Thanks to a grant from Cummins Inc. administered through the Arts Council of Chautauqua County, the youth at the Eastside YMCA are one step closer to producing award-winning videos.
In the latest class of a multi-week program, Eric Basile, associate producer for MediaWorks, spent the afternoon Thursday teaching the details of video production.
"What I'm trying to do is get them to come up with ideas for a short film, based on their surroundings and the resources available to them," Basile said. "The video we're working on now is about a ping-pong ghost that haunts the Eastside YMCA and challenges the living to matches. We're looking at things from the creative beginnings all the way through production and post-production."
In addition to teaching the children how to properly frame and shoot a scene, Basile, a University at Buffalo film school graduate, helped them visualize their idea and storyboard the scenes. Together, they sat and discussed how to put the film together and the different approaches that could be used to get to different outcomes.
"This program is an extension of what we've already been working on, as far as the dancing, the choreography and the music," said Billy Torres, Eastside YMCA branch manager. "We have some kids that like to dance and others that like to rap and now we're finding that some of them are more inclined to the technology than being in front of the camera or microphone."
Torres explained that the program is just another way his crew tries to keep the local youth engaged in positive things.
"For every negative influence in the community, we have to have 10 positive things to offer to keep them coming here and off the streets," he said. We try to keep them busy and having fun and the video production is just another great way we can do that."
