the picture above for Bo’s 1973 encounter with a gunslinging heckler.

“The Bays incorporate a classical ensemble into their improvised electronic performance, using a unique system of real-time music scoring projected for the audience to see as well as hear.”

Sounds like there’s plenty of potential for disaster or triumph here. The Bays improvise, the composers throw the score at the orchestra as they go along, and the conductor hopes for the best… The video below gives you a bit more of an idea, and this writeup. Catch it on Friday as part of Integra; not the kind of thing you see at the Custard Factory everyday.