Thank you for your interest in 'Lines'. In this EPK site you will find detailed information about our short film, as well as photographs for download. Use the links below, or simply scroll down the page. Please don't hesitate to contact us with any questions or special requests!

SYNOPSIS

A rebellious teen is held after class and told to write lines as punishment for misbehaviour. When her dorky teacher tries to connect with her and lectures her on the benefits of “fitting in”, the teen decides that enough is enough.



DIRECTOR

Director Biography - Sonja Jasansky
Sonja Jasansky was born and raised in Toronto, and relocated to Los Angeles in 2003. ‘Lines’ is her first short film, and was shot on location at UCLA while she was a student in their Extension program. Before becoming a filmmaker, Sonja was a graphic designer and letterpress printer. She is currently in development for her next short film, and is working on a feature length screenplay.

Director's Statement
‘Lines’ is a quirky short film about a rebellious teenager who turns out to be quite beyond just “going through a phase” of defiant non-conformity. The overall concept of “not fitting in” was borne from Sonja’s own memories of highschool, which she can now look back upon with amusement, although there is most definitely a revenge fantasy element to the film. It is an ode to teen angst, and a delightful imagining of what could have been if Sonja’s devious teenage wishes had come true.

‘Lines’ is Sonja’s first effort at a short film, and was produced as part of a course at UCLA Extension. Having no previous experience in film, the course was a good introduction into the process of filmmaking. It gave her the opportunity to work with other beginners, and to gain hands on experience not only in directing, but in all aspects of film production from script development and pre-production, through to production design, editing, and post production. Sonja’s completed film was well received by her class, and she was encouraged to submit her work to film festivals, which has been an amazing learning experience in and of itself.



CINEMATOGRAPHER

Director of Photography Biography - Andrew Nawrot
Originally from Ontario, Canada, Andrew Nawrot began his career in film in 2003 as a Visual Effects artist on The Day After Tomorrow. In 2004, he received the Visual Effects Society award for Outstanding Created Environment in a Motion Picture for his lighting and compositing work on Spider-Man 2. Following this, Andrew worked as a Lead Technical Director on The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, where he did the primary look development for the film’s opening Bombing of London sequence. Most recently, Andrew has been working as the Lead Environments Artist for Spider-Man 3, where he has been leading a large group of artists in creating the digital city environments for all of the film’s major action sequences.

‘Lines’ was Andrew’s first venture into real world lighting and cinematography. His experience with still photography as well as lighting in a digital world provided him with a strong foundation from which to develop as a Director of Photography and he very much enjoyed positioning lights and a camera that were actually real.



CAST

Monica May
Monica grew up in a little town called Land O’ Lakes, which is home to the most nudist colonies in the state and no they don’t make the butter there! After high school she moved to downtown Tampa where she cut hair ;during the day and worked on becoming a fabulous actress at night, studying acting with Kathy Laughlin. Monica plugged away audition after audition and got her first break on Power Rangers SPD where she played ‘Z’ Yellow Ranger. ;She spent ;9 months in ;New Zealand ;living with Kiwis and fighting evil doers. ;Upon returning to the USA she moved to LA and has been working ever since. She guest starred on ‘The Suite Life’ with Zack and Cody has filmed a handful of short and feature films and is currently prepping for her first staring role in a feature film directed by Greg Aronowitz. And yes, Monica May is her real name!


Tracy Thorpe
Tracy Thorpe is a recent transplant to Los Angeles from Chicago where she primarily did live theatre (including a very long stint at The Second City Theater) as well as some commercials, television and film.

Since moving here, she has done a pilot (The Factory) two features (Charlie Wilson’s War and American Zombie) one episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, and three short films - including Lines.
She can be contacted through C.E.S.D. 310-475-2111



