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Let’s make a film! Short films are some of the favourite films at Raindance Film Festival. The beauty of a short film is you don’t need to have experience, money or training to make one. A short can be anything from a few seconds (like a Nokia 15 Second Short) to 45 minutes (according to the Oscars™). This short film tool kit shows you how to make a short film.
Check out these 12 steps below to find out how to get your short film made!
The Short Film Tool Kit: 12 Steps To Making A Short
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Step 1. Get a script together
A short film is a unique type of story. Because it is short you can’t use the normal opening story techniques of a feature.
Here’s some ways professional screenwriters create stories for short films. You need to hook your audience. These story techniques condense the opening into a few seconds.
- Universal moment: a short film favourite. Wedding, first kiss, national and religious holidays, championship sporting events
- Cyclical story: stories that tend to start and end at the same place, but there is now new meaning
- Time bomb: where something specific must happen in a certain time or else dire consequences will befall the character
Here’s some idea generation exercises. Can you write a hundred words on one of these? Could it become the basis for a short film?
– the office prank
– a day in the life of …
– the local bus stop
There are loads of tricks to generate ideas for shorts.
A script for a short need not be written in industry standard format. But it should be written in what filmmakers call a ‘Shot List’, a simple a one or two line description of each shot the camera takes.
[To get your very own professional script format guide send an email to screenplay@raindance.org]
Check out the other steps below and happy filmmaking!
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Photo Credit: Bertie Watson
I founded Raindance Film Festival in 1993 because the British film industry was closed, polite, and congratulating itself while shutting new filmmakers out.
I co-founded the British Independent Film Awards in 1998 because British indie film deserved more than a shrug, a pat on the head, and a Tuesday night screening.
Raindance didn’t start as a brand. It started as a rebellion: film training without gatekeepers, a festival without permission, and a community built by filmmakers who weren’t waiting to be invited in.
Later, we took it global: Toronto, Vancouver, New York, LA, Berlin, and Brussels, because independent film doesn’t belong to one city, one class, or one accent.
I’ve produced 700+ short films and seven features, including Deadly Virtues (2014) and ALICE, which won the SXSW Grand Jury Prize (2019) not because someone “discovered” us, but because the work earned its place.
I’ve written three books used by filmmakers worldwide because too many courses taught compliance instead of survival.
In 2009, I was awarded a PhD for services to film education, ironic, given that most of my career has been about tearing down the rules that education insisted you follow.
I don’t believe in waiting for permission.I believe in making work, building systems, and forcing the industry to catch up.
Specialties: Independent Film (the real kind) · Producing · Writing · Film Education · Festivals · Breaking Broken Systems
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