H68.2035.901       4 Credits

After completing their MOS project, each student directs a short digital video documentary. The purpose of this project is to heighten and develop the students dramatic skills. This will be shot with one or two person crews, beginning over the Holiday Break, and continuing into the first few weeks of the Spring Semester. The documentary exercise is meant to teach the director to use the camera to capture life as it happens. Similar to improvisational acting, this is improvisational directing. Of course, as in all improvisations, there is important preparatory work: What is the truth of the scene or environment? How will I approach it as a visual storyteller? What stylistic approach is most appropriate for my subject? What beats will I search for, and how will I capture and even enhance them?

The third project in the first year is a short narrative adaptation shot on digital video. This will be the first time that you direct speaking actors. The adapted material is chosen to free the director from the burden of creating the outline of the story, from creating the characters. This, then, becomes a pure directing exercise.

Important questions to be addressed: What do I feel is the essential dynamic of the adapted story? How do I make that dynamic meaningful to me, and then to my audience? What tone do I seek for the film? How best achieve that tone?

The following issues will be addressed: casting, locations, set design, props, rehearsing with the actors, camera approach to the places and the faces, blocking, wardrobe, mise-en-scene, commanding a set, collaborating with a larger crew, editing for story, dialogue, character, tone, and movement.

Additional sections of the same course (H68.2035.902, .903, etc.) may be offered.