Chapter 12:

PART III: Filmmaking

MONDAY CAME FAR too quickly that weekend. Mom dropped off my candy money with Ms. Fitzgerald at the elementary school and discovered I actually had two-hundred-and-sixty dollars extra in my account. She said that a couple corporations had given some donations that had helped. I was ecstatic when she told me that night. I'd never, ever, had that much money to spend before!

On Tuesday I went over to Amy's house and we played Barbies some more. She made a comment during that episode that if we kept playing with them she was going to have to get me my own dolls. I couldn't tell her, but I could think of few things that I wanted more. I was so glad that we had become such good friends. Amy had really filled a void in my life since I had never really had any real friends, let alone one like her before. We had become so close now I was sure I wouldn't know what to do without her.

Mom had commented on my necklace that Saturday night when she had brought me home. Somehow neither of my parents had ever noticed it before. Apparently Mrs. Hancock had told her about it while they were in the car, so she had asked me if she could see it. After looking at it she had told me she couldn't believe that Mrs. Hancock had spent so much on us.

When I had looked at her questioningly, she told me she guessed that the set must have cost at least three-hundred dollars. My mouth was open for most of the rest of the evening. I had no idea.

That Wednesday we were sitting in our English class when Mr. Tamera said, "We're going to have a major assignment due the week after next. It's going to serve as a major grade for this nine-week period. It's also going to serve as half of your semester final exam grade."

He let that sink in for a moment as we all got a bit nervous. After he handed out project guideline sheets he continued. "This will be a group project. You will each be working in a group of four people. Each group will present their project in class in two weeks. You have several options here on what you can do..." He explained the options and said, "You must do it on one of the books that is listed below. The more unique and exceptional your project is the higher grade you will receive."

He talked for a few more minutes before we divided up into groups. I was so glad that Amy was in this class! She actually hadn't been at the beginning of the year but had been transferred into this class at the semester. Why? I don't know. I thought she had a better English teacher before. Within a few minutes Amy, Nikki, Ashley and I had our desks together and were brainstorming on what to do the project on.

Amy was looking at the paper and said, "We should do a video for our project!"

"That sounds like fun," I replied.

"We could be really creative and use Barbies for the characters," Nikki suggested.

"That sounds like a great idea," Ashley added.

"Umm... okay." I said. Ashley and Nikki didn't know that I played with Amy and her Barbies... I didn't really want to give them any indications otherwise.

"My dad has a video camera that we can use for it." Amy said.

"Okay," I replied.

"Well let's start working on a script then," Amy said.

We did as she said. Amy suggested using one of the Nancy Drew books on the list as the basis for our movie. She seemed to think that would be one of the easiest books to use for what we had planned. I wasn't so sure – I had read all of them before – but I went along with it. After about ten minutes of sitting in class we went down to the library with a pass to see what we could find.

We picked out the specific book we were going to use and the four of us divided it up into four parts. Each of us was going to come up with a script from our section. At the end of class we each agreed that we should work on recording our video this Saturday. That way, if anything went wrong, we'd still have a week to figure out how to get the project done.

When I came home that day I told my parents about the project and they seemed to think that it fit the 'unique' and 'creative' criteria for the project. I worked hard on the computer that night coming up with my part of the script for the book. I was amazed I managed to get as much done with it as I did that night. I really only had about four pages of my portion of the book left to do when I went to bed that night. I printed out what I had done and took it with me to school the next day.

We were sitting in the group talking when Ashley said, "Hey guys, I told my dad about this project and he offered to let us use the TV Station for it."

I had completely forgotten that Ashley's dad was one of the managers at the local TV Station. "We can use their cameras?" I asked incredulously.

"Yep! And, he said we can use their editing equipment too. He'll show us how to use everything."

"Wow, cool!" Nikki said.

"Yeah," Amy and I said at the same time.

"Then it's settled?" Ashley asked.

"Definitely," I replied to her.

We spent the remainder of the class period working out what we would need for Saturday. The girls discussed what Barbies they had, what doll houses they would need, and how they would get all of it there. I just sat there in stunned amazement. I was taking part where I thought I could, but I didn't have any Barbies of my own to bring for this. And, even if I did, I wouldn't be sharing that bit of information with them! Before class ended that day we all agreed we would have our scripts completed by the next day.

That night at home I finished my script and then called Amy. We talked for a short while before I reminded her she was supposed to come over to our house the next night. She agreed again on that and, as we hung up the phones, went to get a note signed by her mom so that she could ride the bus to my house.

