DEAN MILAN
director, producer, cinematographer, photographer, colorist
9) Unagi
Fashion Design Short, SCAD
May 2024
Color grading is FUN! Fashion reels are the purest art form of filmmaking there is, and I'm incredibly glad I was able to bring the director's dreams and visions from their ideas and mood boards to life in the final delivery! It was so nice to play around with the colors and express what was possible from footage.
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8) Apricity
Senior Thesis Short Film, SCAD
April 2024
Working with Nancy yet again was an exciting and cool experience, especially since this project was a World War 2 period piece produced in the brand new SCAD back lots!
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I worked hard as 2nd AC, assisting the camera team with whatever they needed to get done! It went well, and the whole team was a joy, and there were many who contributed to all sorts of jobs for the project, it was a massive operation.
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I'm so happy that now they've finished editing, I get to be the colorist! Grading the project has been a great exercise of my skill sets and tools to use, and Nancy couldn't be happier with how it looks; I made sure to give it a rich color scheme and lovely film style in the grade, it's exactly what she was aiming for. Yay! Can't wait until it's published.
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Shot with:
RED Camera
7) An Artist's Battle
Documentary Short Film, SCAD
March 2024
Art is such a beautiful expression of life experiences, things you care about, and your pure imagination. During a documentary production film class at SCAD, me and 4 other students joined up to produce our final project - we wanted to create a video essay about one of the most famous students SCAD has.
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This was a fresh taste of journalism and exploring someone's personal stages in growth over the course of their childhood. The project was truly an international look into what art can mean for someone in a really profound and unique way. I was the cinematographer, and colorist for the film! This film was elegantly inspiring, a lens into another world! I loved this project and the aesthetic look I rendered.
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Shot with:
Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4k
Rokinon Cine DS Prime
Moment 1.33x Anamorphic Lens Adapter
6) Can You Help With The Groceries?
Short Film, SCAD
October 2023
Oooo scary! It's nice to remember that filmmaking is supposed to be fun! Really fun! I loved the costume design, dreary settings, and creative play with characters.
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As a gaffer, I got to make the shapes and aurora of this sci-fi horror film really come to life and tower over the audience. The lighting's moody tone satisfied the director Jack and his cinematographer.​
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Tossing the audience around with something scary and then giving it a comedic twist is always a joy to work on, and joining projects like these are why I'm here in SCAD.
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Shot with:
RED Camera
5) LANA
Senior Thesis Short Film, SCAD
May 2023
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Color grading this film was a blast! I've worked with Mikayla Poole many times up until this point, and was more than happy to grade her final senior thesis project. While I can't find any public publishing of the project, I do have my work saved. Her story was incredibly powerful and the set dressing, lighting, and cinematography was beautiful!
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Shot with:
ARRI Alexa​​
4) What's Online
Short Film, SCAD
October 2022
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For this project, I got to serve as the main sound operator for production audio! It's been a while since I've had the chance to be sound boom operator again, and I met an incredibly talented guy, Aidan, who I previously worked together with. He had brought in additional gear and supplies to help me working on audio, and it was a great success!​
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Later on, the director, editor and I were able to talk about how the look of the film worked. I commonly work on the color grading and technical aspects of RAW video like REDCODE, Blackmagic RAW, or CinemaDNG. I also contributed to reconfiguring the camera on set to give us the best opportunities for style in post.
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It came out wonderful, and the lighting work was also fantastic!
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Shot with:
RED Komodo
3) DJ
Short Film, SCAD
October 2022
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I met up with a friend from the production "The Jungle", and he needed a Director of Photography for a short project of his own during my sophomore year. I got the chance to work directly with RED cameras.
I loved playing with how the REDCODE footage works in Davinci Resolve. The sharpness, color bit depth, and quality of dynamic range is unlike anything I've seen before. Its strength with skin tones and the highlight roll offs are fantastic.
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Set was also fun! I met Ash, who knew a lot about the LED light kits we were able to mount on our C-stands. We played with warmer and cool colors on set to make things visually interesting to fight the boring white walls, since we didn't have the resources to paint.
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Combining FilmConvert curve and grain tools, LUTs, and Hue vs Sat tools helped create a great image. The RED Komodo respects the classic filmic workflow. It takes some procedures to set up for shoots, calibrate in post, but the pay off is huge!
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Shot with:
RED Komodo
Rokinon Cine DS Primes
2) The Tears of Our Reality
Senior Thesis Short Film, SCAD
April 2022
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This was one of my very first projects I got to contribute in when I joined SCAD, it was my freshman year. It went incredibly well, I loved to see the art, the commitment, efforts, and everything about being on set reminded me how much I love filmmaking, and set great expectations for my time here.
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I was glad to serve as their 2nd AC, and it tapped me in to what my future would be like. Film projects in my life were now at the point where they depended on numerous people to function successfully within the time and financial constraints we have, to properly emulate the real industry. It paved the way for me to learn how to produce bigger projects and network with other students in SCAD. Wonderful stuff!
1) The Jungle
Short Film, SCAD
February 2022
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My first project opportunity in SCAD! At the time, I was reaching out and exploring all the projects avaliable who needed crew during the Winter quarter. I met Tara, and she walked me through the whole process of what the world of her story was, and to this day, is still one of the most successful projects I've worked on here so far.
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This was the first time I got to see the use of professional lighting equipment, and be a part of a crew to this scale. We had many grips, lighting teams, producers, anyone. Every shot we did was tailored with an amazing lighting crew who I got to work with. The film had a great flow of production, and crew was in harmony.
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Before college, I was always used to either be doing all these things by myself, or would only have access to 1-3 other additional people who would help with these things. This would limit the scale of projects I could accomplish in a timely manner. Now, things were going to be bigger!
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Shot with:
Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K
Rokinon Cine DS Primes
