Figured I'd share my experiences shooting HEAVEN, U.S.A
I'll keep updating as I go
Heaven, U.S.A, like many other short films, started as a conversation
I was talking to a member of our crew about religion and that's where the story developed
We always feel forced to defend out believes, whether we are being attacked or not.
We believe other people are ignorant, while they think that we are naive
It'd hard to just let people be happy with what they believe.
The Story developed and we decided "no more short films about idiotic killing suspense where every actor is the same age, same race, and same style" We made sure in the creation of the script that we combined different races, and ages.
The synopsis
Jamie, a young teenager, has to deal with her mentally disabled brother who has faith that going to church and praying to god will help their unemployed mom get her job back. Arriving to the conclusion that God wouldn't give her brother a dissability and make the mother lose the job and her father, Jamie believes that praying is stupid and therefore does not do anything.
That changes as she is forced to chase down a boy who has stolen a kite from a store she was going to apply for a job at. The boy has been trying to send a letter to Heaven to his mother, who passed away. Just like Jamie, the boy's father has told him to stop trying to contact her, that it was stupid, and would not bring her back.
CREW
3 man crew, which included me, Angel Ramirez, who was the production manager and script supervisor for the film, and Andy, who plays Jamie's brother Adam
Equipment + format + workflow
The short was filmed on a canon XH A1 shooting 60i at 1080i. Recently bought was a steadicam Merlin which played a big part in the film. For most of the production an Audio Technica shotgun mic was used with a rode boom pole. It was edited through FCP in a macbook pro connected to a big hd monitor.
The objective
Wanting to be a professional Director of Photography I wanted to have something to build my reel. Past work (high school television production class) was not going to cut it and I felt that I had grown a lot as far as experience.
I'll keep updating as I go
Heaven, U.S.A, like many other short films, started as a conversation
I was talking to a member of our crew about religion and that's where the story developed
We always feel forced to defend out believes, whether we are being attacked or not.
We believe other people are ignorant, while they think that we are naive
It'd hard to just let people be happy with what they believe.
The Story developed and we decided "no more short films about idiotic killing suspense where every actor is the same age, same race, and same style" We made sure in the creation of the script that we combined different races, and ages.
The synopsis
Jamie, a young teenager, has to deal with her mentally disabled brother who has faith that going to church and praying to god will help their unemployed mom get her job back. Arriving to the conclusion that God wouldn't give her brother a dissability and make the mother lose the job and her father, Jamie believes that praying is stupid and therefore does not do anything.
That changes as she is forced to chase down a boy who has stolen a kite from a store she was going to apply for a job at. The boy has been trying to send a letter to Heaven to his mother, who passed away. Just like Jamie, the boy's father has told him to stop trying to contact her, that it was stupid, and would not bring her back.
CREW
3 man crew, which included me, Angel Ramirez, who was the production manager and script supervisor for the film, and Andy, who plays Jamie's brother Adam
Equipment + format + workflow
The short was filmed on a canon XH A1 shooting 60i at 1080i. Recently bought was a steadicam Merlin which played a big part in the film. For most of the production an Audio Technica shotgun mic was used with a rode boom pole. It was edited through FCP in a macbook pro connected to a big hd monitor.
The objective
Wanting to be a professional Director of Photography I wanted to have something to build my reel. Past work (high school television production class) was not going to cut it and I felt that I had grown a lot as far as experience.
