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6.5 Ways To Start And Finish A Documentary Film Project

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For the past year, I have been working on an online documentary video series called Innovators of Vancouver that documents leaders of vision, passion and action throughout my hometown of Vancouver, WA. Each episode is 5-10 minutes and combines a filmed interview with B-roll of the Innovator doing the work that inspired me to choose their story for the project. I have finished six episodes, currently working on the seventh episode, and because of my work on this project, I often get asked by aspiring documentary filmmakers what they need to know to get started making their own documentary projects. Among everything that one could know about making documentary films, here are six and a half things that any aspiring documentary filmmaker needs to know about starting and finishing a documentary film project.

1) Know What Interests You

A lot of people don’t know where to start when it comes to making a documentary and it is important to start with what interests you. It could be something serious that you have personally struggled with such as depression or cancer. It could be the story of your grandparents coming to America. It could be a visual blog post about your addiction to gator meat or your love affair with coffee and doughnuts.

2) Start In Your Own Backyard

You don’t need to travel the world in search of experts or subject matter for your documentary film. What you are interested in and what you end up making a film about can be filmed in your own community, all it takes is finding the people that share the same affinities that you have. Start with your friends, family, boyfriend, girlfriend, spouse or kids. Ask them their thoughts on your subject, this is formally known as conducting a pre-interview. It helps you to develop a report with your subject off-camera, ensuring that you know exactly what they bring to your documentary film. It also helps you with step three.

3) Learn How To Ask Great Questions

Essential to great documentary film production is the ability to ask great questions that are open-ended and specific to your interviewee’s experience with your subject. By pre-interviewing people you learn about the depth of their experience, their passion or dispassion for your subject, and helps you to craft a series of questions that go beyond who, what, when, where, why and how. With that said, the best place to start is:

  • Who are you?
  • What do you do?
  • What are your feelings on [subject]?
  • When did you first experience [subject]?
  • Where can people learn more about [subject]?
  • Why does [subject] matter to you?
  • How can [subject] affect others?

These aren’t the best questions, but they are a starting point, but you will only get to the ending point if you…

4) Shut Up And Listen

Don’t be like newsanchors and pundits that interrupt to get their agenda and point across, shut up and listen to what the person is saying. Nod your head in agreement, emote with body language, empathize when necessary. If you think of something to ask as a follow-up, write it down and wait until they are done talking before asking the question. Learn how to make people feel comfortable by looking them in the eye and giving them 100% of your attention.

5) Adding Images And Video To Further Tell The Story

Now that your interview is recorded, find photos and film B-roll that will help visually tell the story. Childhood photos go well with stories from your grandparents. Film volunteers serving in the community, follow your subject as they go about their business during the day, and don’t forget to get multiple angles, wide-shots, close-ups and everything in between.

6) Edit Everything To Tell A Broader Story

Open your favorite video editor: Final Cut Pro X, Premiere Pro, iMovie, Windows Movie Maker and start watching the interviews. Clip what stands out, forget the rest. Start adding the B-roll on top of the interviews. Keep building without worrying about the length of the project. Once you have a strong beginning, middle and end, eliminate the fluff. Fine-tune the edits. Level your audio so that all of your interviews are at the same volume. Add some background music, but don’t break copyright laws: use royalty free music or find a local musician that will let you use their music in return for free advertising.

Now that you have a finished documentary film, here is the final tip:

6 1/2) Do it again

Don’t just check “Make Documentary Film” off your bucket list, do it again with a different subject. You’ll learn better ways to do specific techniques, your editing will tighten, you’ll learn what to shoot and what not to shoot, and you’ll become more comfortable reaching out to subject matter experts that bring depth and credibility to your finished film.

With that, get out there and start your next documentary film. Most importantly, finish it, upload it to YouTube or Vimeo, and share it in the comments of this post.

28 Brilliant Bloggers Talk About Creating Video Content

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Brilliant Bloggers is a weekly series here at BlogWorld where we look at the best posts from around the web all surrounding a specific topic. Every week, we’ll feature three of the most brilliant bloggers out there, along with a huge list of more resources where you can learn about the topic. You can see more Brilliant Blogger posts or learn how to submit your link for an upcoming edition here.

