The life of a student is hectic. Add a film project to the workload and a part-time job you might have too much on your plate. However, anyone taking a film major may want to shoot a movie to gain experience and master equipment. In some colleges, it’s essential for students taking a film major to complete a project before graduating.
Film projects impart valuable skills required in a career and allow a resume to stand out. They teach teamwork, and when done well, a project becomes the easiest way to get a good grade. However, there are several things that a student who wants to shoot a short film should know.
You Have to Plan the Project
As aforementioned, college students are perpetually busy. There are numerous classes in a day to attend, assignments to complete, and notes to study. Apart from the course load, there are volunteer work and extracurricular activities. With poor time management, a student ends up procrastinating, leading to workload piling.
A professional essay writer who will help reduce the workload can come in handy when you need free time. Furthermore, students must also plan their time and project because a film can lack the record button, unlike video or digital media. So once it’s rolled into a camera, the student making the short film has to pick the right stop, shoot and unload the film take it to a laboratory for processing.
Know who will be involved, when everything will be happening, where and who will be involved. The whole shooting process takes time, and you also have to consider what time in the day you’ll have good lighting. Therefore, the whole process of shooting even a short film requires proper planning and good time management practices.
You Need a Good Script
A great script tells a story that the audience can relate to. Even if you’re making a short film, the writing process is tedious and time-consuming. Another issue is that writing a script for a short film leaves you with less time to develop the story.
Remember, if the film is a school project, you have to write a good script that will motivate the professor to award good marks. A confusing storyline brings an unsatisfactory film-watching experience. When the audience fails to understand the message of your film, then you have failed to tell your story visually. Therefore, before you begin the shooting process, give a friend the script to read to ensure it’s clear and the story is fascinating. It helps to practice script writing to help sharpen your skills.
The Short Film Can Jumpstart Your Career
Students who graduate with a film degree often start at entry-level positions, and some even get jobs in sectors not related to the entertainment industry. Most use entry-level positions such as film intern, personal assistant, or film promoter as learning and networking opportunities that make a great foundation for building a career.
Besides, once your school project is successful, you have a tangible proof for future employers that you can quickly apply the knowledge and skills taught in the class into a real work environment.
The film industry is hard to break into, so if your short film in school is a success, it might capture the attention of a director or producer already established in the industry and jumpstart your career. So take the school projects seriously as they also count as a form of experience of work done.
A Scrip Without Dialogue Comes in Handy
There are numerous successful short films without dialogue, such as Geris Game which won an academy award, and Strangers, which won the top prize at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival. Whether for artistic or practical reasons, short films are light on dialogue. There are several advantages to making your short film wordless.
For starters, it reduces the chances of coming up with a bad script that will bore the audience. There is a chance that the actors you will use in your film are not experts in their craft. Wordless stories cover up the flaws of actors who are not convincing and eliminate the cost of using expensive sound recording equipment.
Use location and characters to help dramatically set the stage for your story. In case you don’t intend to use actors, then a lack of dialogue will bring out a stronger performance. If you must include words, make the script light, but if you’re writing dialogue is your weakness, you’re better off producing a wordless short film to increase the odds of scoring a good grade in your school project.