East Lyme - An East Lyme High School graduate is part of a production team screening short films at full-house performances and film festivals.

Cinematographer Alexander Paul of East Lyme and writer and director Jonathan Ade of northern Virginia presented their films earlier this month in a tour of destinations including Mystic and Manhattan.

Their series of short films, called "Meditations," consists of "Man in Water" (2010), "Supper" (2011) and "ItsOkayItsOkay" (2012). Several film festivals have shown their work. "Supper" appeared at shows such as the San Francisco New Media Film Festival and the Hollywood Film Festival.

The Independent Filmmaker Project, a nonprofit organization, recently accepted their application for their newest film project, "Lay in Wait," into its sponsorship program.

"We both really love our craft and really love what we do," said Paul.

The filmmakers, both graduates of Emerson College in Boston, expressed an early interest in film.

Paul became captivated with animation after seeing his first film in theaters, Disney's "The Little Mermaid." He built his own animation tables, and the visual culture of Joan Benincasa, a New England painter and relative, also influenced him. He further performed at the Children's Theater in Niantic.

"It became a lifelong pursuit of theater and film," he said.

As he grew older, he began collaborating with friends on videos. He starred as an actor and filmed a series of vignettes, inspired by Woody Allen, called "Niantic Stories" and filmed downtown.

The 2004 East Lyme High School graduate, who has worked as a second camera assistant on the set of the television shows "American Horror Story" and "Raising Hope," became interested in cinematography while studying at Emerson College. He also credits his high school film teacher, Grant Place, for supporting his interest in film and helping organize the film showing in Mystic.

"He was enthusiastic about my fascination about film," said Paul.

Director Ade also said he developed an interest in film and video at an early age. He made a series of short films in high school, as well as videotaping broadcasts of his school's morning announcements. He studied and made films at Emerson, where he discovered his passion for directing.

The two Emerson graduates, who met through a friend after college, realized they shared an artistic language and begin collaborating on meaningful films.

"The meditation film series takes unobserved moments of life and tries to illuminate them on a larger scale," said Ade.

They planned the first short film, "Man in Water," over a year and filmed it within two weekends in the garage of a Los Angeles apartment.

"It was just a wonderful process. We both kind of said, okay - what's next?" said Paul.

So they planned a second short film, called "Supper," where they raised over twice the budget of the first film and a more elaborate set-up that included building scaffolding to film outside of an attic. Their third piece, "It'sOkayIt'sOkay," which had double the film budget of "Supper," used a sound stage; they also said they raised enough money to pay the crew for the first time.

The director and cinematographer prepare extensively before filming and prepare to establish a point of view to make decisions while filming on set, explained Ade.

The two embarked on a tour to discuss their work on the "Meditations" series in Mystic, Manhattan, Brooklyn and northern Virginia. At each event, they noticed more people in attendance than at the previous showing. At one show, they said, there were so many people they even had to turn some people away.

Their next step as filmmakers is a 25-minute narrative film called "Lay in Wait." But they aren't stopping there: the two plan to create a feature film in the future.

k.drelich@theday.com

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON THE FILMMAKERS AND THEIR PROJECTS, PLEASE VISIT: WWW.LAYINWAIT.COM