7 March 2013
FESTIVAL: Poly High School is host to the new Science-Fiction Film Festival.
By Cole Nelson, Staff Writer
From Sundance to Cannes, film festivals provide an entertaining and accessible way to showcase the work of many talented individuals who put time and effort into the creation of a motion picture. With the growing presence of a gifted video production program here on campus, Poly High School will now host its first-ever short film festival.
After creating the brand-new Advanced Video Production class here at Poly, teachers Sid Llera and John Enyeart were determined to take student-produced visuals to a whole new level. With the hope of showcasing the students’ video talents, the two tag-team teachers dove head-first into organizing this unique school event. However, there is a catch. Every short film that is produced for and submitted to the festival must fall under the distinct science-fiction genre—space-oriented, to be exact.
The first step in this festival is generating individual production teams to write, direct, produce and edit their project. Llera and Enyeart are hoping to incorporate many groups and classes here on campus to assist the production teams: specific literature classes have been asked to write the scripts, Theater is available for casting calls and Digital Music will produce the scores and soundtracks. Advanced Video Production also plays a crucial role in this process; they are allowing access to their cameras, green screen technology, computers and other video equipment to the production teams to aid the development of their projects.
After all films are submitted, the judging panel uses a period of two weeks to decide the video finalists. Once chosen, things progress to the next—and final—step for a film festival: screening the films. The lucky finalists then get the chance to view their final product projected on the big screen in Poly’s Littleworth Theater.
If all goes well this year, Llera and Enyeart plan to make this an annual event for Poly students to enjoy for years to come.
Courtesy of hospitalandoutreach.files.wordpress.com