Wednesday, 28 November 2012
Video of Dublin
A little video of Dublin to give you a feel for the place. (Yes I did indeed write the music as well).
Dublin from Wayne Robson on Vimeo.
Thursday, 18 October 2012
Random stuff about living in Dublin
Somewhere out there there are beer, tramps and people who will ask for your cigarettes! |
The same as during the
day you will see beggars on most corners. If you gave to them all
it would bankrupt you, some appear to be 'career beggers' who are not
as desperate as some others. So whether you give to any, alll or
none is up to you, but like any big city they are pretty much
unavoidable unless it is pissing it down with rain.
Now as I've touched on
before, thre are a LOT of pubs in Dublin, probably more than 1 person
could drink in in one lifetime. Its very easy to get tempted to
visit a different one each night before you turn around and realise
that you're never at home in your flat. Just because everyone speak
english does not mean they do things the same way as england,
scotland or wales or any other country fo tthat matter. There are
distinct ways things are done over here that you'll come across
yourself and are far numerous to mention in detail here.
I'd urge you to set up
a bank account as soon as you can to make life a bit easier while
your here, and you'll need a passport and some sort of proof of your
address (a bill will do fine, but you'll need to wait for ti to come
first. There may well be another quicker way that I'm not aware of.)
It also rains a fair
bit in Dublin and when it does...boy oh boy does it hammer it down.
So make sure you have a waterproof coat as there's nothing worse than
walking to and from work soaked to the skin as if you've been in a
shower with your clothes on.
If you need to buy
something whether it be clothes or something for your flat stephens
green is worth a look and your best bet is aplace called 'Dunnes',
Although there are a few places with cheap plates and cutlery etc in
camden street as well.
Thursday, 11 October 2012
Finding Somewhere to Live
Home is where the axe is! |
You have a choice of
course, you could if you are lazy and have more money than sense
simply keep staying in hotels and bed and breakfasts, but trust me
you'll fast get sick of having no time to yourself or privacy. I
spent another week split between 2 separate rooms in 2 separate
houses. While the 1st one was fine, the cheaper one
staying in a house owned by 'Mim' was excellent and I was made to
feel far more at home. (I'd strongly recommend it for a stay if you
have a choice in fact, as its the bed B & B I'd ever stayed at in
all my years traveling around.)
When looking for
somewhere to stay long term chances are if your working for screen
scene then they will help as much as possible to find you somewhere
that both meets your budget and also that's a nice place. In the case
of those who came over around a similar time as myself, we had to
also contend with the fact that the students were all coming back and looking for a place to stay. So most places were gone inside of 24
hours, often far less, so you had to be fast.
Www.airbnb.com
is a good place to look for places and was found by Yanko sitting
just behind me right now. Now price wise your going to often need
one months worth of rent as a bond and usually either 2 or 4 weeks in
advance. Also some places want a year long contract so you may have
to either negotiate a shorter term, or look elsewhere.
I'm paying 200 euros a
week for my apartment which has 1 bedroom, a bathroom, a kitchen and
a main room to myself in a self contained apartment. But you can
spend as little or as much as you want really. Now for me as I'm
living away from my wife and kids, to me it isn't home without them so
it doesnt overly bother me. (plus I spend most of my time either at
work or reading in the pub around the corner lol). On top of this I
have the electric to pay as well.
Now this means either
setting up an account over here, or using a one back home (which
could possibly incur bank charges for transaction not in your own currency, so look that up!) Also if you do open an account you will
need your passport and a utility bill such as an electric of phone bill
before you can open one.
Having access to the
internet is of course a priority in our online of work. While some
ISP's over here do let you do a 'month by month' connection, its
often easier to simply use a dongle. O2 over here seem to be the
best bet at the moment. Although at the time of writing it does only
give you 5 gig a month so you'll need to be careful!
Touching on mobiles I
would strongly suggest picking up a local sim card as it'll be far
cheaper and if you have either a second phone or a one capable of two
sim cards you can also keep your old number from back home.
Now please keep in mind
that this blog is my own opinion only, its not being 'funded' or
influenced by anyone and you take the advice here or leave it.
Hopefully the entire intention is that it will help people coming
over t6o Dublin to get a feel for the place when working over here a
bit faster.
My biggest advice for
anyone with a family is to resist the temptation to keep loking at
pics of your wife and kids every 5 mins as that's a one way ticket to
driving yourself nuts. Make sure that you do have some semblance of
a social life over here as you will fast get sick of things
otherwise.
'All work and no play
makes jack run round with an axe'.
...next time we'll cover the practical side of living in Dublin.
Monday, 8 October 2012
A 3D Guy Arrives in Dublin
There be crawlies outside that Patio door! |
The idea behind this blog is to not so much cover the 'art side' of 3D, but to provide sort of a guide to living and working in Dublin for those who like myself are new here. So I'll be covering the things that may catch you out, the nice places to eat or drink and things that you may want to avoid.
I'm going to try and add an entry each day while I am here for the 5 months of my contract till mid march, by that time it should provide a pretty useful guide to those following over. I'm currently over on a 5 month contract for Screen Scene FX working on a film as the lighter and also doubling up doing any sculpting needed as well.
When I 1st came over here 3 weeks ago I was placed in the 'Leason Bridge Guesthouse' which is a standard initial place for anyone working at screen scene (although this could change in the future). This is a comfortable guesthouse and luckily just acc5ross the road from the Leason pub. (Which has some amazing entertainment nights about half of the week with everything from jazz to rock.) It can get a bit touristy, but to be honest its a nice place to stop for a few drinks as your introduction to Dublin.
Now if you like me are a smoker, most places in Dublin will not let you smoke there, so you'll want to hunt some nice pubs and restaurants that have an outside area. If you are especially unlucky and are at the Leason Bridge guesthouse on the ground floor, you may get one of the rooms with the patio doors leading to the 'patio area' (which in reality is just the car park). Now this make seem like a godsend as you can simply open your patio doors and have a cigarette outside with ease...... BUT!.... while its great during the day, at night it is infested with horse lice and thousands of other crawly things. So if you have any problem with insects (as I do) I advice not opening that patio door after dark.
Your 1st couple of weeks in Dublin it is not unusual for even the most restrained person to go a bit 'pub mad' and be out every night. Mainly as literally every street corner has a pub, bar or restaurant. But this will soon wear off as you'll be surprised how much it mounts up money wise.
Talking of money, settling in Dublin will costs you more than you maybe realize. most people coming over here to Screen Scene do end up pretty broke for the 1st few weeks until their pay kicks in for a week or three. This is less of an issue if you have a couple of grand spare to rely on as well. So do not expect to be living the high life for the 1st few weeks, at some point your money will run out and you will wish you had been more careful of it.
Also cigarettes are more expensive than in England (or most of the EU) so you may want to stock up before you travel over if you smoke. Guinness however is only 4.20-4.60 a pint over here and tastes about 300% better than any Guinness you have have ever had before. In fact I am reliably informed by Garloff sitting next to me now, that against all logic, Guinness actually has less calories than a pint of German lager.
Next time we'll cover accommodation, Bed and breakfasts, shared rooms and apartments. (We may also touch on a few hings about phones that could trip you up if your bringing yours over.)
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