This Week’s Topic: Creating Video Content

You won’t see me dishing out advice about video blogging…mainly because I’m still a little to shy to do it very often. If you search hard enough, you’ll find a few videos where I get in front of the camera, but for the most part, I’m happiest behind the scenes. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t create video content. In fact, vlogs and other video content on your blog can actually spice things up enough to give you a good bump in traffic – and not to mention, if you’re good enough at it, there are also ways to monetize your video content.

So instead of someone who’s still a novice at creating video content trying to give you a bunch of tips, I decided to make this the topic of the week for Brilliant Bloggers. Check out what these much-smarter-than-me people have to say about creating video content:

Advice from Brilliant Bloggers:

The Best Tools for Creating Video Content by Brandon Yanofsky

This is a great post to check out if you’re brand new to video content and are unsure where to start. Brandon gives tips on finding the best cameras, lighting equipment, editing software, and more. If you explore his stie, you’ll also find some other posts about creating video content such as Why Should You Produce Video Content?. Brandon is on Twitter @byanofsky.

5 Common Misconceptions to Ignore for Video Content by Brent McCoy

Think you need to spend a lot of money on your videos? Or that they take to long to create? Think again. In this post, Brent covers these and some of the other common hangs-ups people have about making video. If you’ve been avoiding making videos, this is the post for you. After checking it out, you can follow Brent on Twitter @brentmccoynet.

How to Produce Video Interviews for Your Blog by Francisco Rosales

This is a really smart idea, especially for bloggers who can’t always make it to conferences and other industry events – and I love that Francisco gives a really simply step-by-step how-to (with pictures!), because I’m not the most technical person in the world. This post inspires me to get out there and do a few videos interviews – I really don’t have an excuse not to do them now! Follow Francisco on Twitter @socialmouths.

BONUS BRILLIANT BLOGGER: You should also check out the entire site Simple Vlogging Tips by Jendi (@jendisjournal) for an entire awesome site about creating video content!

Even More Brilliant Advice:

Did I miss your post or a post by someone you know about creating video content? Unintentional! Help me out by leaving a comment below with the link!

Next Week’s Topic: LinkedIn

I’d love to include a link to your post next week – and if you head to the Brilliant Bloggers Schedule, you can see even more upcoming posts. We all have something to learn from one another, so please don’t be shy! Head to the schedule today to learn how to submit your post so I won’t miss it.

Video: I Just Texted to Say I Love You

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We’re all a little social media and gadget obsessed aren’t we? Come on. Admit it! We’ve turned the words Facebooking and Tweeting into verbs. And yes, they’re both on dictionary.com. I checked. Facebooking (verb) – to communicate with (a person) or search for information about (a person) by using Facebook.

Break Media just uploaded a fantastic music video that I am fairly certain will go viral at some point today. It’s called “I Just Texted to Say I Love You”. It’s sung by American Idol contestant Elliott Yamin and stars actress Sarah Hyland from Modern Family and her boyfriend Matt Prokop from High School Musical 3.

It’s basically pointing out the fact that in today’s society, we’ll do anything to avoid face to face interacting. Have you ever seen a couple out on a date and they’re both on their phones? I’m always hoping they are so enamored with each other that they’re texting sweet nothings from across the table. Or possibly, they’re texting their friends about how lame the date is.

Anyway, enjoy the video. Here’s one of my favorite parts of the song:

Let’s get off line
And grab some food
I’ll yelp the nearest place that has the best reviews
This place sounds good
UrbanSpoon Agrees
And this Groupon gets us an appetizer for free

Top 10 Viral Videos For 2011 (January-June)

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By analyzing the charts at Marketing Charts I’ve come up with the Top Ten Viral Videos for 2011 (or at least the first half)!

From this perspective I can see a pretty clear division among the topics: cute kids vs. heart-pounding stunts. There aren’t really any “non-produced” videos in this grouping. No Charlie Bites or Double Rainbows! But we do have advertisements, informational topics, fun with the Royal Wedding, and all those stunts.

1. Evian – Roller Babies

I mean really, what’s not to love about this video? It has babies. And rollerskates. And cooing. All to the music of Rapper’s Delight, which gets everyone on their feet! It’s actually been around since October, 2010 but still continues to be a hit with viewers.

