Detective Lysandra has been assigned to the mysterious disappearance of a relative, but struggles to put together the pieces, even though she has all the clues. She then discovers that the missing piece is in fact, her subconscious.

Shot on iPhone 12.

Director's Bio

My name is Penelope, and I'm 16 years old and in Year 10. I’ve always loved writing, getting my hands on a camera and just film in general, and after spending years obsessing over films I’ve seen, I decided to make my own short piece. With the fresh idea that I was going to make a short film, I went to one of my closest friends at school: Poppy Knight Dunn, whose tastes in film are similar to my own. After agreeing to co-direct and shoot with me, we developed our idea for the story from a collection of aspects we loved in our favourite films, which I then translated into the written script - ‘Lucid’. After assembling my tiny 3 person cast, composed of Leah Jackson (16), Jasmine Wood (16) and Karli Stewart (15), we went to our 3 locations over a few consecutive days to shoot our film. I also brought along my long time friend Emily Gessner (16) who was there to not only capture the audio on the microphone but to help out, which helped everything run smoothly.

The idea of Lucid was born out of Poppy and I’s love for mind bending psychological thrillers/mystery films, taking inspiration from the works of Nolan, Fincher and Villeneuve. From the beginning, we were motivated to create a film with a strong and memorable visual look, which led us to set it in the 70s, using vivid colour grading and period appropriate costumes, sets and props, which I’d collected from around the house and borrowed from friends, it was so much fun to put together! 

I’ve been a massive fan of film scores from a very young age, and being so passionate about it when putting together this film I very much opposed the idea of using stock music, or copyright free music. So, I decided that Lucid was going to have its original ‘score’. Although I had a clear idea of what music and sounds I wanted for each scene in my head, I lacked the music theory and technique necessary to create it myself. I explained to my Dad who has played keyboard nearly all his life the sort of sounds I wanted, and I recorded what he played on the synthesizer which I then mixed about with, changing speed, length and pitch to fit the scenes perfectly.