So. You want to make films? You've got your shiny new digital video camera, your high-powered Macintosh complete with some easy editing software. Hey, how hard can this be? Four teams of College of Education faculty, staff and students found the answer to that during a recent digital video training event and movie competition.

Really hard.

As part of the iFair, an Apple Computer sponsored training seminar, participants got a whirlwind, first-hand look at the difference between shooting video tape and making a movie. Given just about four hours to script, shoot and edit, four teams were challenged to create a two to three minute film, burned to DVD, to be evaluated by an independent team of judges. The rules were pretty simple: No prior video footage could be used. Films would be penalized for being shorter than two minutes or longer than three. Each team also got an OET technical consultant along to help get them through hardware and software issues.  To get a close up look at the film-making progress, I tagged along with one of the teams throughout the day. And, I got the inside story on what goes in to turning a bunch of raw video footage and still camera shots into a real story.

As soon as the teams were chosen, I looked around the room and picked the one I think looked like fun to follow. I quickly settled on the one composed of Bonnie Armbruster, Bridget Arvold (both professors in Curriculum and Instruction), Sheryl Benson (Director of the Council on Teacher Education), and Marge Jerich (Program Analyst with CTE). They're paired with Bob Croy from OET as their technical consultant. By the time I make my way over to them, they've already started their movie session off with a quick planning session. What follows is a description of my day on the inside of a video production in the College of Education.

10:25 am -- The team sits down at their editing bay (fancy movie term for a Mac G-4, with all of the trimmings in the Faculty Development Center) for the first production meeting. Well,  "brainstorming/Theme/Shotlist/Script/Huh?" meeting is probably a little more accurate. It's quickly obvious that time is going to be a major consideration throughout the day, and the prospect of a looming deadline pushes things along a bit faster than most would prefer. However, a rough shot list begins to emerge, and threads of themes, from architecture to education start to wander through the conversation.

10:35 am -- The team has list of location shoots in mind, all of which are out of the building, on campus. A story and theme are still fuzzy concepts, but they decide to continue these discussions on the road.

10:50 am -- The six of us are walking (walking really fast, actually) north, with the Hellene Gateway and Altgeld Hall as two of our key destinations. As they walk, the theme gets clearer quickly. The idea comes out as Eye Spy Illini ---- kind of like Where's Waldo, but with campus landmarks. I have a lot of questions about it, but, hey, I'm along for the ride -- though somehow I've also become the official team tripod carrier.

10:53 am -- There's a sudden stop on the main Quad for an "opportunity shoot." The team pulls up in front of Foellinger Auditorium and decides this is a great landmark and a good spot to start gathering footage. It's at this point when all four realize that none of them have ever used either the digital still, or the digital video camera they've been equipped with. A quick tutorial by Bob in the basic operation of both pieces and tape is rolling -- and, as the team quickly learns when using the video at high zoom -- so is the scene. The importance of using a tripod to get steady video suddenly becomes clear to all involved.

11:00 am -- Foellinger is long forgotten, the team is now on the fast track to the Krannert Center. Bridget Arvold stops to gather footage of a piece of sculpture in front of the Life Sciences Building. There was some quick debate on this subject, with the rest of the team deciding it wasn't necessary. However, Arvold has the camera -- the de facto tie-breaker in these disputes. The rest of the team moves ahead to Krannert to scout.

11:10 am -- We stop to tape (and to still photograph) the amphitheater steps on the east side of the Krannert Center -- one of the unique elements of the campus.

11:18 am -- Steps are history, now the shot of the moment is another sculpture, this one in the entry to the Foellinger Great Hall inside Krannert. Capturing the close-up and then getting a gentle pan out to tape the Great Hall sign takes several tries. This is the most technical composition shot so far and pretty much everyone makes a practice run of it. It's time well-spent as this sequence turns out to be one of the best in the final piece.

11:25 am -- I duck around the corner for coffee and emerge to find the lobby empty and my film crew vanished -- these people do not spend a long time in one place. Remembering the plan, I head for the Hellene Gateway, just a couple blocks further. And, sure enough, I find Sheryl Benson standing at the corner of Lincoln and Green Streets, shooting tape. She's become separated from the rest of the team who are off gathering more still shots.

11: 35 am -- The arch is shot, and the team is on to the fountain just behind it.

11:45 am -- Welcome to Altgeld Hall. The team has split up again, and I've got no idea what the current plan is. I find the video camera crew shooting close-ups of the Nathan Ricker-designed U of I brass logos on the west side doors. Apparently, plans to get footage inside have been dumped due to time constraints.

