44.) The end of an era- Finished Product!

 Helloo!! Welcome back to my blog! Guys... we finally did it!! I'm so excited to share with you loyal viewers the final product for my group and I's film opener. You guys know better than anyone alll of the trials and tribulations we've faced making this film. You also know how much hard work we've put forward to make this the best it can be. I want to thank my fellow group members Mariana Van Brackel, Nahomy Castro, and Phi Le for this awesome collaboration🥺🥺. Also thank you to James Nguyen and Jason Truong for helping us out throughout this journey! 

Grab your snacks, get comfortable and enjoy!

The wait is over, here it is!  I present to you...

Where We Were

43.) What Could've Been...-Failed Ideas

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog! Throughout the production of this project, I've been very transparent in our brainstorming process regarding ALL aspects of the film such as camera shots and angles, camera movement, sound, lighting, color scheme, mis en scene, and editing. My group and I love creative freedom, so we had so many different ideas - some simple, and some more challenging to achieve. In today's blog, I wanted to share with you all a couple of the ideas we had for our project that never got to be showcased...😔😔

42.) Complete Official Storyboard

Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog! As we inch closer and closer to the final project reveal, it's about time you guys see all of the scenes I've been discussing in my blogs in the form of a drawing... In today's post, I'm going to be going in depth into my final projects' storyboard! 

Looking back to the start of this project, I have made MANY changes. I went from brainstorming with a group, to working a solo and starting my own storyline, then to working with my group again and sticking to it! Given this, I have made 3 storyboards so far! One for my solo project, one for this plots' initial storyboard, and finally with all filming and editing with my group complete, our official  storyboard. 

In comparison with our initial storyboard, we did make a few changes. These changes although small, were very fundamental in the development of the plot! Like the initial storyboard, the film opens with our infamous car scene, a gas station sequence, and a packing sequence. However, we did switch things up in terms of camera shots and angles. Initially, we had planned for our packing boxes scene to capture a frontal, head-on mid shot. Then, we'd planned to still incorporate a graphic match cut of the girls getting ready, but this shot was then going to pan right to expose more of the setting. We ended up changing this idea when we got to filming in-person. Our new idea was from a wide shot, showing Vale actively packing boxes instead of the boxes already set and packed with no human movement on-screen. The shot following the match cut was also fixed instead of panned, giving the scene a more candid feel and dramatic effect. We also decided to pack a few more scenes before this sequence. Unlike the initial storyboard, we show Vale taking down pictures and packing boxes before this flashback. 

Additionally, we made a lot of changes to the end. We added new scenes such as the calendar clips, the pool day match cut, and the farewell party. We also ended up elongating the college campus scenes in our official film. This time, we actually showed each girl walking off instead of a quick clip of them standing still in front of their school. 

Overall between then and now, our ideas remained mostly consistent, we just executed them differently. I'm really proud and happy with the directive choices we made because I think they all evoke more emotions, emphasizing the sense of drama.

Well, without further ado... here's our storyboard!

41.) My inspirations

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog!! In my past few blogs, we've been talking a lot about the in's and out's of my film, but we have yet to discuss where my group and I may have pulled inspiration from. In film, there are plenty of girly coming of age films with an emotional twist, but we also pulled a great deal of inspiration from more emotional, scenic movies. In today's blog post, let's discuss some of my inspirations for our final film. 

40.) Taking a closer look🔍🔍

Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog!! In today's post, I wanted to talk about some of the symbolisms and easter eggs in my film. During this journey, my group and I put a lot of thought into the details of the story, some of which might not be the most evident at first glance. So, in this post, let's dive deeper into these details.

39.) Not as easy as it looks- Our struggles

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog!! In today's blog, we are going to be covering some of the struggles my group and I faced during our filming process. After about 2 months of filming and hard work, we were bound to face some problems... and boy did we! 

1. Match cut alignment

On the second day of filming, we prepared to film a match cut of Vale moving boxes in her room and a flashback of the girls getting ready for a party. When we had this idea, we thought it was the perfect segue into a flashback scene. However, this scene was more difficult to achieve than we thought it would be. For one, mid-filming our main filmer James had to unexpectedly leave, leaving us to fend for ourselves🙁🙁. Luckily, we still had Jason to help us out. Because the shot required all four of us to be on screen, we had no choice but to ask Jason to film for us. Although at the moment, we thought we lucked out because we still had someone to film for us, Jason did disappoint😠😠 Just kidding!! He did what he could, we just didn't get the outcome we needed (thank you for your help Jason). So, the one piece of equipment that we didn't have was a tripod. Looking back, a tripod would have been really helpful, especially for this scene. For the present day scene of Vale moving boxes, we had Nahomy hold the camera super super still at the angle we wanted. This angle was intentional because we wanted to show the mirror, the floor, the corner of the bed, and the door.

