The Year 8 Springwood High School student, who lives in Katoomba, came up with the ideas for his short film called A Matter of Chuck while writing notes of any inspirational idea that came to his head.

Armed with a handicam he’d been saving up for and a couple of tripods, Kalani put up an audition notice for actors at his school, chose his cast, directed and filmed every scene, selected appropriate music and tirelessly edited all the footage.

“Writing was the most enjoyable part of the whole process because I got to develop the story I wanted to tell,” said Kalani.

“Directing it all was fun and the most stressful job was editing 20 hours of filmed scenes down to just seven minutes — all in the final two weeks before Tropfest entries closed.”

A Matter of Chuck tells the story of a rather antagonistic and posh boy who starts tormenting a local homeless person.

Chuck loses a lottery ticket he received as a birthday present, which ends up in the hands of the homeless man.

Kalani said he loves making and watching movies and has plans to create a lot more while he is still at school.

“I’ve been experimenting with cameras and creating short films since I was nine