From WXXI news this is connections I'm Rick Stephen.

Today on connections we're talking about short films because short films are having a moment.

Audiences are consuming more short form video than ever before.

And for student filmmakers, the short film is a space to take risks, experiment with new ideas, and share stories that might not otherwise be told.

Short films can capture a single emotion, a fleeting moment, or a bold new idea.

They also give us a glimpse into the next generation of storytellers.

Today, we'll talk with students from RIT School of Film and Animation about what it means to make films right now, how the medium is changing, and what they hope audiences take away from their work.

And on August 28th, you can see some of these films for yourself in the third installment of RIT shorts airing on Zee TV.

We'll talk more about this series a little later, but first, let's meet our guest for the hour in studio with me.

I have Christine Lynn Banna.

She's assistant professor in RIT School of Film and Animation.

I have Deanna Moorhead.

She is a master of Fine Arts student who's film A fish and a bird is part of this year's showcase.

And I have Vin Wynne.

I love saying, I'm going to say your name just because I'm letting you know that.

Okay, then when I'm calling you all the time.

Also, a master's of Fine Arts student film I Had To is premiering in RIT shorts.

And joining us on the phone is Colin O'Brien, who graduated this year with a bachelor's in film and animation.

His film Stuffy The Musical was featured in last year's showcase and the soundtrack is even available on Spotify.

And like always, we welcome you, our listeners, to join in on this conversation.

You can call 1844295 talk.

That's 1844295825 5 or 5 852639994, or email us at.

Connections at WXXI dawg or comment in our YouTube channel.

Thank you, everyone for joining me for this discussion.

It's going to be great.

It's going to be fun.

Welcome to WXXI connections.

And Colin, are you on the line?

Yes I am.

Thanks so much for having me.

Great, great.

So welcome, guys.

Colin, we'll start with you.

Let's start with can you tell us about your short film, Stuffy the Musical and how it came to life?

Tell us all about it.

Yeah.

It's definitely musical.

Was my, like, junior film.

We would call it, like, essentially.

And it was basically going into, like, the spring semester.

I knew I was going to make that, and I had, like, just a not good fall.

I just kind of sucked.

And I was like, I'm not going to do that again.

How can I make this fun?

And I was like, I just can't make something silly.

I want to make it with my friends and I want to like, do musical, because that sounds kind of crazy.

Yeah.

And it's it's terrible.

That's okay.

Because I'm just a little student, and so, like, I kind of just do all of those things.

And then with that, I kind of wrote the song and we like, thought about the idea.

And then, like, I had a bunch of friends that were on the project, like from the start that were really fun, like took a friend who was the lead.

I like who I had him, and so I kind of built the character around him.

And like, I was working a lot with my DP, Matt Schneider to kind of figure out story stuff.

And yeah, so it's just a great time.

It's great.

And tell us what stuffy the musical is about is about your pet, your stuffed animal.

What is it about?

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

It's about, Genie.

His character is, moving to college.

He's, like, about to start, and he's super excited.

But a stuffed animal has just gone missing, and, like, he just obviously you can't go to school without him.

And that's kind of where the conflict.

Right.

And then there's a lot of singing and dancing.

So how much of this is true, Colin?

Are you do you have a stuffed animal?

You can't go anywhere without?

I don't I don't have that.

I have to say, I do remember when I was a kid, my family, we went to the Adirondacks and there was a, like, ropes course out there, and I got a T-shirt from that place, and I swear, I wore every day of third and fourth and fifth grade, and I was like, it was an argument every morning.

I remember with my dad because he was like, please tell me you're not wearing that again.

I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no.

And I would have it like underneath a sweatshirt.

And it was just like it was like I got really good at sneaking around, I guess.

Yeah.

At least thinking t shirts.

Well, that's great for laundry day, right?

Just one.

Just one shirt of why?

That's what I was trying to do.

But no one really appreciated it, I guess.

And a lot of people might be surprised to hear a student film has, like a full musical score, like, how did how did you approach that?

Yeah.

Good question.

I, I just kind of what did I do?

I like I knew going into it that obviously that I wanted to do it.

And so I think a big thing that I knew, I just knew it was going to be hard.

I think we all knew that.

And so we tried really hard to do was just to prepare as much as humanly possible.

So there's actually like we did a bunch of, previews and like previews ization.

So there's a whole version of the film that, I just shot on its phone, and I'm actually just the lead actor, and I'm just singing and dancing around the house, preparing, a really good friend of ours turn, a bunch of them, we, like, shot the film in their house.

So they were super nice.

And we were able to actually just go over there a bunch, before the shoot.

And then we would just, like, show up at night and just kind of, like, miss around for, like, a couple hours and, like, play with stuff.

So then that way when we got to the shoot, we just knew exactly what we needed and we were able to kind of do it really quickly.

Yeah.

Nice.

And I know you, you graduated.

What are you currently doing?

Are you still filmmaking?

Yes, I am, thanks for asking.

I am, I'm doing a lot of, like freelance, sound design, and like, composing work.

I'm.

Which is really fun.

I actually just did a project with Christine Bana that's showing at the Fringe Festival.

Now I'm just that out, and that's, like, super exciting.

And.

Yeah, and I'm actually in the process of moving to Brooklyn.

Oh, nice.

So.

So how has this experience, that routine in doing right?

