The past week we have experienced something great, something phenomenal, something that can’t quite be put into words. The experience took us through amazing doors, it gave us exciting ideas, it brought us new awarenesses, it taught us helpful tips, and it showed us incredible secrets. It was the 2010 Christian Filmmakers Academy in San Antonio, Texas. The academy is a three-day journey that happens about once a year. This year however, is said to have been the best one yet.
One of the very first courses was taught by Kirk Cameron, actor in Fireproof. His testimony was amazing and his thoughts and lessons were very encouraging. Later on the same day we heard from Stephen Kendrick. His session is where I believe we learned the most from. He went over steps for directing, acting, editing ect. that sounded so simple but yet are commonly missed by many filmmakers. And to add some sprinkles on top of the already exciting day, he ended off with showing us several scenes from the movie Courageous. Clips that no one else had seen and that probably no one else will see until its release to theaters date. Courageous is going to be awesome! The rest of the of the Academy was mainly filled with Doug Phillip’s and Geoff Botkin’s amazing classes. There were about 8 sessions a day, over an hour each, and I don’t think there was one that we didn’t learn a list of things from.
One of the greatest experiences of the whole Academy though, was simply the fellowship with other filmmakers. Spending time with our Ace Wonder friends was very refreshing and to put it bluntly was nothing short of a BLAST! But what was even more exciting than that was meeting new people, acquiring new contacts and creating new friendships.
Like I said, the summary of the Academy can’t easily be put into words. But I hope this post has given you at least a tiny little taste of what we experienced during the Christian Filmmakers Academy. We already have the next one on our schedule and are eagerly waiting for it to come.
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Stay tuned for upcoming posts on the Film Festival and some of the films that were shown.
