The Shooting of Dan McGrew

When I was eight years old, my dad showed me a video he had made as a freshman in high school: "Radioactive Ninjas Fighting For No Reason". I thought it was just the coolest thing ever, and it really sparked my interest in filmmaking. I started making my own ninja videos using a low resolution digital camera and Windows Movie Maker on my parent's miserably slow laptop. For several years I started saving up money, and when I was twelve I purchased the student edition of the Adobe Production Suite. I began to become a much better filmmaker, as I was able to use much more extensive software. However, I still used a pretty slow laptop, and the best thing I could film with was my iPod touch (which was actually a pretty good camera). With the help of my friends as actors, I made videos ranging from superhero action films to potato chip commercials. I continued to save up money, and eventually I could afford half of a powerful gaming/productivity PC. My grandma covered the other half. I still used my phone to film, but the quality of the cameras on Apple products was much better. I am now a sophomore in high school, and I am enrolled in the "Digital Media Technology" class at my school. I am now exposed to much film equipment and get to edit videos at school, which up until now had been very boring and uninteresting. The shooting of Dan McGrew is the first actual "Short Film" I have made, and it was originally for an English II project. If the schedules of my friends allow it, I plan to make many more short films, and I would love to go into a career of filmmaking.