In Keokuk early one June morning in 2017, college student Brittany Benedict showed up at Dollar Tree for her first day of work at her summer job.<\/p>\n
She was greeted by Michael Huntington, one of the employees she would supervise. They had seen each other around town but never officially met.<\/p>\n
They chatted away while stocking shelves with candy and laundry detergent \u2014 then made something of a monumental discovery.<\/p>\n
Both dreamed of a career making movies.<\/p>\n
Benedict and Huntington soon became a couple.\u00a0Three months later, they\u00a0bought a camcorder and produced a short documentary about a paranormal club in Keokuk. They laugh now to recall the amateur nature of their first film.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was just not great,\u201d Huntington said. \u201cI knew literally nothing about a camera. The white balance was off, it was grainy, the lighting was awful, and the audio was atrocious.\u201d<\/p>\n But they kept at it and pursued other film-making projects, including serving as videographers for family weddings. They worked hard, learned by experience and experimentation, and honed their skills.<\/p>\n Flash forward five years and you find the couple living in Coralville and working full time on two separate videography ventures from a small office at the North Liberty CoLab, a co-working space.<\/p>\n Their wedding videography business is named One22 Studios and has grown to the point where they now film about 30 weddings each year. Their office is packed with equipment \u2014 four cameras, nine specialty lenses, two computers, microphones, green screens, assorted cables, and other professional filming paraphernalia.<\/p>\n\n \u201cWe love doing weddings,\u201d Benedict said. \u201cWe put our heart and soul into this, and it\u2019s rewarding as heck. We\u2019re making something people will look at for generations.\u201d<\/p>\n But they are also\u00a0deeply attached to their other enterprise called Cintree Films, their dream venture into the movie-making business. The name combines \u201ccinema\u201d with \u201ctree,\u201d a nod to the Keokuk workplace where they\u00a0met.<\/p>\n\n They have produced 15 short films of their own, most of them self-funded or crowd-funded with a volunteer cast and crew. They have also assisted with countless other films and have several bigger projects in the works. You can find samples by searching Cintree Films on YouTube.<\/p>\n The wedding work helps support Cintree Films, because, as Huntington explained, \u201cshort films are not marketable like feature films.\u201d He said the industry generally classifies a short film as anything less than 60 minutes, while a feature film is longer.<\/p>\n\n Most of their short films are about 15 minutes, which usually involves at least three long days of filming, plus countless hours of editing. Although they rarely produce income, these films are meant to build credibility for the videographers.<\/p>\n The couple is starting to rack up awards for their short film work. At the recent Iowa Motion Picture Association Awards, they earned nine nominations and brought home four top awards in categories including editing, special effects, short film\u00a0and web series.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen we got into this, we had no idea you could do small films in Iowa,\u201d Benedict said.<\/p>\n Now they have a network of like-minded friends and associates throughout the state, a collaborating community they were delighted to discover and join. They allude to hundreds of people acting, filming, directing, producing or otherwise involved in film-making in the state.<\/p>\n Making movies is hard work and budgets are lean at this level. Cintree Films usually spends less than $3,000 on a project and relies on volunteer actors, homemade props and sets, plus additional crew expertise as needed. Both Huntington\u00a0and Benedict can handle a camera, but much of her work is in organizing and directing projects, while he excels in editing the final cut.<\/p>\n \u201cWe balance each other out,\u201d Benedict said with a grin. \u201cMichael is a gear junkie and a risk-taker, while I tend to be a little more practical and concentrate on the budget.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNobody is as hard-working or as organized as Brittany for our projects,\u201d added Huntington. \u201cIt is so important that filming runs on a tight schedule because we have to respect the time constraints of everybody working on it. They are mostly volunteers, after all.\u201d<\/p>\n\n Examples of their projects include\u00a0a 17-minute film they titled \u201cRosie\u2019s Necklace,\u201d which portrays a family\u2019s struggle when an elderly member develops Alzheimer\u2019s Disease. They rented a Cedar Rapids theatre to premier the film, plus used it to help raise $1,500 in donations to support an Alzheimer\u2019s organization.<\/p>\n Another of their films, titled \u201cShut the Box,\u201d will premier online this summer. It\u2019s a thriller about former foster children who as adults uncover a game that unleashes a sinister power.<\/p>\n In other projects, Benedict and Huntington\u00a0were hired by Nathan Sharp of Burlington to produce a film titled \u201cBatman: Terrors of the Knight,\u201d which stars Sharp in the lead role. The film is expected to be about 40 minutes after editing and may be premiered at a Burlington theater before the end of the year.<\/p>\n \u201cWe staged a complicated scene in an alley in Cedar Rapids for the Batman film,\u201d Huntington said. \u201cIt was a choreographed fight, and we actually wet down the street with buckets of water to make it look like it rained and give it a more dramatic effect.\u201d<\/p>\n Added Benedict: \u201cIn another scene, we used poster paper and PVC pipe to make the bars of a jail cell for a closeup of The Joker behind bars.\u201d<\/p>\n On screen, it looks authentic.<\/p>\n The pair will work on a feature film in June titled \u201cDead Man Walking.\u201d The story follows a gang member, shot in the head, who is trying to find out who is responsible for his injury, plus what happened to his money.<\/p>\n\n \u201cWe\u2019re helping a Waterloo filmmaker on this,\u201d Huntington said. \u201cIt will be our first shot at making a feature film, and we\u2019re pretty pumped about it.\u201d<\/p>\n At the end of June, they will travel to Texas for a week assisting with a western short film titled \u201cThe Satchel.\u201d They will film the \u201cbehind the scenes\u201d portion of that production. 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