The Real Z

Seattle, WA – 2017
Author Jen Calonita
Cover Photos Michael Frost for Scholastic, Eric Isselee from Shuttershock, Inc.
Originally Published © 2017 American Girl
ISBN 9781338137057
 

The Z. Crew

Z and her best friend, Lauren, are working on finishing their current AGSM (American Girl Stop Motion) video for a social studies project about the gold rush. Although this AGSM is for school, Lauren and Z make lots of these videos and post them online. And more recently, Z has started documenting the process that she goes through when she makes an AGSM, from brainstorming, to storyboarding, to pairing the audio with the visual. She takes more than 700 shots in order to make one minute of footage. At this point, Z’s videos have hundreds of thousands of views!

Z gets an email notification for an incoming message from CloudSong Seattle Film Festival. Z has officially been invited to create a short documentary film for this year’s film festival! The first prize award is $1,500, and Z has six weeks to make her documentary. In addition, Z will be given $300 to help rent equipment and supplies to make the documentary.

 

Brainstorm Rainstorm

That evening, Z has kimchi with her mom and dad. When Z announces her acceptance from the CloudSong Film Festival, everybody is excited and proud of her. Her dad immediately jumps into brainstorming what the movie could be about: paddleboarding, walking Popcorn the dog, flying kites, bike riding, Mount Rainier National Park, and the Space Needle. So many potential ideas!

After dinner, Z waits for Mari (her next door neighbor) to get there so she can tell Mari, Becka, and Gigi the good news. Her friends are so excited for her, and like Dad, they jump into even more brainstorming! Z could try out new camera mounts, film the salmon swimming upstream at the Locks, rent a drone, do a segment on Seattle fashion, filming Mari’s band play, and more!

After all that, it becomes clear to Z that what she first needs to focus on is finding a vision. There was no time to waste!

 

School Daze

Later at school, Z finds that she’s been zoning out during lecture. She missed half the conversation in class. All she can think about is her CloudSong film. She’ll have to snap out of it and focus just in time for the Camera Club meeting.

But while she and Lauren are there, she learns that the club camera was accidentally trampled at a football game, and the club doesn’t have the budget to replace the camera. Until they can figure out another option, they’ll all have to get creative. And that’s when Z has an idea: if she wins the CloudSong film festival, then she’ll get $1,500 in prize money, and she can use that money to replace the club camera! It’s the perfect solution… all she has to do is win first place.

When Z gets home, she’s excited to do her first filming for the CloudSong movie. She decides to take Popcorn out for a walk. Unfortunately, it turns out walking, holding a camera, and taking care of a dog is harder than it looks like and Z loses control of the leash. Luckily, Z and Popcorn narrowly dodge a car.

As Z’s mom comforts her, she finds herself humming Singin’ in the Rain, and Z has another brilliant idea. She can ask Mari’s band to do a remix of the song and perform it for Z’s movie. And then, she can take music video footage of them playing the song in the famous Seattle drizzle.

 

Coffee Talk

After school the next day, Z and Lauren visit Mari and her band at the Beanery, one of their favorite hang out spots. Z approaches Mari with the idea of the Singin’ in the Rain remix. Mari is flattered by the idea, and the whole band agrees to be Z’s rock stars.

Z goes to the library to work on planning her music video shoot. She goes to the film archive room where her mother, a film professor, happens to be working as well. They check up on the responses to the video Z posted about her admission to the CloudSong film festival, and find lots of positive responses. Everyone is looking forward to seeing Z make a real documentary!

But one comment sticks around in Z’s head: the concept that this documentary has to be perfect. Z’s mom mentions that not every first video is perfect; it can take a long time for a filmmaker to get their vision just right. In fact, Z’s mom has a clip reel of some of the first films famous filmmakers made. Some of them are good, and some aren’t so good. But each filmmaker took the opportunity to learn something and grow. Although it isn’t easy, a good director takes chances.

 

Lights, Camera, Action!

It’s the day of the music video shoot, and Z has been preparing for days! But everything turns sideways when one of the guitarists snaps a string. But the musician is adamant that she can’t just pretend to play—she wants it to be authentic. And then things get worse when traffic and bad weather prevents her from getting a new string.

Z decides to take advantage of the drizzling and get some footage of the band dancing in the rain. Although the band is hesitant at first, they see how much fun Z is having dancing around, and they join in. Although it’s challenging to film during bad weather, Z manages to get some good footage, some of which even has her in it!

When it starts to rain even harder, even Z has to admit that filming might be over for the day. She’s not happy about it though. She had such high hopes for that day’s filming session.

 

Showtime

It’s the day Z and Lauren’s big AGSM project is due in class, and it’s a good thing it’s done because Z has been so busy working on the CloudSong video that they didn’t look at it over the weekend.

But when they get to class, they learn that the video Z brought isn’t the AGSM video. It’s scattered clips for her CloudSong video! Unfortunately, the teacher is unable to let them try to present again on Wednesday, meaning that they’ll have to wait for Friday.

Lauren is embarrassed and nervous about her grade. Lauren really wants to do well in this project, and she feels like the CloudSong video has taken over Z’s head and distracted her from school.

In trying to talk to Mari about Z’s fight with Lauren, she accidentally insults Mari and says the Singin’ in the Rain remix is just a silly song and nothing is coming together. Mari huffs that perhaps Lauren is right about Z’s mismatched priorities, and stomps away.

