With the discussion about Premiere’s departure from the Mac market being all the rage last week, we thought it would be interesting to take a look at a feature film shot with the help of a Mac. The film is called Graduation Day, and TMO’s senior news editor, Mike Washlesky, was the director of -photography. The film is a feature-length independent film, and was shot in various locations in Texas. It has also been named a finalist in the Had To Be Made Film Festival, and with Macs having been used in the filming and production of Graduation Day, we wanted to know how Macs were used.
First, we should provide some background on Mike Washlesky, the director of photography for the film. Mike works for TMO to pay the bills, which is how we found out about the film, but his true pursuit in life is filmmaking. Graduation Day is Mike’s second feature film project, which was produced by Birdnose Productions. As director of photography for an independent film, Mike was the main camera operator, as well as the person responsible for lighting the sets, and setting up the shots.
The film centers around the young tech support worker, Chapple King, who is to be married in one week. The film picks up with him on Monday, and soon thereafter, his old crush saunters into town. As the wedding stress and daily grind drives Chapple to question his love for his fiancee, an introspection of his life and responsibility plays out before him, and ultimately he faces a decision.
The film was edited using an Avid system, but a PowerMac G4 was instrumental in getting the film made. “Besides being the only reliable Internet and e-mail terminal — the director and producer’s Windows-based machine could only connect 50% of the time and often froze in AOL — the on-set G4 was often times the center of attention,” explains Mike. “All the digital stills from production were downloaded nightly with image corrections being made via Photoshop. This also served as a meeting point for actors to check out the rest of our production days when they weren’t on set, by being able to browse the many photos that accumulated daily.”
In addition, Final Cut Pro and the PowerMac G4 were used to make daily rough cuts of the raw footage.
The Mac also played a crucial role in the sound department, with the crew recording sound to a portable DAT recorder. "The raw DAT tapes were imported into the system via a sound card, logged and cleaned up to match takes and scenes," says Mike. "The finished trimmed down raw sound files were then burned to disc via Toast for re-assembly in post."
A majority of the graphics used in the movie were created on the Mac using After Effects and Photoshop, including the interstitials and credit crawling. To cap it off, the Mac was used to "author the promo DVD for festivals and industry persons using DVD Studio Pro, Cleaner, and the SuperDrive," Washlesky says.
Which brings us back to the Had To Be Made Film Festival. Part of this festival includes the ability to rate the finalist movies. This means that you can show your support for a film made with the extensive help of a Mac by simply rating it. The Had To Be Made Film Festival’s entire purpose is to help independent films demonstrate their marketability, making your rating important. The film festival is designed to create a venue for promoting independent films that is not limited to a geographical location.
WARNING: Both trailers contain adult language. Accordingly, we strongly recommend those easily offended not watch the trailers.
You can watch the film’s theatrical trailer or the teaser trailer at Birdnose Productions’ Web site. You can vote for the film at the Had To Be Made Film Festival’s Web site. The voting page is under the "Voters" page. For those wanting to view this film, or any of the films featured in the festival, check out the Locations link at the festival site. That will direct you to the locations where the films are available to rent.