Tonight was a very special occasion with the first screening of the complete Amiri’s Child. It was a great pleasure to share this auspicious moment with my colleagues and friends from the North End Health Centre in Oamaru.

This past week has been amongst the most stressful in the whole production. With a deadline to get a viewing copy of the film to a potential distributor and tonight’s screening on the horizon, an unwelcome Final Cut software update threatened everything. The update resulted in corruption of the project render files and prevented the film being exported from the Final Cut software. But Indy film makers are not easily beaten. With the help of the ever resourceful indy film community, a complex but ultimately successful work around saved the day!

Watching the story unfold on the big screen tonight, with an appreciative audience sharing the experience, I knew all the hard work and stress have been worthwhile. Amiri’s Child has been a vision in my mind for so long, words cannot express the reward of seeing an audience enjoy the film.

Whilst it is wonderful to receive recognition from international film festivals, it is the opinions of those closest to you that mean the most.