Shorts kind of, shaped your thinking about your career as a filmmaker?

I think the big thing that I was really fortunate about, and that I really appreciated at our it was just the amount of just, I guess the amount of work you have to do, which is maybe not the best way to say it, but I like going there.

I have a film degree, I don't have a music degree, but when I got there, I was like, oh, I actually, I like writing music.

And the rap program was super encouraging about being like, yeah, like, go do that thing like you love that thing.

You should go do that work as much as you can.

And I feel like, really like well prepared about that.

And like, I loved that I was able to just kind of do a lot outside of class, just working on projects with people.

And so that is by far the thing I'm like most grateful for.

I would say, yeah, thank you, Carlene.

And Christine.

From a professor perspective, what does a showcase like, right shorts mean for students?

We heard a little bit what Colin said.

And, you know, the the push to do whatever makes them happy and explore their passions.

What does that what does it mean for students?

This art shorts, experience.

Oh, gosh.

Well, I can like, extrapolate what it means for you all, but I they're such a great group of students.

Like I, I can't say that enough.

The level of collaboration that Colin mentioned and the level of professionalism, but also not losing the playfulness and losing the exploration and experimentation that they all do.

And I think this is such a great representation for our students, because it kind of shows a bit of everyone's work.

So both Deanna and Vin are some of our graduate students, Kenneth Reynolds, who isn't here right now.

His his capstone film, a senior film, Encyclopedia Galactica, will also be part of the shorts programing who Colin was the like wrote the musical composition for wow.

So a lot of us all work together, and I've been lucky enough to call myself every single one of those professors for different courses throughout their years at.

Right.

So, I think it's just an amazing opportunity.

And we're so thankful to WXXI side to, shine a light on the amazing work that our film and animation students are doing in both the undergraduate and graduate level.

Yeah.

And Colin, the theme was musical last year.

Did that push your your love for music?

Yeah.

Like that.

Yeah.

Like, I thought it was fun and like it was cool to see some of the other projects, that were like also musicals, like, kind of like All Together and one little like program that was, like, really fun and like.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, so what's the what's the theme this year?

Christine.

Oh, gosh.

I think it was an open theme, but I think we have a little bit of every single discipline in film and animation represented.

Yes.

And so I'm sure we will talk more about the specifics of the media, but we have 3D animation, we have live production, we have stop motion, we have experimental 2D, we have a little bit of everything that art school from an animation has to offer in this programing this this year.

Yeah.

And I know themes, you know, short films are so concise.

You have to so focused do themes kind of help the creative process the our event?

I mean I definitely think, yes, I think you're hitting the nail on the head with you've got to pick something tight and sort of I think one of the first things that you learn as a short film maker, as a student is, is scope and how to do that.

Oftentimes you learn it by doing it wrong, by not scoping appropriately, you get a little too big.

And I think, yeah, something that that kind of helps hone in and maybe it's like you make a playlist for your characters or and that's what you listen to before you sit down and work on it.

Or you have like reference media that you're pulling from.

There's different ways to scope yourself.

But I think sticking to some sort of, I don't know, like a mantra.

I don't know if you even had something that you like, went back to while you worked, but a lot of the time I would be like, okay, I wrote a new draft of this.

What did I even want to say in the first place?

And then does this say that?

And so I think that is an idea of of returning to a consistent theme to keep yourself tight because it has to stay short and still pack a punch.

Yeah.

And then how do you narrow down your ideas?

Take me through this, through your creative process.

Well, with experimental films, it's like, you know, you never really know what you're going to get.

So, like, you kind of start off and like, man, like, here's all these ideas I want to put in and then, you know, like, we in the class, it's really cool because you get to workshop it with everybody else and like, everyone comes up with all these ideas for you, like, oh, maybe you should do this instead, or like, maybe this works over here.

So like, it's a big collaborative, you know, even if it's like your film alone, like you're still working with other people.

It's a huge collaborative space.

And I think that's like a big part of why, you know, a lot of us love this because, you know, we're we're creating something, but we're also creating something together.

And, you know, like when you're feeling loss, like those, those like, workshops and critiques actually help a lot.

And they kind of like, help you, like, condense down ideas better.

You kind of like, start to see things that you never really saw.

So yeah, that's something I appreciate it a lot with, you know, in Christine's class and everybody else's because yeah, like like scope can be really huge at the beginning of like, man, I want to make this huge film.

And then everyone's like, let's condense it down just a little bit more and then, you know, you try to figure out how to do that.

And, you know, throughout the, the months and semester, you kind of land somewhere.

So, Christine, this, this camaraderie, you, you build with your, your, your classmate and, and others in the program.

Is that intentional?

Is that how you set up your curriculum?

Very much so.

Actually, I, I try to treat, how I run a critique space as not like the full authority in the classroom, as though, like, I mean, that is naturally where the professor kind of lands.

But I try to put myself on even footing, and I might steer students in a certain direction because of my experience and what I've seen before.

But ultimately it is their films that they are creating.

It's their art that they're making.

And so I really and and I know I'm not alone, my colleagues do this too, but I'm really passionate about creating a collaborative space where it's safe to throw out even bad ideas at each other and, fish through it all to get to somewhere better.

Like where the films, need to land.

Yeah.

And, Colin, I want to talk about bad idea.

