New York Film Acedemy

1st Day

So today was my first day at the NYFA. And what do you know, I was late. But I don't really think it was my fault though. I have been asking to get a schedule a couple of times now. And last week I finally got a letter that I should have received earlier.

The letter

The letter I received said the following:"Check-in and registration is between 9:00am and 12:00pm on Monday, October 25. Please allow 30 minutes to complete the necessary paperwork. All students must be present for orientation, which will be held later that day." Apparently I was wrong, but it sounds like you have to register between 9:00 am and 12:00 pm and you should be there for orientation that will be later that day. And since registration is until 12:00 pm I figured orientation was after 12:00 pm.

More forms!

After filling out a bunch of new forms, my god I can't even count all the forms I needed to complete to get to the US and into NYFA, I finally received my schedule. Anyway I was like 10 minutes late for my first class and that really bugged me. It all worked out, but I missed orientation.

The first class

My first class was Director's Craft #1 and our instructor was Josh Adler. He's a funny guy and I'm looking foreword to other classes he'll be giving. He doesn't like people being late though so that was my first great impression :D He told us about different angles and shots and explained some film jargon. We were also told what's expected from us and told about what films we needed to shoot. I also got the time to look over my schedule and it's a killer! I'll be in school/shooting 7 days a week. And the hours can be killer as well. There are quite some days you're in school from 9:00am till 8:00pm. Outside of those hours you need to write storyboards etc. and figure out where you're shooting your movies. :#

Introductions

I missed people introducing themselves. So when we were on lunch break I tried to get everybody's names. I hitched a ride with Chris and Ike who are cousins and found out that Chris his dad has a production company who produced a lot of big rap vids. Thomas and Oxana also joined for lunch. There are a lot of students in our group from outside the States and most of them already have a lot of experience in film or production of film/tv.

Equipment Orientation and Hands on Camera

Rodrigo Patino had 15 minutes of telling us about the equipment room and guidelines about equipment. Then Ed Timpe kicked off by explaining the cam and how you get your film in, what lenses to use and what should be in the kits you take to a shoot. The camera is so awesome. I'll have to check what kinda camera we use though because I forgot the name. We also learned about F-stops and using filters and how to use a light meter etc. Since I'm a photographer that was the easy part :D

Safety Session

Last but not least Cody Boesen came in to tell us about safety on set. All pretty obvious stuff but always good to be reminded to be careful with all the stuff you do and that on a long day when focus is getting poorer things are doomed to go wrong. And some stuff you might not keep in mind or know about when you don't have a lot of experience on sets.

Well that's it for today. I skipped a lot of stuff from the road trip but I'll post that on my own site when I have the time. Because I know these coming 4 weeks I won't have any time. I'll only be blogging about the NYFA and my experiences and really try to keep up although this is such a killer schedule and also need time to focus on my films.