I had a hard time trying to come up with a project for a "instructional video" for my class at Coastal Carolina University Instructional Design program.
I knew that bullying was a major issue at school, and I also knew that I wanted to make my film entertaining, and that it should be something that I know a lot about: Star Wars
It wasn't too long before I was sparked by my dark humor, enjoyment of parody - such as the loud stylings of the late Infomercial guru Billy Mays, love of Star Wars nerdiness and concern for the topic of bullying - not to mention how boring the instructional videos are that I have to watch about it every year.
I also knew that I have never been able to really make a Star Wars fan film, something that would just divulge my utter love of the greatest film of all time. I knew as a fan film, there were certain things that I had to do JUST right to pay homage to my favorite film. If you are a Star Wars geek such as myself, I hoped you picked up on the following:
- Opening and closing John Williams music
- "I got a baaaaad feeling about this" (mentioned in all 6 films)
- Same color/font as "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away"
- Digital rotoscoping/special fx thanks to the Force.net and Video Copilot
- Over use of wipe transitions, which is the dominant transition found in Star Wars as an homage to Akira Kurosawa films
- My numerous props from my own collection and some of my younger brother Sal's things but not including to my action figures, Pepsi bottle, ROTJ bed sheets, R2D2 droid, Lego figures, action figure books, and even a talking Yoda
- The "Wilhelm scream" sound effect when I cut off the football player's hand. This sound effect can be found in numerous films, but it always make me think of Lucasfilm
- 1-900 THX 1138 (numers/letters repeatedly found in Lucasfilms)
For those of you, such as my students at school, I have also uploaded the MP4 of my movie
Speaking of my students, I hope this will teach them a little something about bullying. I know from my own personal experiences of a Star Wars nerd, I was bullied in school. In fact, I was bullied in some of the t-shirts that you see me wearing in this film. And in turn, when I became a senior in high school, I bullied freshman.
Hopefully, together we can cut down on bullying by utilizing some of the tips in my film, and if not, at least you can be entertained.
I also wanted to give a very special thanks to all of my students and parents at school to help get this done - along with my wife, family and everyone else who helped accomplish this task.
