Tim White may be based in Melbourne but he spends most of his time spinning around the world making great films. We catch up with the new director – who was shortlisted in this year’s YDA short film category – about the trials and tribulations of working with a love doll in Tokyo. Waaaay to go….

How long have you been directing?

I made my first short film when I was in high school and went on to make a few more at university in a Creative Arts degree. The course was really broad and inconsistent so I came out of school with these grandiose dreams of being a director but I had no knowledge or experience to back it up. The dreams eventually got lost in the real world of crappy jobs, toxic relationships and paying rent. I only started taking directing seriously in 2011 when I moved into a studio with some artist friends and began writing again – my first actual directing role was a no-budget music video for my neighbour’s band.

 So you’re a new director then? What’s plan A?

I’m still very new to this and I consider myself very fortunate to be doing the work I do. Like most directors, I’d like to eventually work on features but I definitely don’t see this happening for a long time.

I don’t have any definitive plans, but in the next 12 months I’m wanting to self-fund a short film I’ve been slowly developing for a couple of years – I want to shoot it in Mexico.

At some stage I also want to make a big, crazy J-pop music video and experiment with some VFX driven ideas. I’d love to keep doing commercial work that involves some more exciting locations and interesting concepts. I should probably also consider seeking representation in the western world so I can keep some geographical variety in my work. I’ve always wanted to live overseas before I turn 30 and I’m running out of time now. So maybe in the next couple of years I’ll move my life to Japan or America or wherever the vibe takes me.

 We love your latest film for DCup, Don’t be Shy. Tokyo, Male Love Dolls, beautiful Japanese girls…. Tell us all the interesting bits about the production please. What were the main challenges?

This was undoubtedly the most bizarre and fun-filled video I’ve ever been involved in.
Getting my sweaty hands on the male love doll was by far the biggest challenge with the tiny budget and limited time-frame we had. Japan is the world’s top manufacturer of silicone sex dolls, so I mistakenly assumed it would be easy to rent/borrow/buy a male doll locally. Apparently nobody in Japan has even heard of male love dolls and they seem completely grossed out by the concept of one.

Akira Tanaka, one of my producers, and I scoured the seediest adult shops and S&M clubs in Tokyo searching for a lead – people looked at us like we were sex pests. While another friend Takayuki Kuribayashi contacted all of the local manufacturers in Japan to no avail. I even signed up to all of the online love doll forums – they all pointed me to California.

In the end, I spent all my personal savings buying one online and getting it express couriered from California to Tokyo. Due to Japanese censorship laws (which prohibit anatomically correct depictions of genitalia) I had to get his detachable penis shipped separately, to avoid any hold ups in customs. Miraculously, my love doll (we named him Yoshi) arrived two days before the shoot in a 55kg coffin shaped box. The penis got lost in the mail, so poor Yoshi still has a hole where his junk is supposed to be – and now the most expensive thing I own is a male sex doll without sex organs.

Shooting with a love doll came with all sorts of unexpected difficulties; Yoshi is 53kg of dead weight and although he has a movable skeleton, it takes three people and 30 minutes to change his wardrobe. We also had to roll him around on a wheelchair, which always attracted plenty of strange glances while shooting in public. I think he may have psychologically scarred some small children whilst shooting in the Asakusa Hanayashiki theme park.

Yoshi is freakishly lifelike and detailed; his silicone skin is so soft and he has hand plucked body hair – he seriously is a beautiful work of art. Initially, he was really creepy to be around and I worried that it would be really weird and awkward for Kozue to perform alongside him. So in the days before the shoot I spent time hanging out with him, I gave him a back story and a personality – I wanted the crew to treat him like a person rather than a prop. By the end of the shoot, we all had a strange affinity with him – Yoshi became a friend.

You’re based in Melbourne but seem to have developed an art for leaping around the world filming. How does this work – do you take a DP with you and what kind of kit are you were working with? What’s the craziest travelling shoot you’ve done?

I live in Melbourne but the vast majority of my work happens overseas. I’m probably away about four or five months a year.

Every trip is very different; occasionally I work alone but more often than not I collaborate with DP Liam Gilmour. We’ve spent a lot of time together over the past two years and have developed a really great working relationship. He’s got an amazing eye for detail and brings a very different creative mindset to my own. Most importantly, he keeps it calm and fun in the most stressful and sleepless of productions.

We shot the DCUP video on Liam’s Red Epic and a set of old Zeiss Super Speeds we rented in Tokyo. If it were feasible, I’d love to shoot everything on a kit like this. However, a lot of my work involves multiple flights, minimal crew and very little time on location. For these types of shoots, we bring a much more lightweight, stripped back kit.

 Just recently we shot a commercial for Subaru across five countries. It involved 14 flights over 14 days and very little sleep in between. We would land in a new country and drive directly to our first location. We were shooting with real Subaru owners and their cars, and didn’t have any ability to properly scout our locations before we shot. There were plenty of challenges and frustrations along the way, but I did have my first ever Octocopter and Cineflex experiences!

Do you edit all your own material?

Yes, I do edit my own work. I actually really enjoy the editing process. My work isn’t usually set in stone with specific storyboards. So for me, editing involves a lot of trial and error with different ideas. I feel I’ve inadvertently developed my editing style into a very fast-paced percussive aesthetic and I’m trying to mix that up a bit more. I’d definitely like to work closely with a professional editor in the near future.