Campus Drive: Podcast Transcripts
Campus Drive: Lights, Camera, HoCo
Tuesday, August 11, 2026Intro
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Ryan Record:
Welcome to Campus Drive, your one-way street to all things HCC. This is the pod where we explore the culture, creativity, and conversations shaping life at HCC and throughout the Howard County Community. I'm your host, Ryan Record. And in this episode, we're taking the show on the road, literally.
We're here at the 22nd annual Howard County Student Film Festival to witness a showcase of creativity, storytelling, and talent from middle and high school students across the county. Directing, producing, and editing their own original films, these young creators are bringing their ideas to life and sharing their visions on-screen. Tonight, we'll be talking with student filmmakers about their work, their creative process, and what this experience means to them. After that, we'll also be hearing from some of the festival judges about what makes a film truly stand out to them. So, buckle up, because you're listening to Campus Drive.
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It's an honor to have some of the winners of the HoCo Student Film Fest here. And if you could start by please introducing yourselves, what grade you're in, and what school you're representing?
Momina Malik:
I'm Momina Malik. I go to Howard High School, and I'm a senior.
Milan Conti:
I'm Milan Conti. I go to Glenelg High School, and I'm a senior. And we both are representing the Applications Research Laboratory.
Momina Malik:
Specifically, the animation program.
Tevin Son:
Hi, my name is Tevin Son. I'm a senior at Reservoir High School.
Jackson Visco:
My name is Jackson Visco. I am in eighth grade. And I go to Bonnie Branch Middle School.
Linden White:
My name is Linden White. I am from Wilde Lake High school, and I'm a senior.
Ryan Record:
Tell us a little bit about your film and what inspired the idea behind it.
Tevin Son:
So my film today was Fresh Cut. It was inspired by my own passion of cutting hair. I actually cut my own hair, some friends, family, neighborhood kids. And I've always been intrigued with the relationships that formed in the barbershop, just when cutting hair, because there's those casual conversations. You build relationships with strangers and things like that.
Momina Malik:
I love the cringey movies. So I was like, why don't we make a parody of this? And I also really like the fashion stuff. And Milan is super into fashion, too. So I was like, it would be cool if we made a parody. It would be fun.
Milan Conti:
I thought it would be a really fun project to edit, taking a lot of inspiration from silly transitions and stuff, and all the coloring, too.
Momina Malik:
All the classic, cringey tropes of high school movies.
Ryan Record:
Yes.
Momina Malik:
Making it as hard to watch as possible.
Ryan Record:
[laughs]
Jackson Visco:
My film is called The Critique. And it's about a film critic that is, his film is disturbed by some random guy. And he decides to follow him. But it turns out that they are both secret agents undercover, hunting for each other. And this inspired me after I went to the movies myself and someone interrupted it. And then I just put a weird spin on it.
Linden White:
My film is called The Syndicate. And it was inspired by movies like, of course, Evil Dead 2. We just wrote down a couple movies that we were inspired by. So we thought, what if we did like a noir-type movie? And then as the film progresses, it gets into a more zombie-heavy, Begotten type, like black metal aesthetic.
Ryan Record:
So, what was your favorite part of creating this film, and what was the most challenging part?
Jackson Visco:
Probably just working with my friend Chance on it. Whenever we make films together, it's always a good time. And we always have a wonderful time making them.
Momina Malik:
Personally, my favorite part was honestly writing the script, because I had an idea. I pitched it, and I was like, OK, this is cool. But where do we go from here? We want to do a parody of a really bad Disney Channel movie, but where do we go from here?
So it would be like 11:00 PM, and I would just be on FaceTime with Rory, who was our other person who was helping with writing and stuff. And I would just be bouncing back with ideas and stuff with her. So that was a lot of fun because we came up with some crazy ideas and tropes. So that was pretty fun for me.
Milan Conti:
For me, I think coming up with all the transitions. And we filmed our own laugh tracks and reactions, so that was really fun to add in. I think probably the most difficult thing for me for this film was doing the color grading, because it was one of my first times testing with that and trying to make the saturation really high, and then dulling it down when it was normal, and amping it up when we were in the Disney Channel movie.