2. Volkswagen – The Force: Volkswagen Commercial

Volkswagen keeps generating hit after viral hit with their fun and catchy videos. This one features a pint-sized Darth Vader who uses the Force when he discovers the all-new 2012 Passat in the driveway. It originally aired during the February 2011 Super Bowl broadcast and is super cute. (Hmm, do I see a theme with young ‘ens leading the pack?)

3. T-Mobile – The T-Mobile Royal Wedding

With all the fanfare of the Royal Wedding, it’s no surprise that this one went viral. T-Mobile’s Royal Wedding Dance celebrates the marriage of William and Kate with the help of a host of royal look-alikes and music from East 17.

4. DC Shoes – Ken Block’s Gymkhana THREE, Part 2; Ultimate Playground; l’Autodrome, France

Like stunts? Race car driving? Insanity? Then this video is for you. Seriously, just the sound of this video got my heart racing, and it didn’t stop racing until well after the video finished!

5. DC Shoes – Ken Block Gymkhana Two, The Infomercial

Another one by the folks at DC Shoes Film. Actually this came prior to the one above! This one was produced specifically to market Ken Block’s first-ever Rally TeamWorks Collection. It includes stunts, surprises, explosions and … more stunts.

6. Danny MacAskill – Way Back Home

A lot longer than most of the videos (at almost 8 minutes), this video is more of a story as it follows Danny MacAskill on his journey from Edinburgh back to his hometown Dunvegan, in the Isle of Skye. Complete with incredible bike skills of course!

7. Skittles Touch – Cat

Okay. This one gets my vote for “viral because it’s weird”. And a little bit disturbing!!

8. Air New Zealand – Mile High Madness with Richard Simmons

What could be a better recipe for viral than throwing Richard Simmons (and a bunch of Jazzercise-style dancers) in a video that discusses flight safety?

9. Call of Duty – Modern Warfare Reveal Trailer

If normal stunts aren’t for you, why not throw in a bit of violence in the form of a video game? You even have to agree that you’re over the age of 18 to watch.

10. David Cornfield Melanoma Fund – Dear 16-Year-Old Me

And then there’s something with a powerful message. The video from DCMF is graphic, but real, with important details to everyone (but mostly to teens) regarding melanoma. Although it starts of fun and silly, the video quickly delves into the complications associated with skin cancer, and the increased risks of developing it with sun exposure and tanning.

You’ll notice that Friday, by Rebecca Black, is missing from the list. Why? Because it was taken down by Youtube for copyright issues. So, while it may have gone viral (and I talk about it here), it’s not here to stay.

Make Better Videos, Part 3: Remember The Passionate Beginning

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Ask any working filmmaker a simple question: “what movie would you make if you could, right now?” After a second or two, you will most likely hear an accurate and intricate description of the movie that plays in his or her mind. A glimmering glow slowly erupting from the depths of forgotten passion, showering you with excitement and energy, capturing a glimpse of the original desire to make movies. Somewhere along the way, filmmakers inevitably forget about their specific origin of filmmaking passion. They get caught up in the professional pursuits of their career and over time lose their excitement. Regardless, as long as filmmakers desire to learn, grow and make better videos, they must continually remember the passionate beginning of their movie-making career.

Taking Your Pulse: Where Are You At Today?
Filmmaking is demanding, time-consuming and expensive. Creatively speaking, it’s hard to keep the juices flowing day after day, year after year. The little experiments that once brought tremendous joy, gave way to minimized risk, lessened satisfaction, and a deep-seated desire to escape the burdens of professional filmmaking. This is a critical part of the unfortunate, yet necessary, journey of the artist (yes, filmmakers are artists). If you can make it through the severe times of drought and doubt, you will become a stronger and more devoted filmmaker.

So, where are you at on your journey? For myself, I have been making videos for about ten years and I am coming to a point where I need to empty myself of all that I have learned, so that I can reconnect with why I initially wanted to make videos: To tell stories that matter.

Over the years, I have grown in my technical abilities, but I daily struggle with maintaining my passion and excitement. The stories became less about subjects that mattered and more about making sure that bills were paid and obligations maintained. Not the greatest ingredients for filmmaking success. So, how do you rediscover your initial enthusiasm for filmmaking?

