"Movie making classes start with a script idea. We quickly morph our chosen story into screenplay format with a beginning, middle and and end, a resolution, character arc and all that good stuff. Then once our project is storyboarded, we assign roles, take turns shooting, directing and editing our film in iMovie." Jenny, founder/teacher
WATCH OUR MOVIES ON BIG PICTURE YOUTUBE CHANNEL!!
GENERAL PROGRAM INFORMATION. PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE SIGNING UP!
Big Picture film and photography workshops are available during school vacation weeks, during the summer and privately to 11-15 year olds. The most common age is 13. Big Picture offers a "boutique" learning experience and is part art school/part camp. During film classes, students write, shoot, act and edit a short movie in iMovie. Class size is between 7-12 kids.
HOME TEACHING SPACE: Our home base is the Big Picture home teaching space near the Franklin Park Zoo, where we conduct lessons, review work and edit our projects. One cat and a dog live at the space but are kept separate from the program. Although students usually like to play with an take pictures of the cat, Thumbs. Since 2011, when surveyed, 100% of students said they like having the teaching space in Jenny's home with access to a large yard, living room/game space and working in a family environment.
FIELD TRIPS: Part of filming takes place "on the go" shooting and filming around the Boston area. Teachers drive students around for field trips in the Big Picture Vehicle (s) giving us the freedom to go where we want quickly and conveniently. Whatever movie we make dictates where we go to shoot. Lately we have shot a lot at the 1900's teaching space, the Forest Hills Cemetery, castle island, franklin park and JP Pond.
FOOD: Each day we go to one lunch spot or students can bring a bagged lunch. We try to let you know the lunch option ahead of time so you can decide if you want to pack a lunch.
PICK UP&DROP OFF: Currently, students are picked up/dropped off in JP at The Soldier's Monument (corner of Centre/South/Eliot Streets). We have found this to be easier for parents and students commuting alone rather than getting to the Home Teaching Space in Dorchester. After pick up, we either go on a field trip to film/shoot or head to the home teaching space (2 miles away) to edit and have lessons.
To skip directly to a full Summer 2018 workshop listing on Constant Contact CLICK HERE.
WATCH OUR MOVIES ON BIG PICTURE YOUTUBE CHANNEL!!
GENERAL PROGRAM INFORMATION. PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE SIGNING UP!
Big Picture film and photography workshops are available during school vacation weeks, during the summer and privately to 11-15 year olds. The most common age is 13. Big Picture offers a "boutique" learning experience and is part art school/part camp. During film classes, students write, shoot, act and edit a short movie in iMovie. Class size is between 7-12 kids.
HOME TEACHING SPACE: Our home base is the Big Picture home teaching space near the Franklin Park Zoo, where we conduct lessons, review work and edit our projects. One cat and a dog live at the space but are kept separate from the program. Although students usually like to play with an take pictures of the cat, Thumbs. Since 2011, when surveyed, 100% of students said they like having the teaching space in Jenny's home with access to a large yard, living room/game space and working in a family environment.
FIELD TRIPS: Part of filming takes place "on the go" shooting and filming around the Boston area. Teachers drive students around for field trips in the Big Picture Vehicle (s) giving us the freedom to go where we want quickly and conveniently. Whatever movie we make dictates where we go to shoot. Lately we have shot a lot at the 1900's teaching space, the Forest Hills Cemetery, castle island, franklin park and JP Pond.
FOOD: Each day we go to one lunch spot or students can bring a bagged lunch. We try to let you know the lunch option ahead of time so you can decide if you want to pack a lunch.
PICK UP&DROP OFF: Currently, students are picked up/dropped off in JP at The Soldier's Monument (corner of Centre/South/Eliot Streets). We have found this to be easier for parents and students commuting alone rather than getting to the Home Teaching Space in Dorchester. After pick up, we either go on a field trip to film/shoot or head to the home teaching space (2 miles away) to edit and have lessons.
To skip directly to a full Summer 2018 workshop listing on Constant Contact CLICK HERE.
The Crew filming "Scizzy Dizzy and A South Get Paid"
SUMMER 2018
August 6th- August 17th: Two-week Fiction Film Workshop $835 CLICK HERE to sign up
Students will learn screenplay structure, story development, directing, acting, camera work and editing. After we decide on our story we morph it into proper screenplay format with 3 Acts, Character Arc, Obstacles that the hero must overcome and all that good stuff. We storyboard, assign actors, film around town and edit at the teaching space. Students are welcome to bring short scripts to choose from and/or ideas for our project. Editing is done in iMovie with possible field trip to Apple Store. We also spend a some time watching movies and may go to one matinee. Each student will asked to play a vital role and often switch around from acting, directing, filming and editing. Do not be shy. We need to act in our own films. We like comedies and we like to have fun!
CLICK HERE to see our film 2017, "The Cat's Out of the Bag".
August 6th- August 17th: Two-week Fiction Film Workshop $835 CLICK HERE to sign up
Students will learn screenplay structure, story development, directing, acting, camera work and editing. After we decide on our story we morph it into proper screenplay format with 3 Acts, Character Arc, Obstacles that the hero must overcome and all that good stuff. We storyboard, assign actors, film around town and edit at the teaching space. Students are welcome to bring short scripts to choose from and/or ideas for our project. Editing is done in iMovie with possible field trip to Apple Store. We also spend a some time watching movies and may go to one matinee. Each student will asked to play a vital role and often switch around from acting, directing, filming and editing. Do not be shy. We need to act in our own films. We like comedies and we like to have fun!
