Extended Selfie Wins Short Film Award

Written by: Murray Suid

The pandemic has inspired scores of movies. One of the wittiest is Jon Gill’s “Working at Home.” This extended selfie provides evidence that a one-person production can be cinematically rich. The two-minute video won the Best Short Film Award at this year’s International Mobile Film Festival.

About the Production

About “Working at Home,” Jon Gill explains that he was inspired by many social media posts early in the pandemic lockdown period from people sharing how they were preparing and dressing for work at home as if they were still going to the office.

“Of course I don’t really have a problem with this, but as someone who had been working from home as a freelancer and often was still in my pajamas at the end of a very productive day, I wanted to make fun at this new phenomena. I started with the idea, ‘Some of my best work I’ve done in my pajamas,’ and then I pushed it just a fraction further.

“I did shoot the movie entirely on my own with the exception of the overhead breakfast shot which my daughter did for me. The phone was on the end of my monopod and I set up the shot by standing on the kitchen table. My daughter was on a chair holding the monopod like a boom and I pressed record. Then I jumped down, got in position and my daughter had to hold that position for 20 seconds or so.

“The monopod also came in handy for the walking shot in and outside the house. I held it upside down with the phone near the ground and shot my feet from various angles. If you watch carefully there are a few frames where the shadow of the monopod is visible.”

The gear used in making “Working at Home” included: Shouldered 2 grip; Zhiyun monopod; Sennheiser MKE200 and MKE400 Shot on iPhone XR and edited on iPhone 12 Pro Max (which arrived just after the shoot)

About Jon Gill

Based in Scotland, Jon Gill identifies himself as a mobile filmmaker and educator. While he primarily shoots with a phone, he also uses a GoPro 3Plus, a DJI Mavic Mini, and an Insta360 One R. For him all these devices fit in the mobile category. As he explains on his YouTube channel, “I can easily take them with me and and edit on the fly via my phone.”

In addition to making his own movies, Gill produces films to order, most recently for The V&A Design Museum in Dundee, The NHS in Tayside, and Dundee University.

You can keep up with Jon Gill on Twitter, on Instagram, and on his MadeonaMobile website.

# # #

The editors of MobileMovieMaking have chosen “Working at Home” as the Mobile Movie of the Week.