 Now moving on to the flashback match cut, we needed the camera to be place in the EXACT SAME position to get the transition as seamless as possible. The girls and I quickly changed our clothes and redecorated as fast as possible. Once we were all ready for the shot, Jason seemed to have focused on the camera placement rather than the actual footage we were recording because when we looked back at it, IT WAS ALL BLURRY!! We had around 6 minutes of footage fully out of focus. By that time, the sun was already going down and we were all rushing to film the next scene, which needed natural light. This setback was quite frustrating and stressful because that meant that we had to go back and refilm another time. We even tried to go on CapCut (our editing software) and sharpen up the footage to see if it was still usable, but sadly... it was irredeemable. Although it caused a delay in production, we refilmed the scene with James the next shooting day. We didn't get the alignment exactly perfect the way we wanted to, but we tried our best
🙂

2. UCF Camera Mishap:

Another thing that we struggled with was an issue with our camera when we visited The University of Central Florida on our school college field trip. To preface, the one thing that really inspired our idea for this entire film concept was the fact that all of us were going on this college trip- We thought it would be a good idea to film at these colleges for the story, making it seem realistic and also showing the longevity/ versatility of our filming locations. Given this, we assigned each character a school that they would be attending in our storyline and planned to film at each one when we visited them during the trip. When we went of the trip, the first one to film was UCF for the main character Vale. When we get there, everyone gets off the bus and my group and I were all pumped to film until... we realized that the camera was still on the bus. By the time we realized, it was too late to get it back. This was a majorrr setback because not only did we not film a school we had planned to film at, but it was also the MAIN CHARACTER'S school (the one we should've gotten the most footage at). When we got back from the trip, we needed to do something to make up for this lost footage because yet again, we were on a time crunch. We had to think quickly, and to solve this problem we asked Jason to take us to The University of Miami, which is about 40 minutes away form where we were. We took the drive and finally got the footage we needed for Vale!! Due to this mishap, Mariana's characters' school went from UCF to UM.

3. Editing!!!

Editing, editing, editing... By far I'd say that our editing issues were definitely the most stressful part of creating our film. As I have mentioned in a previous blog, we faced serious issues with our editing software and availability that hindered us from making progress quicker. For the most part, Mariana had taken up the job of being the primary editor of the film, and due to this, she used her father's Ipad to edit. Each time we got together to film, Mariana would immediately take the footage we wanted to showcase and start editing it all together little by little. On our last day of filming, we had planned to film Vale's UM scenes plus a few more present day scenes, and then get straight to editing. We even thought we'd be completely done by that night! Looking back now that would have been very hard to achieve. Once we got all of the scenes filmed, and started to edit, we ran into our first problem. We did not have the Ipad Mariana had been editing on... Mariana's dad had left for a business trip for one week, taking the Ipad with him. Trying to work with what we had, we switched to using Phi's laptop since she had the most storage to hold all of the footage from the camera. Since we didn't want to lose all of the progress Mariana had made, we were on back and forth phone calls with her dad trying to figure out how to transfer the video. This is when we ran into yet another problem. 

The editing software we used called Capcut has the option for a premium membership called Capcut Pro. Of course, this costs money, and in order to share an edited video through the software, you would need to buy Capcut Pro on the device. This meant that we truly had to start from square one. Due to this issue with Capcut, we tried to switch to another editing software called Premier Pro since we had to restart the editing anyways. Issue number 3: we didn't know how to use Premiere Pro!! It truly felt like every solution we tried to come up with was failing + a 2 day time crunch. Just when things couldn't get any more stressful, Phi's computer began to lag and delay due to it being overworked with all of the footage being stored and apps being downloaded. At this point we all felt discouraged. This situation definitely put our team morale to the test because none of us knew what to do However, we devised a plan to recoup together the next day early in the morning and ask Phi's grandma if we could borrow her Ipad to start anew. On this day we worked sooo hard to get everything done, and through blood, sweat, and tears we did it.

