Recently I was in a discussion with some film students in the hallway. The conversation revolved around a recent graduate from the undergraduate program who had sold a feature screenplay and was directing another feature that he’d written. The jist of what was said is that some people just see[...]
Archive for the ‘Filmmaking’ Category
November 24th, 2010 - 9:10 pm § in Filmmaking, News
5 LA Events To Help You Make Your Feature
I’ve been attending a lot of events in LA in preparation for putting together my first feature, which I’m developing with a UCLA screenwriter. These are five that I have found extremely helpful in understanding the process of making a feature film. The name of the game in independent fea[...]
November 13th, 2010 - 11:10 pm § in Filmmaking, My First Feature
My First Feature: Development
In August I co-wrote a short film with a screenwriter from UCLA which I also directed. It was an wonderful experience and I was sad when it was over. About two weeks after we finished shooting he gave me a call. He’d been interning at a film company here in LA that’s been buying up [...][...]
October 24th, 2010 - 12:24 pm § in Film School, Filmmaking
8 Tips for Directing Actors
A few things I’ve learned over the years on how to effectively direct actors: 1. Don’t Overtalk The cardinal sin of student directors is overtalking to the actors. Find a simple emotional backstory for the scene and explain it to them. The same with the characters’ objectives in th[...]
Student Film Archetypes: The Magical Stranger
I have seen a lot of student shorts in the last few years. After a while you begin to see recurring storylines, styles and characters. This is about one of those characters. The Magical Stranger narrative proceeds as follows: We are introduced to a protagonist (hopefully) with a problem; be it their[...]
October 10th, 2010 - 7:35 pm § in Film School, Filmmaking
A Student Film Manifesto: What Are Your Thoughts?
This comes from fellow TFT Directing classmate Ben Arfmann. http://jdcopp.blogspot.com/2007/01/francois-truffaut-certain-tendency.html I’ll keep this short guys, but read (hopefully re-read) Truffaut’s attack on the “tradition of quality” in French cinema. We’re in a [...]
100 New Directors – Where They’re From – Where They Studied – What They Shot On
I recently had the opportunity to purchase the beautiful book pictured above. From the introduction: We asked the artistic directors of ten prestigious film festivals to nominate ten of the best emerging film directors working today. The participants are: Cameron Bailey and Piers Handling, Toronto I[...]
Life After Film School: Aleem Hossain
I saw Aleem Hossain’s Pinkerton in one of my first writing classes at UCLA. It remains one of my favorite short films, a genre-bending joyride. I sat down this week to talk with Aleem via Skype about the making of the film and life after completing his MFA at UCLA. Jason Kohl: Tell me about [...][...]
How Not To Make A Short Film by Roberta Munroe
Buy it on Amazon. The Sundance shorts program began as a box of VHS tapes in 1989. In 2010 there were more than 6,000 short films submitted. For her five years as a shorts programmer Roberta Munroe was responsible for wading through them, deciding which ones would make it to Sundance. I recently att[...]
Sundance Shortslab Part 1: Development
On the last weekend in July the Sundance Institute hosted its first annual Shortslab, a day dedicated entirely to short filmmaking. I was lucky enough (for $150) to attend, and it was an amazing experience. This is the first part of a five-part section on the labs. Part 1: Development Miguel Arteta,[...]