So tell me about speaking of bad ideas, cause, you know.

Tell me about, creating stuff for the musical and how, take me through your process and how having, like, a team and and the collaborative efforts and camaraderie within the classroom help you, kind of compress or your, your film.

Yeah.

It was really helpful to have, like, Nash, like the DP and then and Karina, who's direction designer, were two people that I kind of was nothing ideas off of a lot.

And so it was really nice to just have that immediate feedback, and just being able to hear if there's a bad idea fact.

Because if you hear there's a bad idea for, then, you know, to try and find something else.

That was something that was super helpful.

Working with Kenneth Reynolds for his film Encyclopedia Galactica.

When I was doing the music for that, a lot of that film, we wanted to make the music just very alien, and very like space or just, like, not averse, which is really fun.

And I have a lot of time experimenting with that, a lot of fun.

But also, like, there were definitely some things that were amiss where I would just throw something that Kenneth would be like, oh, that's just not not pleasant to listen to.

Things like, oh, you're right, it's not.

It's just not any good.

And then we'll be able to move on.

We kind of just got over ourselves.

Yeah.

And would find something better.

And it like worked out great I think.

And that's part of it.

Taking that constructive criticism and and adjusting and creating great work.

Your film DNA, a film, a fish and a bird.

Yes.

Tell us about the story you wanted to tell and how you approached it visually.

Yeah, totally.

I think I liked hearing what Colin said, so it was good to have that to start with, because I think I approached it from a same place.

The previous film I had made, just like didn't hit for me.

I learned a lot making it, but it was like too much and I didn't give myself enough space to do it.

And I didn't know how to do what I wanted to do as I started it.

And so I also turned to a musical to like, have a little bit of fun, I think, and take myself a little less seriously while making something that actually ended up being more personal to me than my previous projects, which was kind of neat.

So to give, I guess a gist of it.

It's it's about a fish and a bird.

Shocking.

I'll hold for gasps here.

And they, they fall in love with each other through the sort of like obfuscating surface of Lake Ontario.

So there's a like I can't really see that swoopy creature up there.

But it's mysterious to me.

So I love it.

And then the bird looks down and sees this, like, sort of shimmering thing under the water.

And it's mysterious to me.

And so I love it.

And also, it's an opera, by the way.

And so they sing opera at and sort of with each other through the surface of the water.

But it also sort of comes out of this.

It's like an old African proverb that goes, A fish and a bird may fall in love, but where would they make their home?

And to me, that's a really, like, interesting thought, because I think you could choose to play it.

Like, how do they build that together or, or can they, can they not?

And that was the sort of question, that theme question that I kept coming back to is, am I writing something that feels like you could sum it up with just that little proverb like, is it is it snappy and shareable with people?

So that was what I kept sort of bringing myself back to, was that and I won't tell you how it ends, because I'd like for people to watch it and find out, but I think it's a fun ride.

Yeah.

And then you asked how I approached it visually.

I'm a 3D artist.

Most of what I do that I like to do the most is the rigging part, which I won't get too nitty gritty on this, but, basically part of the process of building, like, 3D assets is putting a skeleton inside of those characters, even though they don't really exist.

They need to be able to move, in order to be animated.

So I put like, bones and I throw a bunch of math and expressions on them, and I put controllers on it so that people can make them move and make it come to life.

And that's where I really like to do most of the work.

So I knew my output of this film needed to be like these two animal characters.

So I spent the whole first semester just like, like crushing out these realistic animals.

And then I wanted, I guess, in the vein of, of taking myself a little less seriously this year.

I wanted to, make sure that it was, like, funny and a little uncanny to watch.

So I landed on, like, the way that watching actually stop motion pieces makes me feel I wanted to do something that, like, felt like you could reach out and touch it had told me on a previous film like, like I want to eat your film, which was the highest compliment.

And I was like, I want that again.

You better want to eat these guys.

So I was looking for, like a tactility and and a realism, like, like you, they're falling in love and it's an opera and it's drama, but they also look like they'd be slinky.

Like it looks like you filmed it with a dead fish.

So that's sort of what I was going for, to just hit, like, what I was hoping was a funny but also poignant spot.

So it was it was a lot of experimenting, but also in a year to churn out something of that scale.

It's a little bit like, okay, make your plans and then like jump in and commit.

So so that was an early direction I had in the planning process the previous semester, and I like ran with it.

And that was how it turned out.

It stayed in a realist like lead, tactile, but still sort of animated space.

And then the animation is very soft motion inspired, but I don't work in stop motion.

So I did it in digital.

Wow.

Okay.

So I feel like that took a turn, but no, no, I so it's up and opera singing bird and fish.

Yeah.

You got it.

Yes that I have a love story love dynamic going on with skeletal parts but dirty but want to make you eat it.

Yeah, you've got those bullet points I feel like.

And they, they're singing in one of them sings in French and the other one sings in Italian like it's a ride.

You're.

Yeah.

It's rising.

It's amazing.

It's something I can't wait.

No.

I'm excited to see how it all came together.

Honestly, the.

And I know when your film is called, I had to tell us about it.

What inspired it?

A lot of things.

So when we were in class, kind of like brainstorming these ideas, I wasn't sure what I really wanted to do.