                                                                                        

38.) Shooting away from home (Final days of filming)

 Hellooo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog!! Today's blog is a continuation of my last post covering the rest of my group and I's filming days. In this blog, I'm going to be giving you guys insight on what it was like shooting on the road during our college field trip as well as what the final day of filming was like.

37.)The rest of our shooting days Pt.1(Day 2, & 3)

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog!! I know that I have talked about what shooting days were like for my group and I in a previous blog, however, I only spoke about the first day. I think it' very important for you guys to know what the rest of our shooting days were like, so strap in, because we went through quite a lot to reach our finished product. In todays blog, I'm going to be walking you guys through how my group and I organized our shooting days, what we did during these days, and any other external factors we endured.

36.) If I had a Genie Lamp- Wishlist

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog!! Looking back at my film, I feel so proud of our finished product. My group and I worked sooo hard to make this film perfect. With that being said... there are still some things that would've elevated it to the next level!! After all, this is a student film, but given our resources, we did our best to maximize the quality and realness of the film. In today's post, let's imagine we had a genie to grant us 3 wishes to make our opener even better!

1. Camera

Although we were blessed to be able to use a good quality camera from a friend (Thank you James 🙏🙏), we did still unfortunately face some issues with recording. For one, the battery of the camera burned pretty fast, so there was a couple times where we had to fully stop production to charge the camera... which sucked. Also, I will say that the camera had issues with focusing on MULTIPLE occasions. At one instance, we literally had almost 10 MINUTES of footage recorded that was completely unfocused. This was an annoying issue we had to face causing us to re-film the entire  scene on a separate day, taking up even more time. I feel that even though the camera quality was more advanced than let's say an IPhone for example, it would be even better if we had a higher quality ( probably more expensive) camera for more refined, sharp footage. I don't want to sound ungrateful though- I cannot thank Phi's cousin James enough for gracing us with his camera. He let us use it for days on end, and at end of it all, it helped us make a great product.

2. Car

Additionally, if there was something I would change about our film, it would be the car used. Although I feel very proud of our car scene, I think something that would have elevated it even more would have been a car that had removable doors and a removable sun roof. Even though we achieved a cool look with Maria out the window and Yve out of the sunroof, I think it would look even better with a more summery car like a jeep, bronco, or convertibleee!! In a perfect world 😓😓. I feel this would amplify that care-free vibe we wanted to achieve. Painting the picture, imagine if we had a topless, doorless car- Wind flowing, sun beaming, I feel like this would’ve looked really cool. If we had this, I think we would’ve also been able to incorporate a greater variety of shots and angles during this car scene, thus elongating the scene duration as well. For example, we could have utilized an arc shot highlighting the open sunroof showing all girls inside.

3. Pro editing

 

When it came to editing, we did run into a few issues. If I would make a wish from the heavens above, I would wish for a smoother editing experience!!! Okay... maybe I'm being a little dramatic. Editing wasn't all THAT BAD after a while, but in the beginning we did face some trials and tribulations. Like I mentioned before, my group and I had a lottt of ideas, some of which heavily relied on editing. For example, for one our scenes, I wanted to animate polaroid pictures stacking on stop of each other using the photos that were taken of our characters showing off their college merch. My fellow group members saw the vision and agreed that it would be really cool to include (even Mariana's mom liked the idea!). Despite the fact that this was creative and unique, trying to execute it was a HASSLE!! I downloaded multiple editing softwares trying to execute this idea; I was sooo determined!!! Sadly, after a lot of trial and error, the product still did not reach the par we wished for. Due to this, I would’ve liked to have more time to get familiar  and master our editing software in addition to more transition options.

35.) Shooting with intention- Specific Camera Shots and Angles

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog!! As we all know, the most important part of a movie or show is the way it is shot. How else can the audience take in the information intentionally? Camera shots and angles have the power to completely change the feeling or meaning of a scene, and as directors of our own film, my group and I used a variety of them to highlight numerous things. In today's post, we are taking a deeper dive into what these camera shots and angles were in our film.

