It's not often that I get the chance to feature other film makers who are just starting out and are going through the motions about how to approach their own career in film. I got to know Alex through my blog and YouTube channel, and since then I've enjoyed our numerous discussions about film. He's made me consider a lot of my own choices with some of his questions about film school, and it's been a lot of fun to hear about what he might like to do and how he might want to get there.
I look forward to seeing how Alex continues to grow as a film maker and am happy to have made another lasting connection via the web - always expanding that network! So, without further delay, here's Alex to share a bit about himself.
To start I'd
like to thank Luke for letting me voice myself on his blog!
My name is Alex Chandler, and I'm an aspiring film maker from Washington State. Currently I'm
looking into film schools that will help achieve my goal in this career. But at
the same time I'm making lots of short films
and learning film techniques wherever I can find them.
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| Alex (left) with friend, Ethan. |
One of the bigger projects I've been
working on with my team, Filming Humor, is a series of short films. The first
one, The Spies; Layer of the Devil
was released Christmas day 2010. The other two our going through the
process.
With the first video, we learned a
lot about story telling, weaving a story together, and realized a lot of our
difficulties on location. From this we were able to create "The Directors
On Scene Checklist."
This checklist came in very handy
during the filming of the sequel, The
Spies; James and the Vampire. Because the two directors, myself included, were
on location working together and knew the checklist fairly well, helping the
footage turn out great.
Another key bonus put off by using
the checklist, was that we were able to run through the script in a much more
timely manner. The only reason we were rushed at the end of the day, was due to
the battery dying...unfortunately a spare battery is another couple weeks from
being owned...just bought it on EBay.
The point here is that with each
experience there is a lot of hands on learning that goes on. I mean it's a lot
of trial and error, but with a lot of my friends in drama, and myself taking
classes related to film in general, we are able to figure things out a lot
faster.
One thing that has happened
dramatically fast between the last few short films we've made, is improvement
to the plot. My friend Mariah is a writer, she has been helping develop the
story and plot lately. And because of her insight we have reordered scenes out
of chronological order, and grown depth to characters.
Really a strong team helps you grow,
which is one thing to look for in colleges. You really want a hands on
experience, and once you get out of the college you will want to know a lot of
different people, with different sets of expertise. Where as I personally am an
editor, I might need to meet up with all sorts of other specialists.
Looking for a college to go to will
be quite a difficult task for anyone, and there are tons of options. Luckily
for me I have Luke to ask for advice from, and his numerous life experiences.
The first thing I've discovered that
I need to do, is decide what I want. In general you will like one part of film
making. I enjoy editing the most, but of course everything else is fun too. But
the key to choosing what, where and, everything else is really a personal
preference.
From my point of view there are
multiple options. You can freelance video edit and film, similar to what Luke
does with Stream Media. You could also work for a company, and have a steady
income; as in the case of Luke, he has Weddingstar. And then the one option I
find the most tasteful, is that of a cinematic nature, more of a Hollywood sort
of thing.
Personally I couldn't say what I'm
planning to do yet, but it will take a lot of time and thought to fully decide.
Thanks for
Reading,
Looking back at my early work like this I'm amazed that despite my limitations with equipment and primitive digital editing software, I really did push myself to attempt some ambitious concepts. In the end it didn't seem to matter that things weren't perfect, as I learned a lot from the process and was able to explore ideas just for the sake of saying I'd done something with them. When you're just starting out, not only trial and error, but trial and error with animation, goes a long way in showing you just what's required to create a scene.
