Hooray for TRF

So, how is this weekend treating you, SIT readers? I spent 7 hours of my Saturday in a hotel room and came home at 3 AM.

You're probably wondering why.

As I may have mentioned, I'm taking a production class this semester called Advanced Practice: Filmmaking (better known as "Senior Thesis"). My group is making a 20 minute fiction piece tentatively entitled "Stale Muffins," and it's set mostly in a motel.

However, we couldn't actually get a motel to shoot in, so we got permission to use parts of a Holiday Inn and reserved rooms for this weekend and next weekend so we can shoot. Due to the lack of time, we have to do as much as possible, so we tried to cram in a lot of stuff on the first day, although what we shot only amounts to about 3 minutes of screen time. That is the magic of film.

Of course, we spent a lot more time setting up lights and props than actually shooting. We learned that several very bright lights can make a hotel room very, very, very hot in a very short amount of time.

I'm the editor for this project, so I get to decide which shots make the cut. Of course, I got to experience the most fun part of editing when I went through and noticed some continuity issues and a couple shots that are going to have to be redone because the boom mic was in the frame.

We're shooting again on Sunday (which is...today now, I guess), and it's probably going to take even longer, especially since the scenes we're doing are in the lobby and we'll have to work around people coming in.

I should get some sleep now, because I probably won't get the chance again until Monday night. In the meantime, here's an exclusive sneak peek at a shot from Stale Muffins:

(Click for full size; It's hosted offsite because the MT image uploader isn't working)

That's the main character (played by the director of the film, incidentally) jumping on a bed.

The full movie, when completed sometime in May, will probably be posted on YouTube, so I'll keep you updated. It's going to be awesome.