Establishing Shots:

Firstly, as the film open we immediately utilize  an establishing shot of the car radio. This shot, though simple, is sooo important to the rest of the film. For one, it establishes where the first scene is taking place, with an angle close enough for the audience to be able to tell that 1. they are in a car, and 2. the title of the music that's playing. The music aspect I would say is most important as it introduces the soundtrack for the entire opener. Additionally, this also gave us a chance to incorporate some diegetic sound into the film. As the film transitions from just a black screen to this establishing shot, you can see Vale's hand turn up the radio, causing the music to begin. This shows that this music is also heard in the character's world, but after this car scene, it become non diegetic. 

Skipping towards to end of the 2 minutes, there is yet another establishing shot. We intentionally put the establishing shot at the end on purpose. After all of the flashback and present day scenes, we finish off with showing each girl walking towards their designated college. The order follows, Eli (Phi), Yve ( Nahomy), Maria (Me, and lastly, Vale (Mariana). Given the fact that Mariana is our main character, we wanted to place her scene last for her to be the last person in the audience’s minds. Due to this, we roll the bulk of our opening credits during a slow-mo still shot of The University of Miami, which was Vale's chosen school. About that by the way... We had to switch Vale's school from UCF to UM due to some complications we faced on the college trip. I'l get into the details of that during a later blog. Anyway, this establishing shot casts a view over UM's lake, showcasing the water fountain, greenery, class buildings, and a town square for outside performances with the UM symbol popping in. At this time, Nahomy was filming random parts of each campus we visited just in case we needed extra footage, and let me just say- Thank God she did!! After editing all of our scenes, we still had a good chunk of time left over, and this establishing shot was not only a great time filler to roll credits, but it's also very meaningful to the story and the lasting affect on the audience. 

POV Shot:

Following the beginning car scene, there is the infamous gas station scene. Although we got sooo much footage from this night at the gas station, only a couple clips made the cut. Out of these few, we knew we HAD to include this POV shot. When Phi and Mariana were first pitching the idea of joining their group to Nahomy and I, they knew for certain a fun gas station scene was needed. They had the cool idea of including a POV shot from Vale's perspective. In this scene, Eli, Maria, and Yve are shown messing around trying on the gas station sunglasses. We had our filmer hold the camera at Vale's eye level, and I act as if I'm putting sunglasses on her. I feel as though this scene makes the moment feel very intimate for our audience. So far, we had only really been showing scenes from an outside perspective as the camera follows the girls. This POV shot let's the audience in to the moment, making it feel more real and heartfelt.

Full shot/ long shot:

Additionally, we also include a variety of full shots, but I want to specifically focus on this one. This full/long shot shows Vale in her empty room moving boxes as she finalizes her packing for college. The way we stage her room in this sequence highlights disparity and emptiness. Her room is less personalized and she is taking her memories down from her walls. As seen, we show Vale's entire body in relation to what is surrounding her. This allows the audience to absorb all of the context they need to understand the scene, thus understanding the impact of the change. You can see the boxes, you can see the suitcase, you can see an empty mirror, and you can see Vale moving a box in her hands. Not only this, but we can also tell how Vale is feeling through her body language. She swiftly moves the box from her bed to the pile with a dull look on her face, which sets the mood and atmosphere for what this scene is supposed to convey. We also included this full shot to transition through a match cut to the next flashback scene.

34.) Editing Pt. 2

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog!! It feels like it's been forever since I spoke to you guys.😢😢 In this post, we are running it back to editing. After tons of new footage being filmed and our story progressing inch by inch, my group and I gathered together to finalize our editing. Now, If I'm going to be honest, this finalization was definitely NOT easy!!! 

So initially, the task of editing mostly fell on Mariana as she volunteered to be the editor. This however did change to adapt to our time crunch and teamwork efforts. By the time it came to edit, each and every one of us spent time working on certain parts. We basically rotated the device between the four of us sporadically; This had so specific direction or order, whenever one of us had an idea or felt confident to make a change, we just did! I will say, this process made me sooo grateful for my group. We all had great ideas, and we created an atmosphere where anyone could openly voice their ideas and pursue them with the approval of the rest of the group. Working on this with my girls made me realize how creative all of us really are! 

