When I first signed up to take this class, I envisioned a classroom full of students who watched extraneous films every day and talked about them with artsy jargon only pretentious filmmakers and film critics used. That was all; I expected nothing more or nothing less than this. But obviously – being the terrible assumer I am – I was proved wrong. We not only analyzed every aspect of a movie – its subplots, its camera angles, and its sounds – but we also wrote a lot of essays and movie reviews that I did not expect.
However, what surprised me the most was our last mission: to create a short film. I was thrilled. And what made it even better? Our ability to choose who we desired to work with. Although I had this power in my hands, I can be completely honest and say that I was not the most confident person in the world when the members of my group were finalized. I had no problem with Yoonjin, Linda and Sonoko; however, I was not close to all of them, and I feared for awkwardness – one thing I don’t like dealing with. Nonetheless, I sucked it up and saw this as an opportunity to make new friends and to learn more about my capability of being an effective teammate in my group.
Our first group meeting consisted of brainstorming. We each pitched in ideas about what genre we wanted our film to fall under. One key idea we all shared was not creating a typical film. We sought to produce a film that would be different from what other groups in the class would make. Thus, after much negotiation and an abundance of rather very interestingly weird ideas, we came to a decision: Twilight. There is much craze about the Twilight series in the today’s media and honestly, it’s too much. We all agreed that the idea of vampires was extremely overplayed, and we wanted to do something about it. Thus, our film is not only a mockumentary about Twilight; rather, it is also about the life of a typical teenage vampire (if that is even typical at all), and it serves to tell viewers that vampires really are not much different from humans like they’re portrayed in movies today.
One thing I enjoyed about my group was our understanding of each other’s ideas and our capability of working together without any problems. In fact, I was pretty surprised at how well we flowed with one another. Thus, picking roles for each person didn’t require much stress. Everyone agreed with which role we each wanted to take part in: Yoonjin as an actress and a director; Linda as an actress and a planner; Sonoko as a cinematographer; and I, myself, as another cinematographer and a editor. All four of us worked very well together and although we had our different roles, we essentially produced the film all together as one group.
Our group filmed in chronological order because we decided that would help make editing easier and faster. The first place we began to film was in the woods by our school’s track field. We had envisioned starting off the film in a specific way, and the location was perfect. Even more so, the weather cooperated with us that day so when we saw what we had filmed afterwards (dailies, anyone?), it was very similar to what we had written and drawn in the first box of our storyboard. Score – this was it.
In this first scene, I held the camera up in the sky and – using a swooping motion – filmed towards the woods in a medium shot. Along the way, the camera captures Linda, passes her, but abruptly goes back to where she is standing – as if it took a double take of her. The effect of this cinematic effect is to enable the viewers to feel as if they are the ones whose gazes are being followed. In this way, the audience is able to be more engaged in the film, rather than just simply watching it. Another cinematic aspect we incorporated in this first scene is a shot of Yoonjin crouching down on the ground, picking up leaves and sniffing them. Filming this was quite a challenge; we were in a hurry to because it was unbearably cold that day, and we were trying to save ourselves of embarrassment from the track runners that would pass by us constantly. Nonetheless, we purposely filmed this part in a low angle so we saw Yoonjin and the tops of trees and the sky behind her. This made Yoonjin seem powerful and distant from the rest of society – which in most vampire movies is constantly the case.
The second scene was filmed inside the school itself. Here, Yoonjin does something very out-of-the-ordinary and quite strange: she goes up to a friend and starts to randomly sniff her hair. In order to depict this moment in the best way possible, I filmed her approaching her victim in a long to medium shot and when she began to sniff the hair, I did so in an extreme close-up. This captured the details of her action more authentically and suddenly, the viewers became more personal with Yoonjin.
The third scene was filmed at Yoonjin’s house, and it was here when things sailed smoothly. The life of a vampire at home is shown in these last few scenes and through The Incredibles being on television and the silliness of the actresses, we tried to be comedic. Yes – it was definitely hard, but it was worth a try! In these scenes, bird’s eye view, close-up’s, and “worm’s eye view” – looking directly up at an object – is used. All three of these cinematic aspects are used to show Linda studying. A bird’s eye view is used to show viewers what work she is doing, a close-up of her pen in hand is used to depict her writing, and a direct shot up at Linda’s face is used later on to show the blood drip on the dining table due to a fake nosebleed we refer to as ketchup. These shots are crucial for this scene because in order to show the different aspects and meanings for studying, it is essential for the camera to focus on different parts of the action in different ways. In addition, we copied the “crotch shot” from M in order to portray the deceit and bogus behaviors of vampires in movies.
Overall, I am happy with my group and our final presentation. The process of producing this film was enjoyable, and I learned a lot through the experience. Personally, my favorite parts of the film are the separate interviews Yoonjin and Linda speak in in between all the action. These parts are humorous and so ridiculous to watch that they are memorable. We could have worked on efficiency so we didn’t have to procrastinate until the very end to complete the film. In addition, we could have used a tripod for some scenes because using a handheld camera was too shaky at times. Through this project, my eyes were opened to so much more about film: its difficulty to capture that one perfect shot, its patience required to perfectly edit everything afterwards, and its journey of collaboration and ambition to create a fabulous piece of art for the aftermath. Because of this opportunity, my perspective of filmmaking has been raised higher. Now, I know to appreciate all the different aspects of movies, and now I have made more friends in the class through this experience. It’s a win-win situation, so I don’t regret anything at all. And there you have it - peace and chill out.
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