And I noticed, like, I have, like, I used to, like, journal a lot when I was, like, in middle school, and I was like, you know, let's go back and see what my, my middle school brain was, was saying.

And I was like, oh, man, this is like really like, you know, young and kind of naive.

So like, I wanted to take that poem and like, I took a poem out of my that journal and I just kind of rewrote it a little bit.

I kind of like, refined it in a more mature, kind of like sense.

And, you know, I brought to the class and, I started, like, experimenting around with like, oh, like, what could I connect with?

And, I started pulling in, footages of the Vietnam War because my family is rooted to that.

My parents are immigrants of the Vietnam War.

And, because of that, you know, they had to flee here and they had to they were refugees here and, you know, built a life and, you know, gave me and my brother a life to, to live.

And, and I wanted to really draw on that because, like, most of my kind of school journey has been trying to figure stuff out like that.

So I figured this was like the next best, like, evolution of it.

So I took that and I just kind of like melded the two mediums together.

And I was like, oh, wait, there's a bridge here.

Like, I'm this poems talking about, you know, the monotony of working and kind of just like living a day to day life the same.

And like, just kind of being, being numb to that.

And, I kind of bridged that idea to, you know, refugees and people having to like being affected by the, the diaspora of, you know, a war and what they have to deal with when, you know, they move to a different country and having to, like, settle and live like a entirely different life, like, what's that for them?

And, you know, that's something like, okay, that's thinking of that.

Like, how did that how does that meaning of the poem, you know, bridge with the meaning of them having to live a new life, go day to day, completely different and like, try to rebuild their life.

And, I felt in like a really sweet spot to that.

And, I just kind of like everything kind of ended up falling into place really well.

And I just, I got to a point where I was just iterating on top of my version.

So it was just refining and refining more and more of, like, what I had before.

And I just got to, like, a really good spot where I was like, yeah, I think, I think this is pretty, pretty good.

Yeah.

So.

So how do you feel about telling in both of you and Colin as well?

How do you feel about telling personal stories?

Okay, telling personal stories in this in this medium?

I know Colin has to leave soon.

So, Colin, can you answer that?

How do you feel, about telling your personal story?

I mean, it's it's scary.

I feel like it's the easiest thing to say.

It's definitely like, at the end of every semester at our AP one of the things we do that's really amazing is we show everyone's work at, like a screening event, essentially like our version of finals.

And so you get into a theater in, like on the campus, and you show your film to, like, anywhere from like 30 to like 300 people.

And it's like, I'm like, I don't know what hard drugs are like, but it has to be really similar.

Very, exciting, I guess.

It's like it's very heart pounding.

Yeah, but it's also like, great to kind of put yourself out there and then you go and like, everyone's very welcoming and very it's generally really positive and it's just like you get to connect with people on another level that's like unlike anything else.

Yeah.

And Indiana, I know.

Your, your story is, is very in depth.

Right.

It's based on an African proverb telling these stories on this medium and it getting personal.

And how does that how does that make you feel?

Yeah.

Colin's right scared I think is a great.

And moving on.

But, I don't know, I, I think that that's why you do it is is what Colin said.

And what he's getting at is, is that it's scary, but it's so like rewarding to have that moment where even one person who maybe doesn't already know you and doesn't know how it's personal to you say like, oh, this like resonated with me.

This made sense to me or or even like a oh, I thought this quote, this reminded me of this thing.

Some people who are like fishnets have come to ask me about the fish.

And I'm like, well, hey, like something grabbed you.

I think that's like kind of the dream when you make anything is that is that it's about like connection.

And there's something really nice about the idea of connection with a stranger or a connection with somebody who's like, listening to this programing who I don't even know exists, who might, like, find something in my story that I made over a year or just like, kind of because I wanted to, I don't know that that I don't know not to get too big about it, I guess, but that that's like the human existence.

But that's that's why people make stuff in any medium, whether it's film or the written word or music or anything like that.

I think is, is what if somebody what if one person like, needed to see or hear this and they did, isn't that cool?

Isn't it cool that I spent all that time on it and I feel for me, that's it.

That's why I'm so interested in seeing the ending.

Because I'm a hopeless romantic.

So me too, girl, for when you started talking, I said, oh, opposites attract.

Or, you know, I was doing the whole romance.

I was romanticizing the heck out of your film already.

Yeah.

So, I'm excited to see how you ended.

Ended that.

And for you, when you're getting very personal, and you're telling your family's story, how is this medium helping you do that?

And how are you feeling about that?

And, I mean, I'm going to echo what Diane and Colin said, like, it's a very scary thing because it's a very personal and like, you know, kind of deep inside in the not a lot of people get to see it, but, I, I feel like it's not like a sense of duty, but like it is because, like, I have the, the, the ability to do it and my parents don't.

And I like to, to do that, to share the stories that people that can't like, actually share and like they don't have the means to.

I think that's important because, you know, like, even though this war happened, like, you know, decades ago, like things like this are still happening and like, I may not look like the people that are things that are happening to them now, but like, it's the same story repeating over and over again.

So like, hopefully it's like, you know, they see my, my film or something akin to it and they just they can see that there's like a lesson almost there to like, okay, like this is still happening and it's still, you know, a thing that's affecting people.

And as, as we kind of live as, you know, go now in this, in this political climate.

Yeah.

Christine, when you watch your students work, what do you notice about the trends that you're seeing in their storytelling in their technique?

