Learning By Doing

Last week, I had the opportunity to be a guest at Cabrini Connections' Video and Filmmakers Club. If you are unfamiliar with Cabrini Connections, as I was, it is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing a volunteer tutoring/mentoring program for teens in the Cabrini Green neighborhood.

When I arrived, the president and CEO of Cabrini Connections, Dan Bassill was being interviewed on camera by some of the young filmmakers for a video for a Year-End Dinner. Afterwords, Dan gave me a run down on Cabrini Connections and the citywide Tutor/Mentor Connection, and then Shuling, a mentor, introduced me to the filmmakers.

I have to admit, I was a little nervous. I don't have much experience working with youths, but they made me feel right at home. The task for the day was to shoot the first of two short films from a mini-assignment. The film should have no more than 2 characters, consist of 6-12 shots and have an unexpected ending. The writer and director of the short was Reggie. The short was called Lost, and it was about a teen (played by Marquise) who meets a mysterious woman from his past (played by Brittany). The camera operator was Melissa. Audio was done by Kierre and Yahshua, and the narrator was played by Anna.

One of the best ways to learn filmmaking is by actually creating a story, picking up a camera and doing it, and that is what these young filmmakers were doing. Learning by doing is key because it allows you to learn from your mistakes. What they were lacking in experience, they made up for with energy. In the future, the young filmmakers will benefit from being able to go and watch how other sets operate. I know I learn something every time I am on a set.

While the shoot was going on, another filmmaker, Sean was storyboarding his short that will be shot at the next meeting of the Video and Filmmaker's Club. I'm looking forward to seeing what comes of it. I also had the opportunity to make a cameo as an extra in the short. I don't get in front of the camera too often, so that was a treat.

On set, it is a challenge for an experienced director to get ideas out of his or her head and executed by the cast and crew, so you can imagine how difficult it can be for a first time director like Reggie. Saying that, Reggie was able to get all of his shots completed and most importantly the cast and crew were having fun. Filmmaking should be fun!

Big plans to close out the year!

With the Year End Gala Dinner only weeks away, we're looking to close out the semester with a big bang! We're currently hard at work on several projects!

The Cabrini Connections Video and Filmmakers Club was proud to provide documentary coverage of the wildly successful Art Show, which took place on April 16th. Armed with our Panasonic TM300 and a mic, we captured the sights, sounds and excitement of the night! Many thanks to all those who agreed to do interviews with us! Melissa is now in the trenches of the edit room, carving out a great piece with all the footage we've collected for the event over the last few weeks.

Just this week, we all had the chance to come up with our own scripts too! This second mini assignment was to develop a story with no more than 2 characters, where someone overcomes a challenge or a conflict. The goal set was to tell it with 6-12 shots and if possible, to also have an unexpected ending. After snack break, we took turns pitching our story ideas to everyone around the table. It was great to hear the wide range of ideas that came through... everyone's certainly got talent! At the end of the night, we all voted for our 2 favorite stories. The 2 winning stories will be shot and edited in the upcoming weeks. How exciting!

Congratulations to Sean Mayfield and Reggie Murphy for winning the vote! They'll both be directing their own short films. I'm sure everyone will be looking forward to pitching in, either as a production crew member, or an actor!

And as if all that wasn't enough, we're looking to start a series of simple webisodes featuring the organizing committee of the Year End Gala Dinner, so get pumped for that! :)

Mesmerized and Motivated

Film club recently had a special guest, Bianca Alexander, a local producer in Chicago. Bianca answered questions and talked to the club about how she accomplished her dreams.

Bianca helped the club get prepared, inspired, and motivated to make their best work yet for Cabrini’s spring showcase. Everyone in the club was so deep into the discussion with Bianca that we lost track of time and ended up hanging out for an extra half an hour! With only an hour and a half scheduled for the club a whole thirty minutes extra is a lot of time. I think it’s safe to say Film Club appreciates Bianca’s insight and is welcome back anytime. Check out some photos below.









Find out more about Bianca at www.consciouslivingtv.com

Cabrini Film Club makes a splash

Film makers and members Shaquille Strauther, Melissa Young and Ashaunti Roby wrote, produced, edited and directed this video to promote their upcoming fundraiser this Saturday 2/27/10 from 4pm-7pm. Buy tickets here to come to this fun event and support Cabrini Connections: http://theawesomes.eventbrite.com

Watch:

The Awesome's Shop & Sip for Cabrini Connections from Cabrini Connections on Vimeo.

On MLK Day Film Club gets a gift

Today Film Club took the day off to show some love for Martin Luther King Day. However last week the club met and we all had a blast editing the mini assignment. We all screened the dailies together, had a good time giggling at the (my) acting, and then broke out into three groups (one group of three and two groups of two) to begin editing.

In the group of three Brittany, Reggie, and Cantrell teamed up with Shuling hanging out to answer any questions. They cruised through the scene and had a solid rough cut well before the club ended. Marquise and Sean were worked together while I helped with questions and the final group of Melissa and Kierre with Michael backing them up took a bit longer to finish. They were both cutting and cutting. I sure they would have kept going strong all night but we ran out of time. Everyone managed to flesh out the whole scene. Check out Sean and Marquise’s rough cut below!

Cabrini Connections Film Club Mini Assignment 1 Rough Cut from Karl Geweniger on Vimeo.

In other Film Club news, I am happy to announce that we will be getting some shiny new equipment! A new camera, sound gear, and tripod just to name a few of the new tools we will have at our fingertips in the coming weeks. We are going to be making some amazing, funny, moving, eye-opening films so stay tuned!

Mini Assignment!

It was the first club meeting of the year. Michael, Karl and I decided to change things up a little with how we were going to conduct our weekly meetings. We're putting our big horror movie on hold for now and working on short mini-assignments each week. We're going to take time to focus on each aspect of filmmaking, such as camera, sound, lighting and editing, so we understand them well.

This time, we kicked things off with Brittany, Melissa and Reggie! The task was to come up with a story, and tell it in 6 shots. Additional requirements? Their 6 shots had to include 1 pan and 1 tilt.

Check out the video to see how we did!

-Shuling

Building Momentum

Greetings, I wanted to start this blog out by thanking Cabrini Connections Film Club for accepting me as a new group leader! This week was another busy week for film club. We continued to make shot lists and storyboards. At this point there is a shot list and boards for about a third of our short film. Working through this process never ceases to inspire me. Everyone in the club has helped to contribute ideas to the film each week and with each new idea I can see it taking shape.

We had a few less members this week due to Brittany and Reggie’s birthday, but that did not halt our progress. Mae gave a great tutorial on the basics of screenwriting formatting. Formatting for screenwriting can be overwhelming at first, it is something that becomes easier with practice. I can’t wait to see the script for our film formatted like a true screenplay.

After our writing discussion we jumped right back into creating shot lists and storyboards for two more scenes. Kierre was on fire this week! He had such a great vision for the kidnapping scene. He managed to transform a fairly simple scene into one with great dramatic and cinematic potential. Melissa and Marquise were feeding on Kierre’s vision as well and we powered through ten shots in just a few minutes!

This week we managed to build a great deal of momentum. I am confident that we will have completed storyboards for the film early next year when we all come back after the holidays. Stay tuned for our photo storyboards.

Thanks for reading,

Karl Geweniger