A Father of the Dead, 2012

WE ALL START SOMEWHERE

this is where I did...

A Father of The Dead, 2012

In 2012, I was fifteen years old and at end of my GCSE cycle; which I thoroughly believed was the most important thing I will ever have to do while on this planet.

little did I know right?

One of my friends Bradley came to me one day in GCSE drama class with a request. 

He wanted an audition tape created to submit for a role where he played the son in a father-son short film in a zombie apocalypse.

bare in mind, this was when zombies were cool. 

At the time, my film-making portfolio extended to YouTube vlogs on weekends, if homework committed it. 

This was my first venture into the dramatic side of film-making and being the go-getter I was; I said yes.

So, one Thursday, at around 1pm (we had a half day you see) I grabbed my HD camcorder and my best pal and we filmed. 

Now, at the time I wasn't aware what the contents of an audition tape entailed, if you would have told me it was to simply place the subject in front of the camera while they read some lines, it would have been much easier than what I ended up doing.

What I ended up doing was create a short film (sort of) 

we created a short narrative based on the few facts Bradley was given in regards to the role. Lasting around five minutes and cut together with footage from my spare room and clips from Hollywood films 

shhh

my concept of set design and mise en scene was non-existent. to my credit, I had no idea what these things were, I was fifteen after all. However here's a small list of what I left in shot to really immerse you into the narrative for the comedies sake.

• The blue on my BB gun revolver, the laws the law right? 
• The Harry potter books on my shelf. However, look at how the colour grading pops the red on the Hogwarts Express.
• The ketchu..blood stains on Bradley's school shirt.
• Parents questionable choice in carpet.
• My skateboard stickers that I deemed worthy enough customise my wardrobe with.
• Crappy drawings on my wall to self-advertise my YouTube channel at the time.
• And of course, myself; the zombie in a red hoodie. Stole the show honestly. 

I doubt if you're reading this you have the time or effort to scrub through the entire video to spot these errors, so I will just provide the screenshots below. 

Once "production" ended, I hit the editing suite on my 4gb of RAM Acer laptop and rendered it out; a render lasting a few hours for the five minute run time.  

Once complete, Bradley sent it off and we screened it to our drama class and received immensely positive feedback from our classmates but more so from our teacher, wish he was more honest but it did wonders for my ego and potential "street cred" during break time (which I sorely needed) 

but seriously...

It wasn't great. Hell, it wasn't even remotely average; it was sloppy and filled with errors.  But this little project was the creative spark that what would shape the next five years of study and indepedent creative ventures and for that, it was fantastic. Besides, we all start somewhere. 

Bradley never got the role and my street cred didn't increase a single percent.