What makes you want to eat it?

Like, do you?

I think in the past, I think I said lick it or touch something.

Maybe not eat some of something.

This.

I'm making stuff up.

Oh, so you you're good.

I truly I mean, I think, to kind of just piggyback off of what everyone was saying, something that I know I've said in some of my courses, and I'm sure you guys have heard from me, is that authenticity is, like, palpable.

And if you keep your art at arm's distance, you're not going to or at arm's length.

You're not going to touch those people.

Like, as you're actually, like sharing the work that you're making or even maybe even feel as, like strongly about the work that you made.

So if we take those risks and we are truth telling in our work, it's palpable.

Like like folks who are educated in film and animation and, and just any or any just consumer or viewer will be able to tell that, some of the trends I've been seeing, with our students is like a hunger to express themselves.

I'd say you guys are great with words here.

Oh, we're out of food for we are.

Yeah.

Unintentional puns.

Yeah, yeah.

No, but truly, like a hunger to express themselves.

And our students are very detail oriented and sometimes especially, in, like, the course that then made his, film.

I had to in like, radical cinema.

Myself and, Professor John Knight, at Wrti, we teach this course that allows students to work outside of like, like the industry pipeline of of of short and feature films.

And when we start to like, interrogate what, what biases, what rules we have for ourselves as artists about the content we make, about the decisions we're making with our art, it really starts to make everything better.

And I think we can get to deeper, more impactful art quicker.

So that's something that I definitely try to instill in my students, especially in that course.

And we have, I believe one of your students made a comment on YouTube, but we'll, we'll talk, we'll, we'll touch on it when we get back.

I have you stay with us where WXXI connection is talking about short films.

I'm Evan Dawson coming up in our second hour after the overturning of Roe v Wade, States got a lot more power to decide abortion laws, and that has affected the flow of ObGyn candidates medical residencies where people want to practice and where they don't.

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Next, our.

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Mary Carey, ola.org and we're back with WXXI connections.

And today we're talking about short films.

And to help me with this discussion, I have in-studio guests.

I have Deanna Moorhead.

She's a masters of Fine Arts student with RIT.

I also have Vin Winn, also a master of Fine Arts student, and, Christine Banner, the assistant professor at RIT School of Film and Animation.

Now, I have a comment here on YouTube for from Brian.

And Brian said, I've acted in 25 plus RIT student films.

Other than that, students regularly writing outside scenes to be filmed in the middle of winter, so it's a fun time.

All right.

The sets are very professional.

What is your response to Brian's comment?

And he has some experience with you guys, obviously 25 plus student films and the besides the winter, he said, it's fun and professional.

How does that make you feel, Chrissy?

Oh, super proud.

I mean, a lot of our faculty and, really try to instill in our students a professional decorum even out like as, as soon as, like the end of their freshman year or early sophomore year.

We have courses that really teach our students how to interact with clients and how to interact with collaborators and talent.

And so we've been really lucky to be, collaborators with a lot of local talent in the greater Rochester area.

Yeah.

And continue to gloat about about RTE's, School of Film Animation.

What makes your, your program more, distinct from from other programs?

Oh, gosh.

I could go on all day about the, we are one of the very few programs that, has incorporated so many different disciplines on even footing.

So we have the School of Film and Animation that's split up into animation, live production, and motion picture sciences.

And so we're one of the few film programs in the country that has a Bachelor of Science that's actually embedded in a fine art program with our MPs students.

We also have under live production.

We then split up into crafts, like directing, like sound designed, like cinematography, and and other screenwriting.

With animation, we have different tracks of 3D digital, stop motion, experimental and 2D digital.

So but even though we're putting ourselves into all these categories, kind of, circling back to what was said by everyone, there's a lot of cross-pollination that's happening.

There's a lot of collaboration and a lot of students who wear multiple hats and want to try multiple different things.

And like Kenneth Reynolds, Encyclopedia Galactica, he's one of our, live production students.

But a core foundational medium of his capstone is stop motion.

So he's a student who went through our life production program, but also, took multiple animation courses and incorporated them into his final film.

So there's a lot underneath one umbrella there that you can, you can touch on.

You can, you know, dip your toe in anything there.

And for Diana and then what made you choose Arts Masters program in fine arts?

Well, do you want do you want this happens a lot.

Yeah.

I'll.

I'll jump in.

Yeah.

I mean, for me, I think it really was that, sort of ability to split off into specified disciplines for me, I think especially at the, the master's level.

So I guess for some context, I didn't do my undergrad degree in animation.

I got a visual art and computer science degree knowing that I wanted to do animation type work, but just sort of like came at it from a weird angle.

So I knew I was going to need in order to do the type of work making I wanted to do.

Eventually a program that would would tailor me towards, I guess, like the industry or prepare me for that.

And I think a lot of the programs and events you can speak to your experience, looking at programs was the same, but I felt like a lot of programs at the master's level were specifically offering things that didn't feel as industry focused.

They felt really, really independent, really, really like, I don't know, I make a joke, but like, like, like I'm going to make a film, like entirely with like my own blood and chicken feathers type like, which like, is awesome, but wasn't what I needed at the stage of my career that I was going into.

So I was looking at like pools of programs that were, I guess like Industry Focus or at least had the flexibility to let me work that way.

