By Goutam Shankar
Jamshedpur: Tata Steel’s Society for the Promotion of Performing Excellence (SPPE) and Kolkata’s Take5 Communications, as a part of the 100 Years of Indian Cinema celebrations, conducted a Film Making course for senior school students at the Center for Excellence. Sixty students from prominent city educational institutions participated in the day long course conducted by Take5 Communications.
Tathagata Bhattacherjee, chief, Take5 Communications and established film maker with many hit feature movies and documentary, short and corporate films under his belt, conducted the classes along with film actor-director Abhishek Ganguli. Lending them technical support were cinematographer Nirmal Mukherjee who was ably assisted by Bapi Samanta with lights and Tapan Sardar with the monitor board. Popular stage and film character actor Indranil Hazra was especially present for acting demonstration.
Tathagata and Abhishek gave detailed briefings to the students on story conception and buildup, script and screenplay envisioning and writing, scene segmentation, shot division, understanding of the camera, framing, angles, camera movements and shots, purposes of trolley and crane and use of required lights and their intensity.
Apart from a keen question-answer session, a quiz based on the film making course covered, was conducted. The visuals comprised clippings from classic films covering the initial period of cinema to present day magnum opuses.
Tathagata Bhattacherjee later told the media, “We (Take5 Communications) have been conducting classes on all chapters of film making at various educational centers all over the country. I am happy to note that senior class students and higher are seriously considering careers in various segments of film making. I was highly impressed with the keenness shown by the students present today. They were eager and keen on going in for the varied options the film industry has on offer. This augers well for a healthier trend in our world of film making.”
Abhishek Ganguli was equally optimistic. “Today’s kids have a greater grasping power, especially on the technical aspects. Film making is all about science in general and physics in particular. Today’s group of budding school kids displayed a sense of eagerness to grasp all segments taught to them. They have the course etched in their minds as was proved by the question-answer and quiz sessions. We are optimistic that the young ones will seriously consider film making as a positive career option.”
SPPE chief Jenny Shah, who was instrumental in the success of the Tata Steel sponsored ‘100 Years of Indian Cinema’ celebrations’ success was all praise for the competent way in which the film making course was conducted by Take5 Communications. She said, “The students were highly satisfied and are eager for more (such classes). We indeed feel that the purpose of this session (film making course) has been served.”When The Avenue Mail asked some students who had participated in the film making course at the CFE about their opinion, they said that their interest and keenness had been further boosted with the session. “We now have a fantastic career option and we will certainly build on the information imparted to us today.”