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Auburn Morrow
Mrs. Lester
Advanced Grammar and Composition
20 March 2012
Senior Project Speech
Stuntwork accounts for over half of all film-related injuries, with an average of five
deaths for every two thousand injuries, and still, I decided to make a film. It was last year when
I was asked to be in a friend’s movie. I had asked why and she said, “Well you have no shame,
so I can make you do whatever.” She waited a moment to add on, “and you’re pretty.” And that
alone was good enough for me, so I agreed to help her. A few weeks later, filming began and I
was acting in a scene with another actor. We barely knew our lines, so half the time we were just
coming up with funny versions of what we were supposed to say, even if we weren’t supposed to
for example, I was mentioning something about a dead relative. I had added the line, “she was
ninety-eight, so it was about time.” Still, I remember the one thing that bothered me was the
camera’s lens. The dark lens was like the ugly face of God just staring at me, taunting me almost,
as I saw myself in its reflection. Between every take, I would always try to glance around and try
to see what I had done, which was followed by a very long critic about myself and how I could
improve the scene. My friend had joked I was like a back seat driver when it came to her
directing. Thus, when the senior project came along and I had to decide what to do, I always
thought back to what went on making that movie. I had a thought pop into my head, and I told
myself with a great false sense of confidence, “I could do that.” I decided to write, produce and
direct my own short film.
Before I could begin, I had to write a research paper that related to filmmaking. I would
like to explain my researcher paper topic. My research topic was about the film industry’s

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problem with piracy and illegal downloading. Piracy is a really big issue for the film industry, for
every time a person clicks that small download button, they lose well earned money. During my
research, I had even found a man who did not receive a cent for his independent short film
because everyone who wanted to view it, just illegally downloaded it. I chose this topic, noticing
how many people didn’t really care about illegal downloading. It was apparent no one cared
about it and even had no problem admitting to doing it. Piracy is a fear all film makers, I realize,
have to face. I understand how discouraging it would be working so hard on a film, having a
personal connection to it and then, people basically steal it. When a person creates something
from their own hands and mind, it becomes their child and no one wants their child bothered
with.
Now, I’m going to tell you about the process I followed in creating my product. What I
first had to do is find a facilitator, who turned out to be Mrs. Estapa, the video productions
teacher here at Creekview. I wanted to find someone who understood filmmaking better than I
did, someone who could tell me the right way to do things and when I’m doing something
wrong. I have had Mrs. Estapa’s class for two years and she said she would help anyone with a
video related project. She has been teaching Broadcast and Video productions for fifteen years
with an undergraduate degree from South Mississippi for Broadcast journalism. Last year, she
also acquired a PHD in education and leadership.
I started my project asking Mrs. Estapa for a specific template I needed to work with
when writing a script. Not to my surprise, there is a structured system screen writers use to create
their scripts. I downloaded one, but that was not the problem. Writing comes very natural to me,
I have never thought that was going to be a problem. What I had trouble with was sticking to a
story. In the beginning, I actually had the idea for a movie called “The Becoming of a Legend,”

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yet the script was becoming too long and too much to handle. I completed two more scripts, one
was too long again and the other became too big for an extremely low budget movie, before I
came up with “A Romance Between Platypi.”
A Romance Between Platypi is about two students, Penny and Parker, who share the
same seat in class and end up exchanging notes. They develop a relationship over time, but when
there is a class seating change, it threatens to destroy what they have created for themselves. So,
Penny comes up with the idea of making it a game, like scavenger hunt where they have to find
each other’s notes by the clues they give. For example, Penny’s first clue is, “To find my note,
you’ll have to find who’s holding it… I hold not only your note, but vast numbers of food, but
never eat it. I hear dozens of conversations a day, yet, I never join in, who am I?” This soon,
after a blunder, leads Parker to the lunchroom where the note is under a lunch table. After a
while, they decide to meet, however Penny secretly watches Parker receive one of the notes,
revealing who he is before she was supposed to know. She decides to look for him at school
when she hears another character, Bailey go on about a guy she likes, who Penny is lead to
believe is Parker. She’s mistaken as Bailey was referring to Parker’s best friend Townsen, who
was another character that helped when it came time to search for the notes. Penny decides to
end their relationship, but Parker will have nothing of it. He convinces her everything, all the
feelings they have for each other are real. She agrees to meet him in the classroom where all this
began. It ends with a lovely movie magic kind of kiss.
After I received approval from my facilitator, my next step was to cast all my characters:
Parker, Penny, Townsen, Bailey and the teacher. I had asked all my friends who didn’t have
anything after school to do, knowing when it came to I could get a good performance out of
them. The girls I had no trouble with, even the teacher, who was played by Mr. Clemens needed

