By Christine de Kock
STUDENTS at Footscray City College put in a marathon effort to produce 55 films in one week as part of their film course.
Cleo Constantinou the head of Footscray City Films, a TAFE division of the college, said such a number of films were rarely produced in a single week at most film schools.
“You need to actually recognize that I am mad,” Mr Constantinou said.
“It’s such a lot of work, it takes six weeks to pre-produce so all the students go through a process of drafting- three drafts of their scripts, they’ve also got to do all the pre-production that goes into making a film.”
A group of about 95 students filmed and directed the productions at Lord Somers Camp and Power House, which is based at the Mornington Peninsula, from 3 to 7 April.
Fifty-five first year students undertaking their certificate course directed a film each with the assistance of advanced diploma students who attended the camp to supervise the production.
“They were working seventeen hour days, they had a time-slot in the morning, the afternoon and at night.”
Ms Constantinou said the students not only learned valuable production skills, as they each acted as the crew on their fellow students’ projects, but some of the films will also be entered in national competitions.
Previous students have been successful in their work being selected for the Melbourne Film Festival.
Ms Constantinou added that graduates of the course had gone on to work at television stations in Australia and to be part of film production crews in the Los Angeles, United States of America.