How Far Away Are You From When You Began?
The first step in connecting with your passionate beginning—–why you make videos—–is identifying where you are at. This will help you to identify and strip away all of the baggage that has piled upon your foundations of passion and desire, things like:

  • Comparing ourselves to other filmmakers.
  • Lusting after the latest and greatest equipment.
  • Arguing about editing software changes.
  • Wishing that we were better at our craft.

As you purge these distractions and de-motivators from your creative process, you will actually see that you are closer to your passion than you realize.

Recapturing The Creativity And Passion Of The Early Years
The next step in recapturing the passionate beginnings of your filmmaking career is to make the film you want to make. Here are a few things that you can do:

  • Make a one to five minute short film about whatever you want regardless of budget, equipment and talent. Break out your cell phone, your home video camera or your professional gear and experiment with new styles that you normally wouldn’t think to utilize. If you are a fan of structure, play with cinema verite or non-linear storytelling. If you don’t like structure, try to be as structured and specific as possible. Essentially do the exact opposite of what you would normally do.
  • Return to the “lab” and experiment with the tricks of the trade. Rent a super wide-angle lens, go handheld, try a dolly-zoom horror/suspense effect, play with focus and composition. There are unlimited tools at your disposal, have fun.
  • Feed your creative soul by reading, watching movies and connecting with others. Need some suggestions? Read Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud or Story by Robert McKee. Watch something funny like Monty Python and The Meaning of Life, a classic like Citizen Kane, something you normally wouldn’t watch like The English Patient or your favorite movie, mine is Time Bandits by Terry Gilliam. If all else fails, call up a friend and have coffee and listen to them talk about their job in cubicle world, that alone might just trigger an amazing surge of creativity and desire to make better films.

By letting the naïve filmmaker within emerge and run free, you might just make better videos that surprise even the internal critic. But in order to do that, you must never forget the passionate beginning to your movie-making career.

Skype Launches an iPad App, Then They Don’t

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iPad and Skype users were excited yesterday when an official Skype app for the iPad was released. Until now, users were having to rely on the iPhone Skype app which operated on a fraction of the screen.

Unfortunately, Skype prematurely released the app and had to pull it down. They tweeted yesterday, “To ensure your best Skype experience, we’ve temporarily removed Skype for iPad which went live prematurely today.”

Some initial tests reported that the app seemed to be working smoothly, but taking a minute or two to load all of your Skype contacts. If you own the original iPad, you obviously can’t participate in a Skype chat or call, but you can view them.

Here’s a video of Skype for iPad, where a user managed to grab a screen shot of the new app before Skype took their video down.

When will we see the Skype iPad app launched again? Not sure, but Skype did say, “We know you’ve been eagerly awaiting Skype for iPad and apologize for the inconvenience.”

We’ll keep an eye on this story and update you again when it is launched…for real.

Marines Head to YouTube for Ball Invitations

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My, my, my how times have changed. Would you ever have thought, let’s say 10 years ago, that a Marine could shoot a video inviting a major celebrity to an event and then get a yes?

Fast forward to the present, and one of the biggest trends on YouTube this week are the Marine Ball invitations that have been given out to stars like Justin Timberlake, Mila Kunis, Betty White and Miley Cyrus.

Sgt Scott Moore with 3rd Battalion 2nd Marines in Musa Qala, Afghanistan asked Mila Kunis to the Marine Corps Ball in Greenville, NC on November 18th. His video currently has over 3 million views. Mila said yes.

Marine Sgt. Ray Lewis asked Betty White to the Marine Corps Ball in Fort Worth, Texas Oct. 29. She politely declined, but Linda Hamilton, yes Terminator Linda Hamilton, turned the tables and said she’s no Betty White, but she would go to the ball with Lewis.

The latest invite was extended to Miley Cyrus from PFC Hart. No word yet if she has accepted.

Just for fun..If you could invite any celebrity to an event, who would it be? Hmmm, I wonder if Bradley Cooper has any plans this weekend?

YouTube’s Most Viewed Cat Video Doesn’t Contain Any Cats

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Cat videos – we all love them, we all watch them, there’s just some about those furry little felines on video that mesmerize the world.