And it was definitely one of those.

And I had the computer science background.

I wanted to do like, tech type work.

And because of all of those other programs that are sort of alongside our our field of study that Christine mentioned, I had access to classes, or at least like people who could tell me what I wanted to know about doing those things.

So that was it for me.

Yeah, I'm a little bit kind of in a similar realm where, like, I wasn't sure because I wanted to do animation as a kid.

So I was like it kind of, it kind of like stemmed from that.

But I'm a I'm also a local.

So like this was like great, like, oh Arts right here, I live here.

So it's perfect.

It's like a ten minute drive for me.

But I, my undergrad was made mainly about just like I was in an English degree.

Creative writing.

So, like, I was kind of on this path already of, like, you know, crafting and creating my own story.

So I was like, what's the next best thing?

And like, I wanted to fuze that that love of, you know, anime and cartoons as a kid with my writing.

And I was like, oh, I got an animation program, a film, an animation program.

So let's try that out.

And then, you know, I'm that's why I'm here now.

But like, yeah, there's a lot of opportunities in the program itself where, you know, they, they push you to and they give you all of these like materials to be ready for, you know, an industry type level jobs.

And they kind of preparing mentally.

And it's it's just been a really good time at the program.

And I don't think yeah, I don't think any other program that I've looked at was kind of giving off that vibe.

So that's why I ended up just choosing a routine.

And something about creative writing would guide you into where you need to be.

Yeah, I took a creative writing course in like, oh, I want to write.

Yeah, I want to do it.

Yeah.

I found in right journalism.

It made me decide immediately, like, okay, this is stay on this path.

So something about creative ranges does it for me.

So what do you think is the biggest misconception about film school.

And either of you can answer, oh, I can't go first again.

I can't.

Christy, what are you thinking?

What do you think?

I feel there's a lot of different misconceptions.

Like, sometimes students think there's a very specific way to make moving image work.

Like, come in with, like, unconscious biases based on the type of content they consume or even or just like.

Right.

And I think they're it's one of the most time intensive, like, visual art mediums you can work in, no matter the discipline, whether it's any type of like production or animation, it is time intensive.

And just where that time, gets put into it slightly differs based on your discipline.

So but it is, to make a timed medium, it takes a lot of time.

And so I think there's a big misconception about the labor and what goes into making a film especially like you see something that's, oh, that's a three minute animation and you're like, three minutes doesn't seem like a very long amount of time, but three minutes could take a year to make.

Yeah.

And it is, it is, it is an extremely laborious process.

So, and going back to the theme of today's, broadcast, making a short is actually sometimes harder than making a long, a longer piece because everything has to be so tight.

Every second is precious.

But on the flip side, like you mentioned, I feel like you can you can be more free and you can experiment more and you can take chances.

So it's both more precious in some ways in the time that you have, but also in the labor.

It frees us up a tiny bit more.

Yeah.

And then what do you what do you, you guys think?

I feel like the biggest misconception.

I feel like the biases.

I feel like I want to challenge any freshman coming into the the film and challenging that where where there's a lot of biases of like, you know, and like animation styles and filmmaking styles.

I, I challenge them to keep that mentality by the end of their, their program.

Because the second year in here, there's so much like, you know, diversity and ways of thinking and it kind of shapes, district your, your work flow a lot more.

So like a lot of a lot of students, I mean, I came in with preconceptions already.

I was like, oh man, I'm going to do this.

But like, I ended up making, you know, a multiple experiment with mental films.

And I was like, I never thought I would make this.

So it it really the program challenge you, challenges you anyways to be as creative as possible.

So yeah, I feel like any misconception about film or animation, like you're going to lose that the second you go into this program, so I don't know if you want to.

Yeah, I do you, not you.

Yeah.

For me, I think, I mean hard agree with the things that the other two said.

I think to throw another thing on there.

Even among like filmmakers, I think there is an idea that especially again, when you're making things in short format, that it it's doesn't have to be a team effort.

There's a like I'm, I'm the filmmaker especially an animators even.

It's like like it's not a group project.

I do it because I can sit there by myself.

But we've already talked a little bit just, you know, in this conversation about how that it never happens that way.

And I think that films do happen that way, I guess, like, suffer for it.

And I think that even if you've hand touched absolutely everything, lots of other people, whether through conversations related to your project or otherwise, I think a lot of people who never, like, sat down with me about Fish Bird, but who sat down with me at other times in my career, who absolutely played a role in that project because of that.

Like, it takes a village, I think, to make something even in the short format and even if it's in animation.

So I think that's a misconception.

And that was great.

That was great.

Deanna, I have another comment on, from our YouTube.

Is from Regan.

And, Regan said what was an obstacle, a question for for the group.

What was an obstacle during pre-production, production, or post-production you encountered when you had to when when you had to either pivot or scrap something and start over?

Oh, do you want to do you have something on how or how do you decide how to pivot, what to scrap, what to change?

I think it was just rewriting the poem and also like I had to like record myself speaking those lines for my film.

And I was working very closely with those voice lines.

So like it was a whole semester of me just in my content.

So like that was the hardest part for me to just hear myself talk about this.

And it was like emotionally draining for a long time.

So I had to I had to bake in like, okay, you need to like, step away from this project for, you know, like a couple of days or, or something.

