By: Maddie Soard
Lights. Camera. Action! Craig Miller’s film studies class starts every Monday sharing their weekend highlights and afterwards they discuss the past weeks and their future projects. Craig has extensive film experience having worked on War of the Worlds, Parks and Recreation, and other multi-million dollar studio movies and television series. He’s used his experiences to teach scholars how to see through films to what is behind the scenes. Film studies scholar Raegan Mardis said that she, “will never be able to watch movies the same way again.” She now knows who will win the fight scene before it begins, what props are fake, and what is about to happen based on the camera angle alone -- and it’s only the third week.
During week one Craig defined what a story is and how you tell a good story with film. Week two brought more excitement when scholars explored narrative visual storytelling and got to dissect beloved movies like The Greatest Showman, as well as make their own movie scene. I sat in on the class Monday of the third week and got to watch them prepare for their busy week ahead. This week they’re focusing on live story telling by filming and live editing a press conference put on by the Communication and Journalism focus areas. As the Director of Creative Arts at Southeast Christian Church, Craig Miller provided state of the art cameras, boom mics, and a live editing system, so the class could put on a professional live action production. The conference went smoothly, and film studies scholars told the story perfectly by switching the cameras as the conversation demanded. In the final weeks of GSP the class will focus on editing film, making their own production, and dissecting other films.
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