Artist's Vision | Short Film [Canon R6 ii] 

An artist who can find escape from the noise and normalcy of life by sitting down and escaping into their work. When they put that pencil to paper, the noise fades away and they are able to focus on a world where everything can be black and white. A world of their making. A simple story focusing on aesthetics.
Artist's Vision
-Written, directed, filmed and edited by: Anson Bickerstaff
-Artist: Keegan Owen
-Sound supervisor: Luke Brooks
-Foley: Isaac Ramirez
-Special thanks: The Rockwoods, Caleb Jones, Sharon Ross
This is a film that was five months in the making. It was the last film I shot before college and editing took place during the transition before and after moving from Colorado to Chicago.
The idea was conceived on a flight and was originally just an excuse to film something in this awesome house. Since then however, it grew into a passion project meant to show off a few skills and curiosities I had about film:
1) "Silent film" - Coming off of a very dialogue-heavy short, I wanted to make a film that didn't strive to be great or anything more than it was. I wanted the story to rely more on the technical execution than the actor's performance. The lack of dialogue became a natural step. Writing a script without words made me focus on using every aspect from framing to color to sound to let the audience feel what the artist sees.
2) Cinematography - I wanted to push myself to work on my cinematography, filling the frame and having fascinating framing without relying on flashy movement. Going back to the roots of cinema was a blast and was made even more fascinating after learning about early film in college.
3) Color/lighting - These go hand in hand. I loved the idea of motivating the story through color and light. The artist's room is cool except his desk where he is in warm light which had a fill light on the side as well. In the house, I worked to use natural light, backlighting, and of course the lack of color to provide a nice contrast and let us see the artist.
4) Sound - I am not experienced with sound, but knew as I wrote it that I wanted to focus more on the foley and music. I am happy with how it came out and it's a solid step forward. Still, it's good to have someone who knows more than you available to critique your work.
5) Firsts - This was my first time filming on R6 mark ii, having multiple costume changes (7 I think), editing LOG footage, using Premiere Pro, using Photoshop (making all the sketches), recording foley and making anything over 5 minutes.
This film was a pain to make, but in the best way. Now in college surrounded by like-minded people it will be fascinating to see what some teamwork can do. I am thankful to those involved, and I'm grateful Artist's Vision could be my final project before college. My best guess, close to 100 hours of work.