But luckily I was also I'm also a psycho and I made two films that semester, so I had another film to also work on too.

So I had like for like, yeah, it's I don't recommend doing that.

But like, I did have something to fall back on.

Yes.

I don't yeah, I, I don't recommend anyone doing two films in this year and it's okay to take a step back.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, regroup, recharge and and approach it from a different angle.

Any obstacles you had to, to face?

Yeah.

Any.

Well.

And what to pick from?

I think I was going to say obstacle number one, sitting across from Reagan all those hours in the.

Hey, Reagan.

Just kidding.

No.

And I think, I mean, for me, the biggest thing was, I mean, to take a moment to, to sort of glaze my composer, I worked with, Julian Stuart Burns, who's a master's student in the composition program at Eastman.

And we met just because I was reaching out to faculty at Eastman about who could help me with this, this big project undertaking.

I am a music enjoyer.

I'm not qualified enough to do the building of what I wanted to add to my piece, so I knew I needed like a partner.

And our collaboration process could be a whole, like our podcast on its own.

Like it was so awesome and so new to work that way.

But towards the end we had a live recording of the musicians, which was so, so cool.

I got to go sit in on the session and like, like stand up there with the conductor and be like, hi, you're working on my film.

Thank you so much.

Very cool.

But, the way that sort of like, animation is such a time heavy medium, I already had to be working sort of in real time on my animations to be building towards something that would be finish up.

All right.

And then really late in the second semester, I don't know if you remember what week this was, because I kind of blocked it out, but I got the The final Trauma right, a little bit, a little bit.

And I got the final recording back of my beautiful, beautiful, perfect like, scored soundtrack and the actual live recording of it all, and it was timed a little differently from the digital version that I had been working from.

Just because, like, that's how it works when you play live music.

But I had like something like, like, I don't know when I edited it down, something like, like 50s or something, which again, in the scale of filmmaking time is crazy, where it was longer than what I had been planning on and what I had been working towards.

And I Christine's making like a, like a somebody save me face because it really was I had to crash out.

I had to take a day to just like put it down and cry, like, truly.

And then you go, okay, well, I only have a couple weeks left of this.

Let's see what I can do.

Let me pick it back up.

So I picked it back up and found spots where I could repeat animation or where I was okay, cutting things or not, all animation is created equal.

So I was like, what can I do?

That's easy, but doesn't take away because I wanted this music to shine and I stand by that composition in that recording being like exactly what I wanted emotionally.

I just had that time barrier.

So, so for me, it was that pick it up, turn it around weekends.

Yeah.

Sometimes you got to put it down and cry for a day, and that is part of the process.

So those are hours.

You see it.

How do you deal with your students when they have these these mishaps.

And they do have to pivot and they do have to take it, take time, take a step back and cry and find find solutions.

How do you oh my goodness.

With that I mean I'm a big believer in like we all need because like while we're in like like the act of making an artwork like this is very emotional.

And sometimes we have to be in our feelings a little bit and, like, play them out.

Because if we squash them, that doesn't help the process.

And it's not healthy either.

So, yeah.

No, I, I actually really quite enjoy the problem solving aspect of, of working with students.

I've been really lucky to work with both of them, one on one in different capacities.

And I, I, I try to put myself in their shoes and put my own biases at the door of like, filmmaking and just try to see the project for what it is.

And usually there's not any one solution.

It's like, okay, if you want to do this path, these are the things to consider.

And that's how you're feeling right now.

But may I present to you this other way that we could think about it.

And so, I, I tried my best to put myself in their shoes while also help giving them, like, almost guardrails to help the project proceed and help them work forward in a healthy manner.

Yeah.

So not be intrusive, but just give them.

Yeah, yeah.

Just allow them to continue with their creative space but provide them some guidance and support.

Yes.

And I want to talk about TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, right where we're seeing all these short films.

What's the role of more traditional short films in the, in that ecosystem and do you think is hurt, hurting, the short film process or the value of short films and all the work you do?

It's a good question.

I my my knee jerk answer is, is to say no.

I don't think that any amount of like more people making more things could possibly be detrimental.

I think like like put your stuff out there.

I don't know, like, I don't know.

My mom tells stories about, like, she always really liked creative writing, but she did it in a notebook.

And she had, like, novels on novels of what basically is Nancy Drew fan fiction?

Sorry, mom.

But but it was, you know, and it was sitting there in notebooks and like, nobody got to read that until I dug them up and they were awesome.

So I like that, that if people were having these thoughts anyway, that they're, that they're getting somewhere and that you're like using whatever's going on in your brain to like put something back out there.

I kind of feel like that can't be bad.

But that's just my my knee jerk thoughts on it.

Yeah, I feel like art itself is just like an ever evolving medium.

So like no matter what, you're just going to have to adapt to like a new form.

So like short media form is is pretty big, obviously.

Like, you know, everybody likes to watch the ten second bites of something.

Yeah.

And you know, like our first semester or.

Yeah.

Or I think our first semester we made like a 30.

No, that's second semester.

It's all coming together.

Oh it's foggy.

You know, we had to do a 32nd film and like that's a shoot, a super short film.

So I mean, yeah, it's like, right in that kind of ballpark of like very short kind of animations.

And it's probably the best way now to kind of get your work out there and, and also get people's eyes on it.

