Choosing a learning experience that suits you - By Brandon Ray with E. Collins
Indie Slate Issue 38, Vol. 9 December 2004

The following is an excerpt of an article from the Indie Slate magazine, December 2004 issue.

... Since taking a three-month summer intensive program at the New York Film Academy, Kristen Coury directed the film Friends and Family (www.friendsandfamily-themovie.com) which was distributed by Regent Entertainment. recalling her initial motivation for seeking film education, she says, "I had what I thought was a great idea for a screenplay and realized I could NEVER give away a script I wrote to another director, just because I didn't know how to direct a film."

Kristen's objectives were specific - she wanted hands-on experience. "I believe in learning 'hands-on' and getting straight to the point. if I had decided to attend a four-year film school like NYU, I would have spent two-years "talking" about all the "greats" and how they did it, Tarkovsky, Bergman, Wilder, etc. It's my firm belief that in many ways this inhibits creativity... you are never free to have an original thought without realizing that's the way some other director would have done it"

he first five days of the NYFA program we spent "on the basics, like threading a camera, lighting a scene, etc. The schedule was five days, all day, then we spent the weekend shooting our first short! The next five days were teaching us to edit, while we began to watch films to see how to "make it work" We rotated with three other people, so we were teams of four, and we each held a different position each time"

"At NYFA, we did everything ourselves: shooting, picture and music edit - everything! In the particular program I had chosen, we were literallyworking seven days a week, night and day - and sometimes all night in the editing room. In terms of cost, even though the cost was expensive for me, it was really a fraction of what I would have spent going to a four-year film school."...