OUR SEVEN DAY SCAVENGER HUNT*! hElp uS!!!!!

Brooklyn Young Filmmakers

OPEN/CLOSE FILM SHOOT

SCAVENGER HUNT: DAY 1



Wanted: CINEMATOGRAPHER W/CAMERA ($300 for 2 Day Shoot,Sept 18 & 19, + 2 planning sessions)


Must have narrative film samples; a good digital camcorder; and enjoy teaching. Special consideration given to DPs who live or work in Fort Greene or surrounding Brooklyn neighborhoods. To apply send info to: communityfilm@wearebyfc.org






(from BACK STREETS, 30min, 2009
trailer: http://vimeo.com/14065517
An Adonis Williams film
Brooklyn Young Filmmakers Executive Producer
Matt Workman, DP http://mattworkman.com/
photo: Holly Hosman)

Brooklyn Young Filmmakers is shooting our next short film OPEN/CLOSE the weekend of September 17 (load-in and set-up day), 18 & 19 (shoot days), at the Brooklyn Free School http://brooklynfreeschool.org/ (free spirit and thought-wise, love the collage of photos on their home page -- more on them in upcoming posts).

This was the first time we started Pre-Production on a Community Filmmaking project without a location already confirmed. We had a small location budget for our three day weekend shoot. Over the last couple of weeks we have been calling out to the Universe (mostly through the internet) -- "HELP!!!!" Low and behold, the Universe answered -- several times!

Of special help was S.O.S. Brooklyn Young Filmmakers put out to FGKids@yahoo.com . Many neighborhoods have a group email for parents to share information. The Fort Greene one is notorious for being one of the most resourceful. I sent a request to join the group, not as a parent, but as someone who works with parents and teenagers. Now if I need info on a good plumber, the best bakery, or how to deal with city regulations, I'll get five recommendations. I asked the group if anyone knew a location that BYFC might shoot at. Within a few days we had three possible locations to choose from! Our faith in the Universe has been renewed! So of course we're gonna keep asking.

STAY TUNED: Over the next six days Brooklyn Young Filmmakers will be posting other items needed for our OPEN/CLOSE Scavenger Hunt. Help us find our Scavenger Hunt items!

What is a SCAVENGER HUNT? It's a game in which the organizers prepare a list defining specific items, which the participants -- individuals or teams -- seek to gather -- usually without purchasing them -- or perform tasks or take photographs of the items, as specified. The goal is usally to be the first to complete the list, although in a variation of the game, players can also be challenged to complete the tasks in the most creative manner.

Gossip columnist Elsa Maxwell is credited with inventing scavenger hunts for 1930s parties: "Serve the dinner backwards, do anything, but for goodness sake, do something weird!" The University of Chicago, every May since 1987 up to 2010, has hosted the largest and best scavenger hunt in the world! http://scavhunt.uchicago.edu

FILM QUIZ: What classic 1930s screwball comedy opens with a drunken bunch of socialites on a Scavenger Hunt for a goat and a lost man in a tent city on a dump? It featured the THIN MAN star and Clark Gable's wife (who died tragically at 33). This film played this season at Bryant Parks Outdoor Film Series.

OPEN/CLOSE is a New York story. A dialogue excerpt:

CARITA:

Someone said, "The present in New York is so powerful that the past gets lost." Maybe that's why so many hurt, lonely people come here....People like us, when we remember the past, it's always what was broken....

Copyright 2010 Trayce Gardner & Debbie Boswell

FILM QUIZ ANSWER: MY MAN GODFREY (See trailer: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3810665927813772372#

OPEN/CLOSE PRE-PRODUCTION

HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT:

CREATING A FAKE COVER FOR A BOOK THAT WILL BE USED AS A KEY PROP

FOR THE CHARACTER CARITA LOCKE

IN THE FILM OPEN/CLOSE

(This is the first draft of the cover by BYFC student Solomon Oke. What do you think about it? What

do you like? What would you change? Tune in for our next blog posting and hear the critique Solomon got and what alterations he was asked to do. Then check out the final version of the book cover!

(Solomon Oke

with his daughters

Sarah Yetunde (3.9 yrs)

and Deborah Opeyemi (9 mths)

I am a Brooklyn Young Filmmakers student and the shoot photographer for the OPEN/CLOSE film project. I, Solomon Olanrewaju Oke, born in the mid-fifties, grew up with one of my uncles, a farmer and a hunter, in a small hamlet called Ago-Amodu in the rural part of Western Nigeria.

I left my country to go to St. Aldates College in Oxford City, England, where I studied Economics and Business. After graduating I came to the United States and enrolled in the College of Staten Island. Two and a half years later I dropped out having lost my interest in Economics and Business. I looked for a trade to engage in. Since I love working with my hands, I thought about becoming an electrician. But I could not afford four years of study and $16,000. I later picked up an interest in becoming a photographer, but I did not have two years and $4,000 that the course required. Luckily I saw a small ad in the newspaper for a home study course in photography. I paid $500 for the course material, studied at home, and became a photographer.

Now I work part of my time photographing weddings, portraits, and products. In my second job I work as a security supervisor at one of the NYC Welfare Centers. I also have developed an interest in writing and in 2008 Enaz Publications published my first book, "With Sex On My Mind".

I want to put photography together with writing and so I became a student with Brooklyn Young Filmmakers. Someone asked me why now, why at my age, I decided to learn about filmmaking. It reminds me of what my mother asked me when I was 19 and she found out I tried to commit suicide "Why now?! Now that we spent all our money and energy to raise you, why now do you want to kill yourself?!" I looked at my mother, acute sadness in my eyes, and answered her -- "It's better late than never Ma; it is better late than never." This is the same answer I gave to the person who asked me why, at my age, I want to learn filmmaking -- except there was no sadness in my eyes this time when I answered.

MY WISH is to teach my daughters, Sarah and Deborah, as they grow up, to enjoy film as a means of entertainment, but to also appreciate it as a medium of expression and a world of many jobs.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF MY COUNTRY FOR YOU

NIGERIA gained independence from Britain on October 1, 1960, after 60 years of being its colony. Popularly known as the giant of Africa, Nigeria has about 140 million people and it is divided into 36 states plus the capital territory Abuja.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigeria )

Situated in West Africa, Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa; it is the eighth most populous in the world. The country is split in half between Chrisitians and Muslims. The country's official language is English, but there are well over 200 different regional languages. Nigeria has three most influential ethnic groups -- Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba. It is very rich in cultures and good in sports, especially in soccer, running, boxing and weight lifting. Nigeria is the largest African oil producing country and it is one of the major oil suppliers to the U.S. (There are many large oil spills in Nigeria that have been going on for decades and the world has paid no attention: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/17/world/africa/17nigeria.html )

- Solomon Oke