Tevin Son:
I would say my favorite part of creating this film was how it actually happened. So the funny thing is, I wrote this script about three years ago during the end of my freshman year, sophomore year. But I struggled to actually complete it because I couldn't find a barbershop who would be willing to let me use the barbershop or set for an extended amount of time. So it'd be this weird moment every few days where I'd ask a random person, do you happen to know anybody who owns a barbershop? And just this past winter in 2025, I asked one of my friends, Lorenzo. And he said his stepbrother owns a barbershop. So I contacted him, and he let me use his barbershop. And he actually acted in this as well.
Linden White:
I think the most challenging part was really just the managing of everything.
Ryan Record:
So, tell us, what is it like to have your film featured here at the HoCo Student Film Fest?
Milan Conti:
It's very rewarding.
Momina Malik:
It really is. Honestly, we just kind of submitted this for fun. We were like, oh, there's a film festival coming up. It would be kind of cool to submit our film. We were working on it for so long. We spent so much time on it. So we were like, it would be really cool if people got to see it.
Tevin Son:
So for me, I'm really grateful for this opportunity here at Howard County. I've known Miss Lee for four years. I'm actually the founder of a media production organization at my high school that I founded freshman year. And she's the sponsor for it. So I'm really always grateful for opportunities for film and media in our area, because there's just not that much. I think being able to showcase my work here is really a blessing.
Jackson Visco:
It's an honor. I'm so happy to have it win. And yeah, it's always just a fun time being here and seeing everyone else and what everyone else is doing in the county.
Momina Malik:
Placing second place, that was really surprising for us. But we're really honored, very grateful. So that was amazing.
Ryan Record:
Well-deserved as well. Excellent work. So last but not least, do you see yourself continuing with film or media in the future? And what are the goals or dreams when it comes to storytelling and creative work?
Tevin Son:
Yeah, for sure. I'm actually planning on pursuing film in college. I'm not sure where yet, but I definitely want to direct or be involved in the film or media space in some way or form in the future. So yeah, definitely. 100%.
Milan Conti:
Well for me, next year I'm studying film and television production at Chapman University with an emphasis on video editing. So I'm really excited to be telling other people's stories through my editing.
Momina Malik:
I'll be studying animation at Savannah College of Art and Design next year.
Jackson Visco:
I absolutely see myself continuing making films with my friends and just having a good time. And my dreams are, I want to be an actor and a director and a writer for movies one day. And yeah, I hope those dreams start here, and someday they can grow.
Linden White:
At the very least, it'll remain a passion of mine. At the very least, definitely a hobby. I'm actually going to UMBC next year. Go, Retrievers! And they actually have a film club where they watch movies, talk about them with each other, and eventually make movies together. So I will definitely be partaking in that.
I just want to make something different, you know? I am heavily inspired by '80s movies and that sort of, quote unquote, "cheesy era" of movies. But I just think they're just amazing. These directors, they weren't scared like they are today. I think today, directors, they're afraid to make cheesy movies. I think that's terrible. I think we need to bring back the cheese.
Ryan Record:
Thank you so much for coming on the show today. That's all I got.
Momina Malik:
Thank you so much.
Milan Conti:
Thank you.
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Judges
Ryan Record:
On behalf of Dragon Podcast, I want to give a huge shout out to all the students who participated in this year's film festival. You'll likely be seeing their names in the credits of some blockbuster very soon.
While students provide the heartbeat of the festival, there's a panel of experts tasked with the difficult job of evaluating their work. We're joined now by some of the judges with years of experience who had the pleasure of seeing all the talent on display. Thanks for joining Campus Drive today, everybody. If you could each start by introducing yourself, telling us a bit about your professional background, and how many years you've been helping out with the HoCo Student Film Festival?
Jill Lee:
Hi. I'm Jill Lee. I am a school librarian at Reservoir High School. I've been a librarian for 16 years now. And I think I started working at the HoCo Film Fest 12, 13 years ago. So I've been running it for quite a while. And I also teach the video production class, which is something that I was told I was going to be teaching, and have loved every minute of it, and have loved teaching myself about film. So that is a little bit about me.
Ryan Record:
Sweet.