CLICK HERE to see our film 2017, "The Cat's Out of the Bag".
FROM FOUNDER/TEACHER:
We started making movies in 2012. We make fiction shorts and also documentary/social experiment movies. The fiction classes are typically two weeks giving us time to write out own script, watch movies and pick out genre and theme. The thing I like about writing our own script is it is relevant to whatever the students are thinking about or interested I at that time. Plus they have more ownership over the characters and the story.
We set up a list of things to shoot and pick out locations and assign actors. Students take turns behind the camera, directing and acting, helping with set design, props and costume. We do everything together. If someone is more interested in camera they can do that more or editing for example. Sometimes we bring in TA’s working in the field to give advice and we usually take an IMovie lesson at the Apple Store.
The fiction movies we have made since 2012 are the “Fortune Cookie Killer”, “Ravioli Revenge”, “The Cereal Killer”, “The High Price”, “Scizzy Dizzy and A South Get Paid”, “Project Ero”, “A Hard Night’s Day”, “Ghost Smashers” and “The Cat’s Out of the Bag”. A lot of our films involve detective work for some reason and a very big dose of humor. Often the actors improv the scene only knowing the goal of the scene before we shoot. The director, actors, camera operators and writers consult to make sure it has all the necessary points for the script/story. With larger groups, like 2017 we had 10 students, we tend to assign more specific roles and also write down more lines and scene info.
For locations we often set up mock sets here at various rooms in the home teaching space. I have a huge two family with a yard and garage and basement. We have access to the second unit as well so it has really worked well for filming. We also shoot around town like Chinatown, The Forest Hills Cemetery, The Prudential, Coffee Shops etc. Whatever it is that we are making, we try to have fun and go with the flow. But, I will keep students on task to make sure we get our movie filmed and edited by last day.
Our Documentary/Social Experiment films are my favorite classes to teach. I have a BA in psychology and this is a fun way to be creative but also explore some kind of social psychology phenomena. We have made 3 films. In “The Kindness of Strangers” we set up different trials for the public to see how kindly people react. Like dropping a dollar and see if it’s returned. Wearing a sling and crutches and dropping stuff to see if people would help pick it up. Wearing a sling and asking someone to tie your shoe.
Documentaries are also accompanied by a series of questions we ask the public and we try to go to lower, middle and upper income neighborhoods to compare/contrast answers. For example in our film, “Safety: Real or an Illusion” one of the questions is “Do you think people need guns to protect themselves?” The lower income subjects gave a definite “no” (even though they were the only group to hear gunshots all the time). Middle class subjects gave a soft no and the upper class neighborhood subjects said yes.
Often these doc weeks are a hybrid of some creative acting and the documentary trials and interviews. For example in “The Bystander Effect” we do a reenactment of the scene showing how the phenomena came to be coined. In “Safety: Real or an Illusion”, midway though the film it turns into a fiction caper movie when one of the interviewers gets “kidnapped”. We have to call on the two detectives from the previous summer’s film, “Ravioli Revenge”, Inspeca Deck and Dexter to help solve the crime. Of course for fun and because the students wanted to dress up, we hire a real life superhero to join the investigation. This came about because we watched a documentary for motivation before deciding on our own project, which happened to be about people who think they are, and act like superheroes in everyday life.
Most kids tend to think they want fiction movie making class, which is why we have only had 3 doc classes in 6 years. But I feel like if kids knew what we actually do, and how fun it is, they would love the social experiment movies.
Jenny Connelly
Teacher & Founder
March 2018
MORE BIG PICTURE ART HOUSE PRODUCTIONS
CLICK HERE to go to our YouTube Channel
CLICK HERE to get to all of our videos on FaceBook.
CLICK HERE to see our 2017 film, "The Cat's Out of the Bag"
Click Here to see our 2016 documentary film, "Bystander Effect".
Click Here to check out our 2016 film "Ghostsmashers".
CLICK HERE to check out our 2015 film, "A Hard Night's Day".
CLICK HERE to check out our 2014 Fiction Film, "Scizzy Dizzy and A South Get Paid".
CLICK HERE to see The High Price, fiction film, 2013.
Social Experiment Films The Kindness of Strangers and Safety: Real or an Illusion.
CLICK HERE to go to our YouTube Channel
CLICK HERE to get to all of our videos on FaceBook.
CLICK HERE to see our 2017 film, "The Cat's Out of the Bag"
Click Here to see our 2016 documentary film, "Bystander Effect".
Click Here to check out our 2016 film "Ghostsmashers".
CLICK HERE to check out our 2015 film, "A Hard Night's Day".
CLICK HERE to check out our 2014 Fiction Film, "Scizzy Dizzy and A South Get Paid".
CLICK HERE to see The High Price, fiction film, 2013.
Social Experiment Films The Kindness of Strangers and Safety: Real or an Illusion.
Some mischief on the set of "The High Price"
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The Docudrama crew, "Safety:Real of an Illusion"
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Home Teaching Space in Dorchester near the zoo, two miles from our meeting spot in Jamaica Plain.
