#48hfp

My pitch to anyone who hasn't done a 48 yet goes like this:

You get to make a film with your friends. And there's no client.

Full stop. End of pitch.

I'm not joking.

It's a fully truthful statement, by the way. For our team, for sure. Other teams it isn't exactly the same. They're not making films with their friends, they're making films with friends they just made.

It's a feature of filmmaking that each of us can slip into a new team without much fuss.

Why?

Because we're tuned into our roles, our expertise, that thing we do.

And regardless of team, no matter the film, there's always a specific thing that needs to be done whether that's getting a story on its feet, figuring out a shot on location, feeling out the role as an actor, editing the footage as it comes in. We slip into our Zone and off to the races we go.

Even with the 48-hour deadline, maybe because of that 48-hour deadline, foxhole friendships are conjured very easily because we're literally all in this together, trying to figure things out, coordinating, cooperating, investing our ideas and our efforts. It's a thoroughly engaging experience in every direction.

Of course there are a lot of different roles to step into including roles for anyone with zero experience in filmmaking.

Zero.

There is a place for you.

By the way it's still making a film with your friends even if you're just making those friends.

And yeah.

There's no client.

For our first 48 Hour Film Project in 2021 and our Sci Fi film, "Cleaners", I was 100% into preparing. I read the script over and over before going to bed Friday night. I read it soon as I got up Saturday morning. After a shower and getting dressed, I made myself comfortable in front of our living room windows, read through the script with pen in hand and made editorial notes. Read the script again and made notes regarding music. Read the script again and made notes about sound design.

After that, I gathered as many sound effects as I could before the morning's footage showed up at my door. I grabbed loops and sound I thought could be useful. Visual effects. Templates. A bag of things I could grab off the shelf should the need arise that calls for such specific solutions.

Since then, 2022 + the October horror film that Fall, 2023, and 2024, my process was the same... ish. Reading a bunch, making notes, and doing everything I can to be ready for the edit Saturday afternoon. Sort of making sure I have everything I need as well as a plan.

And this time?

I simplified.

Why?

Because this time around, the writers quickly committed to a genre the producer and director swore never to indulge again. There were two genre choices available and, given locations to which our production was already committed, the second genre simply failed to inspire. But horror? Yes. Absolutely. And so the question became How can we do this in a way that's ours? Instead of trying to embrace a genre, what would this horror movie be if we'd deliberately chosen to do one ourselves in the first place? What would inspire us to reach for this genre were we not involved in a competition compelling us to do so?

Hmmmmm.

Interestingly, I already decided that I wanted something I'd not done before. I wanted a different process for editing a film in 48 hours.

Why?

Because I don't like ruts. Don't get me wrong, ruts, rails, established protocol are great for speed. But they're confining to the thought process which is the point. Don't think... do. And so I changed my process for doing so as to tip the scales toward a different outcome than I'd otherwise conceive. Maybe not better. Maybe not worse. Just guaranteed to be different.

By the way... now that we finished it, yes.

It's totally better. 😁😁😁

And we're not regretting the horror like before.

The horror, in fact, makes our story even better.

This time around, I didn't prep my post-production process. I made no notes. I didn't relentlessly read the script. I gathered no effects, assets, or knowledge. I didn't even set up the project in which I edited. Nor did I establish folders for all the incoming content and outgoing scenes. Instead, the prep I did was more in the lane of preparing me, preparing my brain. Mental exercises. Thinking through editorial decisions I made before, whether they hold up, what I'd do differently and why. The prep I embraced was geared to shaping how I think.

Shaping how I think?

Yup.

Like (even though this was not my call), participating in the writers room Friday night to help conjure our story. Like reading the script twice first thing Saturday morning and then doing yard work... allowing the words to do I don't know what in the background. I even organized my project folders differently, naming each folder after the professional who provided the content. The music folder named with the first name of the composer. The sound design folder named with the first name of the sound designer. The camera footage folder named with the first name of the photographer.

Why?

To create a hitch in my process and force my thoughts down different neural lanes. Literally... to process information differently.

This is not, by the way, a repudiation of the creative process I employed the first time around. This is me choosing a different car with which to propel my creative process because I want to access something different within myself. An alternate superpower, if you will.

And this.

Because I'd not prepared anything other than the condition of my mental processes, I came to the edit with different editorial preconceptions than I'd otherwise have. What I had, of course, was the 90 minutes of story conference in my head from the previous night. I had the story, how it came to be, and where the passionate opinions of writers lay against different parts of that story. So when I started reviewing the first footage I had, the footage for scene 2, that footage wasn't informing a pre-existing genre framework in my head. Instead, that footage was declaring itself. Telling me what it's capable of. For example, the view from behind the main character at the start of scene 1 declares a personal occupation with appearance. The reverse single, meanwhile, communicates human indignity like gangbusters. Which is why I'm on it for so long. Each shot or each significant moment in a shot, declares something. The question for me is... What does each moment communicate and which moments flow together, conjuring the experience the director and producer wish to impart to a theater audience.

And so on.

Change the creative process. Reach a different outcome than you otherwise would have which begs the question Where was this film destined had I used the process I always use?

No idea. I simply chose to choose a different way of thinking that served me. For any project, there are any number of methods that can serve me. I pick one... then full throttle from there.

Whichever one I choose, fulfills the film that results.

It's a helluva thing...

But there you are.