I've always adored story telling. There are so many vast ways of expressing a story that you want to tell, from writing to visual arts. In both of these categories, there are, again, various forms of which to adopt; you can even combine the two. That's what really got me into wanting to create my own films.
I would describe my hobbies as seasonal, because I'll go through phases of a) music, b) role-play, c) design, and d) writing. I'll phase in and out of each period, enjoying every moment of it, gaining inspiration and motivation from each of them. a) I listen and play, the atmosphere of sound creating new visual stories in my mind; b) involving video games, seemingly being the least constructive of the four, yet, depending on the genre of the game, I can explore that virtual world, picking up inspiration as I go along. It's especially helped when user customisation features have been incorporated, such as creating the look of your avatar. The Fable series is great for this, going on various quests, and ultimately deciding your moral alignment, for example; c) drawing and painting characters that spring up that have minute meaning in all aspects of their visual aesthetic, and; d) actually putting pen to paper. From all those hobbies, I get the thrill to create my very own piece with the help of the inspiration that I've gained from them.
That's why film making is so great. You can pull all of these hobbies together, creating an explosion akin to The Big Bang, forming a new world of your own. While writing is the foundation of this, there are many more aspects that help to bring the concept to life. Capturing it, lighting it, casting it and acting it, re-telling it through the method of video editing. Of course, it's never good to settle yourself as a jack of all trades, master of none. Some may argue that this is better than a master of one, but then your finished work isn't going to be all that outstanding then, is it? That said, it is highly beneficial for you to have a good grasp on as much as possible, then you can properly communicate with the other masters about what you want but, again, you really ought to specialise somewhere, lest you be deemed a worthless attribute to a project.
Depending on the context used, it can be highly insulting, or an alright compliment. Now, it's different whenever are left with everything to do, so you can understand how insulted I was when I was informed of a certain blog post made a certain ex-team mate. So take a spot of advice from me: if you ever find yourself stuck with someone who drops all their duties on you, yet will happily hoard credit, milking the small things that they did, get the hell out. It drains both energy and motivation for something that you would normally love to do, and that is something that I would not wish on anybody. It leaves you feeling angry and worthless. It's good to be competent in as many aspects possible, but what you really want to do is to strive to better yourself in particular roles, thriving in them, and thus becoming something that others will seek out. Well. Hopefully.
The main purpose of our final year film is to exploit ourselves in the particular roles that we want to go forth with. I enjoy most aspects of the process of film making and, I think, especially in a student film, it's easy to allow yourself to become incredibly nervous over letting other people take over certain roles. There are only a certain amount of masters who will, no doubt, be in high demand. In the bigger picture of things, it'll be no problem because you're seeking these people out for your own freelance work.
I'm looking into the roles of writer and director because I create the idea with the former, then bring people together and communicate with them to make it happen. Normally, especially in independent productions, the producer will be the same person. They're more to do with organisation and financing considering they're the ones who actually fund the thing in the first place, so there's a lot of discussion with the director over what's actually possibly to achieve. So what I'm trying to say is that it's actually kind of pointless to have someone who is purely the producer. That's just my two pence anyway; it's an independent film, and a student one at that, so there actually isn't going to be a budget anyway. You're paying for anything specific to the work out of pocket. That said, sometimes it's good to have a co-person by your side in case the project becomes too precious to you. If you can keep yourself grounded and have developed a thicker shell, then that's just dandy.
I want to really elongate my writing skills. But with that, I'm going to need to do a lot of research. I've already posted some research prior to this particular post and I'm still reading into it. It's just a matter of taking these annotations from my now graffitied books to this blog. It's a fascinating process that leaves you wanting to find out more, further gearing your motivation to work.
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