ENG 276
Personal Essay Filmmaking
The College of Saint Rose
Megan Fulwiler and Kim Middleton
Summer Immersion: May 12-22, 2008
Monday-Thursday, 12:00-3:00
The Course
Welcome to the Personal Essay Filmmaking workshop! The word “essay” derives from the French verb essayer—which literally translates as an “attempt” or a “try.” Writers and filmmakers alike use this form as they attempt to create a new understanding about an important experience, question, or issue. Composing a personal essay film is a project of self-exploration that requires you to become a critical reader of your own experience in order to make meaning from it. (In looking back from your current vantage point, what have you learned? Why does this experience matter to you? What do you want others to learn from your own life?). There is no one “right” way to create a personal essay film, but we’ll explore–and experiment with–a variety of prompts and strategies designed to help you mine your personal territories. Your job as a writer and a filmmaker is to craft meaning and insight from the raw material of your lived experiences—and make them relevant to readers who don’t know you. In doing so, the filmmaker must always take the subject beyond the obvious and into new territory for both herself and her audience.
Course Objectives
• Identify important characteristics of personal essay films
• Critique the effects and strategies employed by filmmakers
• Choose and employ film techniques in your own film
• Practice aspects of the filmmaking process: brainstorming, drafting, revising, storyboarding, filming and editing
• Learn how to be thoughtful critical viewers of your own and others’ films
Course Activities
The goal of our workshop is to brainstorm, develop, assemble, and edit a personal essay film in two weeks. To this end, we will spend a lot of our time engaged in the processes below. The finished product should be a compelling personal essay film, of no more than 2 minutes.
• Viewing: Good writers and filmmakers study their genre. We will view a variety of personal essays in order to study the choices filmmakers make about content, tone, voice, structure, sound, visual effects, and voice-over narration.
• Writing: Writing will serve as the fundamental tool for constructing the narrative of our personal essay films. We’ll write to brainstorm, discover, develop, deepen, and reflect on the story we’re telling. Our writing will allow us to track what happens when language moves from page to screen.
• Blogging: A portion of our course is online. In addition to having a course blog as a central space for assignments and course information, each of you will create an individual blog as both an archive of your work and a “studio” space for brainstorming. There will be a total of 10 blog posts and 3 sets of comments on others’ blogs.
• Filming & Editing: We’ll learn to use digital video cameras, audio recorders, and the editing program MovieMaker. Each of these technologies will help to manifest the important scenes, ideas, and emotions in your personal essay film.
• Peer Workshops: An important aspect of any creative process is to get feedback on your work-in-progress. You’ll have the chance to work with your peers in small group workshops at various times during this course. It’s important that you are a thoughtful and considerate presence in these meetings, intent on helping each filmmaker develop his/her film to the best of his/her ability. In addition, you’ll also be required to comment on each other’s blogs.
• Mini-conferences. Throughout the next two weeks there will be multiple opportunities to discuss your work-in-progress with either Megan or Kim, and sometimes both of us.
Supplies
• Flash drive (suggested; great for transporting images, sound, etc.)
• 2 CDs (for recording your film)
• A notebook (for recording ideas, notes, etc.)
Assessment
We are interested in your daily engagement with all the course activities, the process with which you develop your personal essay film, and the quality of the finished product. As an “immersion” course, attendance in each and every class is required in order to pass the class.
Process and Participation (60%)
In-class=30%
Online= 30%
Product (40%)
Final film=40%
A Student was a stellar participant in both class discussions and the daily blogging. Posts were well written, insightful, and specific. Student demonstrated commitment to engaging with the subject of the course, and the process of self-discovery and representation. Student produced a film with the following characteristics: a compelling story that taught the viewer about a subject; incorporated personal experience with investigation; demonstrated conscious awareness of film techniques; successfully used a wide range of camera shots; incorporated sound, text, and image in interesting and meaningful ways.
B Student participated in both class discussions and on the blogs. Posts were insightful and specific. Student produced a film with the following characteristics: a clear story; incorporated personal experience with investigation; demonstrated awareness of film techniques; attempted a wide range of camera shots; and integrated sound, text, and images.
C Student was a lackluster participant in both class discussions and online blogging. Posts were slim, sloppy, or missing. Final film had a story, but did not explore it or examine it; did not try a range of film techniques; lacked evidence of experimentation with camera shots; neglected to attend to the relationships among sound, text, and image.
D Student seldom participated in class discussions or did not complete online blogging. Posts were slim, sloppy, or missing. Final film lacked a story and did not reflect any conscious use of film techniques. Film neglected to attend to the relationships among sound, text, and image.
F Student was absent, did not participate in either class discussions or online blogging. Student did not attempt to produce a final film.
