Assignment 1 - 'Summertime'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhI2iJ2AdNA

Commentary --

My intentions with this project was chiefly to both convey a narrative that has a beginning and an end in a cohesive, fun, and interesting way, in addition to putting on screen a personal and honest experience of mine. The film structure was interesting because, from the story I wanted to tell and its perspective, I was pleased with the more ‘photographic’ elements of my project, as it made the use of silhouettes and shadows that much more menacing and intriguing. In my opinion, this intrigue stems from the fact that there

isn’t a short second or brief moment you see what’s supposed to ‘scare’ an audience seen commonly in television and film, but you get to see a more real and intimate perspective of it in the project. This is also the reason behind the use of solely first- person stills, as it further puts the audience into the mind of the main protagonist, in this case, me. Additionally, I wanted to exaggerate the fact that this narrative is personal and authentic by using ad lib techniques to convey the story, as my scriptwriting process was primarily writing down bullet points as a guide for myself and I simply told my recount of the story in a unique way.

My response to the final product is pretty swell, I would’ve liked to have more time and more minutes for me to tell my story as I feel as if it would’ve been far better to get into my mindset more in each of the specific situations I was in that evening. Giving more context would’ve made the experience more relatable which leads to the narrative being more believable, ultimately gelling together to create a more refined cinematic experience. I would’ve also liked more time to add specific sound effects correlating to the events pertaining on screen, as I feel that would’ve added another element of immersion. Furthermore, having active sound effects would’ve made the experience far more relative and thus easier and more passive to watch as viewing still images on screen is quite ordinary for the average person to see so adding a constant element would limit that effect a fraction.

I also wanted to make this experience as authentic as possible in the short period of time we had to complete this task by scavenging my old iPhone, from 2016, the year this occurred, in addition to the door basketball hoop in the hallway. This element was placed as my young brother had an obsession with ‘dunking’ during that period and thus he would leave his miniature hoop lying around on a different door every night and it is vivid in my memory that the hoop was present on the hallway door that evening so, I went looking through some old boxes and made sure it was there for filming.