My Experience of the Saturday Shoot

I didn't feel very enthusiastic about shooting on Saturday because the weather was nice and I imagined we would be spending most of the time in the classroom or developing in the dark room. In the end it turned out to be a really fun experience and, especially because of the weather. The actor movements for our film were very heavy and I was afraid we wouldn't have enough time to get to our location, don our outfits, and teach everyone the steps. I think we got everything shot right on time. I liked that the other students were so helpful and listened to everything we said. We all ended up getting really relaxed and just having fun with the whole project. I loved the enthusiasm. It was much more worrisome to be shooting on film, knowing that we only had one shot. It really made me think about every aspect before shooting. In the digital world I usually just shoot and correct people after the take. It was amazing and relieving to see all our efforts culminate on that tiny strip of film in the dark room. So many things had to go right to get there. I appreciated watching that backwards, sped up, negative 23 second projection of our film more than anything I have ever shot on DV. The realness of that strip of film and the time it took to make it and project it truly made every second miraculous. I just kept saying, "we made this, all of this" over and over in my head. That magic is easily lost in our generatio--where pushing a button can give you everything you want.