She called me back a few minutes later and said, "Hey Brandon, this is Amy again. My mom wants to talk to your mom."

"Okay?" I replied quizzically.

My mom got on the phone and after listening for several minutes said, "That sounds like a great idea... No I don't have any problem with taking her for the night... I can drop them both off at the station Saturday then.... Sounds great!" I wondered what she was talking about.

"Okay, here's Brandon," She said as she handed the phone to me. She whispered to me, "Amy wants to tell you."

I got on the phone and asked, "Tell me what?"

"Well, Mom and Dad need to go see my grandparents in Las Cruces tomorrow. They were originally going to drag me along too. I told them I had to do the project with you guys this weekend, so they thought they'd see if I could stay with you guys for the weekend..."

"Cool!" I interrupted, that was so exciting!

"I thought so too. Anyway, I'll be coming over to your house tomorrow after school and I'll stay until Sunday afternoon. I'm so excited!!" She said, clearly hyper.

"Yeah!" I paused for a second and suddenly wondered, "Umm... Amy? What are we going to do about getting your stuff over to the TV Station?"

"Ooh... that's a good question. Let me ask my Mom." She came back a second later and asked, "Is your mom going to be home during the day at all?"

I went and asked my mom real quick, before coming back and telling her that she'd be home around ten for a bit. She went and talked to her mom for another quick second and said, "Okay, my Mom's going to bring over my clothes and stuff, and the things we need for Saturday at ten. Just let your mom know that she's going to do that, k?"

"Sure," I replied. We finished up our conversation and I let Mom know of the plans.

I went to bed really excited about the project. I thought it was going to be a blast to work with the TV Station's equipment on Saturday. It was also going to be great having Amy over to spend the weekend.

That night I dreamed that playing with Barbie dolls was a normal thing for boys to do. Everyone played with them right? At least in the dream they did. For my birthday I imagined my parents buying me a great big dollhouse and filling my room with Barbies... It was great.

IN CLASS THE next day we combined all of our work into one script and fixed some problems that we saw in our storyline. I think we all left looking forward to Saturday and the filming we were going to do. Ashley's dad was going to meet us at the TV station at nine in the morning. We were planning on being there till five in the evening, or later, working on it. The girls all made sure that they had their lists together of stuff they needed to bring.

After school Amy rode the bus with me to my house. The driver had already been told by my mom that Amy was going to ride today. When I opened the door I saw that two of Amy's dollhouses were sitting on the floor in the living room. They were going to be really important for the film, so we were glad to see that her mom had dropped them off. We made sure that we had all of the dolls and clothes we needed too, then I made her play with Legos for a bit. It wasn't that I didn't want to play with her Barbies, it was more that I didn't want Mom to come home and find us playing with her Barbies!

Dad was out of town at a convention for the weekend, so it was just Mom, Amy, and I at home. She made dinner for us and then we sat down to watch a movie in the living room. When we were done she said, "Listen Brandon, I think it's time for my turn to play with your hair!" she said.

"Ooh yeah," Amy said. "I think it might even be getting long enough we can braid it decently now!"

My hair at this point had reached just past my shoulders. I loved it, and was genuinely happy that she was going to play with it. "Okay – I guess." I said to her indifferently.

Before I knew it I was getting attacked with all sorts of brushes, feeling my hair pulled and twisted this way and that, having my hair braided and such. After looking at me like that she said, "let's do something different." She whispered something in Amy's ear and she nodded. She had me go dunk my head in the sink real quick to get my hair wet, before beginning to work from scratch on it. She also brought out something that I had wondered about for some time – the curling irons.

A little while later she had my hair curled under at the bottom, and I had bangs that were also curled up top. My hair certainly looked like a girls at that moment! She soon snapped some more pictures (she'd been snapping some every time they set my hair with something,) and said, "That's enough for tonight."

"Umm... will this come out in the morning?" I asked.

"It should." Amy said. Mom had done her hair the exact same way and took pictures of the two of us together before we all sat back down and watched another movie. That night I enjoyed being able to sit there with my hair in pigtails, just like a normal girl, next to Amy and my mom on the couch. After the second movie finished we were ushered towards my room where Amy took the bottom bunk of my bunk beds and we went to bed.

Or so we wanted Mom to think... We actually talked for a long time that night about all sorts of things. I don't think we actually fell asleep until three hours after Mom said, "lights out." I think Mom knew that, because she had even less pity for me about waking up the next morning than she normally did! We both got dressed and ready to go that morning while Mom made breakfast for us. I used one of the ponytail holders that Mom had bought for me to put my hair up after breakfast.

