Film Studies Internships

This week at cinespace was an exciting week full of exciting things I was able to do and see. This week we continued to work with the inventory and making sure everything is accounted for and ready to be used by the customers of Cinespace. We also were able to take out a lot of lights and work with them to see how they would function on a film set. It was fun to see how to use some common lights that are used throughout student and indie sets (Aperture LEDS, Tube lights, etc.). It was a lot of fun to see how these work and get my hands on them to see the capabilities of said lights.

This week at Cinespace I have been working with lights while trying to keep up with the inventory needs that cinespace requires. This week was my first week I was full time and it was a great learning experience. My days this week consisted mostly of taking off the branding of products, testing lights before placing them in orders, and doing some small repairs to some of the lights we looked at (repairing the sockets, fixing the light switches, etc.). I really enjoyed it this week when we went to an empty sound stage and was able to see what it was like within a sound stage that big productions use. It was really cool to see what's inside of one and how one might utilize the space within a sound stage.

(Week of 05/29/26)

This week at Highland I've been fortunate enough to read multiple feature length spec-scripts and do coverage on them. It's been so interesting reading scripts from different genres by different writers around the world. Ive found with every new script I cover ive gotten better and better in my analysis of the project and being able to determine if it's a good fit for the company. It's been fascinating seeing different projects come through in different stages of development, and seeing different pitch decks some scripts come with.  

This week we also had our weekly intern development meeting where all the highland interns within my department have a zoom call together with the head of the development department. In these meetings we are able to talk about the different scripts we read, what we liked or disliked about them, and practice pitching! I've really enjoyed being able to hear about what other interns have been reading/ covering and what appealed to them about certain projects.

Luckily, this week I was spared from any injuries (although even if I wasn’t, I am sure they would be just as on it as they were last time) anyways, this week was more inventory- we tested more LED lights, baby baby lights, Arri lights… by the end of this, I will be a lighting expert. We also tested a giant 18k light, and with the light the cables to find out which one wasn’t working- I joked about wanted to stand in front of the light for a little UV action and a possible tan, but my intuitive cost free idea was vetoed. (Perhaps for the best) also this Friday, I was able to come in at a later slot than usual, and work with the other two interns- that was great. It was awesome working with other students. That is always my favorite. Another successful week- I can actually feel myself getting stronger, which is super helpful.

This summer, I am interning with Cinespace Studios. Cinespace is one of the largest production companies in Wilmington and is home to some of the biggest studios and thousands of film equipment to make any production a successful one. I will be working within the lighting department for Cinespace which means I will help with orders, fix lights, check on their inventory, etc...

How’s it Going? (Wk3-06/01/26)

Honey Head Films

This week at HHF, I got to do a lot of hands-on work. Specifically, I attended an event hosted by Wilma magazine that featured some of the most talented and accomplished women in the Wilmington area. Being able to attend that event and help delegate the interviews was so much fun, and it was very inspiring to see such a large room of successful women from a diverse range of careers. My main role for the interviews was to hook each interviewee to a mic pack, which became easier as the evening went on. However, a challenge of that task was navigating the stunning and unique outfits the attendees had worn; each one posed a different challenge in how best to conceal the LAV.

The other large part of this week was meeting with some very talented women in the local Wilmington film industry, whom we hope to have work with us on the feature project HHF is currently developing. I made a general script breakdown of specific set pieces and prop call-outs to reference during the meeting, and we also discussed things that would be implied in building the world of our story, that may not be directly listed in the script. Being able to see two people, specifically, two women, who are successful in the production design aspect of the local film industry was reassuring. It reminded me that I am on the right path and that my drive and tenacity will hopefully get me to where I am now.

It’s hard to believe that my time with HHF is halfway over, and I am really excited to see where these connections take me as I stay in the local area for my career. I hope to keep in touch with all of the wonderfully talented folks whom I have had the privilege of meeting. As for what is in store for me next week, the status is TBD, but I will update everyone at the end of the week on what I accomplish! See you all then.

