The seven-week class will wrap up this week with a Red Carpet Premiere from 6 to 8 p.m. Saturday at Art in the Loft. The event is free and open to the public.

The class divided into three groups to work on their own films, which will be showing at Saturday’s premiere. Each film is very different, although all three were given the same script to work from.

“The dialogue is the same, but the stories they came up with are completely different,” Irving said.

One film is a thriller, another is a drama, and the third is science fiction, set in space, so a green screen was used for filming.

Courtesy Photo Above, from left, Matthew Fitzpatrick and Lisa Woolever sit in front of a green screen while Bryant Zitlau, Chance Lukitsch, and Zachary Irving prepare the equipment for the shot.

Irving explained why a green or blue screen is typically used for some scenes.

“You can key out any color,” Irving said. “Green or blue screens are used because they are not in the pigments of our skin … It gives us the option to film in a controlled area in a location that is unattainable, such as space.”

Alpena native Irving owns and operates Irving Entertainment, a video production company he started about three years ago, with studios on Water Street in Alpena.

All three films were shot at Irving Entertainment.

“They only had three hours to shoot it, and then the next group was coming in,” said Irving of the shooting day.

Courtesy Photo Zachary R. Irving chats with Gary Goren in the foreground while Kasey Behring and Jillian Pilarski prepare to be filmed.

He added that the students learned about time management and what is and isn’t doable when given a certain timeframe for shooting and editing.

“I think a lot of them learned immensely from that experience,” Irving said.

Both Irving and Bauer-LeMonds were pleased with the turnout of students, as well as the diversity in age range and experience level. The youngest student is 11, and the most experienced at life is in their 70s.

“It was really cool to see these different age groups and different types of people that are all excited to learn about film, and also, how to create film,” Irving said.

Producer and Script Supervisor Jessie Howard played a large role in the success of the series as well.

“It was nice to see a couple of very enthusiastic young filmmakers, 11 and 17,” Bauer-LeMonds said. “They’ve had such an interesting contribution to everything … They collaborated all so well together.”

Writer and producer Bauer-LeMonds is originally from Alpena, but spent 20 years in Chicago and Los Angeles, working on production projects before returning to Alpena.

Irving has been Emmy-nominated and is an international award-winning filmmaker who has worked on multiple projects from feature films, documentaries, and commercials

“What we really wanted them to take away from this is one, creating a project,” Bauer-LeMonds said. “Two, championing that project, and three, as they’re shooting it, to give it their voice.”

Irving and Bauer-LeMonds were pleased with how it turned out.

“These guys just brought it home,” Bauer-LeMonds said. “It was really fun.”

She and Irving talked about possibly doing another Intro to Film Series if enough people express interest. Then, down the road, they may consider a second class that would be more of an intermediate film series.

“We’re really hoping we can do this again,” Bauer-LeMonds said.