Senior Projects 2012 Dear Senior Project Panel Members: Thank you so much for taking your time to review our project and sit on our panel. We are excited to share our Senior Project with you. As you peruse our information, please enjoy our reflections and artifacts. We look forward to presenting to you and welcome any questions you have. Inside you will find: • • • • •
Cody Butler’s Reflection Taylor Hole’s Reflection Ethan Land’s Reflection Scarlet Rose’s Reflection Artifacts from the project (NO ARTIFACTS WERE SUBMITTED)
Sincerely, The Movie with a Meaning Team
Cody Butler Senior Project Reflection My time at CSA started with the first day of freshmen year, and ended with a senior project. A senior project that will leave a positive impact to our community and, provide us with a fun and educational experience. When we started this project we had a hard time coming up with an idea for our product. We all knew that we wanted to make a film but we needed to find something that we all have experienced in our lives. After long thought we decided we would do it on teen suicide for it’ss omething that has affected our school and it’s a big issue in our community. Our first idea was about the dangers of the internet, focusing on teenagers meeting strangers online and having face to face confrontation. We spent a few weeks trying to make a real life connection to it and make a script but we had a lot of trouble with the issue. So we took a short break and we all came together and thought of teen suicide because we the whole school had a connection to it. When we decided on the topic we came up with a story board and script quite fast. One of our greatest triumphs is that we decided to make film that was setup to be like a choose your path. With that ideal we began to find actors, but the actors we got dropped last minute so we used our selves for a lot of the characters but we had some actors stick with us. Most of our filming was shot at Millrace Park but we also used our school and a group member’s house. If there were one thing I could have know from the beginning it would be know our topic. My biggest takeaway and how this will affect me in the future is in time management we did a good job at it and in overall project managing because this will greatly help with my business or maritime career.
Taylor Hole Senior Project Reflection My senior project is titled “Movie With A Meaning”. The concept was to make a meaningful short movie that will help pre‐teens and teenagers know that they are not alone. The movie is about a lonely teenage boy who meets a “friend” online. The movie covers topics such as the dangers of meeting someone online, as well as dealing with depression and the struggles of being a teenager and growing up. The movie itself is a choose‐your‐path video. The viewers get to choose what they want the movie character to do next. Each option leads to a different outcome. This way, the viewer can watch it more
than once, and still get something new out of it each time. We chose this video out of personal experience. It was something close to our hearts. In the beginning of the year, our initial thoughts were a rough idea that we wanted to make a video that helped someone with an issue they could be going through. The idea was very rough and we didn’t have much planned. As time went on, we planned more details and shaped the project more into an actual concept. I am very pleased with how revolutionary this project was. I do believe it could have worked out a lot better, but there were many struggles along the way. Most of the struggles we faced had to do with time management, working around schedules, and weather issues. When you make a movie, there are a lot of people involved. There are those creating it and those who are acting in it. All of the creators and actors are teenagers in this case, and have very busy schedules. Most of us worked, and dealt with internships and other things in their personal lives. School work also got in the way. There were some times where we planned to do some filming, and ended up not being able to because it was raining or snowing outside. We would have ruined our equipment. However, I feel like this project was very successful. It helped us grow and learn our time management skills as well as creating bonds with community partners that know more about making a video. I am satisfied that it worked out as well as it did for the experience that we have. I do wish that I would have known how long this project was going to take, and how to better plan things to get them done on time. In the future, I will now be able to work with my community partner on tasks regarding creating movies or doing anything creative. I now feel like I will be more successful in the future. I would like to do something with filming as my future career. This experience will greatly help me in the future. It was also a very great creative experience. I had a lot to learn about the filming process, angles, lighting, sound, and new editing skills that I hadn’t learned in the past. Because of the time management issues in this project, I feel like I will be more successful at managing time in the future.
Ethan Land Senior Project Reflection I always wanted to be a filmmaker. I wanted to tell incredible stories about faraway places or even about the subtle things in life, the minute details that otherwise go unnoticed. That was the goal of our project‐ ‘A Movie with a Meaning’. We set out to educate the public on a dangerous‐ though usually overlooked‐ matter that faces the ‘Facebook Generation’; meeting in person with people that you know only online. Our movie is still far from ordinary; it brings the audience into the film, allowing them to determine the actions of the main character, thus influencing the outcome of the story.
Our story began when chronic loser Markus (played by myself) is contacted by Bobby (Cody Butler) or Bobbi (Maghen Banks) (depending on the choice of the audience). Markus then meets his new ‘friend’ in person and shenanigans ensue. The audience is faced with some tough questions regarding Markus’ future. The most important skill I learned from this project is time management. We set time based goals, but we did poorly when it came to enforcing them, which forced us to allocate extra time to get back on schedule. Otherwise we did reasonably well in managing transportation, filming days, and props. I can say with absolute certainty that I have a new respect for time management.
Scarlet Rose Senior Project t Reflection Our group’s project was called “Movie with a Meaning” and we created an innovative video to promote awareness of the dangers of meeting someone you don’t know online. Many young people do this without much and thought, but the truth is even though it doesn’t always turn out bad, it can turn into a dangerous situation. To make the video revolutionary, we designed it to be “choose your path” style, where a character is faced with a choice and the viewer can decide the next course of action, which can change the story entirely. Our project changed somewhat from the original idea. For awhile we wanted to have the video to have indirectly touch on depression too and how to get help for someone who may be suffering, but instead we had to cut back. I think it kept our main theme stronger though for doing this. Our initial actors in the video had to change simply because of trying to find people who had enough free time to be available when my group and I could be. As far as being pleased with how revolutionary the project was, I think it succeeded. I don’t really have a scale to compare it on though, because I don’t know the details of how other peoples projects turned out so it may be less revolutionary then others. However, as far as making a video goes, I think we took a risk with the “choose your path” style, it’s something you don’t see in videos and it helps the viewer participate in a more hands on way. The most successful part of the project in my opinion would be when we came up with the storyline of the video. It’s hard to get 5 people to agree on a plot, tone, and pretty much every aspect of the movie, but we all ended up having a storyline we all could feel good about. We collaborated the most on this and I’m glad we could accomplish this important task without anyone getting upset. While I am satisfied with our senior project, I do wish that we had completed it faster. It was difficult finding time to work on the project when I had to stay in school until 3:05 the first semester and work 30+ hours a week. I wish I would of known from the start that when choosing people to be in the video I really
needed to find people with more free time, and I wish I would of found a way to make more time for the project earlier in the year. When I started this project I thought it would relate to my future career goals of being a part of the film industry. This is no longer accurate as I don’t think I will be pursuing a career in film. I don’t know what I will do for a career. I suppose I accomplished my creative goals. It definitely helped accomplished my main goal of the moment, which is to graduate high school.
No Artifacts Submitted