Ok, so let me bring you up to speed:
Right this moment, the Digital Films guys [or ‘teh DF Krew’] are in the middle of a 48 Hour Film Competition for BC High School Students called Zoomfest. The topic that was given at 5PM PST today was ‘The Road Less Travelled’ and the prop was a key.
Up to speed now? Good.
There are six of us total. Max (grade 12), Mike (12), Ben Wright (10), Shyam Valera (10), Mannan, (10) and me, Kashif (10). I’ve decided to liveblog this as I’ve always wondered what it’s like being in one of these but never actually seen something on it anywhere before. I’ll try to update as often as possible, but for now, here it goes:
48 HOURS LEFT We got our topic and prop, as mentioned above. For an hour and a half we sat in the proudction room and incoherently brainstormed half-formulated ideas for an hour and a half. We got a story we thought was good, to which my mum’s response was: “you want to win, don’t you?” [ZING!!!11!].
Then the pizza came, and we ate.
Bellies full, we went back to the drawing board, and through the evolution of ideas, came up with one that we’re actally pretty pumped about. Without revealing the story, I’ll say this: it’s about how the choices we make can affect ourselves and others. And there are doors. Lots and lots of doors.
43 HOURS LEFT It’s now 10PM and we’re writing the screenplay. We have to have it done for tomorrow morning, so we can shoot the film tomorrow and do post-production on Sunday.
21 HOURS LEFT No. Time. To. Breathe. Oh, god, I wish I didn’t have a math midterm and 10 other things to do on Monday. As you may be able to tell, I haven’t had too much time to update the post, but there’s a bit of a calm period now as we start editing the first scenes. All the filming has been completed [YAY], more cookies, chocolate and pizza have been consumed, and we’re on our way through post-production. Just pray we don’t blow a fuse.
The day started at 7AM, with all the guys coming to my house. We prepped until the sun rose completely, and then went outside.
It was raining. Hard.
So we went to the school, since it’s usually open on Saturdays, and there was a vlleyball tourney going on. We got there, and it was locked.
More to follow, stay tuned.
8 HOURS LEFT Sorry about the abrupt ending yesterday, I HAD to sleep - but I’m up now, Max is over to edit and score, [started at 7AM again], and we’re right in the middle [editing scene 5 of 12] of post. For anyone who doesn’t know what post(production) means, it’s all the stuff you do after shooting - editing, colour correction, music, sound, DVD, etc. The only thing I hope we have enough time for is the rendering, since we’ll have the video + other filters too. Hurry up and finish now, is our bet bet, I guess. So we will.
[RE: yesterday, we might as well do an audio podcast for that; there’s too much to type and read.]
2.5 HOURS LEFT Ben here and Kashif and Max are busy editing. Since i don’t know how to work a Mac i have to type out the post. They say we’re basically done but I don’t believe them. I’ve been sitting here mostly just watching Red Vs Blue and Michael Jackson videos on youtube as Kashif and Max fight over what i should say during voice overs and Kashif’s mom tries to scare Kashif into thinking we aren’t going to win….She’s pretty good at it too.
0 HOURS LEFT (WELL, NEGATIVE TWO, BUT LET’S NOT GET CARRIED AWAY HERE.) My God, that was intense. We handed in the movie with FIVE MINUTES REMAINING. The problem was that the drop-off point closest to us was a 30 min. drive, as no school in all of Surrey [120 + schools, btw] had at least three groups. Jeez.
The Drop-Off was like a super stressful and awesome heist movie. My dad had the car running as we [Max and I] ran out of the house with a fresh DVD and some cans of Pepsi [either for celebration or consolation, we figured], we got onto the highway, and it was getting dark with a lot of rain.
We overtook cars, carefully turned corners, and got to the Drop Off Point [MetroTown, a 600 store mall here], and ran up the steps of the mall after jumping out of the car while it was on the street. We got into the mall, and found out we were at the wrong side. So we did the only thing we could do: run through Canada’s second biggest mall at one of its busiest times of the week dodging people, cutting corners through stores, and running down a broken escalator.
Study for Midterm now. [great ending, eh?]
- Kashif, a.k.a Mr. Noodles