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little convincing. It was the guys I had trouble with. I went through five different guys who
agreed and then bailed out before I found someone reliable to play Parker, my next door
neighbor and childhood friend. Townsen was also a problem. A good friend had agreed to play
him during the writing faze, but when it came time to film, he filled his plate with other after
school activities and had no time for me. I had to fire him. He thankfully understood that and
literally, a day before filming I cast someone else to play Townsen and he was perfect, like he
was born for the role. It was funny to me; he knew his lines better than any of my other actors
who had months to learn.
However, before I could start filming, I had to story board, which is something that
becomes a guide for you. It was there to tell me, where to set up my camera and what shots I was
going to make. The way a storyboard is set up is a picture of what the shot will look like, what
the audio is beside it and then what is happening is written under the picture. What really got to
me was all the writing, the dialogue and the actions had to be written in capital letters. I probably
had to go back and redo sentences over a dozen times because I forgot to do it in all capitals. In
the end, I do have to admit, as long as the process was, it was worth it. It honestly did help me set
up where to put the camera for filming. I didn’t feel like I was going in blind, especially with
eighty-three pages worth of a plan.
Next, after acquiring all my tools: the script and the story board, it was time for filming.
Mrs. Estapa could provide the camera because I could check one out from her class. However, to
do that I had to fill out an insurance form, meaning if I damage the camera or any equipment I
check out, I have to take responsibility and pay for it. Also, Mrs. Estapa does not provide tapes
for filming, so in the end I spent approximately twenty-seven dollars on tape. Going into filming,
I divided up the scenes by who was in them. I did not want people who had nothing to do but

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distract my actors to come. As the director, I had decided to be the bad guy because if I had let
my friends laugh and get off task, I would have never finished filming. Getting a performance
was not the problem with filming. Filming the next scene did not happen until I was satisfied,
even if I had to go behind the camera and show them. The tedious thing about filming is to get
everything available, all angles of the shots have to be filmed: from up close, from one
perspective to another, high above the actors and from far away. It’s why filming can not be
done in a day because for one scene, it will be filmed at least twenty times and that’s also with
the actors getting it right. The real problem was the locations that were set to film: inside
classrooms, the parking lot, the cafeteria, hallways, the library, a bathroom, Target and a park in
downtown canton. Filming in school was simple, being we did it after school and there wasn’t
anyone there to bother the production. Surprisingly, the janitors were very helpful, going out of
their way to clean around us and waiting to clean classrooms we were using. Near the end of
filming, I had my reservations when it came to filming at Target. I called the store, who directed
me to the manager and then to their main office. They denied my request for permission to film,
saying they have never seen anyone receive permission. So, I reviewed the scene and knew it
still had to be filmed outside of school. I rewrote the scene to be filmed at the covered bridge.
After that scene, filming was finished.
Now that filming had completed, I began the editing process. This meant, with all the
footage, I followed along with the script and the story board and created the movie. Of course, I
had to go through all the scenes, picking out what angles I liked the best and which performance
I thought turned out the best. The nice thing about editing, one shot, let’s say Parker had a really
great performance, but my Townsen could not get the scene right until the last shot. I could cut
the clips up and just pair them together. The process is long however, so it required I stay after

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school to edit and edit during my class with Mrs. Estapa. It was actually nice. I could get input
from Mrs. Estapa as soon as I needed it. For the film, I chose a lot of music from the 40s, 50s,
and 60s because I really thought it was such a sweet and innocent romantic film, I wanted the
music to match it. The music, I found, was profoundly powerful when backing up my lines I had
written and the actor’s performance. In the end, with the final edit, the film is thirty-seven
minutes long. It was longer than my estimation from my story board.
I learned, despite whom I am, I can actually be a serious person and demand respect. I
feel like I’m the kind of person who can be a leader of a group coming out of this. I’m a very
stressful person and can feel very run down and depressed working on projects and such. I did
find myself obfuscating a bit every now and then, but I could not help myself. However, I was
very surprised how organized I was. I had everything together in one binder and saved the script
in a dozen different places, in fear I would lose my flash drive, which I did.
My communication skills worked well in my favor after having to ask for permission every step
of the way with filming, including the call I had with Target. I could not imagine doing anything,
but becoming a writer and an author. However, I’m very happy I explored this type of writing
and learning what’s beyond that stage creatively. Still, through the entire process my favorite
part was writing the script. I did write four scripts in the end. I plan to apply to Kennesaw, North
Georgia and Agnes Scott College in hopes to earn my Bachelors degree in creative writing.
Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to come here, we do appreciate it.
Does anyone have any questions?