Internship Lessons

Stonefilms has always enjoyed our summer intern program, and through this program we have met some incredibly creative young men and women. We have been able to mentor students from many Houston colleges, and this year we are lucky to be working with a high school junior from St. John's School in Houston.

He will learn from our team about storytelling, editing, shooting and graphic design. But we will learn from him, as well. Social media communications are a natural for students in high school, and admittedly our learning curve on Facebook and Twitter have been at times, quite steep.

And we will be reminded that there are so many ways to tell a story now. Many years ago, we bought some of the first Avid editing systems in town. We were so proud of our 320 Gig harddrives that were only $9,000 a piece! We would render effects overnight, and share stories with editors around the country about the latest tips and tricks to save time. We called ourselves "PowerUsers". 

Today we looked at the amazing new Hyundai web site, where users can edit a car commercial, complete with a soundtrack by The Smashing Pumpkins, and post the spot for all the world to see. All without ever downloading an application or file set. And as far as overnight renders - a distant memory.

We will learn from each other, and that is what makes the Stonefilms internship such a great program. We will brush up on MySpace and Twitter, and he will see how we light greenscreen sets to make the edit go smoothly. And we will both be reminded that no matter what the technology, even if your Tweets can have only 130 words, or your video can only be 25 Megs to fit onto a server - you have to have compelling content. 

And that's a great lesson to learn.