student films

I went to the Shepherd University short film session at the theater located on German Street.  I was quite impressed with the presentations that I witnessed.   All of the films were created differently and you can tell how different students have different styles of filming and different types of thinking when it comes to stories.  Usually when a teacher gives students an assignment to make a film, those students like to create stories where they have places to film that fits their story lines.  However, some of the films were very unique.  For example, the one film that stuck in my mind was one of the ending films about two brothers and a funeral home.  It was very interesting to me that the students were able to use a real funeral home and all the aspects a funeral home has to film.  They filmed inside the funeral home and they even filmed were caskets were held.  Being able to find sources like this to film at is a very hard task for most students.  Another film that I remember is one where it is a narration of a girls love life to another girl and the guilt she felt for not being honest with the people she loved.  The narrator did a good job in telling a story in a fashion that an average person would tell.  It wasn’t a perfectly detailed story, but blanks could be filled in about what the story was all about and it was a good flow.   I was quite impressed with the films in general.  It takes a lot of time to create a short film, especially if only a few people are working on it.  Finding time to edit everything of a film, finding actors and actresses, finding places to shoot different scenes when you do not have a budget to get things that you need is a difficult task and these students did a great job implementing different techniques to make the ordinary of campus life into a realm of fiction.  The students who made the films also had a good idea about how to use different types of lighting, sounds, and special effects to keep the audience’s attention and to make the film seem as realistic as possible.  For example, in the one film the guy was driving drunk.  The film at this point showed the driver’s perspective.  The film seemed distorted coming in and out as if you were the driver in the situation.  Overall, the films were very well put together and you could tell a lot of time was put on them to make sure they were well made.  I enjoyed the time I spent there and I cannot wait until I see the next film session.