The Dangers of Go Zones

Aside from the feature film, we were given another project- a PSA. My team started out with a PSA about hitchhiking. A little girl comes in and hitches a ride with a strange man. The end twist was that the man ends up getting robbed by the little girl. We had the whole thing storyboarded and planned and ready to film but our two big film days were cancelled because of snow and snow days. They made it so when the days came, we had no equipment.

So, it was back to the drawing board.  We took a day and brainstormed new ideas that would only take a day or two to film. We ended up taking this thing at our school called Go Zones, the area in the hallways reserved for people walking, and making a short about the dangers of blocking them with your feet. The concept of Go Zones, while I guess fundamentally important, was always a little funny to us, so we made it a comedy. We were lucky enough to keep our actor from our original video and film during the lunch hour.

We filmed the voice over one day, and visuals the next. Sadly, we couldn't get all the equipment we needed so the shots are shaky. I think if we had too a bit more time and had everything we needed, it good have been pretty good. Not saying what we have no isn't funny, it definitely is. Editing full on Sarah's shoulders so I only saw the final product. I was proud of her for taking a short day of work and making a real video out of it.

I learned a lot about being prepared and having back up plans on this project. Communication was also really important in the process. Communicating with actors to get availability took a good chunk of time because one of our main actors could only be reached in person. Almost no one was ever available on the same day. But, we got it planned and prepped and we were set to check everything out. But then snow day after snow day came and blocked our filming days so we had to communicate within our group to figure everything out and then get the plan to our actors.

If I could go back and do anything differently I would have prepared for filming days even earlier and checked out equipment ahead of time in the even of snow days. I was really proud of the way my groups worked together when those snow days through a wrench in our plans.

I am definitely looking forward to this project next year so I can step up my game and show off what I can really do.