Chewstick seeks short films for new festival
Gone are the days when you need expensive equipment and a $1 million budget to make a film. These days it can be as simple as pulling out a cell phone or an iBook.That’s why the Chewstick Foundation is calling for entries for ‘The Bakatown Short Film Festival’, Bermuda’s first short film festival to be held this month. By short film, they mean an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all credits.“The Chewstick Foundation has always been involved in empowering storytellers, artists and social justice, and in that vein has always been associated with various forms of entertainment and public dialogue,” said Chewstick Executive Director Gavin Smith. “However, there is one medium that has seldom gotten the support it deserves, both generally and through the work of the foundation. That medium is film.”He said it is a hard industry to fully support on a local level because it takes a lot of time and money to make a film and generally there aren’t many people involved to take it to a high level. Making movies has become cheaper and easier than ever, and locally film-making has seen a renaissance of sorts with anyone with a Flip (phone) and an iBook making music videos and getting thousands of views on websites like YouTube or Vimeo. The short-form film is making a run for creating a local film industry, showing all manner of local culture and lifestyle and telling a truly unique story that is increasingly essential to fortifying national identity and pride.”Chewstick has teamed up with international short film festival organisation ‘Future Shorts’ as well as the Economic Empowerment Zones Agency (EEZA) and Digicel Bermuda, to create ‘The Bakatown Short Film Festival’.The deadline for submissions is January 18 at 5pm. The festival is planned for January 26 to 28. Short films must have a running time of no more than 40 minutes, including all credits, and can be submitted on DVD, CD, USB or web link. If accepted into the festival a DVD copy must be provided. For full submission guidelines see Chewstick’s website at www.chewstick.org.
Here are give tips for making a short film with your cell phone.
1. Plan out your movie carefully before you start filming. You can use storyboards to create a mock up of what you want to do.2.Pan shots tightly and avoid moving the camera quickly during filming as this can cause a blurry effect with many cell phones.3.Think about the colours of what you are filming. Bold, bright colours will stand out better on a small screen.4. Don’t edit on your phone. Move your footage to the computer and edit using digital editing software. For information about online editing software see http://www.desktop-video-guide.com/top-5-free-video-editing-software-review.html .5. Don’t forget to edit the sound as well.
