How to Make Your Movie: An Interactive Film School on CD‐ROM offers an introductory film‐making course that lets students explore a real film school environment. Each classroom focuses on a different topic where film professionals and professors from some of the world’s finest film schools share their knowledge and experience. Mr. Grli (pronounced “GUR‐litch”), the writer, director, and producer, holds the position of Eminent Scholar in Film at Ohio State University.
There are two ways to explore the Interactive Film School. Students can travel through the building, exploring the materials step‐by‐step, room‐by‐room, as in a game or virtual reality‐type setting. They could also use the Shortcuts menu, which displays blueprints of the building, to go directly to a desired room or to specific information. (The save feature offers an option to bookmark the location to resume a lesson on subsequent use.) They could also use a combination of both navigation methods.
On entering the school, the student first encounters an indolent security guard (Roy Garlic, an obvious play on the producer’s name and possibly the nickname his students use), who grants access to the building and gives initial instructions. The second floor has five rooms: the Film Grammar Room allows hands‐on experience in the basics of film making. The Festival Room has information on film festivals all over the world; but it requires the student to complete the course before using it. The Equipment Room features an interactive lighting studio and a light metering exercise. The Film History Room and Library contain books and resources on film history and movie‐making techniques. There’s also a restroom with a paper‐towel dispenser that metes out film trivia.
The third floor is completely dedicated to the production of a short film. It lets students observe first‐hand the whole film‐making process, starting in the Research Room and going on to the Script Room which has an old script‐writing computer full of the previous year’s trials and errors. Students can then go on to the Pre‐Production Room which will prepare them to make their film. The Post‐Production Room lets students edit the film and mix sound. These Production rooms feature leading professional film makers and educators at New York University, UCLA, and other well‐known film schools as they share their understanding of the art and the craft of film making.
The fourth floor has a Screening Room where students can watch last year’s class film in its entirety. After completing the course and viewing the film, they can go to the diploma room to print their diploma and open a bottle of champagne.
How to Make Your Movie uses the metaphor of a school closed for the summer. However, the metaphor limps. The building looks more like a haunted house than a college. The producers used an abandoned mental hospital in Athens, OH and superimposed appropriate graphics for the film school. There are few desks and chairs and little furniture. There’s plenty of virtual equipment for students to play with, however. In a school closed for the summer or even at the end of the day, this equipment would all be under lock and key. Lecture notes are kept in an abandoned file cabinet, packed in boxes, tacked to the bulletin board, or left in binders. Most of these lectures are very brief and there’s very little exposure to some of the instructors.
How to Make Your Movie has good “production values”, as one would expect. The designers paid a lot of attention to the details of the virtual environment. Although the metaphor may limp a bit, there is little to distract the student from the main purpose of the product. Even the graffiti focus on film‐making techniques or on the lecture notes.
The package comes on three CDs. The first two are for installation and instruction. The third contains the raw footage and electronic files used to produce the film for the class project featured on the disc. Students with digital editing software can manipulate these files to create their own versions of the film. How to Make Your Movie also comes with a production notebook which provides checklists and exercises to help students stay organized through the production process.
Mr Grlic intended How to Make Your Movie for high‐school students interested in film school and for college students in introductory film courses. It is an excellent example of how a CD‐ROM can treat a subject in ways that would be impossible in a printed textbook. Students can get visual experience of movie‐making techniques, such as how to frame, shoot, sequence, and edit scenes; how different lighting affects work; and how to mix background sound and sound effects. Last fall, Mr Grlic taught an online film‐making course through Ohio University. The course was based on the CD‐ROM and the University charged $6,000 for tuition, which included a video camera for each student.
Faculty have no reason to fear that a CD‐ROM might replace them, however. While such a product can produce a very convincing virtual experience, it cannot substitute for hands‐on exposure to the equipment or personal contact with a professor. How to Make Your Movie: An Interactive Film School on CD‐ROM is an excellent introduction to film making. It also serves as a reference tool for aspiring film makers. It includes listings of film festivals, descriptions of popular camera and lighting equipment, and a bibliography of recommended books. Each classroom has a bibliography and resources related to the topics covered there; but students can access the complete bibliography and other resources, such as the course outline and related Web sites in the library. This product is highly recommended for its market niche.