Anthony Hoos:
I'm Anthony Hoos. And one of my functions here at Howard Community College is to gather local content to air on our educational access channel. But over the years, I've produced content on my own in the form of a paranormal and historical series. Here at the college, I've taught script writing, lighting, editing, anything production, television workshops, digital media, film history, you name it. And I've also taught for Penn State University in the same capacity as an adjunct. What piqued my interest in the Howard County Student Film Festival, back in 2014-- I think that's when I met Dan and Jill, right after that.
Dan Gvozden:
Yeah.
Anthony Hoos:
Dan, you were with Brian Roan on Reel Talk, right?
Dan Gvozden:
I was going to bring it up on the air. Yeah, we have history together.
Anthony Hoos:
Well, you still can.
Dan Gvozden:
Yeah.
Anthony Hoos:
But yeah, back in-- that was like 2014. And I was going to include the Howard County students in the Maryland Student Film Festival, which HCC was hosting here that year. It was another film festival that lasted a couple years. But at any rate, I reached out to Carol Fritz, Binki McKenna, Danielle DuPuis. Jill, I don't even know if you were around. It might have been a year before you got there.
Jill Lee:
Yes, I was helping but not helping officially in the role yet.
Dan Gvozden:
You were helping. Yeah. So, I coordinated with them, and we formed this partnership. We no longer do the Maryland Student Film Festival, but what we can do for students and what we do do is air the student films on our channel. So any student who wants to do that is welcome to participate.
Ryan Record:
And, Tony, you and I go way back as well. You were my professor back in the day.
Anthony Hoos:
Yeah.
Ryan Record:
And full circle-- we're working together now, man.
Anthony Hoos:
Yeah, here we are, Ryan.
Ryan Record:
Thanks for bridging the gap, Tony. Dan?
Dan Gvozden:
Yeah, hi. I'm Dan Gvozden. And I've had a whirlwind career, Anthony kind of tipping it off there. I've been teaching film production for 15 years. I currently teach as an adjunct at Towson University.
But I've had a career in film criticism, working with Anthony on Reel Talk, a film review show in the style of At the Movies, with a good friend, Brian Roan. And I've been working with teenagers and high schoolers in all kinds of different capacities of film production. And I just try to get involved in everything.
And my latest endeavor is starting my own film school in Catonsville called The Backlot. It's a film school and studio meant for people to engage their interests in production or, really, any level of filmmaking that they want to get involved in. I've got screenwriters. I've got real estate agents who want to up their game. And I'm doing high school film camps this summer that I'm really excited about.
And this is my first year working with the HoCo Film Festival. And I was really honored to be invited to be a judge. Given my history with Howard County in a variety of different ways, it was a nice kind of return after my time away in Los Angeles for the past decade, to come back and work with Howard County and the great team there. And Jill invited me into her classroom, and it was a lot of fun. So yeah, that's a little bit about me. And this was a great experience.
Ryan Record:
Fantastic. Glad to hear and thank you all for joining us today. Now when you're reviewing these student films-- and I know there's a lot of them-- what is something that immediately makes a film stand out to you as a winner?
Jill Lee:
I can tell that whenever I watch the films, I usually can guess what are the top five. And usually what stands out to me is the story. If they don't have a good story, the rest doesn't matter. And audio.
[laughs]
If I can't hear what you're saying, then I have no idea what the story is. Even if you don't have a great camera, that's fine if you have good shots, good angles. But if your story is solid and your audio is good, those are usually the ones that I find to be the winners.
Anthony Hoos:
I'll follow up on that. When I'm reviewing student films, what immediately makes a piece stand out is how its storytelling meets its technical concept. A winner doesn't have to be technically perfect. But a strong, focused script that is communicated clearly from beginning to end always gets my attention. And I also pay really good attention to composition, continuity, good sound editing. Like Jill said, that audio is really important. Special effects, when used correctly, makes a film stand out. And I think most importantly, a standout film kind of lingers like an earworm. So after it ends, it forces me to watch it again for clarity and maybe a third time. That's the film that usually rises to the top for me.
