A film by Will Mosley, 2018. All the films

Stoven skating down a rooftop walkway at dusk, the Asheville skyline and the hills beyond

Film · No Plan · 2018

Will and Stoven. No plan at all.

A day in Asheville with his friend Stoven, the artist, that refused to follow any plan: a tiny skateboard on a parking deck, a walk downtown, a long lunch, and a rooftop as the light went. Sixteen months later Will made a whole film about him.

Go with the flowThe film was first called Go With the Flow. Will has always said that was his way of doing a day; this one proved it.

  • 14:01running time, published on YouTube December 3, 2018
  • 270shots, counted by scene detection on the film file
  • 0.2sthe median shot; 61% of the shots last under a second
  • 88sthe longest take, starting at 9:05

01 · The day

A deck, a street, a table, a roof.

From the top of a parking garage to the top of a hotel, with a long lunch in the middle. Six frames in film order.

Morning

  1. A mint and blue mini board balanced on a roof ledge1:16
  2. Stoven in the elevator, arms wide2:24

Downtown

  1. Stoven dancing down a city sidewalk3:28
  2. The mini board lit on a dark tabletop8:04

Dusk

  1. Stoven and Will at the table, grinning9:08
  2. Stoven skating the rooftop toward the skyline12:16

02 · The baby board

Eight flights down on a baby board.

It starts with a review. Will has a tiny skateboard to test, and Stoven, who never says no to anything risky, rides it all the way down a parking deck. They score it out of five as they go, and keep scoring everything else all day.

The mini board balanced on a roof ledge over the street
The board on the ledge, a parking lot far belowStoven riding down the empty parking deck

Frames at 1:16, 1:28 and 1:44.

03 · Downtown

Wherever the day went.

Down on the street the film just follows them: Stoven dancing down the sidewalk, a palm reading, a musician on the corner, the city going about its day around two friends with nowhere to be.

Stoven dancing along a sidewalk by a brick building
Stoven far down an empty side street
Stoven in the glass elevator, arms out, laughing
A phone held up, showing one of Stoven’s bright paintings

04 · The table

Three hours in, finally lunch.

They land at a restaurant and the film slows to the pace of the meal: a plate, a dessert, a long laugh. The longest take in the film is here, the two of them at the table for a minute and a half without a cut.

Stoven and Will at a restaurant table, warm light, both grinning
A dessert with cream and strawberries
The mini board lying on a dark table

The loop at the top of the page plays without sound. The film itself is below.

05 · The roof

And the day ends above the city.

Stoven has one more surprise: the top of a downtown hotel at dusk. The board comes out again, the skyline goes blue, and Will closes with the point of the whole day: get out past the awkward part and go live a little.

Stoven skating down a rooftop walkway, the old city building and the hills beyond
Downtown Asheville from above at dusk, mountains on the horizon
Will on the roof, the city behind him

06 · What came next

Then he made a film about Stoven.

Sixteen months after this day, Will spent twenty-four hours with Stoven at the canvas and out after dark, and cut it into Stoven, a 30-minute portrait. It is the film he calls the best documentary he has made.

07 · The cut

270 shots in fourteen minutes.

Every bar below is one shot, as wide as it runs on screen. Half the film is quick flashes between moments; the long bars are the ride down, the lunch and the roof.

Each bar is one shot, as wide as it runs, in film order

Counted with scene detection (ffmpeg, scene score over 0.35, frames scaled to 480 wide) on the film file. The median shot is 0.2 seconds. Will’s own shot sheets for this film, made at the same threshold, list 209.

08 · Watch

No Plan, in 14:01.

Watch the film on YouTube ↗

Meet Will

Every film here was shot and cut by Will.

This one is part of the films he makes about his own life: friends, family, and the days that go somewhere he did not plan.

Next film: Homeward →

CreditA film by Will Mosley, who directed, shot and edited it on a Canon SL2. Stoven appears as himself. Published on Will’s channel in 2018 as Go With the Flow.