(Week of 05/22/26)

This summer, Im interning with Highland Film Group. Highland is a studio based in Los Angeles that specializes in the independent film financing, production, worldwide sales, and global distribution for commercial films. I am fortunate enough to be interning under Highlands development department, assisting them with doing script coverage, sitting in on pitch meetings, and anything else to help out!

I'm extremely excited to see what goes into financing and developing a feature film, and seeing how projects are chosen to move forward from a business perspective. I'm also extremely interested in screenwriting myself, and am really looking forward to exposing myself to different material from writers who are known and unknown! I am really looking forward to the entire experience and can't wait to share more with you all soon!

I recently started my internship with Shoe Money Productions, and while I am only a few days in, I have already gotten a much better understanding of the development side of the entertainment industry. Since beginning the internship, my primary responsibility has been reading scripts and writing coverage. Coverage involves writing a synopsis of a script and providing feedback on its strengths, weaknesses, and overall potential as a project. It has been interesting to see how much thought goes into evaluating a screenplay beyond simply deciding whether it is enjoyable. Instead, I have been learning to consider factors such as audience appeal, character development, story structure, and whether the writer demonstrates a strong enough voice to be someone worth following in the future.

One of the most exciting parts of the experience so far has been learning about the various writers whose work we may read throughout the internship. Before this experience, I mostly thought about the finished films and television shows that audiences see on screen. Now I am getting a glimpse into the early stages of development, where companies read countless submissions in search of strong stories and talented writers. It has given me a new appreciation for how many projects are being considered at any given time and how much work goes into them long before a project is ever produced.

Because my internship is remote, I have also had the opportunity to connect with other interns based in Los Angeles. Even though many of us have not worked together extensively yet, it has been great meeting people who share similar interests and career goals within the film industry. Hearing about everyone's different backgrounds and experiences has made me even more excited for what is ahead. One of the coolest parts of working remotely is the flexibility to read scripts from almost anywhere. I was even able to work on script coverage while staying at a Disney resort this weekend, which made for a pretty unique office setting! At the same time, I'm excited about the opportunity to spend some time in Los Angeles later this summer and experience more of the industry firsthand.

Although I am still at the very beginning of my internship, I am already learning valuable skills in script analysis and professional coverage writing. I am looking forward to reading more submissions, improving my ability to evaluate stories from a development perspective, and continuing to learn about the process that takes place before a project ever reaches the screen.

This week at First Cut, I was brought along to help out on the set of a commercial shoot for a construction company in New Bern. This was a really exciting opportunity for me, as it was my first time being a part of a commercial production (and my first non-student set). I shadowed Marc from First Cut, who had been hired as a grip for the day by Wil from Guerrilla Productions. The shoot originally had two locations (New Bern and Emerald Isle), but a third was added at the client’s request. This additional location required Wil, Marc, and me to alter/adapt our shooting schedule to make sure we finished getting the footage we needed of the different properties before sunset.

Luckily, the shoots were fairly simple. They wanted interviews and B-roll of workers at their main office and an active construction site, as well as confessionals and B-roll of two homeowners who lived in one of the company’s recently built homes. With Marc’s guidance, I set up sticks, lights, and flags at each of the three locations. It was really cool watching Wil direct and interview the employees and homeowners. Getting a behind-the-scenes look at how an average talking-head/confessional-style commercial is made was super interesting.

On Sunday I worked with Megan Petersen and the beginner acting class. They started off doing a chemistry read for a three-person scene. This was the class's first time doing a three-person scene, which they found exciting but a little difficult. Afterwards all the actors circled around, and we did a table read for the entire pilot episode of the show Severance. I read along as well, in place of an absent student. After the table read, we watched the pilot episode of Severance and took notes on similarities and differences that were in the script. Lastly, we watched their chemistry read tapes and gave feedback. They were also able to compare their tape to the real episode. 

