Reflection on Portfolio Project

What a journey it has truly been. I put my all into this project. Blood sweat and tears have gone into this (literally). When I first heard about the project I was super stressed, I didn’t think it was possible.

I had knowledge on how to produce and edit a film, but I just wasn’t confident that I could do it.




I remember when we were taught about this project. I was so stressed out. The only thing I knew I wanted to do was a coming of age genre. The process of figuring out what I wanted to do was extremely challenging and way harder than I thought. I am an extreme perfectionist and I will not produce something if I don’t like the idea.




After talking with my partner, and with some of my classmates, I came across one of my classmates, Megan. I remember sitting there as she was telling me about her project and I was amazed, and she was so far ahead of me. As this did stress me out, it also inspired me. I asked her for some guidance, and she suggested a pregnant teenager.




When she told me this idea I was totally opposed. I thought “Why would I ever create a film on something so uncomfortable and controversial?” After speaking with my partner, Madi, about it and to my teacher, they absolutely loved the idea. Although this was a weird concept for me to grasp, I knew I had to try it out and trust the process.




After stepping out of my comfort zone, the ideas just started to flow. I knew I needed some sort of obstacle to overcome during this film, considering the genre. Having a pregnant teen wasn’t enough. I wanted to add more layers of conflict like the fact that she is excelling in high school, and has a big future ahead of her. This, still, was not enough for me. I wanted viewers to be engaged. I thought, “wouldn’t it be so interesting if we had the guy that impregnated her, just leave her alone the next morning?” to add a further sense of suspension. Ideas were FLOWING. And then I needed to spice it up, even more, and I had the guy be in the same classroom as her.




After my ideas started flowing, I started to stress out way less. But then, I realized I was brainstorming way too much, and I needed to start filming. There were many hardships in trying to find times that worked for me and my partner to film. Not only do we have to film, but we also needed to find actors. Then I began to stress again.




My partner Madi, really only filmed me once as we needed to find times that were more convenient for me as I was the lead actor. This lead to the decision that Madi would edit the whole thing since she was barely able to really help produce or direct. Most of the time I had friends filming me with Madi on the phone and helping make mise-en-scene choices and decisions.




Finding actors wasn’t too bad, but I obviously felt a little guilty for having them take time out of their lunches or days to help me film. At some point, I did just grab random people and teachers from the hallways which ended up working out.




After I was finally done filming, I felt so much stress leave my body. That was until I found out about the CCR. All that work and I still wasn’t finished.




I started working on my CCR’s RIGHT AWAY. I started brainstorming ideas, and I had a good idea of what I wanted, but my teacher did not recommend it so I had to get ideas from friends and obviously come up with some by myself. I ended up doing a house tour and a podcast which I think came out pretty well. The editing process for the CCR did take me a fat minute as I had to incorporate lots of multimedia, all while I was in Aruba, on spring break. It was quite annoying that I had to work on it during spring break but I’m just happy that it’s all over with.




Overall, I’m extremely proud of my work and I’m extremely proud of how far I’ve come. I think I’ve put so much effort into this project and it’s finally over. The stress and the tears were all worth it and I’m so proud of how far I’ve come not only as a producer, director, and screenwriter, but also as an actor. I think I really challenged myself with this film and I hope Cambridge enjoys it.