Project Bluelight

Project Bluelight is a professional motion picture production company within the School of Cinematic Arts where students get hands-on experience in motion picture production. Project Bluelight was founded in 2004 as a professional, educational, and community outreach program with a dual goal of creating high-quality independent films and providing an intensive, practical, film production experience for DePaul students.

 

Virtual Production

In a virtual production environment at DePaul Cinespace Studios, SCA students and faculty are embracing cutting-edge technology to combine on-set performances and virtual computer graphics live on camera in real-time. Virtual production techniques are revolutionizing film production methods and are rapidly being adopted across the professional industry.

Brian Andrews taught a Project Bluelight course with film production, 3D animation, and game students to create experimental projects for the stage, and the technology was used to create special effects for another Project Bluelight, Shayna Connelly’s The Tensile Strength of Air.

Read more about how DePaul students and faculty are using this emerging technology.

 

The pilot is now streaming on The Roku Channel.

Inferno (2020)
Director: Wendy Roderweiss

The pilot for the dark comedy Inferno was directed by Wendy Roderweiss and crewed by School of Cinematic Arts students as part of a Project Bluelight in 2019.

In the show, a mistake leaves an altruistic law school grad desperate for a job and he interviews at a firm of morally depraved divorce lawyers. Ultimately, he must decide if he’s willing to sacrifice every principle he lives by in order to save his future.

Read an interview with Roderweiss where she gives a behind-the-scenes look at the Project Bluelight course that empowered 26 DePaul students to shape the project and gain professional experience to launch their careers.

Previous Projects

movie film crew chatting  

The Tensile Strength of Air(2022)

Director: Shayna Connelly

After witnessing a traumatic event, Lauren re-evaluates herself in relationship to friends, family and career. Fantasy and reality blend as she assesses her identity and reasserts herself differently in the world.

 

Oh Baby! (2019)

Director: Meghann Artes

Miracle, science and luck all play a part in this vibrant and fantastic imagining of how life begins.

gingerbread man animated  

Merry Christmas from DePaul(2019)

Director: Meghann Artes and Devin Bell

A stop-motion animated film celebrating the magic of Christmas.

 

Bernadette (2018)

Director: John Psathas

In the summer of 1994, an awkward 15-year-old boy enlists the help of the Park District's least valuable employee—a local lothario and suburban legend—to win the heart of Bernadette, an 18-year-old French foreign exchange student.

 

Quiver (2018)

Director: Shayna Connelly

Horror and desire meld when Suzanne arouses a ghostly presence and begins an unusual courtship across space and time.

 

A Place Called Home: Here and Now (2018)

Director: Connor Kovak

Here and Now explores the relationship between caseworkers and their clients. As advocates and most importantly listeners, caseworkers Like Melinda help people like Albert, Joyce and Barb to manage and look forward with their lives.

 

A Place Called Home: Keep it Movin' (2018)

Director: Katie Scheuber

Keep It Movin’ shows the crucial support that Depaul USA provides clients like Jamie and Corida in turning their lives around and feeling a sense of community for the first time in a long time.

 

A Place Called Home: The Good Bad Guy (2018)

Director: Melissa Pratt & Whitney Clark

The Good Bad Guy shows how meeting clients like Fred, who has struggled for years with issues of drug use and homelessness, where they’re at is essential to helping them slowly regain and believe in the life they had given up on.

man infront of a piano in his gloomy living room  

Ten More(2017)

Director: Brad Riddell

A concert pianist receives a startling omen from above as he struggles to recover from a brain injury.

two women near a swimming pool  

Gardening at Night (2016)

Director: Shayna Connelly

Waiting puts time out of joint as Samantha anticipates the death of her oldest friend.

 

Nostalgic (2014)

Director: Ron Eltanal

Nostalgic follows the story of an aging scientist who must choose between: a trial drug that will help him hold on to his memories, but lock him in his past; or a future with his son and granddaughter, but doomed to dementia.

 

Speed Dating (2014)

Director: Meghann Artes

Desperate to find the man of her dreams, sweet and plain Ava tries a last ditch effort, speed dating. But the absurd cast of characters she encounters makes her wonder if being single is not so bad after all.

2 human silhouettes near an encompassing trippy spiral  

For the Records(2014): An Interactive Documentary on Young Adults and Mental Illness

Director: Anuradha Rana and Doris C. Rusch

A multidisciplinary effort bringing together DePaul's cinema and game development program as well as the School of Nursing, For the Records is an interactive documentary on young adults who live with the mental health issues Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), Bi-polar Disorder, Eating Disorder (Anorexia Nervosa) and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD).

 

Fatal Vittles (2012)

Director: Devin Bell

A dark and whimsical alphabet piece about 26 things to never eat.

 

Make It a Great Day (2012)

Director: Joshua Jones

Mother Nature's peculiar sense of irony creates a convoluted path of survival for a newborn chick with unfortunate timing.

 

Turbulent Visions (2010)

Director: Lisa Barcy

A short animated journey from chaos to tranquility as seen through an airplane window. This was a group project, and was conceived and animated by DePaul students as an 'exquisite corpse. Materials include found and mashed-up images, sand, After Effects, and piles and piles of X-Acto blades.

 

Scott's Dead (2010)

Director: Matt Irvine

Estranged brothers from a dysfunctional family are forced to reunite in Scott's Dead, a gritty tales of abduction, betrayal, and metamorphosis.

 

In Love with a Nun (2009)

Director: Ron Eltanal

When Rob's girlfriend Jill breaks up with him because she has decided to become a nun. Rob coincidentally starts having seizures whenever he starts to sing. That's a problem for a high school student who wants to be a rock star one day. Rob decides to win Jill back at the school talent show, but must square off against his biggest opponent: Jesus.