BY BOLARINWA AKANDE
A total of 75 participants have benefited from the Del-York Creative Academy, the annual film and television workshop organized by Linus Idahosa and his wife, actress Stephanie Okereke.
The Filmmaking class reportedly had 25 students, while the Production Design class had 14 Students. Two students registered for Screen Writing, while the Cinematography and Editing classes attracted six 18 students respectively.
According to Idahosa, founder of the Academy, the training had engaged highly experienced resource persons equal to the standard of the New York film school.
“The academy engaged trainers from Los Angeles and New York who have since arrived in Lagos. The workshop is targeted at those whose creative products we are already familiar with.”
The faculty from New York include the costume and set designer, Wendelyn Slipakoff; Jamal Speakes for Cinematography; Sara Rabuse for Makeup; Grant Housley for Filmmaking; Ryan Gibson for Screen Writing and Evon Barros for Editing, Graphics and Special Effects.
Called “train-the-trainer programme, 12 outstanding students from the 1st and 2nd edition of the Del-York Creative Academy Workshop in 2010 and the 2012 were also selected to function as teachers’ assistants with two attached to each lecturer.
The Head of Student Affairs, Del-York Creative Academy, Jide Johnson, remarked that “The ability to adapt to an environment and use that environment to design is paramount.”
He pointed at the view behind the building to this reporter, stating that the small vegetation could be converted to a location for a war film. Of course, the memories of the images of the Vietnam War in the box-office hit, “Rules of Engagement” rushed in.
Johnson enumerated some beautiful success stories recorded by Del-York Creative Academy with optimism that creative treasures are stored up for use in the movie.
“Some of our students like Emma Edosio and James Omokwe are doing good short films for television stations like Ebonylife TV. Another one, Tonye Faloughi shot the first matinee advert in Nigeria after participating in the 2010 training programme. We have one student who is part of the cast for GidiUp on Ndani TV,’’ he declared.
It’s been a month of light-camera-action at a four-week intensive film making workshop held at the Digital Bridge Institute, Oshodi. Pockets of young filmmakers assembled at various film locations on the premises of the Institute, arranging props and cameras as they begin to put theory into practice.
Production techniques in filmmaking are taught through well-structured courses which also include Producing, Directing, Acting, Digital Film Making, Broadcast Journalism, Set Designs, Costume Design and Make-up, 3D animation, Graphics and Special Effects.