Shortly after eight we gathered all of Amy's Barbie stuff up and put it into our minivan to go down to the station. To say that Amy and I were hyper would have been the understatement of the year. Between the two of us getting to hang out together all weekend, and the excitement of doing something new and interesting like this, nobody could calm us down!

When we arrived we found Nikki and Ashley waiting for us already outside. They gave us a hand taking everything into a studio Ashley's dad had set aside for us to use. The room was actually a lot larger than I ever figured we'd have available to us, and we had a sky backdrop behind it that we believed would be perfect for behind the doll houses. There were several other types of backdrops that were available to us that they used for commercials too.

Ashley's dad gave us a tour and showed us how to use one of the cameras and set up several microphones for us to speak into. We practiced using them for a while and after about two hours of setup and practice we were ready to begin filming. Ashley's dad had worked in the film industry before his current job, so he actually knew more than enough to help us out with anything we wanted to accomplish.

He stayed in the room to watch and answer questions, but left us pretty much, 'hands off,' to do our thing. Occasionally he would make a suggestion about a camera angle, or suggest that we move a light to another place or something. But, overall it was definitely left in our hands to do what we wanted to do. At one point he actually took another camera and recorded us working on the project. He thought it might be a good idea in case someone accused us of letting him do all of the work!

Shortly after one in the afternoon we took a break and ate some pizza he ordered for us.

"Mr. Sanders, thank you so much for all of this. We really appreciate your help!" I said to him.

"It's no problem Brandon! I'm really impressed with what you guys are doing. I think it's going to turn out to be a great project! Certainly a lot better with this equipment than it would have been with a home video camera."

"Yeah – definitely. Just how good is this equipment?" I asked.

"Well, a lot of TV shows are actually shooting with cameras like these now. Plus, since we're able to use a higher quality set of mics and lighting, this should look and sound pretty professional."

"Cool, I can't wait to see our finished product!"

"Neither can I, I think it really is a cute project." He said.

After lunch we got back to work. It was about three when we were able to wrap up our filming. I looked over at the stack of three 'Digital Betacam' tapes that were on the table. Mr. Sanders had explained we had been recording with the best cameras that the studio had.

"Well what do we do now?" I asked.

"Now I'll show you guys how to edit your video down to just the good cuts and what you need to do to put all of those together."

He led us to an editing room, and began to show us how to move the parts we wanted on to one 'master' copy. I couldn't believe how much time it took just to go through this part. We all ended up calling our parents and letting them know we were going to be there for a while still.

At six o'clock Mr. Sanders went to get some burgers from Sonic for us while we continued editing. We finally had a good rough cut done close to eight that night. He helped us come up with some titles for the beginning and end of the film then.

"Tell you what guys, it's almost nine. Why don't we meet back here tomorrow afternoon at two, and finish up by adding some music to the project and cleaning it up?"

"Okay, that sounds good to me," Nikki said with a yawn.

"Yeah Daddy, I'm tired," Ashley said.

"Then we'll do that," he said.

We cleaned up the dolls and the doll houses and everyone took their stuff home. I had called my mom and she was waiting to help us out.

That night Amy and I were only up an hour past when we were told 'lights out.'

SUNDAY MOM MADE us get out of bed at eleven and get ready to go. We arrived at the station on time with a bunch of CD's in hand. Her dad had suggested that we bring some to put behind the film. Adding the background music had somehow made it look much less like a cute kid's project to something far better.

We worked tirelessly for another three hours on the project before declaring it done. I couldn't believe how cool the project looked. He even showed us how to include a clip that he had recorded of us working in the ending credits, next to the credits! I don't know about the rest of the group – but I was pretty psyched about it.

Her dad then showed us how to transfer the master copy to VHS tapes. We made ten copies of the tapes and put them in the nice black hard shell cases that he gave us. He also handed me the original beta master.

"Why are you giving me this?" I asked him.

"Because you basically were the director for this film. I was really impressed with what you did this weekend. In a couple years when you're a bit older I might be able to find a place for you to work down here at the station." They had put my name in the credits as the director, I liked that part!

"Really?" I asked.

"Yep, anyway I thought you should have it. Now let's get you all out of here before we're here till nine again!" He said laughing.

We were basically done, but Amy wanted us to add a nice cover to the front of the videotape cases. She had suggested using her dad's computer at home – so we were all going to meet at her house Wednesday to work on that. She also had suggested we come up with a movie poster for our film. Ashley thought that would be a good night to try out the movie on all of our parents – with everyone planning on getting their parents to watch it at seven that night.