As I was taking a look at some YouTube trends for the past month, I saw on the YouTube trends website that their most-viewed cat video for the past month, didn’t contain any actual cats. There was talk of cats. A lot of talk of cats actually. But no real life cats doing anything quirky or funny. What?!

Have you seen “Debbie” and her “eHarmony Video Bio”? Considering the video received 2 million views in one day, I am sure you have. For those of you who may not have any clue of what I’m talking about, here you go.

Debbie loves her cats!

Okay, so “Debbie” is actually a girl named Cara Hartmann who’s Facebook page describes herself as an entertainer. Her video is still averaging around 100,000 views a day and has over 11 million views at the time of this writing. There have also been numerous parody videos made, which you can see here.

So, let’s ask ourselves the question “Why was this video so popular?” A popular cat video with NO cats! The short answer. Because we were all trying to figure out if this girl was for real. After closer examination and the video becoming so popular, it was obvious this was a joke. And a darn good one at that.

Just for fun, if you put together an eHarmony video bio, what’s the one thing you would say you just loved?

Make Better Videos, Part 2: Keep Your Objectivity… Kill Your Darlings!

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Over the years as a working video professional, I have gotten a lot of sage advice from fellow filmmakers on how to make better videos: “Befriend the person in charge of craft services,” “never date the lead actress,” and my personal favorite, “don’t fall in love with a shot, scene, or line of dialogue unless you’re willing to kill your darlings and leave them on the cutting room floor.” While the first two pieces of advice technically have nothing to do with the final product, the third piece of advice is crucial in maintaining overall objectivity and remaining true to your story and the audience..

“Seeing Around The Edge Of The Frame” – Walter Murch

A lot of time, energy, ego and money goes into making videos and films. Pre-production and production generate an enormous amount of work for a lot of people. Emotions get involved, decisions are hastily made, and the story begins to unfold. Dailies are produced and sent to an editor, who begins to watch them, make notes and construct a rough edit based on the script.

Ideally, there is distance between the production process and the editor, primarily for the purpose of maintaining objectivity. This distance allows the editor to see the story within each shot, and not be clouded by things that happened on set.

In film editor Walter Murch’s book on film editing perspectives, “In The Blink Of An Eye,” he extols the need for an editor to see only what is on the screen. He writes, “The editor, on the other hand, should try to see only what’s on the screen, as the audience will. Only in this way can the images be freed from the context of their creation. By focusing on the screen, the editor will, hopefully, use the moments that should be used, even if they may have been shot under duress, and reject moments that should be rejected, even though they cost a terrible amount of money and pain.”

Murch is known for editing films such as “The English Patient,” “Apocalypse Now,” a re-edit of Orson Welles, “Touch of Evil,” among many other films. “In The Blink Of An Eye” and “Conversations” are two books that every budding and working filmmaker should have in their library as they are jam-packed with nuggets of truth that speak to this idea of storytelling objectivity.

How To Maintain Objectivity In A One-Person Crew

But what about the one-person crew making videos? How can objectivity be maintained when everything is known from start to finish? The answer? Practice!

As a filmmaker, I love making short 5-10 minute documentaries for the purpose of practicing my craft and meeting interesting people. Each video is an attempt to learn how to tell a better story, and in many ways is a lesson in maintaining objectivity. I have learned to let the story breathe and unfold in each stage of creation.

When I get the initial spark of an idea, I think of who the subject will be, the questions I would like to ask them, what kind of B-roll will serve the story, along with technical questions related to production. I may have some shots that I want to try, but I am willing to cut anything that will make the final video weak. From there, I shoot everything that I think that I’ll need. Typically, I shoot roughly 2 to 4 hours of raw video including interviews and B-roll, which I then edit down to the final length of 5-10 minutes.

During the editing process, while I edit to the story that I have constructed through pre-production and production, I also think about issues of pacing and clarity, as well as educational and entertainment value. If one section is dragging, it is often because something that I thought would work, isn’t. By removing a line of dialogue, or even trimming 1-2 seconds, pacing can be improved.

I then think about clarity. Is there a clear message throughout the video? Are the interview clips telling a clear and concise story? Should the B-roll be introduced sooner or later? How long do I hold on the shot of the interview subject talking?

Finally, I think about educational and entertainment value. Did I learn something by watching the final video? Was I entertained? Did other people finish the video with a feeling that they wanted more? Or was there general disappointment in the story told?

