Camp Description:
Orson Welles once stated, “If you give me three days, I can show you the ABCs of film.” The New York Film Academy gives our students a bit more time—our programs run from four to eight weeks. Our goal is to give students the basic tools and practical hands-on experience needed for film-making. This lays a solid foundation for future work. The students themselves will apply what they have learned to whichever path they take.For many students, the time and tuition required to complete a four-year university program are impractical burdens. We believe that students provide the talent; we provide the instruction, equipment and structure. It is the students’ drive and creative ability which carries them forward.
We provide students with the opportunity to learn directing by doing just that— directing. Students are challenged to make creative decisions that in some way, great or small, contribute to the drama of their films. Everyone has a story to tell. We encourage students to explore the various ways of expressing an idea or a thought through moving images.
The New York Film Academy believes that the correct path for filmmakers is to immediately start making their own films in a hands-on intensive working environment. Towards this end, all students begin making their own films in the first week of all our workshops.
Students will use the Arriflex 16 S camera. The Academy maintains over 200 camera packages, the highest ratio of cameras to students of any film school in the world. Because of its simplicity and unmatched ruggedness, this camera has filmed action from Vietnam to the NFL, and has served as a non-sync camera for countless documentaries, music videos and low budget films. Our cameras have variable speed motors, which allows you to create images whose speed varies from ultra fast to very slow.
Award winning films have been produced out of the New York Film Academy workshops with this camera package. It has been proven time and again that filmmakers armed with our equipment can produce outstanding films. The Film Academy challenges the filmmaker to use the camera, lights, and lenses to best tell their stories.
Crews
While every student in the program writes and directs his or her own films, it is important that students realize that filmmaking is a collaborative art. Students form four-person crews and gain invaluable experience rotating in the principal production positions:
* Writer/Director/Editor/Producer
* Director of Photography
* Assistant Camera
* Gaffer/Grip
By getting behind the camera as a cinematographer, students train their eyes for composition and learn to respect the difficulties of setting up a shot. Similarly, by working as a gaffer and taking responsibility for the lights, they practice how light and shadow affect the film. Working in the various crew positions builds empathy and respect for the principal crew positions, and is essential for successful work as a director.
These crews function as working groups for each film exercise and the final film. Thus, each student will not only direct a series of projects, but will also work in crew positions on his or her colleagues’ films. Crews are required to meet each week with the directing instructor to review their scripts and shooting plans.
Assignments
The Film Academy faculty designed a series of film projects as building blocks for the final film project. They are intended to instill in each student a degree of confidence in visual storytelling and to provide a foundation in basic film craft.
