What did I think of film school when I first started out? I was terrified, yet it gave me an opportunity to get a greater grasp of how to make films. After watching many films, reading many books on film history and the biographies of several filmmakers, I was itching to get started. Luckily I had been given a super8 camera for my birthday when I was a kid and it gave me the ability to start making some silly little films, most of which were experimental in nature.
Not really having the ability to work with actors, I used my friends in my clunky and extremely crude science fiction epics in the era of Star Wars and "Star Trek". I even shot war footage off of a TV set to depict an intergalactic battle, as well as plastic army figures that I set on fire to show the horrors of war. When you're a kid and you're making your first films in your backyard, you find that you have to improvise.
Long before I attended film school, I wanted to make the equivalent of the big budget sci-fi epic, with practically no money at all. A toy model enthusiast, I used the discarded parts of model planes and ships that were lying around and constructed a big, hideous behemoth of a space ship and a space station. Then I needed to create the inside of a space ship, so I bought some pieces of huge black poster board, punched holes in them and taped them to the windows of my parents car. I made a spacesuit out of my mom's jogging suit and a bicycle helmet, set up some lights inside the car and voila! instant space ship. I used the same pieces of black poster board for the space scenes, with my monstrous spacestation suspended on wires that were tacked into the ceiling. Of course I was more interested in the visual elements rather than creating a script, so I had no real storyline to work with. I just wanted to make a sci-fi film and looking back on it, a little guidance might have helped me in the end.
I never finished this space opera. I shot about 30 minutes worth of footage and was kind of stumped as my best friend in grade school who was the main actor moved away to another state while we were making the film. Yet, the experience was rewarding and for the time, based on what I had to work with, incredibly innovative.
Once I got into film school, I drew on these experiences when I was 8 years old and tried to apply them to the films I would make as a student. While I never went back to creating a sci-fi epic, I explored narrative films more, worked extensively with actors and got a better understanding of how to make films overall. By watching other films and learning the techniques of other filmmakers, I realized how ambitious I was as a kid and what was technically possible at the time.
Most film schools aren't terribly interested in seeing elaborate sci-fi epics; they want to see if you can understand how a film is made, how you direct actors and how you write screenplays. Even if you've made films as a kid, you may not have a full understanding of how to make a film. Yet a film school education gives you a well-rounded encompassing view of how complicated it is, while being rewarding at the same time.
Not really having the ability to work with actors, I used my friends in my clunky and extremely crude science fiction epics in the era of Star Wars and "Star Trek". I even shot war footage off of a TV set to depict an intergalactic battle, as well as plastic army figures that I set on fire to show the horrors of war. When you're a kid and you're making your first films in your backyard, you find that you have to improvise.
Long before I attended film school, I wanted to make the equivalent of the big budget sci-fi epic, with practically no money at all. A toy model enthusiast, I used the discarded parts of model planes and ships that were lying around and constructed a big, hideous behemoth of a space ship and a space station. Then I needed to create the inside of a space ship, so I bought some pieces of huge black poster board, punched holes in them and taped them to the windows of my parents car. I made a spacesuit out of my mom's jogging suit and a bicycle helmet, set up some lights inside the car and voila! instant space ship. I used the same pieces of black poster board for the space scenes, with my monstrous spacestation suspended on wires that were tacked into the ceiling. Of course I was more interested in the visual elements rather than creating a script, so I had no real storyline to work with. I just wanted to make a sci-fi film and looking back on it, a little guidance might have helped me in the end.
I never finished this space opera. I shot about 30 minutes worth of footage and was kind of stumped as my best friend in grade school who was the main actor moved away to another state while we were making the film. Yet, the experience was rewarding and for the time, based on what I had to work with, incredibly innovative.
Once I got into film school, I drew on these experiences when I was 8 years old and tried to apply them to the films I would make as a student. While I never went back to creating a sci-fi epic, I explored narrative films more, worked extensively with actors and got a better understanding of how to make films overall. By watching other films and learning the techniques of other filmmakers, I realized how ambitious I was as a kid and what was technically possible at the time.
Most film schools aren't terribly interested in seeing elaborate sci-fi epics; they want to see if you can understand how a film is made, how you direct actors and how you write screenplays. Even if you've made films as a kid, you may not have a full understanding of how to make a film. Yet a film school education gives you a well-rounded encompassing view of how complicated it is, while being rewarding at the same time.
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