The Maximum was my first big solo production in High School. I had a month to make the whole thing and it definitely took everything out of me. This was a major leap for my production quality as I was using the gimbal for the first time. Though there was definitely a learning curve once I got the hang of it my scenes completely transformed into something that resembled mainstream quality. The Maximum was also the first time I worked with a big cast and had to plan scenes around everyone's schedules. I was hesitant at first because I’d only make stuff with 2-3 others max but this experience proved how helpful having a cast is. During the entire process whenever I needed an extra push of motivation I'de always think about how I’m not just making this movie for myself, but I’m making it for everyone in my cast. I didn’t want anyone to feel like their work wasn’t being shown to its fullest through my camera work or through the editing. This film was definitely pushing what I was allowed to talk about in a highschool movie, like it wasn’t overly gorey or crude but the innuendos to psychedelics is pretty hard to miss. One of my proudest moments of pre-production was deciding to use glitter to show bits of the maximum coming into contact with the characters, because obviously I couldn’t have someone snort or inhale something but glitter is something totally affordable and visually compelling. I think the idea came from thinking about tropical plants I see in movies and videogames where they spew spores onto whoever goes near it. Deciding what the maximum should be was a whole other mystery I had to figure out for awhile, since in the script it’s described as just a changing ball of light. I didn’t know till I looked online that there was an LED that did exactly what I wanted.The biggest challenge with this film was making a non-linear story understandable for an audience on their first viewing. Since the story cuts between before and after the party I decided that having some sort of caption saying what day it is was definitely necessary. My favorite scene in the entire film was when the character Anthony is running down the hall with the tracking shot that follows him all the way up into the room then pans around him a couple times until revealing Jessica hiding in a tent behind him. I still can’t believe we were able to get that shot and it was so flawless in the final product. There were a lot of moving parts to it with someone holding the light behind me as I ran with the camera with someone needing to close the door the moment the camera passed through it. That scene felt the closest to a real set with how many people were involved to make it work.