More so like, you know, short form put out like a five second animation, you know, that's how you kind of like kind of get the ball rolling if you want it to.

And it's much more easily accessible to nowadays.

So I think a lot of people can just and I think if you make something that's five seconds long, you start to get a taste of what it would feel like to make that bigger thing, which I think just I mean it like, welcome.

I want to hold the door open for people who want to make films or really like anything, make stuff, make cool stuff.

And so I think you do start to get a taste of like, man, that was harder than I thought for just five seconds.

That took me all weekend.

Imagine what three minutes would take me, you know, and people become part of that world, which is cool.

Yeah.

And Cristine, do you see these platforms like TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, hurting the process or really helping develop and expand the value of short films?

You know, I totally agree with what Van Indiana said.

I really think that, like the egalitarian like, like, like process where we're like, there's no door or invitation.

We need to be in the room where films are being made.

And that's somewhat new.

In the past, like 4 or 5 decades, like pre 1960s, you had to be allowed on set to even have access to a film camera.

But as soon as, like, well, I teach history probably obviously.

But in the 1960s we had the Sony Porter pack that was released, and any consumer who could afford it could buy it.

And I kind of think of TikTok, YouTube, Instagram as similar.

Anyone with an internet connection and a cell phone with, with, with, with, with audio and video capabilities can be a filmmaker.

I think the only negative is the shift on our attention spans.

Yes.

But otherwise I think we all should be able to be authors and to and should have the opportunity to publish our work to fellow humans.

Yeah.

Do you do you have any negatives about short films?

I read a little article, and when some of the, some of the arguments against short films is that's too one dimensional, it's a challenge to tell a complete story.

In short, in such a short period of time, and the pressure to compress large ideas into a small format is real.

Is there any negatives at all when when creating short films for us, I guess I don't think that the words challenge or pressure are negative.

Like, I think that's good.

Oh, excuse me, Miss Moorhead.

I, so, No, I just I think that that is part of the package.

I think we would be remiss to completely replace longer form media with short for media, but I don't I think that like, again, I guess the more the merrier.

Like, if I double down on that argument.

Yeah, I don't know.

I think other than the attention span thing, only in that if people are watching short format content and getting used to it and going, oh, well, anything that's longer than, you know, like a minute and 30s I scroll past or turn my nose up at, then that's unfortunate.

Then again, we're losing people seeing cool stuff that people made.

But I think if you can kind of like keep your horizons open, I'm down to open my horizons all the way down to one second content I miss fine like, you know, I like short format.

Stuff is good too, but I, Yeah, I wouldn't want to, like, guess.

You know, condense everything down into one spot for, like, oh, we can't do short films.

Like, I think it's accessible.

And I think that's the point of art, you know, like you're you're supposed to share your thoughts and obviously you don't have a budget to do like a 3 hour or 2 hour movie if you do.

Cool.

But like for the most part, you know, you might have only enough time to do maybe a two minute film.

And if you can get your story out in two minutes, do it.

You know, like it's it's it's there for a reason.

I don't think anyone should just look at it negatively.

Like.

Yeah, like a challenge yourself.

Right?

Like that's the point of art.

You evolve as your as an artist and your skills grow, and the way you think grows and the way you tell a story grows.

So it's like, yeah, I don't think there's really any negative other than like, you know, we we could use a little bit of moderation on, on like five second clips on TikTok.

But yeah.

And I think, I think though like I would challenge you to watch something short format and like not find a second or third dimension to it.

I think, I think, I guess I think it's one dimensional, if that's what you made.

But you can certainly make a feature length film that's also kind of one dimensional.

So I don't think that that's about the format.

I think that's about the stuff that you made.

Oh.

Oh yeah, I definitely agree.

Yeah.

Crispy.

Are you are you looking for where do you see film and animation education headed over the next decade as a professor?

Oh gosh.

I think there's a big step into virtual production and VR films.

And some of our students and faculty have started to explore that quite a bit.

Yeah.

I think mixing media, and that kind of multidisciplinary collaboration is becoming bigger.

And, for myself, I work also in more experimental and, production design, world.

So like, like live media performance.

So, like working with video, that may be a little bit different every time you see it perform.

So there's almost like an ephemeral quality to it.

Like it's fleeting.

So I think pushing that and, like a return to analog is something I think we're all craving in this kind of new reality.

We're living with.

Like, is that made by a content creator?

Is that made by AI?

And, just the volume of content that's out there, which again, I don't think is a negative thing, but I think, the pendulum swings and, and we react to it in that way.

Yeah.

And quick, before we wrap up our, our a piece of advice you would give to a young filmmaker or the best piece of advice that you've gotten.

Oh, I like to tell people, make make your second best idea.

I think it's the closest sometimes a common piece of advice is like, like kill your babies in the world of film.

But but make your second favorite thing so that you can have fun with it and let it be a little bad, and then it'll turn out better than you think.

Like, set yourself free and then same person, you know, same ditto.

Take chances, take chances.

Yeah, I love that.

And Red shorts premieres on Sky TV on Thursday, August 28th at 8 p.m.. You'll see films by art students including our guest today, Diana Moorhead.

And then when, along with our filmmakers from RIT School of Film and Animation.

Thank you all for joining me for this discussion, for this short discussion on short films here on WXXI connections.

And.

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