On Tuesday I worked with Ron and the advanced class. They came in with a scene from the show Succession memorized and ready to use for an audition tape. This was a two-person scene, and the actors were able to choose which character they wanted to read for. The other intern Kendall and I took turns reading the other part for the actors. Afterwards they were able to watch their tapes and the class provided feedback on their performance. We talked about what went well in the scene and what subtle things would enhance their performance.

This was a very fun week for my internship. I got to work on a narrative film in the G&E department, and it was a super great experience. I got to work with titan tubes and primarily aperture gear, with a few light mats. The shoot went from 3pm Sunday to 3am on Monday, and I had a blast working with everyone. It definitely is some of the most fun I’ve had on a set in a while.

This is the Grip Truck ->

Was on Fire Watch, and it was really pretty outside ->

Outside of that, I helped with prep for a shoot coming up this Monday, got to really talk with more people who work with Port City, even had time to shoot some hoops with some different people, and play around with the Easy Rig and FX 6.

Come to think of it, that footage probably would have been great for this blog post, too late now, lol.

This week I continued editing social media posts to promote the Museum Cafe. Tuesday I worked on adding footage of the cafe food items that I filmed the prior Thursday and Tuesday filmed a tomato artwork in the museum gallery to use in my edit. This Thursday was a slower day where I was asked to "research" other museum social media's and trends for inspiration. Being someone with limited knowledge or interest in copying or emulating social media trends I found it difficult to find inspiration or ideas from watching TikTok's as I was instructed to do. I made my task more productive by creating a list for my superiors of technical suggestions related to social media tags, unique and original approaches to media creation, and filming styles that could align with the museum's art focused image. Given my experience with editing and creating social media content I believe my technical knowledge would be significantly more helpful. I do find it a bit disheartening that I'm given little guidance or creative direction by my superiors. I have the technical knowhow but I can only do so much when my instructors are vague with what they want.

Later in the day Thursday I got to meet Claire Helen Ashley, an artist based in Chicago who's work is being displayed at the Museum, and I was asked to capture her working on it. It was a pleasure meeting Claire who was very kind and also passionate about her work. I filmed a lot of creative shots and angles that I felt properly complimented her piece; the Harris Via Oban Hot Rocks: Sea Urchin. I also filmed her working on the piece as instructed and was able to briefly chat with her. I unfortunately had not captured many photos of Claire and her work which I later found out is what my superiors specifically wanted for a potential image social media post. The rest of my day Thursday was spent salvaging stills from my footage and touching them up in photoshop. I will admit this week I once again forgot to take photos while I worked but I do have some photos from the social post I was editing.

Continuing on with the sketch process this week, I met with my supervisor, Reilly, at the dreams center in downtown Wilmington. There, we went over some logistics, like who will help with the sketch and what equipment we will have access to. We also toured the space and mapped out where we would film. Throughout the week, Reilly continued working on the script. 

Today, we met over zoom to go over the script and work on the shot list that’s pictured below. I was also made aware that plans for next week have changed a little. Rather than shooting the sketch over the course of the next week at camp, the filming day has been moved to a later date. As far as next week goes at camp, I’ll be meeting the kids, helping them rehearse for the upcoming filming day, and shooting b-roll. I’m so excited for the next couple weeks, to really start bringing this sketch to life by rehearsing, filming, and editing it!

I had a bit of a longer week with going on an extra day but it didn't make my time here any less enjoyable. The main project I have been working on the past couple days is editing together the “Varsity Line” theater play at Thalian. This definitely was an interesting project getting to work with multi-cam editing within premiere pro. When editing, it feels like I am watching a movie, but I get to choose the camera angles. I have also had a great time watching the play and watching the comedic story; I recommend watching it. I also ran tests to check and see which cables were the fastest to make sure files on hard drives transfer quickly. It was also someone's birthday this week. For lunch, the entire Port City Films family went out to eat for lunch and got ice cream to celebrate. 