Now, let's backtrack a bit... What was our final editing day even like? Basically, on our last shooting day we all decided to gather back at Mariana's house to complete our finishing touches + finish editing. Long story short... filming the last few scenes took wayyy longer than expected, leaving us with limited editing time. As we all were a bit worried, we didn't stress too much because we were very determined and confident in our collaboration skills. This team morale didn't take us very far though! 😀 We ran into stressful issues with our devices and editing software ( I'll get into further detail in a later blog... it still pains me to think about😖😖) These complications felt like a huge setback in the moment. I mean, think about it, we had been filming ALL DAY, we finally finish, we are pumped up and ready to edit (even though it's already 10pm), and when we think we can get to work, NOTHING is working on our side. I will say, stress and hostility was pretty high within the group at this point because we were on a huge time crunch due to the time taken up during our 3-day college trip.

⬆⬆

us trying to figure that mess out...

Given this issue, we decided to recoup the next day and LOCK IN!!! Thankfully, we had a day off from school, so it was perfect. I'll just say this: That day couldn't have went better. When I tell ya'll we locked innn!!! All of us decided to meet back at Mariana's house at 10am!!! Pretty early but we all had things to do that day, so we faced yet another time crunch. Even though we did exceed the time we thought editing would take, it was definitely worth it. Like I mentioned earlier, we collaborated very well when it came to editing responsibilities. The key was to keep an open communication of what we wanted our final product to look like and to be patient with ourselves and each other. The ipad we used basically just got passed around between us all at different times. By around 4:00pm, we were so close to the finish line. We edited the entire day!!!.. with the exception of taking a food break for Wingstop😅😅. At this point, we all had to start heading home, and we only had a couple finishing touches left to edit.

     

33.) Shooting days - Day 1

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog! I'm very excited to share with you guys my group and I's experience on shooting days.

Filming days have been super fun yet productive. Since my group has a delay due to our rearrangements, we have had to get as much as possible done in our filming days. So far, we've gotten together 3 times to film so far. Each time, we go to Mariana's house and figure out local, close-distanced location to showcase. During these times, we've focused on filming mostly our flashback scenes and some present day ones as well, but we also have pending location plans. On February 11-13, we actually are going on a College Field trip sponsored by our school to explore the public colleges in our state. This field trip actually inspired our idea for the entire film! With this location, we can make our film much more realistic by showcasing the actual colleges our characters plan to attend in real life. I mention this to give some context into what our current and future filming days look like.

Day 1:

On day one, we focused on filming 3 specific things.

1.Storyboarding

2.Opening car scene

3.Gas Station scene

On the first day we were SUPER excited to finally turn our ideas into reality. With our time crunch and scheduling predicament, we knew we immediately get started on our storyboard to organize our ideas and serve as a blueprint. Me, Phi, and Nahomy headed to Mariana's house pretty early on to ensure we had enough time to storyboard AND get some filming done. After a good chunk of time, we finallyyy finished storybaording and let the boys know they could start heading over. 

At this point, we didn't realize how much time had passed, and we really needed to film our car scene because we wanted to capture the light of golden hour. Although we rushed to catch the light, once we got in the car we knew we wouldn't have to try hard to execute the vibe we wanted. The sun was PERFECT, and in the car while we filmed, we played Ribs by Lorde( our background music in the film), which really got us in the zone. However, one challenge we did experience what getting the lighting right for our establishing shot. Our establishing shot is a close up of the radio in the car, which is fairly easy to capture, but the glare of the sun made the song title on the radio illegible, which was the whole point of shot. We ended up having to use our quick thinking skills and use Phi's jacket to cover the light, which thankfully worked. The entire car scene shooting went fairly smoothly after that, other than the fact that Mariana was driving( she's not the best driver)... it was a tad but scary but we were okay!!😀😀

 By the time the sun went down, we had already caught the sunlight we needed to catch, and it was time for our nighttime gas station scenes. THIS. WAS. NOT. EASY!!!! Okay maybe I'm being a bit dramatic... But seriously, we went through a hassle trying to find a gast station we were allowed to film at. Firstly, we attempted to film at the gas station closest to Mari's house, but when we asked the workers if it was okay... they said no😊 We took the L and headed to the second closest gas station. We took yet ANOTHER L because they also said no! At this point, we were completely over it and pretty discouraged, but we did not give up👿👿. Finally, we went to the last and farthest gas station. For this gas station, we learned from our mistakes and decided not to ask for permission... Luckily, these employees were really cool and they didn't mind at all. After this, it was a breeze. We basically just ate snacks and hung out, so the scene looked natural and vibrant.

32.) Let's talk stereotypes

 Helloo!! Welcome back or welcome to my blog! In today's post, we are going to be focusing on the representation in my film. When I say representation, I'm referring to the portrayal and characterization of our characters, and whether or not they fall into any stereotypes or more niche groups. 

