FILM SCHOOL
The Film School returns for its second year with double the number of classes. Hosted by visiting filmmakers and focusing on the art of filmmaking, session will be held Wednesday, July 28 through Saturday, July 31, at noon and 3:00 p.m. at Northwestern Michigan College’s Scholars Hall.

No application is needed for the Traverse City Film Festival Film School.  Beginning at noon on July 21, interested participants can purchase tickets for $5 online (www.traversecityfilmfest.org), by phone (231-922-8903) or at the box office and merchandise store on the main floor of Radio Centre on East Front Street near Park in downtown Traverse City. Sales will be limited to four tickets per person.

Wednesday at Noon
Sound is More Important Than Picture
Good sound can make a good film great, and bad sound can ruin an otherwise great picture. In this fast-paced class taught by David Missal and Damien Lange of Sennheiser Electronic Corp., learn how to get the best sound, with the right microphone, at the right time. Topics include pickup patterns, booming technique, shotgun mics, and tips for eliminating unwanted noise during production.

Wednesday at 3pm
Screenwriting
Jim Burnstein (“Ruffian,” “Renaissance Man”), one of the few working Hollywood screenwriters who lives in Michigan, heads the Screenwriting Program at the University of Michigan Department of Screen Arts & Cultures.  He will share his stories about working in the loneliest area of the filmmaking business, and teach the art of the screenplay.

Thursday at Noon
How To Make a Short Film
TCFF 2010 features a record 40 shorts. Directors of many of these films, including Sharon Shattuck (“Parasites: A User¹s Guide”), S. Vollie Osborn (“Monsters Down the Hall”) and Mark Mazur & Trent Hilborn (“Surface”), will talk about how they made their films, why they made them, how they¹ve found audiences, and what they plan to do next.

Thursday at 3pm
Bill Plympton: Animation Master Class
Oscar-nominated independent animator and filmmaker Bill Plympton (“The Tune,” “The Cow Who Wanted to be a Hamburger”) presents a condensed version of the intensive 14-week course he has offered at his New York School of Animation. Using live drawing and clips from his films, Plympton will talk about the creative and business aspects of his work as an independent animator. Every attendee of the Master Class will get a free Bill Plympton drawing!

Friday at Noon
Acting for the Camera
Robert DeNiro, Julia Roberts, Mickey Rourke, Nick Nolte, Gena Rowlands, Elia Kazan, John Cassavetes, Paul Schrader and teachers Uta Hagen and Lee Strasberg ‹ these are just a few of the people our instructors have worked with. Come watch acting in front of the camera under the expert guidance of Robert Rayher, noted experimental filmmaker and Senior Film Production
Lecturer at the University of Michigan, and Pamela Guest, a U-M graduate and one of the few Hollywood casting directors who also performs.

Friday at 3pm
Making (and Financing) Your Film in Michigan
The State of Michigan’s film incentive package has the industry abuzz from coast to coast. This class will address a question every filmmaker faces: how do I get money to make my film? Lisa Pick and Lisa Berden of Miller Canfield will talk financing nuts and bolts. Carrie Jones and Richard Jewell of the Michigan Film Office will talk about the tax credits. And we’ll hear
from Lee Storey, who shot parts of “Smile ‘Til It Hurts” on Mackinac Island, and Mike and Jeff Farah (“Answer This!”), the first people ever to shoot a film in Michigan Stadium ‹ and during a game, no less!

Saturday at Noon
Situational Ethics in Documentary Filmmaking
Acclaimed filmmaker Jon Alpert (“China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province”) has shot documentaries all over the world. Like all doc filmmakers, his art regularly takes him into situations where he must makesplit-second ethical decisions that effect not just the filmmaker, the
subjects, and the subjects’ community, but sometimes millions of other people as well. Alpert will talk about good choices and bad, and the sometimes tragic consequences.

Saturday at 3pm
Storytelling Through Docs
Documentary films offer unique opportunities to understand our world in new ways. Weaving a story out of the stuff of real life is a rigorous discipline, and the talented nonfiction filmmakers from around the world whose work is on display in this year’s festival have created cinematic
gems. Michael Webber (“The Elephant in the Living Room”) and Jeff Deutchman (“11/4/08”), masters of storytelling in this challenging form, will share what they have learned.

The Traverse City Film Festival will take place July 27 to August 1.  A full schedule of film forums, panels and classes can also be viewed at www.traversecityfilmfest.org.