11:50 am -- While in the neighborhood, the team decides that the Alma Mater statue is simply too good a thing to miss. This turns out to be a brilliant decision, as an extreme close-up of the left eye of the sculpture will play an integral part in the Eye Spy production.

12:05 pm -- Back in front of the Education Building, the team is looking to find the one shot that best represents the building. Immediately, all eyes focus on one of the pigeons sitting ominously over our heads. Sadly, even with the tripod and a couple hours of experience, the team finds that pigeons are miserable film subjects. They move to the steel sculpture outside the north entrance as a second choice.

12:15 pm -- Location shooting is done. The team has gathered video and still footage from nine different spots in just slightly over an hour and a half. This is a lot of material, in a short period of time. Given that many film crews will work in a single location for days, getting nine in ninety minutes is pretty amazing.

12:45 pm -- After a break for lunch, the team hits the editing bay -- ready to start what's going to prove to be the real work. The Faculty Development Center is suddenly a pretty chaotic place. All four teams are back in the "studio" to start their editing. Things are cramped, there's a lot of background noise -- combined with the deadline, less than 2 hours before teams are supposed to be burning their finished projects to DVD for judging, the pressure is already mounting.

1:00 pm -- Another tutorial from Bob has the team ready to hook up their cameras and start downloading video clips and still images to their Mac to start assembling the movie.

For a bystander, the next hour and a half is pretty uneventful. For the participants, it flies. Suddenly footage from nine locations becomes a big challenge. That's a lot of clips to transfer, to review and to place in the film timeline. In fact, given the time constraints, along with the realization that not everything filmed in the field comes out like you hoped, the team will end up scrapping most of their taped material to focus on just a few locations for the finished product.

2:30 pm -- If the FDC was busy an hour ago, it's much like I'd imagine a NASA control center to be like now. Keyboards are being pounded, debates over cut points and scene transitions are flying. Every fifteen seconds or so a new music track sounds out over the general chaos as several of the teams are working out the sound component of their pieces. 2:30 was supposed to be the production/editing deadline, in order to have time to burn the films to DVD and present them to the judges by 3pm. So far, nobody has even asked where the blank DVDs are stored. There is still a storm of editing and arguing underway. It's loud, busy and, generally, a fun place to be.

2:50 pm -- Suddenly one team stands up and wanders off. The first ones done! I look to see where my team stands. It doesn't look promising. While most of the clips are in place and have been edited for size and composition, I'm not sure they've got any transitions or sound in place.

3:00 pm -- A second team has started burning their film, leaving just two groups pounding away. I see my team has drafted Ed Cranston, the Apple trainer into service to assist them with adding titles and some transitional elements to their film. Looking over their shoulders, it looks like things are really coming together.

3:20 pm -- Pencils down everyone. Everyone is done. At least as done as they're going to get. Though, when you wander around the room, most of the discussions start with "I wish we'd had time to ."

4:00 pm -- The films have been delivered to the judges and in the meantime, everyone is back in the FDC to see their work played on the big screen for the public.

I'm impressed when I see the final piece, and not just because the team has included a shot of me in the closing credits. Considering what things looked like just five hours ago, random ideas being pitched around as they walked across campus, and basically no experience with the equipment or the software or in editing movies, the two minutes of Eye Spy Illini pulled off by Arvold, Armbruster, Benson and Jerich is really impressive. Sure, it was rough around the edges, but, hey, try giving yourself four hours to conceptualize, film and produce a video and see how things turn out.

And the judges agree. Their two and a half minutes is good enough to earn the four of them a share of second place in the competition. They're beaten out by a walking tour of the Krannert Art Museum guided by the curator himself -- an act of shameless manipulation that everyone has to admit results in a really cool short film.

Armbruster, Arvold, Benson and Jerich aren't holding their heads in shame, by any means. Second place looks pretty good, especially considering what they had less than three hours ago. And, everyone had a much better idea of what's involved in video production -- from the challenges of maintaining a steady hand to the simple understanding that everything takes twice as long as you expect.

"We needed more time," says Benson.

"Really, this would have been a great two day event," agrees Armbruster. "It took us a lot of time just to get used to the physical equipment, much less editing the clips on the computer." All four agree that the clock, combined with their unfamiliarity with the territory of video production were the most challenging features.

But, all four immediately and enthusiastically agreed that the iFair did its job -- to introduce our faculty and staff to the potential of digital video technology to use in their teaching. I asked them all if, on their own, would they have been likely to sit down for 6 hours and immerse themselves in the experience as they had done here.

"Absolutely not. I wouldn't have done this on my own," said Arvold.

And, that, was really the point of the iFair in the College of Education.