For the most part:

Overall, I'd say our film highlights a range of characterization between characters. Each of the girls have their own distinct personality, morals, and style. Although we highlight multiple types of people, I can also say that we do succumb to some stereotypes as well. In our film, we wanted to represent the challenges of a shifting friend group. This theme is reflective of real, raw challenges teens and young adults face as they get thrown into life. With change comes heartbreak, adjustments, and pain, but it also can bring wisdom, appreciation, and maturity. We also highlight the purity of an all girl friendship, which actually shares parallels with our group in real life. Besides being a team for this project, Mariana, Nahomy, Phi and I are also best friends. For our flashback scenes where we showcase the characters having fun and hanging out, we really don't have to try hard to make it look natural. In fact, some of the events in the flashback scenes have actually taken place in real life! 

Vale:

Our main character Vale, played by Mariana, comes from a place of hardship and struggle. To refresh your memory, Vale is a Colombian migrant, arriving to the U.S at the ripe age of seven years old. Her family had a hard time adjusting to their new life when it come to money, careers, language barriers, etc... Vale herself struggled with finding her way when it came to social dynamics and school. Fast forward to the end of high school, Vale chose to do everything in her power to write her own story. She never wanted her past struggles to define her or hinder her potential. Through this mindset, Vale developed a perfectionist personality out of resilience but also fear. She has dreams of becoming a politician out of a desire for justice and change given her troubled past in her home country.

Fair? The representation Vale possesses I would say is mostly fair and not so stereotypical. Vale's characterization is actually more unique compared to the typical portrayal of immigrants in television. My group and I didn't want the fact that she is an immigrant to hold Vale back or put her in a box; We wanted her history to serve as a stepping stone to greatness. 

Yve:

Next, we have Yve. Played by Nahomy, Yve is our wild child; She comes from a more troubled and unstable home life, causing her to act out and behave somewhat recklessly. She tends to have a big influence on her friends, and most of the time it isn't the most positive. Hanging out with her friends is a big escape from reality for her, but sometimes she influences them to follow her lead, resulting in trouble for all of the girls. Despite this, Yve cares exponentially for her friends, and has a heart of gold.  Although she is clouded by her negative circumstances, Yve is extremely smart and emotionally intelligent. Due to this, she has aspirations of pursuing psychology, but that college "party life" is still number one on her bucket list.

Fair? Although Yve's characterization corresponds logically to her circumstances, I would say she does fall under a stereotypical category. Yve is the classic "bad influence" or "edgy, angsty teen girl" that lacks in her sense of self and direction. Yve is the stereotypical rebel with a shaky home life that finds escape in going out and distracting herself from her problems.

Eli:

Eli, played by Phi is the shy one. Eli is on the more reserved side; She's not really outspoken or outgoing. Eli struggled with being bullied when she was younger, making her slightly insecure, causing her to hold her ideas in and be more of a listener, rather than a talker. Because of this, Eli struggles with her sense of self as well. She comes off as easily moldable, as she is often influenced by what everyone else is doing. Despite her shyness/ nervousness, Eli is an absolute sweetheart. She cares deeply about people, especially her friends. She often goes with the flow and serves as a breathe of fresh air in the group. She is the type of friend that no matter what, she will always feel like a vessel of peace.

Fair? When it comes to Eli, we also took a more stereotypical approach. Due to her shyness and insecurity, Eli is impressionable, making her susceptible to external influences like Yve's edgy behavior for example. This type of person is common in friend groups, Eli and Yve's dynamic especially. The wild child and the shy girl? What a combination...

Maria:

Last but not least, we have Maria, played by me. Maria is the good influence in the group. She is deeply family oriented and is the oldest sibling. Because of this, Maria is level- headed and goal oriented. She tries to offset Yve's bad influence, always looking out for the girls in the grand scheme of things. Maria has an old soul, making her peaceful and wise. Although Yve and Maria tend to butt heads due to their contrasting mindsets, they both understand each other perspectives. 

Fair? I think that it is common for friend groups to have a person always trying to lead them in the right direction. Most of the time, this person is seen as the "goody two shoes", but in our film we took a different approach. Our good influence is less overbearing and more genuine. Maria doesn't act out of fear or worry, she acts out of care and logic.