Dan Gvozden:
For me, I'm looking for something that, I think on top of all the other things that have been said, are they taking advantage of the medium itself in a unique way? Are they doing something that could really only be a film? But I'm looking for that unique blending of editing, sound, visuals, mise-en-scene, all the elements that make something uniquely a film. And I feel like you can kind of tell, almost immediately, is this person thinking about this in a cinematic way or not? And if it could be something that's done on the stage, no shame to it. But I'm looking for someone who really thought about this from its very genesis as, is this a film?
Ryan Record:
Right on. And on that note, as you know, sometimes students' equipment is limited. How much weight do you give to the technical perfection versus the strength of their storytelling?
Anthony Hoos:
I think the technical polish really matters, but it's secondary. So, if the storytelling is really strong, clear, and engaging, I can overlook those rough edges in production because I realize-- I was there once. I realize what the limitations are in terms of equipment. However, when the technical issues consistently block my comprehension, when I'm supposed to be watching completely inaudible dialogue, or disorienting editing like breaking the 180 rule, which happens sometimes, things like that really limits the impact that I want to get while I'm watching it. And the best student films usually balance both. They might be simple technically, but the choices feel like they're intentional, and they really serve the narrative.
Dan Gvozden:
I like to say that, really, the sky's the limit for what kids can do now. I mean, technically, these kids have more in their phones, in their pocket, than any of us had, often in a professional capacity, to produce things. And so I agree. There is a certain level of tongue in cheek or suspension of disbelief. But oftentimes, if I'm instructing a kid, I'll say, if you aren't able to pull it off, is there a way to rethink it so that you can do it within your means so that we don't have to suspend our disbelief? But can you limit it in a way that your props all work within the constraints of your setting, or change the story to be smaller in scope so that you can really own the craft and technical mastery of the thing that you are approaching?
Yes, there is a sort of accepting that there aren't limitless resources for high schoolers. But also, there are ways to get so many things. And so, it's hard to judge because someone might be making a film that has ambition that they can't possibly match with resources, up against someone who scaled back their ambition for the resources that they actually have so that you don't have to suspend that disbelief.
And my bias, perhaps, is towards the people that found a way to match their ability with their ambition and pull together the thing that allows me to fully believe in the world that they're presenting to me. But I think stories are adaptable. And "the medium is the message," so to speak, to quote Marshall McLuhan. I would find a message that matches where you're at, if at all possible.
Jill Lee:
Yeah. And what I usually tell my students-- because the quality does vary quite a bit with whatever students have and what we can offer. But usually I let them know, as long as I can see intention in what you're doing in your story, and I can see intention in terms of, are you telling your story through the camera, or are you letting go of some of that creativity because you have a good camera? There are students that have won that did not have a good camera and did not have the best stuff, but it showed their intention of the fact that they really took the thought and the time to make a good story using the resources that they have. And that shows their tenacity and their hard work through the story.
Ryan Record:
And speaking on things that we have today that we did not have back in the day, AI. This year's festival had a strict no AI policy. So from a judge's perspective, why is it important to highlight human-only creativity at this stage?
Dan Gvozden:
What else are we doing here if we're not highlighting human creativity? If I wanted a robot to make films for me, I could do that all day long. It's funny because you say that, but I just got done fighting on behalf of the 48-hour Film Festival, which was accepting AI-written scripts. And it's like, why are you even getting involved in a 48-hour Film Festival, which is all about creativity under pressure, if you're going to use AI for it? It just doesn't make any sense to me.
What are we judging? Your ability to type a sentence in and get a good result out of it? To me, that's not what we're doing here. The joy of making a film is seeing someone go, I need to go and get x, y, and z things to pull it off, and write and create all these things. But AI is not the answer. It's more accessibility to the resources, in my opinion.
Anthony Hoos:
Yeah. I think that policy exists across education and across all the creative fields simultaneously now. And it's so important to have a policy like that that protects their learning process. I think when a student knows they can't rely on AI tools to generate ideas or some sort of structure to their film, they wrestle with that creative process. Like Dan was saying, they should be wrestling with that process themselves, which is also going to reflect a more meaningful result, I think, in the end.