When we finished up at the studio Mom came and picked us up, dropping Amy and her stuff off at her house. Her parent's gave her a hug when she got there – apparently they had just gotten back themselves, and we left her there as they waved us off. I had a lot of fun that weekend, and couldn't wait to show off our project to the class in a week and a half.

By the time I got home that night I was completely exhausted. I ended up laying down on my bed at seven, and the next thing I knew Dad was waking me up for school the next day.

THE DAYS BETWEEN Monday and Wednesday seemed both close and yet so far away. I hung out at Amy's house after school both Monday and Tuesday. Her mom joked that they should make the spare bedroom my room with as much time as I spent over there. Amy seemed pretty enthralled with the idea as well, but of course I couldn't say yes to something like that! That would be cruel to my parents, who both really did love me.

On Wednesday the four of us caught a ride with Nikki's mom to Amy's house. When we asked about riding the bus together there we were told it was too many additional students – and I wasn't about to rock the boat with my Mom's workplace. Once there we went to her dad's study on the first floor and began working with his computer. Amy's mom was already home when we got there, but other than saying a quick 'hi' to the four of us, stayed busy in the kitchen preparing for the party.

To say they had an amazing setup was to understate, big time! He had the latest computer, software, scanner, and printer that you could get. Within about an hour we had created a great color cover for the outside of the VHS tapes. The cover that we put on the tape box featured a picture of one of the dollhouses taken in the studio with our title overlaid on top of the picture. It looked really neat. We also were able to design a 'movie poster' with the same artwork as well.

At 5:30pm her mom came into the study to find us wrapping things up and said, "Okay I need help setting the table please!" She was looking at Amy and me. I wasn't sure when I had reached the new status, but I was no longer a guest and had been accepted as a member of the family. Of course I was honored, but apparently that meant I had to help take care of guests when they came over.

"Okay," Amy and I answered at once. We left the others to finish cleaning up.

We helped her mom put several massive leafs in their formal dining room table so that we could seat fourteen people for dinner. Everyone had two parents present, except Ashley, but she did have her two big sisters that came for dinner too. Ashley didn't talk about it much, but I knew that her mom had died when she was really young.

Monday when we had talked to Amy's mom she had gotten this idea of having a really cool pre-movie dinner get together. She was a great cook – especially for events like these – so we were really looking forward to it. My mom had also gotten in the spirit and created an incredible chocolate mousse cake.

Amy and I made a bit of a game of setting up the table. I think we finished a lot faster because of the game. "Okay you two go get Ashley and Nikki, and then get washed up for dinner."

"Yes ma'am," Amy replied. I think she'd gotten in trouble for a smart aleck comment last night – she was being pretty respectful today.

We dragged the two of them upstairs to the bathrooms and washed up before coming down just in time for all of our families to arrive. Mrs. Hancock had outdone herself on this meal. She had cooked several Prime Ribs to absolute perfection. She also served mashed potatoes, broccoli, and homemade bread. She had taken the afternoon off from her patients so she could do all of this.

At the end of dinner we had the chocolate mousse cake my mom had made. It was by far my favorite dessert that my mom made. The bottom was basically a gigantic chocolate chip cookie. She then took Kit-Kat bars and made a ring around the cookie to make a 'shell' to pour the mousse into. Then if that wasn't rich enough there were also chunks of Kit-Kat bars in the mousse itself. I loved every bite of it! Everyone else also seemed to enjoy it a lot too.

Following dessert we all gathered around in their living room. The four of us ended up sitting on the floor while our parents sat on the sofa and some other chairs that were brought in.

"Well, thank you everyone for coming to the premiere of our movie," Amy stood up and said in front of everyone. "We hope you enjoy our short film!" Our parents were all a little obnoxious at that point, clapping and whistling loudly. They were clearly having a lot of fun, but I was sure they weren't expecting much.

I started the VCR and we began watching the film. Okay, at this point I should preface this; it was a bunch of Barbies with voiceovers in different locations... That being said though, it was actually really incredibly good. The main part of the film lasted just twenty-two minutes, and the credits went on for another three minutes.

Our parents of course had to tell us that it was good, but the four of us agreed we didn't think that they were just saying that because they were our parents... In fact they even made us show it again, so we decided we had something here. After the second showing we all helped clean up from the movie and put our project in a safe place to take to school next week. They also made us take several photographs holding our project and the posters in front of us.

We all left to gohome around 8:30, with everyone saying thank you to the Hancock's for hostingthe premiere. It had been a really funnight for me, and I think everyone all had a fantastic time.

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