Istanbul Film Project Workshop

This course will be a guided field trip of Istanbul, Turkey, within the context of students shooting a film project while there. The rich historical, cultural, geographical, and visual landscape of the city makes it an ideal location for the travelling filmmaker. The content of students’ projects may vary each time the course is offered but may include: time-lapse shooting of the urban landscape, creating an architectural documentary, documenting a specific neighborhood in the city, creating a process documentary about a specific element within the city. Students will also gain the experience and skills to learn to operate as a “location filmmaker” which includes proper planning, learning and applying cultural sensitivity, and learning to be comfortable as an outsider filming in both public and private settings. This course includes a pre-trip session, during which students are presented with the course objectives, its main topic and logistical details of the trip itself. After the trip students will have a short period of time to complete post-production on their projects before two short final sessions where we screen projects and wrap up the workshop.