PRODUCTION NOTES

About the Production
As this was Sonja Jasansky’s first short film, she needed to keep it small and simple – which was necessitated by the constraints of the course at UCLA extension that she was producing the film in, and the fact that she had no budget to speak of. Each student was originally allocated 4 hours for their shoot – but luckily for Sonja one of her group members cancelled at the last minute, allowing her an additional 4 hours (which of course still didn’t prove to be enough). The course was also helpful in that it negated the need for production insurance, and would provide shooting locations within the beautiful Westwood campus. So Sonja wrote and prepared for a story set in the picturesque Murphy Sculpture garden. But, as things often go in the world of filmmaking, her location became unavailable just weeks before the shoot date. In fact, it wasn’t known if there would be any exterior locations available at all, and the only guaranteed location was a classroom. So, with about 20 days to the shoot date (and no money to dress the classroom as anything other than a classroom) Sonja wrote a new script that would be appropriate for the new location. With the casting date only 4 days away, she rushed through a first draft and posted casting calls within 48 hours. Her first ever casting session went surprisingly smooth (all scheduled actors actually showed up!) and luck was on Sonja’s side as she was able to cast two very talented actors that were perfect for the characters she had just created. The next 2 weeks consisted of further script development and polishing, shopping for wardrobe and set dressing, extensive storyboarding, and a rehearsal with her actors.

On the day of the shoot, everything went as well as could have been hoped for. The crew consisted of 5 people: Sonja (as director), her husband Andrew Nawrot (as director of photography and sound), Jillian Toohey (as producer and production assistant), and two of Sonja’s classmates. The shoot ran long (as one might expect for a first time filmmaker), and went for about 10 hours, not including the 4 hour set-up. Everyone persevered, which Sonja is eternally grateful for, as it was a most amazing first film shoot experience that she will always look back upon fondly.

Sonja spent the following 2 weeks editing her film in Final Cut, learning as she went, having only had a 4 hour introductory course to the software under her belt, and never having edited before. In post production, Andrew worked with her on the sound, and then created the subtle visual effects that were vital in the effective telling of the story.

Cinematography
Lines was shot on a Panasonic DVX100a with a RedRock Micro 35mm adapter to help narrow the depth of field and bring the focus onto the characters and away from the background. 28mm, 50mm, and 105mm Nikon lenses were used. Rack focusing and camera pans were kept to a minimum due to the lack of a dedicated focus puller. Because of the nature of the 35mm adapter, the images in both the viewfinder and the recorded footage were mirrored vertically. To compensate for this, several shooting configurations were tested and the best solution involved tethering the camera to a notebook computer running DV Rack during the shoot. This allowed for the notebook to serve as a 17” widescreen monitor with waveforms, and it also had the added benefit of being able to capture the DV stream as it was recorded to tape, providing a backup of all of the footage being shot.

Aesthetically, Andrew wanted to establish a dull and sterile feeling to the classroom. The commercial fluorescent lights in the classroom were used as the primary overhead light source, as their poor colour rendition characteristics helped to mute any warmth in the room. Additionally, a 1k lamp, two 650w lamps, and a 300w lamp were gelled to balance the fluorescent colour temperature. The visual effect of the lines being copied and pasted was accomplished by using the simple technique of mixing between plates (of a clean piece of paper and a full page of written lines). The interactive flashes when the lights blow out at the end of the film were added in post by rotoscoping and painting over the raw plates. During post-production, the colour of the film was adjusted by adding a touch more green and increasing overall contrast. A noise reduction pass was run on the final output.

Production Design
Since the film was written for and filmed in a classroom, it kept production design requirements quite manageable for Sonja, both practically and financially. In order to make the bare-walled university classroom look more like a highschool classroom, Sonja dressed it with anti-drug posters, class lessons on “recognizing the signs of drug addiction” written in marker on easel paper, newspaper clippings, and colourful pages from second-hand books. An old and disintegrating canvas map of Canada that Sonja owned added a personal touch. The desks were another thing to address, as they were all exactly the same, and Sonja wanted a teacher’s desk that looked larger and different from the student desks. Not being able to transport a bigger desk to the location, she used cardboard and paper to create a false “surround” on the desk for the teacher.

Since the setting was quite stale and drab, Sonja paid close attention to the physical appearance of the actors, wardrobing and accessorizing them to accentuate the personality and individuality of their characters. Sonja cut and styled a wig for her main character, complete with blue and green coloured hair chunks. A custom choker was made out of an old vinyl belt, pieces of ball chain, and dismantled computer circuit boards. Electrical tape “fingernail polish” added to the look, along with “F U” rings fashioned from computer keyboard keys and black twist-ties. For the supporting character, Sonja’s actor provided her own set of custom-made buckteeth, and vintage 80’s eyeglasses. Sonja then decorated the teacher’s desk with a borrowed tape cassette player, a floral mug and sparkly stickers, pink plastic horses, and her own squirrel photo in a “Hugs & Kisses” picture frame.

