Rebecca Potter
This year I was awarded an ORCA grant to make a series of commercials promoting family history. The commercials are targeted to teenagers and young adults in hopes of showing them different ways they can use their skills to take part in the vital work of family history. From film, to blogs, to photos, youth can use their technological skills to contribute to the work and come to know their heritage.
The roles I played in these commercials were writer, director, producer, and editor. Writing and directing these shorts stretched my ability and experience in fiction filmmaking. I have primarily focused on documentary work so these commercials helped me to expand my practice and give me a taste of commercial work. Film works in three stages: preproduction, production, and postproduction. Being directly involved in each stage provided many opportunities for learning and growth.
In the preproduction stage I wrote and rewrote several story ideas for the commercials. I prayed, pondered, and drafted over several different storylines until it felt like I had strong and compelling stories. After those were in place I had to find a cinematographer, actors, locations, and equipment in order to be ready for the production phase. Scheduling everyone’s busy schedule and finding the right people the play the parts were extremely difficult tasks.
After weeks of preparation, the production phase began. Filming occurred over three different weekends and many long days. Directing actors is not something I had done much of before, it took patience, various communication styles, and trial and error to catch the right shots and actions. It was amazing to see the willingness and skills of everyone in the crew. All of the crew and cast were amateurs but their dedication and patience with the project shows through in their performance and I felt like it was a great success.
On the set, the cinematographer taught me about a new camera he was using the lighting techniques he used for his shots. I learned a great deal about fiction filming and lighting tricks. Another area of filmmaking I learned a lot about is the important role of props and wardrobes. Having done mainly documentaries I didn’t realize the huge task those two elements play in fiction filmmaking. It took a huge amount of time and persistence to have continuity between shots and ensure that the actors and actresses looked the part they were to play.
The post-‐production was perhaps the most time consuming of the three phases. The camera we used requires extensive file conversion in order to be able to edit the clips Final Cut (the editing program). Learning how to do the file conversion was a somewhat frustrating task but I eventually became accustomed to the process and was able to edit to films. Finding music, the right shots, and the final tag line for the commercials took a lot of time, thought, and energy. I really enjoyed editing these however, the difference in time it takes to edit a short fiction piece takes considerably less time than a lengthy documentary; it was a nice change of pace.
Tom Lefler, my mentor, was extremely supportive and helpful throughout all three phases of the project. I thoroughly enjoyed working with him and respect his thoughts, suggestions, and critiques. I hope that I can continue to work on projects with him in the future.