When Sara set a New Years’ Resolution to challenge herself, she never thought that would mean traveling to Tokyo for winning an international film contest.
Meet Sara Crochet, ’17, who graduated in Moving Image Arts, won gold for her film “Exulansis” in the 2019 international Nikon Photo Contest. The ceremony for the contest winners was in Tokyo, Japan, and Sara was awarded her own Nikon camera.
Sara was born and raised in Lafayette and is now the Store Manager and Visitor Services Coordinator at the Hilliard Art Museum on campus.
She credits this prestigious award to the hands-on experience and mentorship she received in the Moving Image Arts program, the rich, artistic culture that Lafayette provides, and the support of her family and friends.
Moving Image Arts at UL Lafayette
One of Sara’s favorite parts about studying Moving Image Arts at UL Lafayette was the ability to get her hands on a camera right away.
Through the Moving Image Arts Program, Sara worked as a camera operator and a producer on “Local Produce,” an online video series for KRVS 88.7 FM.
“Just to be able to step into that realm of working on set showed me that this field of work is definitely what I want to do,” Sara said.
Sara loved working in Fletcher Hall, so much so that she calls it her “second home.” Fletcher Hall is where she met her two best friends, who were part of an exchange program for architecture from France.
“They were extremely creatively driven people,” Sara said. “Eventually, it brought me to France for a little while. We showed each other that making art was therapeutic and that there’s no reason to be afraid to show things and show your work and always keep creating.”
Those friendships, along with the mentorship and guidance from assistant professor Virgile Beddock and Liberal Arts Assistant Dean Sally Donlon, helped Sara thrive in school, despite the challenges she encountered along the way.
“Never give up,” Sara said when asked what advice she had for other students. “It took me six years to finish school. I felt the need to give up at many different points in time, but I’m really glad that I did finish and stuck through with my degree.”
Creating ‘Exulansis’
When Sara described how she came up with the original idea for her award-winning short film, she said, “It was very similar to what my actress is doing on screen. I found myself in the mirror, and I guess it was a very strong anxiety attack, and it sparked the idea. Months passed and every week I thought about this idea and how it really, really needed to be put pen to paper, idea to screen.”
Then, in November of 2019, film lab KINOMADA brought 50 filmmakers to Lafayette for a 10-day workshop. During that time, the filmmakers created around 20 films that were shown at the annual Southern Screen Festival. Sara was invited to be a part of the workshop, but a death in the family prevented her from attending.
Just 25 hours before KINOMADA’s screening time, Sara resolved to create and contribute her own film.
She called friend and actress Kamille Taylor, and they immediately began shooting.
“The film didn’t come out how I initially planned it to be, but after getting home and seeing all the footage that I had and putting everything together, I realized it was exactly what I needed it to be,” Sara said.
They started the process at 4 p.m. the day before the deadline. By 7 p.m. the next day, it was screened for the public at the Southern Screen Festival.
But she didn’t want to stop there with her film. When Sara started to do research for other potential screenings, she discovered the International Nikon Photo Contest. The application had five different categories, and the topic for the short film entry was “hope.”
“I felt that my film fit in perfectly with that,” said Sara.
Months later, when Sara received the congratulatory email, she forgot that she had submitted to the contest. The email came as such a shock that she actually thought she might be getting scammed.
“I remember walking around work and showing my supervisors and asking if they thought the email looked legitimate or not,” she said.
Nikon officially published, and out of the record-breaking 97,369 entries the contest received, Sara won the gold prize for the short film category.
Off to Tokyo
With her win, Sara traveled to Tokyo for the award ceremony — for free.
“Traveling to Tokyo was the most bizarre thing ever. Never in a million years did I think I could be going to Tokyo for free. Everything about it was a dream,” said Sara.
This was the first time that she had been on a plane in five years, and although she was fearful of the travel there, Tokyo was a pleasant surprise.
“Everything there is so organized and safe,” she said. “I never expected that I would love Japan that much, but it felt like that was exactly where I was supposed to be.”
Sara also connected with other filmmakers that were part of the contest, Sara De Antonio and Jason Parnell-Brookes. De Antonio won the grand prize, which Sara commented was, “so rightfully deserved.”
Before winning this contest, Sara didn’t have her own camera and relied on other filmmakers’ equipment to shoot her films. Now, with the camera she won through the contest, she’s prepared to continue working on her own films.
“I set a New Year’s resolution to challenge myself,” she said. “That’s when I was in a musical, submitted this film, and got on a plane. It’s been a year of challenges and accomplishments so far and I plan to keep doing that, hopefully.
“I’m just very excited to do good work.”
