TALL TALES: CREATING SHORT FILMS & SHORT STORIES

An immersive and hands-on class in the art of telling short form stories taught by a working director. Students will concept, pitch, and write a short film or short story (music video and video game concepts allowed).

Short films and short stories provide students the freedom to convey a message or experiment with a theme without the burden of committing to a lengthier, more time-consuming task. Students should be free to try many ideas. It’s the process of creating that is important, sometimes more than the result.

Some of the best short stories have inspired television shows such as The Twilight Zone, and the greatest authors began as short story writers such as Stephen King or Earnest Hemingway. Short films have inspired movies such as Whiplash, Bottle Rocket or the animated film Frankenweenie.

SKILLS:

Identity – The best stories are the most personal ones that are unique only to you, even if the underlying theme is a universal one. You can’t tell a personal story unless you know who you are, what you are about and what you want to say. Using techniques in class, each student will investigate and formalize their identity.

Concept & Pitching – Each student will concept and pitch 3 short ideas to the class. Based on students personal choice and constructive feedback from peers, they will choose the one concept they want to work on for the class.

Treatment – Each student will create a visual treatment for their short film, music video or video game concept. For short story writers, they will be required to create visual concept art or a potential book cover that best captures the mood or tone of their story.

Journaling – Students will do free-writing exercises in class to explore their thoughts and ideas, their fears, their hopes. This will help remove that inner voice of self-doubt or writers block that can sometimes clutter the artists mind and prevent them from creating. It can also inspire new ideas.

Screenings – Students will watch several academy award winning and foreign short films, both live-action as well as animated. Students will also read selected short stories by authors such O’ Henry, Flannery O’Conner, Raymond Carver, Anton Chekhov, Earnest Hemingway.

Guest Speaker – As of now I have a screenwriter, video game author (God of War) and concept writer for various projects (Kanye West, Apple TV) who will speak about the importance of being able to write across various genres and platforms. Hope to have more guest speakers by the summer.

NOTE: Please bring a blank notebook (lined or plain) that you will use for journaling at the beginning of each class. This will also be your notebook to use for all your ideas.

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR

Ramesh Iyer is a DGA Commercial, Music Video and Web Series Director who has directed over 100 commercials starring celebrities including Milla Jovovich, Joe Jonas, Demi Lovato, Venus Williams, Cam Newton, Ian Poulter and Kyle Busch.

Winner of an AICP Award and Two Young Gun Cannes Awards for commercials, his work is part of the permanent collection at MOMA New York.

Ramesh began his career writing and concepting for feature film directors including Martin Campbell (Casino Royale), James McTiegue (V for Vendetta), Marcus Nispel (Conan the Barbarian) and Pierre Morel (Taken).

Ramesh studied as a Directing Fellow at the American Film Institute and later received his MFA in Film & Advertising from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. He also graduated from the UCLA Professional Screenwriting Program. His screenwriting mentors were author Joan Tewkesbury (Nashville) and writer/director Michael Gottlieb (Mannequin).