FST 201 Blog

Next semester I plan on working full time and school full time like I did for this semester. Its been extremely hard to try and balance work, school, and life just in general. Now that I have done it all for one semester, I feel like I can do it all over again but have a better grasp on things. I plan on taking mostly film classes because that’s all I really need to graduate. However, I am finding it difficult to get into those classes because they all filled up within a matter of minutes. I had no chance. It’s frustrating to know that all I need is film course and I can’t get into them. I keep trying and refreshing the Registar page in hopes that maybe someone will end up dropping a class. I am optimistic that everything will work out. It is just nerve racking right now.

So for the Cucalorus film festival, I went to go see a couple of shows that weren’t film related that I ended up really enjoying. This first one of those shows was the comedy show at Dead Crow Comedy Club. Mo Alexander was the headliner for the show. Before Mo went on, there were a few others before him. Two of the performers were from Canada and both were obsessed with the fact that this was where Dawsons Creek was filmed. The other performer was from here. He actually was named Port City’s Best Comic and was extremely funny. After that Mo went on to perform and the jokes were just as hilarious. He was a bit drunk when he went on which made things even funnier and he interacted with the crowd a lot which was awesome. After the show had ended, my boyfriend and I ended up at the PsyloJo concert. They were performing at the Whiskey. The was nice and they were a Phish cover band. I grew up listening to Phish, so it was a nice ending to a really cool night.   One of the shorts th...

I think everything went as smoothly as possible. I was the producer for this project. I had a little trouble getting connected to the right people to get the permits to film at Carolina Beach State Park. The people at the park were more than happy to help us out. Filming went great. I was there whenever someone needed a hand or to run around and collect things. Sound was a bit tricky for us because we had boats go by super fast which had the water splashing on shore loudly. We also had people who were interested in what we were doing and I think we had some voices in the background that made us have to re shoot a few things. We were also fighting the sun setting. Our director wanted to get a shot during the golden hour so we only had a few minutes to shoot before it went completely dark on us.

I think having the pre-production materials was necessary so that we had a clear idea on what exactly we wanted to shoot. Anna and I went out and did a little location scouting so that we could look around and see where exactly we wanted to shoot. I think this was also a great idea seeing as how we wanted a creepier setting and a wooded area. We ended up going to Carolina Beach State Park and found a great location. Having the Master Scene Shot list as well really kind of pulls the whole team together so we can clearly get the right shots in a timely manner. This way we do not run the risk of going over our time schedule. I think the most difficult for pre-planning everything out is getting what is in our heads onto paper and making sure that what is on paper is relayed into the filming process/final cut. Being able to get the permits proved to be a little bit harder than I originally thought. I had to go through several different people and offices until I finally reached the person ...

For the Master Shot scene, we’ve come up with a few ideas. We really liked the idea of someone being up for execution or a type of trial. We came up with a witch about to be executed, kind of like a part of the Salem Witch Trials. Because it’s fall it’s kind of a Halloween themed narrative and costuming should not be too hard to come up with. The witch will not look like the typical witch with green skin and a pointed hat, but more pilgrim like. We have not decided if the executioner should also be look more pilgrim like or a medieval. With it also being fall, the setting for the shot will be perfect. WE have still yet to decide exactly where to shoot, but I think we all agreed for it to be somewhere outside and in a kind of wooded area. We may have more than two actors as well for the witnesses to the execution. Still working out the details.

Shooting the vox pop was very interesting. We had a few people who were willing to do it and they all had a different view of drag that worked out for us. Shooting only took a little bit of time compared to filming the expert interview. We shot a few questions and then I ended up choosing the one that I thought fit best for the film. The b-roll shot that we got took extremely long seeing as how Gary (our expert interviewee) takes a few hours to get into full drag. We were at his apartment for at least 7 hours filming while he got ready. We shot different things around his apartment that expressed Gary’s personality. The entire process was truly fascinating watching him get into full drag, especially with using unusual tools such as a purple glue stick and a cold spoon to use to flatten his eyebrows.