NIFTS Graduate Matthew Secures Film Festival Place with New Film

Matthew Killen, former HND NIFTS Creative Media Student at SERC Bangor Campus, has made a new film called ‘Beach Baby’, which has secured a place at the 11th International Underground Cinema Film Festival 2020.  

Matthew originated the concept for ‘Beach Baby’ on the HND course, making the film and earning himself a distinction. He later developed the script and secured funding to remake the film and better realise his vision. It took a week to shoot and was a yearlong editing process, Matthew had also hired a composer from Dublin to score the films soundtrack. Matthew comments, “Beach Baby is a modern-day drama that follows Ethan & Chloe, a young couple whose relationship is tested when they find out that Ethan has lung cancer and Chloe is pregnant. We follow their journey together as we see them trying to deal with this sudden change in both their lives.” 

Matthew has a long history with studying at SERC; “I originally studied music production many years ago at the Downpatrick Campus and then did an HND in Music Production at Bangor SERC. I am a musician myself and play in a band called Wynona Bleach and ended up creating all the music videos and documentaries for the band to date. This then made me decide to come back to SERC to further improve my knowledge in film production, I did a part time HNC Creative Media and Ballynahinch campus in 2016 and went on to do my HND Creative Media in Bangor SERC in 2017. I also ended up coming back in 2019 as a part time lecturer for the course teaching Single Camera Techniques for TV.” 

On the HND Creative Media Course, Matthew says, “The course itself was extremely eye opening for me. When I first arrived, I had the attitude that I knew everything, however I was very wrong. The course enabled me to learn about all the aspects of film and TV. I was very lucky to have incredible lecturers Alison Cockcroft and Pete Graham who spent so much time on ensuring that I was as prepared as possible for the industry.” 

To keep up to date on information about where and when you can watch ‘Beach Baby’, click here. 

If you are interested in learning more about film at a professional level, please consider our Media Courses. 

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