I also conducted an interview with a professional filmmaker for the main semester assignment. I interviewed Simon Carey from Cinespace. He works in the equipment department and is usually an electrician in a lot of the movies filmed in Wilmington. I think it is a very valuable conversation. He has a lot of experience in the industry and many stories about working on movies or tips to have a better on set experience. We talked for over two hours and I didn’t feel like I was conducting an interview, just a conversation about movies. I also got to meet some of the interns at Cinespace so I got to learn about what they’re learning there and what they do. Overall, I think this week was fun as always and very productive.

This week we continued to do inventory of the shop as well as working with new lights. My two favorites that we looked at were Gemball lights and some nicer LED lights. I enjoyed getting to test the color settings of the LED lights and the Gemball lights were really fun to set up. Another fun experience that I had this week was getting to ride around the studio in the back of a golf cart to go to the sound stages. One final thing that was really cool this week was we got to see one of the soundstages that had partly been rigged. I enjoyed this because it was cool to see what work goes in to make the soundstages suitable for filming. I have noticed that I am starting to feel more comfortable around all the different types of lights and I can differentiate why they are different. One of my big worries at the start of the internship was that I wasn't going to be able to retain everything but I am glad to have proved myself wrong. We have a lot of orders to fill next week so I hope I can put my new knowledge to the test. But overall everything is still going great and I am really enjoying getting to work at Cinespace!

This week at Lighthouse, I had the opportunity to really begin diving deeper into the post-production side of things. Admittedly, this has always been the area I struggle with the most and sometimes find editing programs to be overwhelming to learn. The post-production team at Lighthouse completely changed my mindset on this. I discovered how collaborative the editing process can be and got to use DaVinci’s editing program for the first time. For the first part of my week, I went through several collections of videos and made first-round selections to be passed forward in the editing process. This was a fairly simple editing task and gave me ample time to familiarize myself with the platform. Erin, Paul, and Jon were all so patient and helpful, it made post-production become a lot less intimidating for me. I also got to work on developing talent reels and learn about color grading later in the week which were both new experiences for me, and I enjoyed learning more about the process behind this. 

Keeping my interest in production and business in mind, Lighthouse has continued to provide me with the opportunity to meet with their Executive Producer, Tyler, to learn more about an upcoming project they have been developing and have just begun production on. I got to see the more last minute, knit picky necessities of pre production and the level of planning that goes into a production of their size. We had a long discussion of the differences between preproduction depending on genre, production scale, and budget and how he has learned to prepare for each specific project type. These conversations are one of my favorite parts of the internship as he is so passionate and knowledgeable. I have loved getting to learn from someone so experienced in what I hope to do one day. 

Finally, my favorite thing I got to do this week was attend the final pass of the shoot that I got to be a PA on at the start of the internship. This project was the first one that I have gotten to see of theirs in each stage of development, and I loved getting to see how the production had turned out. I also loved getting to hear the team members' opinions on what worked and didn’t work in each shot, and making their selections based on this. Once again, everyone was so collaborative and I enjoyed getting to work hands-on on the project and with everyone at Lighthouse. This was such a full circle moment and has continued to make this internship such a special experience for me.

This week I got to help with two shoots for FOX and edited for one project. The first shoot was on Monday at Novant Health at 1:00. I got there at around 12:45 and helped get everything set up! We were just using two BM cameras and only two LED lights, so overall, not a lot. Filming there wrapped in about twenty minutes, and we were headed back to the office by 2:00.

The second shoot was at 4:30 on Wednesday at some private club in Wilmington. And even though the shoot was at 4:30, it was still really hot outside. I shot some B-roll while the background actors arrived, and then we filmed a few specific B-roll scenes with them. Thankfully, we also had some of the shoot take place inside, and so that was a nice break from the heat.

Other than those two shoots, I also got to do a bare-bones edit of the footage from shoot one. It was just a bit of cutting between cameras and some color grading, but hopefully I'll get to finish it fully next week!