In terms of energy, time, and money spent, student filmmakers are the quintessential struggling, starving artists.

The real challenge for some student filmmakers is dealing with their restrained capacities, going beyond their limitations and still remaining passionate about their work.

Take Laura Davies (senior-film and video, English) for example.

She has just submitted what she says is her tour de force, Under the Floorboards, to the Penn State Student Film Festival. She said avoiding the bumps in the road was the biggest challenge, with an equally huge payoff.

"Being a student filmmaker is almost impossible, but it's those obstacles to me that make it worth it," Davies said.

The film was accepted into the festival this past Sunday, and Davies said it's the capstone of her college career.

"This is the big one; it's definitely a passion project," she said. "We shot on film this time. Though I've done that before, you really start to appreciate the art form if you screw up, not only monetarily but also emotionally. We really put our hearts and souls into this."

Under the Floorboards tells the story of Harold Merrill, a prolific novelist undergoing a dry spell -- thirteen years of writer's block.

He travels to his childhood home to regain some semblance of his imagination.

Davies said that she got the idea from her own mind-blank while attempting to write her script and says that despite the real-life nature of the initial idea, the script is by no means a memoir.

"I started thinking about student films, and I decided I didn't want to do anything about State College or with students," she said. "I ended up with writer's block, and the idea stemmed from there. It's not autobiographical at all -- it develops well past my grasp, more so than I had imagined it would."

In terms of inspiration, Davies said while many try to find their own niche in the art world, that feat is almost impossible without external stimuli.

"There's not really one person I try to emulate. To become an individual you have to draw inspiration from everything. I can be inspired simply by people walking down the street," she said.

With writing and directing, Davies said her influences vary. Artistically she said she tends to gravitate toward the works of Todd Haynes (Far From Heaven) and Todd Field (Little Children), while most of her writing draws inspiration from the likes of Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

"The movie really has the same sentiments as those writers, that you can really see upon the fourth or fifth viewing ... and I hope people are so inclined to see it that many times," Davies said.

For the future, Davies said she's taking things one step at a time, and as a part of her "one year goal plan" she's traveling to Argentina in the coming months.

"Ideally I'd love to be a writer/director, but filmmaking is too expensive," she said, "unless someone would be willing to pay for it ... "