Zenith

Introduction

The Zenith Project, as the name might suggest, is the pinnacle of our experience at Freestyle.  While it’s not necessarily the biggest project we’ll ever do, it is the most polished, self-directed project. We plan out our project with a two-month timeline, design our own rubric, and hold ourselves to the deadlines we set.  In essence, we’re using all the skills we have learned over the past two years to create one final project that we can be proud of.

My Zenith Project is going to be a 15-30 page TV pilot script, with one ‘teaser’ scene from the episode being filmed to go along with the script.  When I joined film class, my biggest interest was in writing for film and TV, as that is when I feel like I’m able to best apply my creativity and skill set.  Once this project is over, I’ll have a fully-written screenplay, as well as a filmed scene from the episode.

This project is a new challenge for me because I’m planning on tackling a different kind of genre than usual: dark comedy.  My hope is that I’ll be able to strike a good balance to create the right tone. The biggest challenge about this project, though, is setting to be entirely self-directed.  I’ve never done something on this scale completely on my own before, so the thing of most importance to me is keeping up with the work I’ve given myself, and setting a proper schedule in order to do so.

For my Production Class, I will be incorporating all of the three parts of filmmaking: pre-production, production, and post-production.  I’ll use my experience in writing and story structure to write out the episode. For production, I will use my new skills in blocking, lighting, and sound to set the tone of the scene, and make it look professional and polished.  Finally, in post-production, I can use the skills I’ve learned in Premiere to stitch together the scene.

Process

Writing/Pre-Production

Pre-production was the part I worked on the most, and the part I agonized over the most.  It took a lot of time for me to settle on the right tone, thematic elements, character descriptions, etc.  Originally, I was inspired by Heathers, as an incisive dark comedy that contained many themes about the way American society treats its youth.  I quickly realized that trying to force myself to match the tone of a movie I enjoy is just not the way to approach a project that is my own creative work. It still took me a while to capture my unique “writer’s voice,” and it wasn’t until the end of the process that I was able to be satisfied with the story I had built.

The writing process: If you’re stuck, move on! Add the minor details later.

One of the biggest aspects of the early process for me was deciding what my deadlines would be, and scheduling out when they were due.  However, this calendar become more of a “work in progress,” as I set my first draft deadline for just two weeks into the project, a deadline I had to push back as the project went on.

While I did fall behind, the calendar was still an important marker for me to check how much progress I’d made and how much work I had still to do.

Production/Post-Production

The production part of this project was very quick compared to pre-production, because the scene I was shooting was simply a way of showing the story I had built visually, and not meant to be pitch perfect.  I recruited my family members and friends as actresses and crew in order to speed up the process, and used the skills I’ve acquired as a film student to make the shots professional and polished, and get the best performances out of my actresses.

My film gear, including lights, my tripod, mic and XLR cable, audio recorder, etc.

After the scene was shot, I edited it together in Premiere Pro, making sure to speed up the pace of the scene and use “L-cuts” and “J-cuts” to make it look like a real conversation and not just cutting back and forth from one person speaking to another.

My Premiere File

Final Product

Here is my final script:

HudsonJ_ZenithFinalDraft

Below is the final edited scene:

ARVE Error: Mode: lazyload not available (ARVE Pro not active?), switching to normal mode