Facility
Students have access to our state of the art equipment,
fully equipped labs, and professional soundstages with green screen.
The school campus operates inside a former commercial production facility and occupies approximately 20,000 square feet that features a 6,000 sq ft soundstage, a 1,440 sq ft insert stage, a 3,000 sq ft scene shop, equipment bays, learning resource center, screening room, audio suite, conference room, cafe and kitchenette.
STAGE A
MPI’s stage is a 1,440 sq foot insert stage with 20’ high ceiling deck, stage electrical and is equipped with grip, electric and lighting units. This stage is used for classroom instruction and film productions. The stage is equipped with a small stand alone set used for demonstrations, lab assignments and student film projects.
STAGE B
The MPI soundstage is a 6,000 sq foot freespan production space with a 20’ high ceiling. A 18’ high “L” shaped cyc wall enables students to shoot green screen, white, gray and black backgrounds. The stage also has a rolling green screen walls for mobile shots.
The stage is equipped with stage electrical to power the school’s assortment of 5k, 2k and 1k lighting fixtures including fresnels, fluorescents, LED and HMIs. The Stage is used for classroom instruction, in-class productions and is accessible for individual student film productions throughout the year. It is equipped with a camera crane, matthews dolly, Mole Richardson & Arri Lighting, c-stands, hi-rollers, flags, frames, butterflys, apple boxes, grip clamps , sandbags, carts, and gel packages.
SCENE SHOP
The scene shop is a space that is used to fabricate and store movie sets pieces, set dressings, props, scenic backing and tools. The shop has extra space to serve as a small stage for shooting film project.
SCREENING ROOM
The Screening Room is designed as a classroom for lectures, group discussions, screening student film projects and conducting crew meetings. The room comes with a digital projection system and a 5.1 surround sound system. Seats up to twenty-six students.
POST AUDIO SUITE
The Post Audio Suite features an workstation utilizing the Adobe Premiere suite, Davinci Resolve and the Fairlight DAW system. The room has 5.1 surround sound monitoring with a large screen video monitor for image playback. Within the suite is a sound proof booth that is used for ADR, voice over, loop groups, foley and sound effects recording.
THE WAR ROOM
The War Room is a conference style space with a large twelve foot table with seating for up to ten individuals. The space comes with a white board, cork board, floor power a 4K monitor with computer connectivity. Students utilize this space to plan productions, conduct table reads and call backs for casting actors.
LEARNING RESOURCE ROOM
The Learning Resource Center contains a collection of film and acting texts, equipment manuals, screenplays, and hundreds of films on dvd and blu-ray. The center includes five dual monitor computer workstations with Davinci Resolve, Final Draft and Movie Magic Scheduling software. The computers are connected to the internet so students can do research on-line.
LOUBERT CAFÉ
Is named after Eric Loubert, a prolific filmmaker and MPI grad who passed away in 2014. The cafe is for everyone who needs a break, quiet time, social time and offers students a place to relax and focus. The cafe comes with complimentary coffee and popcorn. Beverages and snacks are available from two vending machines.
GALLEY
The Galley is a kitchenette with a sink, refrigerator, microwave, coffee maker, and Keurig for students to prepare snacks, make something to eat or stash their lunches til break.
EQUIPMENT
The school offers a wide variety of production equipment as part of its learning resource system for students to train and use on their film projects. Each year MPI invests in new technologies while maintaining its traditional and established film hardware. The school armory houses a multitude of camera, lighting, audio and grip equipment packages. MPI provides students with all their gear needs for the program.
Camera systems include: RED Dragon-X 6ks, RED Scarlet MXs, RED ONE MX 4.5k, Canon C100 Mark ii digital cameras, Zeiss prime lens kits. Angenieux, Canon, Tokina, RED cinema zooms, Follow focuses, matteboxes and filters. Manfrotto tripods, baby sticks, hi-hats. 7”and 21”HD field monitors. AC Kits with slates, light meters, camera tape etc. JVC 4k camcorders, GoPros and Canon DSLR cameras.
Film cameras include: 16mm Arri16SR, Arri16S, CP16 Bolex systems and 35mm Arri camera system.
Field audio kits include: Zoom F4 recorder/mixers kits, Zoom F3 mini recorders, Sound Devices 302 Mixer, Zoom H4n recorders with Shure FP-33 mixers, RODE Wireless GO II lav kits, Audio Technica shotgun mics & wireless mics, Sennheiser wireless mic systems, headphones, amplifiers, boompoles, shock mounts, pistol grips, windscreens and blimps/zepplins.
Lighting systems include: Arri portable light kits, Kino Diva LED panels, Kino Flo 4 bank and 2 bank kits, Arri 2k and Mole 2k lighting, Mole 5k lighting units and HMI.
Grip and Electric systems include: Matthews doorway dollies, skater dollies, sliders, jibs, camera crane, c-stands, hi-rollers, 12x frames, 8x frames, 6x frames, 4x frames, butterflies, flags, silks, scrims, nets, griflons, reflectors, green screen, mafer & cardelini clamps, pigeon plates, risers, dimmers, stingers, appleboxes, sandbags, distro boxes, and gel packages.
