Dr Strange Symbiosis

Participating in SciFilmIt Hackathons to create short films has always been immensely enjoyable. The process entails managing a challenging project—completing a film with limited resources and a random team within just one extended weekend. It also requires a great deal of creativity to unite a highly diverse team, who have never collaborated before, towards achieving a common goal.

With a team consisting of two scientists and two artists, we quickly settled on the scientific theme for our video project. However, all the story ideas we brainstormed required extensive filming, involving various locations and props that were not readily accessible and would have demanded extensive planning and execution time.

It was then that we opted to streamline everything into an exceptionally minimalist setup. Our focus shifted to dedicating time and effort primarily to two key aspects:

Communication: Crafting a brief, impactful message and narrative that motivates the audience to explore the topic further
Emotions: The actors received brief but intense training in acting and facial expressions to effectively convey the message with maximum emotional impact

Less proved to be more in this case, achieving a commendable second place in the public vote when the six films from the Hackathon were screened in Pully the 27th of February 2020.

I appreciate the logistical, artistic, and scientific support provided by the organizing committee throughout the Hackathon. It was an amazing experience, and I look forward to participating again in the future.