'Student-film’ production

During the rains of 2005, I was at the FTII as Post-Production Consultant for dialogues exercise films of 2nd year students. I spent nearly 85 days in the campus, during which time I studied the problems in delays of student film production. After crystalising my thoughts I submitted the following as my humble suggestions.

Summery: Students take admission at the FTII to make a carrier in films, television, music business or any other business related to the entertainment industry. For this they study various specialised subjects, which are fundamental building blocks of ‘art of cinema’. But, learning the ‘art of cinema’ alone cannot grant students any success in any field without incorporating it with the art of ‘time management and financial discipline’. This is true for any business. After speaking to some faculty members and by just being present in the campus, following points emerged and seemed important to streamline the film production process.

Possible solutions for streamlining ‘student-film’ production in future batches of FTII:

· First of all, students seeking admission at the FTII must be prepared to sign an agreement stating conditions and rules of the Institute during their stay here. The draft agreement-sheet could be given for reading to all who are called to appear for the interview, before the interview.
· The ‘agreement’ should have the specific details of various films the students will be making in their 1st, 2nd and 3rd years.
· Each film will mention the medium (35mm/16mm/DV tape) on which it will be shot and final copy submitted.
· Also mentioned will be the ‘type’ and ‘quantity’ of film/tape stock within which each film will have to be completed.
· Each film’s maximum allotted number of shooting, editing, sound track laying and mixing ‘shifts’, will be an essential part of the information.

For example - ‘Dialogue exercise’ (2nd year Direction)

· Duration of the film ‘Up to 10 min’ (and not of 10 min duration)
· 35mm film negative allotted and provided by FTII - 3000ft,
· 35mm sound negative allotted and provided by FTII - 1000ft,
· 8 shifts of editing,
· 2 shifts of ‘track-laying’,
· 2 shifts of R/R …etc
· They may be told that if the film assessment carries 100 marks, 20 marks are for completing it within time schedule and within the raw stock provided.
· If a student is able to cover the ‘submitted and approved’ script in its totality in an 8 min long film, (maximum 10min) he/she should get academic benefits and appreciation. (Old adage of a dress; it should be long enough to cover the whole topic and short enough to be interesting)
· Similarly indiscipline of buying extra tapes for shooting or asking for more film or sound negative should attract lower assessment for their films.
· The problem of students buying their own DV tapes for shooting, could be tackled by the authorities ‘stamping or numbering’ the issued DV tapes. No student should be allowed to bring ‘unstamped’ tapes in the editing room.
· Supervisors should stop anyone using more than the allotted space on the HDD of editing systems. It should be brought to the notice of authorities immediately, if rules are being broken.
· Information must be given about how far students are allowed to travel for their shootings. There must be a mention of ‘maximum distance’ or clauses like, ‘within Pune municipal limits’, along with use of vehicles.
· Guideline for set or outdoors budgets, number of lights and light boys etc.
· All scripts must be written with above guidelines in mind. Faculty also must be strict to reject the scripts that cannot be completed within the FTII guidelines.
· It will turn out to be a good exercise for the students to develop more than one ‘script idea’ for each of their film projects. The faculty can then judge the viability of a script on both the parameters of ‘artistic values & production feasibilities’.
· It must be made clear that all film production is actually a practical examination in its real sense and both students and faculty must treat it that way.
· The students must be assessed/examined by their total production process and not only by the quality of the film.
· Surely all the problems/points may be not covered here. They must be included after consultations with concerned authorities like, faculty, administration, lab, studio staff, security or any other branch of FTII and may be ex-students.
· If students know about all the rules clearly in the beginning and have signed the ‘agreement’; faculty will notice that most of the students will be following the norms. And soon it will set in as a system.
· Language of the ‘agreement’ must be simple yet tough, and loose ends must be tied up for smart ones to misuse.
· Yielding to student demands could actually mean that FTII may be making the students, ‘weaker or handicapped’ to work in the very competitive environment of the film industry, where producers have very stringent time and budget constrains. (No TV program can afford to miss its telecast date.)
· Lastly, concerned authorities must thoroughly scrutinise, discuss and modify any/all of these points, to generate maximum streamlining/disciplinary effect, in the larger interest of the Institute, without students loosing value of the quality FTII education.

Some irritants in ‘Sound Department’ that could create bottlenecks in film production -

2 of the 4, Sennheisser Cordless microphones are not working – could affect adversely if there are multiple shootings units.
One of the stereo speakers (Dyna Audio) with the ProTools in the ‘new sound studio’ has gone for repairs for more than a month. This makes one ProTools out of 3 unusable. Students have been avoiding using this system for their stereo mixes.
2 ‘Sennheisser-816’ are out of order. This is a very important microphone for outdoor recordings. Professional windshields are also necessary for these microphones, as good ‘sync sound’ with wind noise has no use for the recordist. It is advisable that these microphones must be repaired sooner than later and windshields procured.
One video projector out of 2 is not working.
Dolby’s 5.1 mixing arrangement along with the projector in the ‘new sound studio’ has not been installed/commissioned yet. Working on 5.1 Dolby would be of immense value to students of sound, editing and direction, since most of the films in India are being mixed with this parameter.
Optical recorder needed servicing.




Arunoday Sharma
Post-Production Consultant
June 2005
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