<p>Hello,
My high school aged daughter is interested in going to summer film camp in 2010. She has taken classes in video production at her HS, has collaborated on 6 films or so and wants to learn more. She applied to NYU Tisch, but unfortunately, got waitlisted. For plan B, would like to know any opinions on other film schools below. We would love to go to USC, but found the $10400 + boarding price tag a bit too steep. We live in Los Angeles, and would prefer a school in SoCal to offset travel costs, but willing to board.</p>
<p>No. My son was interested in film for a summer program so I searched and found it. You should contact them and ask if they have previous students who have attended you could contact.</p>
<p>No. He is going to an Architecture/Design program this summer. He just is interested in film and photo. Digital media looks like a solid place since they do Adult classes too and are being held at Universities.</p>
<p>UCLA offers some related classes. Take a look at DESMA 4 in the following link. Summer classes for highschool kids where they make music videos and it’s for college credit.</p>
<p>My son attended the UCLA camp last summer – Advanced Film. He would recommend it. His only complaint was that he felt that they didn’t encourage independence and would have liked a bit more “freedom”. I was OK with the tight supervision. He made a group project. In retrospect, he would have preferred to make his own project since the project is only as good as the group they assign you to. He met lots of interesting and talented kids and thought the instruction was very good. We are NOT from Socal and he loved the UCLA campus and area. He made some connections in the screen writing program and some of the kids from that program were looking for other kids to make their movies. All in all, a great two week program.</p>
<p>Alliesmom, Thanks so much for the input. I’m glad that your son learned a lot about filmmaking especially since my biggest concern would be that my D wouldn’t learn very much, (which I’ve heard about some of the film camps) so that’s good news. Glad you liked UCLA; it is my alma mater, so I love it too! Go Bruins!</p>
<p>A superb 5 wk program that was reasonable enough to offset travel costs for my kid was at University of North Carolina School for the Arts. The program is housed at an arts college with a top 10 film program and the facilities and faculty are excellent. In the past, there was an advanced track. All of the students work in various capacities on other students’ films, but also write and direct their own films.</p>
<p>Nester, I went and looked at them. The prices are so great compared to the two programs here in LA that my daughter’s been looking into. But I couldn’t find anywhere whether they are working with real or digital film and I couldn’t even find a way to contact them and find out. Do you know if your daughter worked with 16 mm or digital film while she was in the program?</p>
<p>I cannot speak highly enough about the NCSA program (which I think is now called something different; UNC Arts?) I believe that my S worked entirely with digital, but at that point he was not in the advanced track, so I’m not sure if film is available. Interestingly, he is now in film school in college and his program has switched its production classes entirely to digital. There are classes he can take with film, but not the primary sequence. I will try to find you contact info for the NC program and PM.</p>
<p>My son, who now works in the film industry as a visual effects artist took a class with Digital Media Academy at their Stanford University location. He liked it (a certification program in Apple’s Shake program). Here is a NY Times article, mentioning the UCLA DMA summer camp:</p>
<p>My son is also a junior and interested in film for college. Anyone have feedback on Socapa in LA? We live abroad and UCLA DMA doesn’t have full boarding and he wanted longer than 2 weeks. USC dates doesn’t work. Any previous experiences welcomed, thanks!</p>
<p>UCLA DMA does have full boarding, all the kids stay in the dorms on campus in an area known as ‘The Hill’. All meals are in the dorm dining halls and the food is very good. Most UCLA Summer Session classes are 2 weeks long so if he wants to stay longer he can just take a second class to make it 4 weeks total.</p>
<p>Both of my daughters went to UCLA Summer Sessions when they were each about 15 years old and they both went to 2 classes back to back. (D1 took photo twice and D2 took 2 DMA classes.) Both kids loved the experience and came back with better skills.</p>
<p>The kids are well supervised but still have some freedom to explore the campus and nearby Westwood Village. The instruction is very good and the talent/motivation level of the kids is generally pretty high.</p>
<p>My younger daughter also went to USC film last summer but if those dates don’t work then I’m guessing you don’t need any of that info.</p>
<p>I’m not sure what they have in the specific field she’s interested in, but CalArts is an amazing school located right in LA. It’s competitive but if she was lucky enough to get wait-listed at Tisch, she probably has a shot. Their CSSSA summer high school program is totally worthy of being looked into.</p>
<p>My son attended the Advanced Digital Filmmaking program run by US Performing Arts at UCLA last summer. It is run by USPA, but actual faculty at the UCLA Film school participated in the program. They also have a program at Pepperdine with faculty of USC. Both have boarding/meal programs, and were well supervised. </p>
<p>At the time, my son had already had 2 years of High School Video Production classes under his belt, so he thought that the program was a little too basic for him. He did learn more about storytelling though, and had a great time working with his peers coming from all over the world. </p>
<p>Depending on how much experience your child already has, he could take the one week beginning program, immediately followed by the 2-week advanced program. There are several starting dates available.</p>
<p>thanks all for your responses, will look into DMA at UCLA, but on website it says boarding is only Sun- Fri which means he has to leave Sat night? And since we are from HK, there is no where for him to go!</p>
<p>No they don’t kick the kids out of the dorms on Saturday night. Why on earth would they do that? Send him for 4 weeks, he will be safe and in a dorm every night, and he will increase his skills.</p>
<p>The only thing I can think of that would lead you to think about this is the small gap between 1st and 2nd session. First session is 2 weeks and ends on a Friday and about half the kids will move out that night. That Saturday will be a free day for your son and then Sunday new kids will be coming in for the start of Second session. So your son will have some free time during this weekend change between sessions but he will stay in the same room the whole time.</p>
<p>If you have any further doubts I recommend you just call the program numbers listed online.</p>
<p>Anyone who is looking for a summer film camp should also look into the Summer Film Academy at Chapman/Dodge. They have an excellent program with two sessions. Session 1: June 24-July 7 and Session 2: July 8-July 21. Applications are due by April 2. Here’s their link.
[Summer</a> Film Academy - Dodge College of Film and Media Arts](<a href=“http://ftv.chapman.edu/programs/SFA/]Summer”>http://ftv.chapman.edu/programs/SFA/)</p>