Summer Smoke Trailer

The project of Summer Smoke was put into motion by my filmmaking class, but it was also a chance to challenge myself creatively while spending time with my friends and testing their dedication to the project. The story—a music video set to “Summer Smoke” by Cemeteries—follows a murderer, torn between two conflicting sides of himself, who picks up hitchhikers in the desert. What I believe makes it especially interesting is that the character isn’t just cold-blooded, he’s conflicted and disturbed by his own actions. I wanted to capture the tension between his choices and his regret while avoiding being too obvious.

The Alvord Desert felt like the right place to tell this story. Its wide-open space and the harsh light brought out a sense of isolation and discomfort that matched the character’s internal struggle while also contrasting the close confines of the car. We spent hours filming, surrounded by absolutely nothing but cracked earth and distant mountains. The scenery helped set the tone and added to the feeling of emptiness and tension that I wanted to show.

Editing the film took just as much time and effort as shooting it. Piecing together scenes, focusing on pacing and atmosphere took many, many hours. Although I wrote the script for Summer Smoke, I took suggestions from everyone who came on the trip, which definitely enhanced the project as we ended up completely redefining the protagonist.

Bringing Summer Smoke to life was as much about the experience as it was about the final product. Managing directing, cinematography, sound and editing gave me full creative control but also pushed me to my limits. The limited space of the car forced us to get inventive with camera angles and movement, making literally every shot count, while changing lighting put us in a time crunch  In post-production, I spent countless hours refining the visual tone and color grading, mixing the stark and bright beauty of the desert with the dark claustrophobic tension inside the vehicle. The end goal was to shape a film that blends atmosphere and story, highlighting the struggle of a character trapped not only in a car with strangers, but eventually the manifestation of his own guilt.