A cinematic showcase

Cinematic arts department set to open showcase honoring students’ work

Cinematic Arts students are reeling with excitement over this year’s student showcase.

Liberty University’s Cinematic Arts program will be holding its annual student showcase to proudly display the works of over 50 seniors graduating from the Cinematic Arts program.

The student showcase will take place  May 3-5 in the former Cinemark movie theater located adjacent to Jump Lynchburg.

Cinematic Arts Assistant Professor J. Darin Wales is one of many Cinematic Arts professors helping to facilitate the
screenings at the showcase.

“Myself and the other cohort leaders for the now-senior class have been guiding, stretching and advising the student
filmmakers for the past two years,” Wales said.

“So hopefully some of what we have taught has influenced our students to make even better films than they would
have anyway.”

According to Wales, three to four films are usually screened at a time.

These films will be followed by a 15-minute question-and-answer segment with the directors of the films.

Audience members are welcome to ask questions of the directors or comment on the films.

“It is always nice to see a student’s work come from an initial idea they originally pitched almost two years
ago,” Wales said.

“These are films the directors themselves wrote, directed and oversaw through postproduction to the fruition of a final film shown to the public.”

In addition to student films being showcased, the latest production from the Cinematic Arts program will also be shown.

The short “Paper Football” was shot this past Spring around Lynchburg by juniors in the program.

“Paper Football” will premiere Thursday, May 4.

Senior Kayla Keen is one of over 50 Cinematic Arts students whose work will premier in the showcase.

“As a Cinematic Arts major you quickly learn to operate on little amounts of sleep and hours in front of a screen,” Keen said.

“There have been many nights that turned into mornings working in the edit lab with all the other storytellers in the department working on their films.”

Keen’s senior thesis titled “Sunrise” will be featured at the student showcase.

According to Keen, “Sunrise” is a no-dialogue short film that follows a girl named Cera as she struggles to forgive
herself of the self-harbored responsibility and guilt of her boyfriend’s death.

Keen said that juniors enrolled in the Cinematic Arts department spend their second semester planning and writing their own short films.

Then as first-semester seniors, the students raise their budgets, build their crews, they find their actors and then  film their short films.

“It is a long process comprised of long nights, early mornings, piles of paperwork and preparing ourselves to expect the unexpected,” Keen said.

“The professors in the cinematic arts department have told us from the beginning that no films want to get made, so I am proud of all of us who have finally completed our projects.”

Keen hopes that her fellow Cinematic Arts students will see as a triumphant end to the year.

Doors will open at 10 a.m. For more information and a detailed schedule of the Cinematic Arts student showcase, go to the LU splash page.

The event will be held at the former Cinemark 10 theater.

Doors open at 10 a.m. and the event takes place May 3-5.

“This is an event all Cinematic Arts students look forward to,” Keen said.

“It is a way to show the rest of Liberty and the world the talent that is coming out of this program hidden in the back halls of North Campus.”

Runyon is a feature reporter.