I thought I’d delve a little into the behind the scenes of a personal film I’m working on. I’ve been a type one diabetic for about fifteen years and have become recently obsessed with creating a film about the American medical system. I aim to capture the feeling that the medication that provides you with the ability to exist may one day be taken away, or not covered, or not delivered in time. I deal with the insulin saga every month, and while it may be an extreme example, I think many Americans live in similar situations.
That‘s the context. What I really want to delve into is the process of creating 16mm imagery, from shooting to developing, to editing. This is what our rig looked like when I decided to shoot a few months worth of the disposable needles I use to inject. I wanted to create an in camera “split screen” effect. To do that, I covered three quarters of the image plain and shot through my film. Then, I’d rewind and adjust my matte to expose one of the remaining quarters, doing so until I had a complete image. I’ll go a little more into the film stock when I talk about hand development :)