Integrated media exhibit part 2

Four video and film students are among those helping to organize and coordinate the upcoming World of Wonders exhibit, which includes Cinema-Magic — short films featuring adventures, the outdoors, friendship and more.

Zoey Talent and Sarah Mora, two of the students, are co-directing a short film titled “Across Dimensions.”

The plot revolves around two girls who have the power to jump through dimensions. One girl “hops” into the dimension of the second girl and the two become best friends through various adventures. However, the second girl must eventually return home, causing the first to go crazy and create her own dimension. Problems arise when the created dimension cannot be stable, because it includes things from other dimensions.

“We worked on the pre-production. We got different styles, we made concept art, we designed our characters,” said Mora, explaining how they began planning for their short film. Actors had to be recruited, and Talent herself is one of the main characters.

This film will be a mixture of live-action and animation, allowing the directors to explore their animation interests. Mora hopes to one day work on a children’s television show and has included a section in the style of the former Nickelodeon television show “Blue’s Clues.” Talent has based her section on the Japanese music-making program, Vocaloid and the Vocaloid video, “We are POPCANDY!” A stop-motion puppet was used in “Across Dimensions,” complete with movable joints.

The two students met in high school. Together, they decided to enter Mt. Hood’s film program, which is where they realized the full extent of their love for animation. “We both decided, ‘Yeah, film really isn’t our thing.’ We both belong in animation,” Talent explained.

For Talent, this wasn’t a surprise.

“I’ve been into animation since I was born,” she said, but she didn’t begin learning the craft until high school, when she began drawing. “I’ve always (done) flipbook animation on sticky notes. I have a bunch of those in my room where stick men run across the screen.”

Growing up, she liked the idea of becoming an astronaut or astronomer, but quickly became influenced by movies. “I watched ‘Coraline.’ I’m like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to do animation with my life,’ ” she said. “It’s something that I’m always going to be passionate about, so why not turn my passion into a career? I get paid to do what I love.”

Talent plans to take a year off before returning to school for her bachelor’s degree in animation. California Institute of the Arts or Savannah College of Art and Design are her first choices. “After that I would most likely graduate with a job at an animation studio. That would be my goal.”

Mora always thought she was going to be a veterinary technician. “I had even my high school and college planned out for it,” she said. “Halfway through my sophomore year, I was sitting in class and I was like, ‘No, just not gonna do this.’ ” She had made a film for her freshman English class, which contributed to her decision in pursuing film. “I want to do something more artsy,” she said. She discovered Mt. Hood’s program and thought, ‘It’s not animation, but close enough,’ ” she said.

Mora plans to attend Animation Mentor, an online school for animation and visual effects. “I’m going to take an online school for 3-D animation. It doesn’t have an official ‘degree.’ You get a certificate, but it’s known (and taught) by animators in the field,” she said.

Both students have a drive to continue learning about their craft. “(A)nimation in general amazes me and is fascinating,” said Talent.

Grant Abbett is another student mixing his multiple interests. His short film, “Explore,” is a snowboard documentary starring many of his friends. It follows four snowboarders as they struggle to save money through the summer, so they can afford to snowboard in the winter.

An outdoorsman himself, Abbett was taught by his parents to ski when he was 3. He said he remembers his dad helping him understand the basics: “He was just pushing me down little slopes… (I) pretty much grew up on the mountain.” He began snowboarding when he was 14 and now has over ten years of snowboarding experience. When not snowboarding, Abbett enjoys hiking in the mountains. He likes “boot-packing and snowshoe-ing it,” he said.

Abbett plans to continue making videos after he graduates. A few years ago he started his own brand of activewear, called Ilusive. His online store sells clothing such as face masks, hoodies and shirts to ski resorts and snowboard shops, and in the summer sells sunglasses to boating marinas. “I’m going to continue to focus on that and kind of step back from video a little bit, but I’ll still be filming media for my website,” he said.

Ken Ramsey has spent this last term editing, his specialty. “Just give me a collection of footage and I’ll do the best I can to turn it into what I feel like is a work of art,” he said.

Playing video games helped nurture Ramsey’s love for video game development and film. One of his favorite “Star Wars” video games has a great storyline, and he wanted his family to experience it. “It felt like a movie-type story trapped in a game… I felt that this was a good enough story that I wanted to share it with my family, but they don’t play video games,” he explained. He would record himself playing the game, trying to fit the entire campaign into a two-hour segment that his family could watch.

As years passed, Ramsey’s technology advanced. “By 2011, I had a computer now, I had some editing software, I had a pile of clips, and I was putting this thing together. I really felt like I was starting to become an editor,” he said.

He originally wanted to go into video game development, but when he came to Mt. Hood felt more confident in his video editing. In addition, algebra classes are required for the video game development degree, and he was nervous about taking them.

Having now earned his degree in film, Ramsey plans to take pre-requisite classes and begin his video game development degree in the fall of 2015. “If I could get both the video degree and the video game degree, I would probably think of myself as being done with college for good,” he said.

All the film students will have material on display during the World of Wonders exhibit.