So it also creates that baseline. It's a really fair place from my perspective as a judge, because I can evaluate without the AI ambiguity about what was generated versus what was really authored by them. So I think having that policy in place produces more meaningful results.
Jill Lee:
Yeah. And the reason why I put that in there is because I always tell my students, you need a universal truth. You can have a science fiction film that is completely out there and whatever, but as long as there's a universal truth that everyone can compare their own lives to, then you're going to be good. And AI doesn't know what that is. And they don't know how to make you feel something. And if I don't feel any sort of emotion at the end of your film, I don't think it's going to get very far.
Dan Gvozden:
I want to add on to that, too. I think universal is often accessible through the specific. I look at a film like Moonlight. I have nothing in common with the main character of Moonlight. He is a gay African-American in Southern Florida who grew up during drug crisis in the urban Miami. I have no shared experience with that character, other than the fact that we're both humans. And that movie is so human that I can connect on a very basic level with it. And suddenly, his life is my life. And so, we talk about oh, do we have resources and blah, blah, blah? And how much money and how many tools do we have? Accessing humanity should be free, until AI starts charging for it. But that, to me, is the secret to getting in.
And if I can toot my own horn here, which, whatever. I used to work at a high school film program. And we had a $400 budget a year. And we took films to the top film festivals for students in the world with our tiny, tiny budget. And we're competing with schools that were spending four hours a day with their kids making movies.
And it wasn't because we had any kind of secret tech or access to resources that anybody else had. It's because, like what Jill was saying, is we drilled down very specifically on the human. And that means not cheating. And also not doing the thing that we're all doing these days, which is a single button press that releases dopamine into our brain. Filmmaking is hard. It's a struggle. It takes sweat and tears. And it means being vulnerable.
And AI is just not going to do any of that for you. It's all about cutting through, making you feel comfortable, and telling you how great are. And that is not helpful to anybody.
Ryan Record:
So a lot of excellent points have been made so far. But in your guys' opinion, what is the most important skill students should focus on to move their work towards a professional level?
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Jill Lee:
I guess just from a teacher's standpoint, as long as they don't give up, I think is going to be the key to getting it to the next level if they want to. We want to make sure that if they reach a hurdle, they don't stop at that hurdle. We keep pushing them to go over it and keep pushing them to make the films that they want to make.
We don't want to lower the bar on their creativity and lower the bar on their expectations, either. So, I feel like it's important to just make sure we instill in them the endurance to keep going and keep trying, even though we know they're going to fail. And they should know they're going to fail. But the best filmmakers, in my opinion, are the ones that just don't give up and keep trying. So—
Dan Gvozden:
Yeah, a lot of lessons learned through failure. So—
Jill Lee:
Yes.
Dan Gvozden:
--I agree.
Anthony Hoos:
Yeah. Being persistent like that, that's definitely going to work in their favor. But I'll lean back on my disciplined storytellers mantra. I think that's the most important skill that students should focus on in order to move up and to level up to a more professional level.
What I mean is taking an idea and shaping it into a clear, intentional, and engaging narrative from beginning to end. You have those points of conflict and you have your climax. And it's a great story. At the student level, it's common, I think, for them to be really, really super passionate about this passion that they have. And they bring to the medium their motivated ideas, but not really consistency in executing all that, because it's difficult.
But moving toward a professional level, to me, means making refinements like cutting what doesn't serve the story itself and making every scene, shot, and all their sound choices purposeful. I think a professional can be distinguished not by just what they include, but what they confidently leave out of their scenes and their films.
Dan Gvozden:
Yeah, I think both of those bits of advice are really important. Whether you want to add on to that with the get in late, get out early. And in regards to creative forward momentum, I always say you're only as good as your next idea in the arts. Everybody can get very stuck and hung up on the idea that they're currently on. And yes, you want to make that good. But you should always keep moving forward.
Everything's been done before. And so the way you're going to make your stuff special is to keep iterating and also be never content with your work. But if I'm going to talk specifically about filmmaking, especially for high school filmmakers, the thing that I want to stress is, can you do it without dialogue? I think it's the number one crutch that people lean back on, which is-- I'm not saying dialogue isn't a good thing. I love a Tarantino film as much as the next guy.