Shooting package:
Panasonic DVX100a MiniDV 24PA
Redrock Micro M2 35mm adapter with HD achromat
28mm, 50mm,105mm Nikon lenses
1000w Arri Open Face Light
650w Arri Fresnel Light x 2
300w Arri Fresnel Light
Oktava MK-012 Hypercardioid micorphone
DVRack used for monitoring and backup capturing

Post-production:
Final Cut Pro - Editing/Sound/Colour
Adobe After Effects - Final colour and noise reduction

Total running time: 9 min 10 seconds

CREDITS

Written & Directed by
Sonja Jasansky

Monica May as Gretel

Tracy Thorpe as Miss Hart

Produced by
Sonja Jasansky
Andrew Nawrot
Jillian Toohey

Executive Producer
Jillian Toohey

Director of Photography
Andrew Nawrot

Editor
Sonja Jasansky

Production Designer
Sonja Jasansky

Production Assistants
Jillian Toohey
Jia Liao
Peter Cicale

Casting by
Sonja Jasansky

Sound + Music Editor
Sonja Jasansky

Sound + Music Technician
Andrew Nawrot

Colour Timing + Visual Effects by
Andrew Nawrot

Special thanks to:
Dana Reidel
Chad Grenawalt
Squirrely
Tasha Jasansky



PHOTOS

Click images below for larger sizes (links open in new window, or right-click/option-click to download and save). Please email sj@sonjajasansky.com to request larger sizes/different formats.

Click here to view/download jpeg file (853 x 480, 100 KB)	Click here to view/download jpeg file (853 x 480, 97 KB)	Click here to view/download jpeg file (853 x 480, 115 KB)
			Click here to view/download jpeg file (1500 x 2100, 3 MB) CREDIT: S.Jasansky
Click here to view/download jpeg file (2250 x 1500, 3 MB) CREDIT: S.Jasansky	Click here to view/download jpeg file (2250 x 1500, 3 MB) CREDIT: M.May
		;
POSTER W/ CREDITS Click here to view/download TIF file, zip archive (2430 x 3645 tif, 18.7 MB zip archive) CREDIT: S.Jasansky	POSTCARD (NO CREDITS) Click here to view/download jpeg file (1500 x 2100, 2.5 MB) CREDIT: S.Jasansky
Please email sj@sonjajasansky.com to request high resolution jpegs of the above photographs. From left to right: Sonja Jasansky, Andrew Nawrot, Monica May, Tracy Thorpe

SCREENINGS

IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER
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Aarhus International Festival of Independent Arts, 2007
OFFICIAL SELECTION
www.afianopop.com

- - - - -

Calgary Fringe Film Festival, 2007
WINNER: Best Short Screenplay
WINNER: Best Short Film
www.calgaryfringe.ca

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Great Lakes International Film Festival, 2007
NOMINEE: Best Narrative Short
NOMINEE: Best of the Fest
NOMINEE: Best Director
NOMINEE: Best Lead Actor - Monica May
www.greatlakesfilmfest.com

- - - - -

Home Brewed International Film Festival, 2007
FINALIST
www.homebrewedfilm.com

- - - - -

Manhattan Short Film Festival, 2007
FINALIST
www.msfilmfest.com

- - - - -

Mount Shasta International Film Festival, 2007
OFFICIAL SELECTION
www.shastafilmfest.com

- - - - -

San Fernando Valley International Film Festival, 2007
WINNER: President's Award
www.viffi.org

- - - - -

Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival, 2007
OFFICIAL SELECTION
www.sidewalkfest.com

- - - - -

Snowyfest International Film Festival, 2007
FINALIST, KOSCIUSZKO THREDBO BEST SHORT FILM
www.snowyfest.com

- - - - -

Toofy Film Festival, 2007
OFFICIAL SELECTION
www.toofy.com

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Tulsa United Film Festival, 2007
OFFICIAL SELECTION
www.tulsaunitedfest.com

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Tribeca Film Festival, 2007
OFFICIAL SELECTION
www.tribecafilmfestival.org

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Wildsound Feedback Film Festival, 2007
WINNER: Best Performances
www.wildsound-filmmaking-feedback-events.com

- - - - -





CONTACT

Sonja Jasansky
sj@sonjajasansky.com
310.339.7926