 

Total Pro

After school, Z goes with her dad to the Locks to get some cool footage of the salmon swimming upstream. Unfortunately, she spent almost all of her $300 renting the drone, so she has to get some good footage.

And when it’s hard for her to get anything besides moving water, Z’s even more distraught. She switches directions to do an interview with a Seattle-native family walking down the paths. This manages to turn her afternoon around. So maybe the Locks didn’t provide the footage she hoped it would, but maybe there’s still something here she can use.

 

Rainy Week Blues

The rest of the week continues to rain. The bad weather combined with the fighting with her friends puts Z in a blue mood. It’s not until Z’s dad comes in to talk to her that Z realizes that maybe it’s her turn to apologize… face to face. Apologizing via text doesn’t always work the same way as a true in-person apology.

Z decides to visit Mari and Lauren to try to get their attention. Mari is forgiving, and like that, they’re friends again.

Z decides to take a different approach with Lauren. She makes a sign with candy that says “The Horrible Homework Hacker,” an AGSM original coming soon from Lauren and Z!. She brings the sign to Lauren’s soccer game and holds it high in the sky to get her attention.

Z’s plan works! She promises to come to more of Lauren’s games, and acknowledges how important that project and the AGSM videos are to Lauren, and that Z let her down. Lauren accepts the apology, promising they’ll work on “The Horrible Homework Hacker” soon.

 

Sneak Peek

By the end of the week, Z had managed to fix up her project with Lauren, and put together a rough cut for her CloudSong video. She offers her friends a chance to see a sneak peek.

Z and her friends snuggle into her bedroom to watch the movie. For the most part, all of her friends have great responses. They point out their favorite clips, and say they wish the movie could have more of those. And then Becka drops criticism: “Some of the other scenes felt like they were someone else’s movie.”

Z takes some notes. Parts of Z’s movie don’t quite fit together. There’s no single theme or story, just a mish-mash of different parts. Z feels crummy, but she knows that good directors can take criticism to make their work better.

Time to get back to work!

 

What’s Your Story?

Z works for days on her film. She keeps trying to take clips apart, and paste them back together. But it’s just not quite working right.

Z’s mom continues to push her to try to figure out what her story is, what she wants to say, and what she wants to show about Seattle. And that’s when Z realizes she’s trying to show her Seattle. She’s showing Zeattle!

When Z goes to her friends to ask them what they think, she confesses that she isn’t always confident about her plans. Sometimes she’s nervous whether things will work out. Lauren confesses that she feels nervous in school. Becka confesses that being in a wheelchair is exhausting. Gigi admits it’s hard for her to make and keep friends because she travels so much, and finally Mari admits that even though she loves fashion, she still gets nervous about how she looks.

The girls realize that even though they’d been friends for ages, there was a lot of stuff they were keeping secret. Releasing those secrets—just being themselves—makes them feel great!

 

The Real Me

The girls decided to post their stories on Z’s blog, under the hashtag #TheRealMe. Z’s blog is getting tons of positive responses, including comments, written stories, and video responses! Everybody is telling a secret about themself or a story about themself that they haven’t shared with anybody else.

Although #TheRealMe is becoming a fun project for Z to work with, she’s got something else important to do: submit her video for CloudSong. After she nervously presses Send, she gets a response. It gives her the chance to watch some of the other video submissions.

One boy did a video all about the Seattle underground tunnels and secret passageways. Another girl’s video was about the creepy places and things in Seattle, such as haunted shops, graveyards, and a giant shoe museum. Each film told a unique story.

 

“The Horrible Homework Hacker”

Z is working on “The Horrible Homework Hacker” with Lauren when she gets an email notification. It’s a response from CloudSong about her video submission! Z is nervous to open the email, but she knows that she has to.

She got second place! Her film will premiere at the film festival! She didn’t win first place, that went to the boy who did the video about the Seattle underground, but still—winning second place is a huge accomplishment.

 

My Big Night

When Z arrives at the premiere, she’s surprised to see a red carpet, a camera crew, and some people being interviewed. Her whole family gets to walk down the red carpet before they’re escorted to a packed, private theater.

Before Z goes inside, she does a small interview with the Seattle Tribune. They ask Z what she hopes the audience will take away from her movie. Z responds that she wants them to remember how she tried to stay true to herself, how Z tried to show everything that makes Z’s Seattle, Zeattle.

Once inside, Z’s seats have their names on them, like true guests of honor. The movie features some drone footage of Z’s neighborhood, a walk with Popcorn, scootering to school with Mari, Camera Club with Lauren, dinner with Mom and Dad, and lastly, footage of Singing’ in the Rain with Mari’s band, with the music playing on top.

The audience bursts into thunderous applause! Everybody loved the film, and most importantly, Z had made a film she was proud of.

 

A Fresh Start

Z and Lauren get ready for another meeting of the Camera Club. Unfortunately, without the first prize money to buy a new camera, the Camera Club would have to get creative with how to film content. But Z realizes that maybe there’s other ways to get content. Kids could use their phone cameras to film pieces… even phones would produce decent quality videos. Kids could do stop-motion filming with just pictures.

Z’s ideas begin to spur even more ideas from other club members. And pretty soon, they have to start taking notes! Z is so excited to tackle another film adventure. She knows that her and her Z. Crew have so many stories to tell, so she’s excited to get started.

Back to Z