“Can I get a TC?” yelled Brad.

“Time check! 7:00pm!” I yelled, adrenaline coursing through my veins. The room we were sitting in instantly became smaller and hotter.

It was June 9 and we had 1 hour left until the deadline to submit our short film for the 10th Annual 72 Hour Film Shootout competition sponsored by The Asian American Film Lab. This is how it works: You assemble a team (director, writer, editor, DP, sound, actors, etc) and on Friday night at 8pm ET, the contest announces a theme (This year’s was “Color of My Hair”) and you have until Monday night at 8pm ET to submit a finished product. Finalists get their films shown at film festivals. My teammates and I had that weekend free and decided to enter.

“We still need music!” shouted Lawrence, the director. “Brad, go to the keyboard and just play something that fits the intro scene. Think sad. Pixar Sad.”

My team’s experience allowed us to brainstorm an idea and execute everything in the short time frame. We had all the shooting done over the weekend and now we were on the final lap of editing which usually takes the most time. Despite our collective experience, making a short film in 3 days still proved to be challenging.