The idea

"It was summer of 2020. I was driving while shuffling through some new music. I stumbled upon a song that for some reason invoked a particular melancholic feeling in me. Music often has a very strong effect on the stories I write. In the following days as the song stayed in my head, an imagine appeared in my head. I looked through the eyes of someone that was being drowned by a young woman. It was a very weird thing to try to place in context. Figuring out the story felt very much like being a detective; Where are we, who are these people and why did this happen?"

"To be honest after the idea floated around in my head for about a week, I sat down and wrote the first draft of the script in one evening. Later I consulted with friends ands creative partners to finetune the ending. That draft is the one that went into production. I was very pleased that the entire vision stayed true to the script beat by beat. It ended up working out exactly like I hoped it would."

Writer, director and producer, got along fine... As I was all three!

"Joking aside, I was fortunate enough to work with my friends and long time collaborators to bring the vision to life. I had lots of people looking out alongside me trying to find innovative ways to scout locations, think about props, lighting and timemanagement. When we finally found a location, we ended up gathering with the main actors and a small part of the crew to create the entire pre- visualisation on location using an iPhone. This allowed me to really take my time to feel my way through the script whilst trying different things with the physical location. We also made a 3D scan of the set which allowed me to create an accurate map on which we could plan the placement of actors and camera-rigs per shot. Finding angles was never easier. My main goal was to get a separate angle that would convey every emotional shift that occurred. We ended up solving loads of problems in advance. We had a total of sixty shots."

Teamwork, Dreamwork

"We prepared for three months straight. I was mainly working together with the lead actress who I had originally cast for a different short film that was canceled due to corona. When the new ‘corona proof’ script came around, she ended up helping out with a big part of the pre-production process. She was the one that ended up spotting the shooting location. We also had two people figuring out logistics and helping out with time scheduling. It was a very intimate proces in which everyone involved worked in complete service of the vision. It was so wonderful to work in sync with people who didn’t bring any ego with them. I am very grateful to have had that amazing opportunity. We ended up going for two days of shooting since that was the most time we could plan to get everyone together at the same time. We’d crowdfunded, but there simply wasn’t enough money to keep them from their regular jobs longer."

"Miraculously, we ended up shooting all the sixty shot’s in two days. It was amazing seeing everyone at work. We worked two days for twelve hours straight with fifteen minutes per shot. No one complained of wavered. Everyone gave their full 100% and worked like clockwork together. I think everyone understood what we were doing it for. It was a labor of love I think."

Finetuning; details and accents

"I edited the film myself and worked on the visual effects. I tend to really take my time while editing to massage the best combinations of takes to convey the moment. I’m very proud to say that the script was executed in the final cut word by word. Everything was there. Of course I went back in to tidy up certain things in the edit, but I never replaced takes or shots. I only realized while editing the extend of the amazing attention to detail that the crew managed to squeeze out of the time we had. It felt like an eerily tight fit in which everything just ended up coming together like I had hoped it would."

"There is a subtle bit of music throughout to film. Which was composed by the lead actor, who is also a long time friend and coworker. He and I have had a very well defined work bond and know exactly how to communicate what we mean. He had de vibe nailed first try. Of course we also used the song which inspired the film. The sound design was done by Manglemoose, a studio that I discovered very recently. They generously worked overtime on this project. The sound-designer ended up re dubbing the voices with a language coach present. I think he made the world of the film sound amazing. It really sells the story."

"We have a color grader in house. He also was the main camera operator on the film. I ended up sitting beside him to dail down the look for over four weeks of trouble shooting shots. It’s safe to say that he went above and beyond to get the film looking the best it could."

"We had a premiere at the theatre besides our studio. As of now, we are really in the early stages of submitting to festivals. We mainly used film freeway. The response has been positive!"

(c) All visual material is used with the filmmaker's permission.