Sunrise, Love
The comma in the title does a lot more work than people might assume. The meaning of the title reads more like, “It’s sunrise, my love.” An acknowledgment of when and where they are, and their connection to each other.
Sunrise, Love is the story of an immortal man named Ambrose who is cursed to spend hundreds of years under the sea, only surfacing for one day at random. His immortal companion Beth waits for him on the shore. When he returns they must make the most of his one day on land before he is forced to return to the sea. However this time around, Beth has a plan to reverse their destinies.
“Find images that speak to you.
Everything else comes second”
— Paraphrased from Melissa Langer in my Production Practices class.
This was the advice given to me after my first pitch for Senior Thesis flopped horribly. And it was the advice I needed most to hear.
At the time, I was more worried than anything else. I had spent the summer coming up with the pitch, and having to start from scratch three weeks into the semester threw me off my rhythm. However, I knew in my gut that my professor was right. Not only was the pitch not landing, it was antithetical to everything I had done previously with my art. So I followed her advice. I went home and found a jumble of images that spoke to me, without knowing how they would fit together.
Below you can see the images that first sparked the idea of Sunrise, Love in my mind.
I began writing the script. Pulling together ideas for scenes and seeing how they could fit together. Using the above inspiration images as a guide, I found the story of these two characters.
A screenshot of the first three pages of a rough draft version of the script.
While writing the script I held auditions to find my actors. I used the website “Backstage” to post about my project. I was fortunate to get many responses. This is how I met Maggie Shirk and Gaspar Mendez, both union actors who wowed me with their auditions.
Having union actors meant I needed to get permission from the union for my student film. That process took time, paperwork, and getting one of my friends COVID compliance trained. It was worth it as Maggie and Gaspar gave an incredible performance that brought the film to life.
Cinematography
Meet Keara Kob
My favorite partner in crime, and my most trusted cinematographer. She is an incredibly talented artist with a long list of experience.
I met Keara on the set of 1805, a historical fiction short that was shot in central PA. After that, we worked in tandem to create three short films, Missing Him, ASH, and The Fae Folk.
Of course, I asked her to work with me on Sunrise, Love, and to my delight she accepted. The rest is history.
See side by side the city spinning shot, with the behind-the-scenes footage of how we captured that moment
The original scene
How we did it
The next step, finding locations.
Sunset Beach, New Jersey
I knew that I wanted to film in the ocean at sunrise. I’m sure you can already see the potential problems here. For starters, Pennsylvania (the state I am from) is landlocked. Secondly, sunrise only lasts for a few minutes, at best for maybe half an hour. That leaves us with very little time to film.
How to solve this problem? Finding the perfect location.
Sunset Beach, New Jersey is a peninsula with the Atlantic Ocean on both the east and west sides. What this means is we can film sunrise on the east side and sunset on the west side. Effectively doubling how much we can film in a day while guaranteeing that the sun is over the ocean side both times. This geography made it possible for us to have a weekend trip to New Jersey, stay overnight, and film all our ocean shots without having to return for multiple trips.
Me, Gaspar, Keara
Gaspar, Maggie, Keara
Tessa and Maggie
Gaspar, Maggie and Me
Keara and Gaspar
Gaspar and Keara
The Philadelphia Museum of Art
I love this museum. I’ve had a membership every year since moving to Philadelphia. It is fortunate the museum also has a pretty lax video and photography policy. They allow non-commercial filming and photography as long as you don’t use a tripod, block guests, or cause any kind of disruption.
We made a plan before entering the museum, so once we were inside the focus was entirely on getting the shots we needed.
Sosuite, Sunrise-facing Penthouse AirBnB
Beth’s apartment is a central and important location in the story. It defines Beth’s character and shows the kind of person she is. It was essential to find a location that reflected her, and I knew that my apartment or my friend’s apartments would not cut it.
I was able to find this gorgeous Airbnb that had everything we were looking for.
Most of our time was spent filming in this apartment.
Costumes
Meet Maura McLaughlin
I met them quite literally in an elevator. I knew who the Costume Shop Manager was, so when I saw her talking to a student in the elevator I guessed that this student probably worked with costumes. From the bit of conversation I overheard, this student seemed a like-minded individual.
I knew my film needed good costumes to help build the world of the story. I decided to strike up a conversation and see if they might be interested in my project. Luckily we were on the top floor going down so I had time for an actual elevator pitch. Who knew elevator pitches were even a real thing?
After hearing my pitch, (only slightly surprised I guess their major) Maura agreed to sign onto the film.
Maura’s expansive knowledge of costuming, familiarity with the school’s resources, and incredible vision made them an indispensable part of the team.
The Animated opening
In December my professor threw me a curveball
Here is the rough outline of the opening animation by Angela Visconti
My major at school was Film+Animation. Everything seemed to be on track for graduation until my professor pulled me aside to tell me I needed to include animation in my thesis, or else I would not graduate.
Horrified and unprepared this far into the semester, I turned to my friend Angela Visconti and asked for her help.
We came up with the idea to do an animated opener that would set the stage for the film.
Scoring the film
I wanted an original score with live instrumentals, on an incredibly tight schedule.
Meet Zach Tridico
Zach and I met at the Philadelphia Global Game Jam. We teamed up with a few others to create a game called, “Golden Thread” based on the idea of Theseus and the labyrinth. He wrote the score for that project. Later he would also compose the score for my films, “Dragon, Rider” and “ASH”
Zach is a talented Jazz Musician who brings a wonderful perspective to the scores he writes. I brought him onto the project pretty early on. I knew that shooting in the ocean meant I had to wait to film very late in the spring.
Shooting that close to the final due date meant I had about 2-3 weeks to edit the film, and less time for Zach to score it.
Our plan to handle that kind of short deadline, was for him to start composing based on the timing of the script, and finetune it once I completed the final film edit. It is incredible to have not only an entirely original score but to also have it recorded by real musicians, and that is entirely thanks to his hard work.
Funding the film
Nothing happens without money. My short thesis would be no exception.
The teaser trailer
I took the money I had saved from working two jobs and shot enough footage to create a proof of concept. Using this teaser trailer I made a Kickstarter and applied for grants.
I wanted to prove that I could deliver on what I was offering.
Total amount raised for Sunrise, Love: $1,219.35
Kickstarter Contributions: $619.35 (after fees)
Scribe Grant Contribution: $500
Additional Donation: $100
Expenditures Breakdown by category
Total Amount Spent on Sunrise, Love: $2,954.82
I used Google Sheets to keep detailed track of my spending on the project
As you can see, Sunrise, Love was about halfway funded by my community, and the other half by my own efforts.
Sunrise, Love has been shown at the Philly Film Showcase, the Scribe Media Center, and at the University of the Arts Film Showcase.
I am incredibly proud of the film, and all the work that went into it. I hope to show it in more places in the future.
Deleted Scene
Ever heard the phrase, “Kill your darlings.”? As an editor, sometimes for the success of the project you have to remove scenes that you otherwise think are very good.
For the proper flow of Sunrise, Love I made the difficult decision to cut out the picnic scene. Lucky for you, it’s available to watch right here!