Highlights:

1) Storyboarding Workshop: This was cool. I've always loved the way good comics frame up a shot, and this workshop didn't disappoint. It was led by the amazing Leo Partible, and he talked about films that relied heavily on storyboarding. He shared examples from Sin City, with a beautifully composed scene every few frames. He suggested filmmakers watch silent film, such as The Passion of Joan of Arc, to see how they use images to tell a story, rather than alot of dialogue.

2) Sunscreen Student Short Film block: Woohoo! This was fun. There were alot more people in the theater than I expected for the screening. Even though they were the most busy people at the festival, both of the founders of Sunscreen, Tony Armer and Derek Minor, showed up to watch. Also, our film instructor, Professor Dave DeBorde from Southeastern was on hand, and plenty of friends. The Perfect Guy was the first film shown. Our team of Devon and Evan, and screenwriter Cassidy, were all on hand. We got a good applause. Next was Tripped, a funny setting with plenty of improv dialogue from Dave DeBorde. I liked The Heist, that my friend Evan worked on, and the second film from the fall course was The Chip. Actor Christoff Marse starred in it, and in the last two as well. Rolls was a short romantic comedy that I helped by working the slate and the camera dolly. And finally was a film my dad directed called Dark Night in Sunshine City. Although they had some crazy challenges I'll talk about another time, his film had the most complex storyline and many rich, colorful shots. (if anyone has links for the other films, email me)

After the films were screened all of the teams were called up for Q&A. I shared with the audience the lessons I learned on the film, and how we had to pull some 'movie magic' to get driving shots without a DL, and bedroom shots without a bedroom or even a bed. It was really exciting, and I look forward to submitting several films next year.

In the first photo below, I'm thinking about what I will say when the mic gets down to me, and my dad, in the Hawaiian shirt, is flanked by his producer, Dennis Barron, and cinematographer, Sam Der. In the second photo I'm grabbing a moment with director Dave DeBorde, who I worked with on the comedy pilot Spinners.

4) A Career in Film workshop: One of the last workshops of the event was by Phil Cooke, a ball of energy, experience, and wisdom. Phil led the audience through a plan to focus their careers for success in film. He talked about keeping your eye on your long term goal, branding yourself, building relationships with others, and much more. Some of his personal stories included 6 months filming a documentary up the Amazon, with no cell phones or email, falling out of a helicopter while shooting a concert aerial shot, and getting shot at and his crew arrested in Asia. Phil has written several books, screenplays, directed films, and does many speaking engagements across the country. He is a 'connector' of people, and a good guy to know.

5) Wrapping up: By Sunday evening I was full. I had seen and heard so much, and was ready for a night when I could get to sleep before midnight. Unfortunately, there were plenty of speakers, workshops, and films that I didn't get a chance to see because of conflicts. Here's a few I missed, but heard good things about: workshop and concert by Michael Tolcher, composer for One Tree Hill and Scrubs; a staged screenplay reading and musical performance for Lullaby, by writer/director/producer Kimberly Wetherell; screening of the winning "Best Feature Film" at Sunscreen, Prime of your Life, which looks terrific from the YouTube trailer. On the way out, I did get a chance to check out FilmRally's new production software tools, and snap a pic with one of my favorite local peeps, Paul Wilson. I worked with Paul on the set of Spinners, and you could not meet a nicer guy anywhere in town. Well, that's all from Sunscreen; till next year, "Roll film!".

All of the daily blog posts and photos from Sunscreen Film Festival 2010.

Labels: filmmaking, indie film, sunscreen