My Experiences From Making Short Films
AUTHO
Our professor in Fil003 required us to make two short films and combined, will serve as our third long exam. This was heavy but we accepted the challenge. Brainstorming was done by each and every one of us. We all had our own stories that can be developed into a film but in the end, it’s in the hands of the majority. Me and my friend Amiel’s story was accepted by our director and were among the ten stories that will be voted on. The voting went on and ultimately we lost. The stories that were chosen were of Pauline, Steve, and Alpha’s for the first and Chrischabel’s for the second film. Our production name was “Sining Palukan.” Now time for writing. Keep in mind that we are just college freshmen students.
The script of the second film finished earlier than the first but were revised several times until our professor accepted it. Meanwhile the script of the first film also was rejected and revised a few times but after a lot of brainstorming by our scriptwriters, the script was ready. The storyboard was all that was left, this was a bit easier. The title of the second film is “Alas Otso” and first film is “Asmodeus.”
Then the building up of a crew and auditions for roles were next. The role of one character was auditioned by at least two students but only one will get it. It was a meticulous process but eventually our director and professor chose the right set of students to play their roles. The others that were not part of the cast were all part of the production crew. I ended up being the video editor for both films and assistant director for the second. I was happy with what I was given but next time, I’ll try to go for directing. Aim high!
Meetings were held every week in preparation for the shooting of the first film. Final checks were done before we started the shooting and the setting was at a resort first. We thought that this shooting would turn out good but in the end, it was a disaster. Most of our members just partied and swam in the swimming pool and our director was just lying around, turned out that he can’t handle the pressure. Although a few scenes were shot. I was really disappointed with that shooting. All of us wasted our money but we got to move on. The next day our professor got angry because she knew what happened. So we decided that we will re-shoot the whole movie with a new story. Challenging and disappointing for all of us.
The new script and storyboard were available the next week. We were ready to shoot the first film again but the problem is we only got a week to pass both the first and the second. So we split the production crew into two. One for the first film and the other for the second. I went for the second.
Simultaneous shootings were done to maximize time. Me and the others involved in the second film first shot at our school cafeteria. Then the house of our director for a few shots. Next we moved on to PASEO for the rest of the scenes. The first day of shooting our director was present but the following days he wasn’t present. He was too busy with the first film but we understand him. So me and the two other assistant directors took up the task of directing almost the whole of the film. We shot several scenes at PASEO for I think three days. The rest of which were shot in my friend’s house. Most of the time we finish our shooting at 9 or 10pm. So we usually get home late. There was this one time that I got home at 11pm because of overtime. We don’t have much news about the progress of the first film but from what we’ve heard they didn’t get a lot of sleep.
It took us about a week to finish shooting the second film. About three days left to pass it. Me and my co-editor Avegail edited the second film for two days but problems arose as the first film needs to be edited too. So we did simultaneous editing for the first. Three of us edited it for a whole day without sleep then the next day the second film again without sleep. In total, I got 2 days of no sleep but I kept in mind that it’ll be worth it in the end.
The day of the passing of the film came. We weren’t still finished with the first but our second film is ready. We showed it to our professor and the whole class. Sadly my professor didn’t quite like it. She said our film lacked the “Oomph” factor. So again we re-shot most of the scenes and edited it again and passed it again on our prof. AGAIN she rejected it so we re-shoot again and finally she said, “Okay.” FINALLY! We were all relieved but nervous at the same time because we don’t know what her reaction is to our second film.
The passing of the first film has meanwhile been quite straightforward. She accepted it immediately but wasn’t that impressed at all, harsh reality.
Before uploading the two films on YouTube, me and my co-editor re-edited both to clean them up. Still there were some parts of the two films that need re-editing but we just let it be, besides our director approved them both. This was a fun experience and I will apply all of the things that I have learned from this in my future projects.
Here are the links to the trailers:
ASMODEUS (First Film): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acP9vFXO6-Q&list=UUf-GgGf-sIZRAWHDIHZ6IAw&index=1&feature=plcp
ALAS OTSO (Second Film): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8jgi6lOg30&feature=relmfu
author: Martin Jarmin
p.e./mj
©Copyright 2012, Filipino | Definitely Filipino™. All rights reserved. Copying of any article from this Definitely Filipino blog without permission, is strictly prohibited. DISCLAIMER: All articles are opinions of their respective authors and not necessarily of the site owner and Definitely Filipino.
