Creating An Abstract Film

When creating a movie, multiple elements must be taken into account: The plot, characters, settings, camera angles, etc. For a theme such as abstract, this is a very wide-open topic with multiple ways to achieve the goal of creating a film. Other themes can have a linear and direct storyline but an abstract film needs to be the opposite. A central theme based on abstraction may sound easy to develop, but it is actually quite complicated.

To take a theme, such as getting ticketed on campus, and make it abstract is running a creative risk. Usually a film’s message is shown directly, but because an abstract film is not a normal film, the theme must stray away from the norm. The director must take a theme and make it subliminal as opposed to direct. The spectrum of abstraction can be shown using two extremes: On one side of the spectrum, an idea can be straightforward and the audience may understand fully. On the other end, one can make the idea so abstract that the actual message is lost. The key to making an efficient abstract piece is to find a balance between both.

When creating an abstract video, the creative process is quite different than other videos. While other films may be straight-forward, what makes an abstract video different is the fact that the video must not be straightforward. Deciding what theme to use and how exactly to execute it visually is perhaps the biggest challenge. One can write a storyline for one idea and end up with something completely different by the end. As was previously stated, finding the balance between two extremes can complicate a simple idea in an abstract piece.

Each visual and auditory element was used with a specific goal in mind. The overall topic of ticket-giving could have been changed to ticketing bike riders, but then the audience may end up confused and assume the director has an agenda against bicyclists. That is why choosing to ticket students for minor infractions over another form of transportation was best for the project.

Another element that could have been altered was the music. The music was meant to mirror the feeling that one feels when getting a ticket, but keep the overall mood light and funny. The person could be having a “good” day and then things come to a sudden halt when they get a ticket. Subsequently, their day is ruined. If different music was used, such as “F**k Tha Police” by NWA, then the message could be taken as a direct insult to law enforcement when in fact that was not the message at all. “Tickets” is simply a parody of everyday life on a college campus.

If “Tickets” was created using a different medium the effect may not be the same. A comic strip might be the next best way to achieve the goal, but that is strictly a visual medium. Music helped separate “Tickets” from direct political commentary, whereas if it was drawn in a newspaper as a political cartoon then it could be aligned with other satire and possibly ridiculed. Other mediums such as writing a story or making a song would lose the message and lose the audience. Photographs may be somewhat effective if there are multiple, but using a single photo may appear odd out of context. Simply put, the idea would not be able to be executed in any other way except by video.

The initial topic chosen was nowhere near the subject of “Tickets”. It took multiple run-throughs of the previous topic to realize that it would not be effective. The public nature of the project helped fuel the creative process and evolve the film into what would eventually become “Tickets”. Knowing that it would be shown to the class and possibly future classes helped mold the film because the plot of “Tickets” is something that every driver on campus could relate to. Choosing to present the topic in a humorous way was the best method for “Tickets” because humor’s ultimate goal is to make society look at its own absurdities in the mirror.

For the “self-portrait” aspect of the film, each individual story involved every group member. One or two students would act and then the other student would shoot. Instead of doing three separate stories with all of them coming together at the end, “Tickets” ended up being vignettes with one overarching theme. The whole film is initially a dream sequence based on the protagonist being ticketed in the beginning. It takes place in a fantasy world where students have authority to ticket other students for minute infractions such as leaving garbage behind or putting makeup on in public.

Developing the plot and planning the film was harder than editing the film itself. Social media (In this case, YouTube) provided no complications. Since the movie was so short it uploaded to the website right away. iMovie is a relatively easy program to use, especially for those familiar with the iOS system on other Apple products. Once the shooting was done it took virtually no time at all to piece the whole film together. The only trouble that created complications was the creative limitations iMovie has. During one part in “Tickets”, a student is talking to another one with bad breath. The original idea for this part was to use a green-yellow filter that waved slowly, mimicking bad breath like in cartoons. Due to iMovie’s limitations on altering its filters, this was not possible.

Overall, this project was relatively simple despite the challenges in the beginning. The only problems that arose were during the creative portion: Ultimately deciding how to execute the abstract theme without venturing too far away from the message. For the group dynamic, there were no quarrels among group members. The work output was consistent. Each member put forth equal effort and contributed excellent ideas. The final product contains a skit imagined by each member, and everyone had input whether they were in the specific vignette or not.