Objectivity Is About The Audience

A lot of questions to ask. The truth is that whether you are working in a large crew or by yourself, the final video does not exist in a vacuum. There is an audience that interacts and watches your video, hopefully sharing it with others.

Keeping your audience in mind is the final way to maintain a sense of objectivity. By treating them with respect and telling the story that needs to be told, you will be able to kill your darlings.

After all, you can still release your darlings that were cut on YouTube, or alternatively, as Deleted Scenes on a DVD release.

With that, get out there and practice. Happy filmmaking!

Make Better Videos, Part 1: Emulate Your Filmmaking Heroes

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In an effort to provide valuable information and to learn to make better videos, I am embarking on a series of posts that will unpack some concepts that I learned in college and need a bit of a refresher as I continue the daily journey of filmmaking. The first part of making better videos is an important reminder for all filmmakers, rookies to seasoned professionals: emulate your filmmaking heroes so that you can learn how to tell stories in new and exciting ways.

Emulate. A Dirty Word?
With an abundance of affordable technology in today’s modern digital world, anyone can make a movie. But like any artistic pursuit, each filmmaker strives for originality, to have their own voice and style that is devoid of influence. So, with this framing concept of originality, why is emulation so important to me?

First, to emulate simply means “to imitate in an effort to equal or surpass” (dictionary.com). It is the identification of a style or technique that you want to learn and then imitating what has worked in the past, building upon the accumulation of knowledge to do something of greater value.

Second, emulation helps you learn from the mistakes made by others, why they were mistakes, and how they can be used in different applications or contexts as solutions to new problems.

Finally, emulation goes back through the different periods of art, expressed magnificently during the Renaissance through the relationship of the apprentice and the master painter.

Apprentices started out doing menial tasks around a master painter’s shop, but would eventually start copying the drawings and paintings of the master. If considerable talent was shown, the master would promote the apprentice to work on background and minor details of original paintings, leaving the primary details and figures for himself. If the apprentice excelled at these details, then and only then, would the prospect of becoming a master painter and hiring apprentices be a reality. [1]

Identify Your Heroes and Their Style – How Do They Tell Stories?
As a lover of cinema, who are the master filmmakers that you aspire to be and are inspired by? Are you inspired by the timeless films of Steven Spielberg? The futuristic views of George Lucas and the Wachowski Brothers? How about the iconoclastic visions of Terry Gilliam or the comedic offerings of Kevin Smith? There are a million directors out there and identifying your heroes, why they are your heroes, and what you want to emulate is the first place to start.

From there, start looking at the different aspects of filmmaking and how your heroes use them to tell stories. Does a director favor one type of hero/villian relationship? Is the choice of dialogue wordy or sparse? Are there certain camera angles and shot compositions that are a trademark of the director? How is depth of field used to isolate or bring attention to details? How does the lighting change the tone of a particular scene? How is sound and music used in the context of storytelling? Is there music in every scene like Star Wars or is there room for the dialogue to speak for itself? How does the pacing and editing of a scene fit into the movie as a whole?

Using these questions as a starting point of analysis, start studying the work of other directors. Don’t just stop at gaining head knowledge of how a director works, take the time to grab your camera and try out different techniques. By emulating your filmmaking heroes, you will not only gain a deeper understanding of the filmmaking process, but in time you will make better videos, and shape your original voice.

A Shining Example of Emulation
I want to end with a story that has stuck with me for almost ten years. A friend of mine was mentoring a middle school student who had expressed interest in becoming a filmmaker. His desire and ambition led the young student to recreate scenes from Star Wars IV: A New Hope entirely with LEGOs.

Shot by shot, scene by scene, he used the same camera angles and composition, lighting, editing, music and sound effects. It was an impressive undertaking and to this day, I have no doubt that what he learned by recreating and emulating the vision of George Lucas has stuck with him through the years, especially as he continues pursuing a career in Hollywood.

With that, I encourage you to pick a scene from your favorite movie and do your very best at recreating it shot-by-shot. You might just be surprised at what you will learn about the art and craft of making better movies.

Happy filmmaking!

[1] The Renaissance Connection, http://www.renaissanceconnection.org/artistslife.html

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