But refining your visual storytelling will take you further than anything else, because it can tell more of the story than I think you're comfortable with. And don't forget about your close-ups. They may be scary. You may have to get up close to something and not show something else. But filmmaking is as much about what you don't see as what you do see. And close-ups are a great way to add that punctuation mark to the end of a sentence. And don't be afraid of them, kids.
Ryan Record:
So, last question. If you could sum up the spirit of the 22nd Annual Howard County Student Film Festival in just one word, what would it be?
Anthony Hoos:
I would say "emergence," just because it's not about perfection for these kids. It's where and when their creative identities begin to take shape and emerge into something more intentional. I mean, it's a student film festival, so it's going to capture these moments where their skills and ideas and personal voices are still passionate and still forming. They're just starting to come into focus.
I mean, some of those junior high films were pretty amazing. That's what I think of when I watch those. There's a lot of this experimentation. There's the risk-taking in their storytelling, and then in just in the general craft. And then there's that whole discovery that usually coincides with their efforts, which is just brilliant. So I would say "emergence."
Dan Gvozden:
I was going to say something about-- and I don't know if there's even a right word for this. I was going to say, like, "blended." One of the things that really blew me away about watching the films this year were not only the variety of genre, but the variety of genre within each individual piece. And for good and for bad-- some of it worked, some of it didn't work. But that's part of that sort of experimentation and emergence that Anthony was talking about.
You'd have these sort of satirical comedies that would suddenly turn into something else. Or I think about that middle school piece I think Anthony might have been referring to, The Critic, that started as a sort of satire of snobby film people, but then turned into a sort of heist movie spy twist 'em up. And I love the experimentation that the kids are willing to get into.
Would I maybe have encouraged them formally to tighten it up a little bit? Maybe. But now is not the time, right? Junior high is where you get to do wacky things and figure out what works. And like those are the films that I liked that were daring and trying to do something new. Seeing all that blended together as they find their voices was a lot of fun.
Jill Lee:
I'm thinking more of a "snapshot" or "simplistic," not in a negative way. But a lot of the films, I noticed, took some small, in terms of what we would see in life as a small little vignette of your life, and made it into a story. I'm thinking of a few of, like the haircut one where he goes to get a haircut, or a girl trying to make a friend, or the one where they redid the early 2000s movie. Those kinds of things, it's like little slices of life, but I think they highlighted it in a really creative way.
Dan Gvozden:
I think those are the perfect example of some of the things I was talking about in terms of you can do something huge in a really small thing. I mean, that's an access point into something much bigger. Yeah, I agree with you, Jill. I think that was a great way for the films that really stood out, were able to find that thing that brought everybody in.
Ryan Record:
Well, guys, thank you so much for hopping on the pod today, making this film fest a reality for all these students so they can be emerged and blended and maybe tone it down, be a little more simplistic. But yeah, it's an absolute pleasure to have met all of you and to have been able to participate in this myself. So, on behalf of Dragon Podcast, I just want to thank Jill, Dan, Tony for your time. And can't wait to see what happens next.
Anthony Hoos:
Thank you, Ryan.
Jill Lee:
Thanks so much.
Dan Gvozden:
Thanks.
[Jazz music]
Outro
Ryan Record:
And with that, the credits are rolling on our coverage of the 22nd Annual Howard County Student Film Festival. And what an incredible night it was, seeing the world through the lenses of these talented young creators. Whether they are exploring the technical side of the craft or finding their voice through storytelling, one thing stands out-- the future of film in Howard County is in great hands.
If today's interviews inspired you to pick up a camera and tell your own story, remember that the journey doesn't have to end at high school graduation. Programs that help build up media visionaries are available at Howard Community College to take that next step and live out your dreams.
Thank you again to the student filmmakers and the panel of judges for sharing their time and vision with us today. To keep up with more stories happening across our campus and community, make sure to follow us and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. We have so many more podcasts at your fingertips. Just search Dragon Podcasts wherever you get your podcasts.
Until next time, remember to keep your hands on the wheel and your eyes on the road. Thanks for riding with Campus Drive. This is Ryan Record, signing out.
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Campus Drive: Lights, Camera, HoCo