[flickr id=”11439889055″ thumbnail=”medium” overlay=”true” size=”original” group=”” align=”none”] It was roughly this same time last year when I had just finished my first semester in the program that I reflected on my reasons for graduate study. Reading back over that now my logic still seems sound enough, but one year later with the benefit of hindsight what are some of the tangible results that you too might experience as a graduate student in the creative producing program? For Columbia, I produced two corporates; President Carter’s farewell film, and another short film showcasing Columbia talent that was screened at Open House this past fall. Narrative short films I have worked on include the independent comedy Safe Word for which I was casting director; the post-apocalyptic zombie flick Goodnight, My Love that I line produced earlier this year; I produced and assistant directed the coming-of-age drama He Owns It, We Built It, which we filmed in the sun-basked wheat fields of Kansas in August; there was the coming-of-age dramedy Immaculate that I assistant directed; and most recently, the Columbia and NYU Tisch School of the Arts co-production Dark and Light Leo which I produced. Eighteen short films later, this year I also forayed into feature film for the first time; I was 1^st Assistant Director on the Chicago unit of a low-budget independent feature, and 1^st Assistant Director on the independent feature Swan Song for Academy Award nominated director John D. Hancock that filmed between Indiana and Michigan throughout the summer. This year classes have included Line Producing 1, Post-Production, Story Development, Cinema Studies II, Critical Analysis of Contemporary Film & Media, Marketing Distribution & Exhibition, Long-Form Narrative Development, and Cinema Studies III. [flickr id=”11440053483″ thumbnail=”medium” overlay=”true” size=”original” group=”” align=”none”] It has been a productive year; equal parts mind broadening, inspiring, and exhausting. Lately Chicago is somewhat of a bustling hub for production. Not counting the many independent shows around town, television series that have filmed in and around the city this year include Shameless, Mind Games, Sirens, Chicago PD, Chicago Fire, and Betrayal. The studio blockbusters making use of the Chicago skyline include Divergent, Michael Bay’s Transformers: Age of Extinction, and the Wachowski’s Jupiter Ascending. This year Columbia etched its way to #14 on The Hollywood Reporter’s Top 25 Film Schools of 2013. Most people laugh when I say I didn’t come here to learn this much stuff, but really I didn’t. Both Columbia and Chicago have afforded me opportunities beyond what I had ever imagined. I travel home to Ireland for the holidays to spend some time with family and friends — plus I’m going to read some of the 2013 Black List screenplays that I managed to get my hands on — before returning state side for my final semester of study. Fourteen of us producers move to Los Angeles in March, to finish our studies and make the move into the industry. It’s a daunting prospect, but I’ve been listening to Hans Zimmer while writing this — right now it’s music from Inception — so with a suitably dramatic undertone I will conclude by simply stating; it’s time. [flickr id=”11440053683″ thumbnail=”medium” overlay=”true” size=”original” group=”” align=”none”]