Senior Aaron Abrams and his film group, Fierce Apathy Productions, won the first place prize of 1,000 dollars for his film Arbor Day in the Broadcasting Justice Video Contest in St. Vincent de Paul, Alameda.

The contest was created to bring awareness to issues of social justice and green justice in communities and to encourage interest in service. The prizes were 250 dollars for third place, 500 dollars for second place, and 1000 dollars for first place.

Abrams said that the contest was for high school students, the video had to be between 3-5 minutes long, and it had to follow one of the two prompts.

The first prompt was: What does social justice mean to you and what can we do about it? Create a video that raises awareness about local social justice issues and how they affect those in your community. The video must inspire and encourages others to make a difference. Some social justice issues to think about: Poverty, Hunger, Educational Inequality, etc.

The second prompt was: How can you and your community create a greener environment for future generations? The Green video competition encourages high school students to create a video that brings awareness to issues of recycling. Create a video that highlights recycling issues and how we can address those problems. The video must include the concepts of “reduce, reuse, and recycle” and encourage others to participate in such practices.

Abrams said that before he knew about the contest, he had been working on an idea for a fake trailer with senior Nick Smith, about a rogue environmentalist who kills people who are not environmentally conscious, so it fit right into the prompt for Green justice.

“We changed it from a fake trailer to an actual short, and shifted the focus from the killer to the police trying to solve the crime, so that there could be more of a story, and we wrote the script. Our main priority with the short was to have the information in there while still making it really entertaining to watch,” Abrams said.

Smith and Abrams worked together to prepare for the filming. They shot during weekend over the month of September and occasional weekdays as well.

They finished it a month before the deadline, which was Oct. 25, and turned it in.

They got the announcement that it won first place on Nov. 28, and the check presentation was on Thursday December 6.

“We brought Andrés and Lennon on to be the two leads, with Nick playing the role of the killer and two different minor characters.

Abrams said seniors Luke Johnson and Hannah Weverka were also brought on to play minor roles, and senior Delevan Tam was there to help make the production run smoother.

“He played a bit part as well. I directed edited, filmed, and composed music for the short” Abrams said.