Write It | Plan it | Shoot It | Direct It | Edit It | Show It

Let’s make a film!

Short films are some of the favourite films at Raindance Film Festival. The beauty of a short film is you don’t need to have experience, money or training to make one. A short can be anything from a few seconds (like a Vine video) to 45 minutes (according to the Oscars™).

This toolkit shows you how to make a short film.

Check out these 12 steps below to find out how to get your short film made!
Write It | Plan it | Shoot It | Direct It | Edit It | Show It

Step 1. Get a script together

A short film is a unique type of story. Because it is short you can’t use the normal opening story techniques of a feature.

Here’s some ways professional screenwriters create stories for short films. You need to hook your audience. These story techniques condense the opening into a few seconds.

• Universal moment: a short film favourite. Wedding, first kiss, national and religious holidays, championship sporting events
• Cyclical story: stories that tend to start and end at the same place, but there is now new meaning
• Time bomb: where something specific must happen in a certain time or else dire consequences will befall the character

Here’s some idea generation exercises. Can you write a hundred words on one of these? Could it become the basis for a short film?

– the office prank
– a day in the life of …
– the local bus stop

There are loads of tricks to generate ideas for shorts.

A script for a short need not be written in industry standard format. But it should be written in what filmmakers call a ‘Shot List’, a simple a one or two line description of each shot the camera takes.

[To get your very own professional script format guide send an email to Lexus@raindance.org]

Check out the other steps below and happy filmmaking!
Write It | Plan it | Shoot It | Direct It | Edit It | Show It

Created for the LEXUS Short Film Competition