Director's Notes

Production History

I started this film as an autobiography. The idea was that myself and a collaborator of mine would play the main characters, and the plot would mirror a separate (feature length) project that we had been working on together for the past year. However, when my collaborator dropped out of this project last minute, I chose to "forge" on ahead without him, and continue producing the film despite the obstacles. With less than two weeks before the shoot, I was able to pull together an amazing cast and crew. Their creative contributions elevated the story and captured the narrative with incredible depth and dignity.

Production Notes

Because I wanted to shoot with a lot of candle light, I rented the Sony a7s camera. I'd seen what the a7s could do while doing art direction for a film submission to the 72 hour film festival in NYC. I was totally blown away by the dynamic range and low light capabilities. While shooting in 4k wasn't in my budget for this film, the camera still produced incredible images. We used my DP's canon lenses, and for 90% of the candle-lit scenes, were able to record without cheating the light with additional bulbs. For one scene in the bedroom, we used a 6ft slider. As a sketch artist, I originally developed the script as a series of drawings and storyboards. Although the dialogue and plot changed quite a bit, all of the first images I had in mind for the script remained in the final film. Special Thanks to writer, Daniel Kim for his creative feedback on the early written scripts.