Personal Critical Evaluation
when we first started this project i knew it was going to be quite a tricky piece- i hadn’t really made an observational piece like this before- so i knew that i would be learning alot as i made it. when we first began, the narrative was quite unclear to us all- and our ideas didn’t make much sense. but as we went deeper and deeper into the project, a narrative revealed itself- and we ran with that.- because of this, our style was slowly developing, and a structure was building. this was quite stressful though- as for a long while it seemed as if we were changing our minds every day, and we couldn’t go with one specific idea- what was really happening was that we were slowly building layers onto what we had already.when we first started our shooting and editing- we did not really have a clear purpose as to what our film was going to be about- we didn’t know what message we wanted to leave with the audience. this meant we started to take a route which wasn’t really linked to the brief- we got really involved with thinking about celebrity culture, and fashion. which is linked to capitalism, but there wasn’t much of a message that we could leave with the audience. as time went on, we developed an idea to focus on advertising, and media- how this is used to control us as consumers. this idea was very strong- and we knew what message we wanted to bring to the audience through this narrative.
my personal involvement with this film was fairly heavy. the original idea was Chris’- it was a great idea, and i wanted to fully support it- which is why i joined his group. however (as i have been saying) there was alot of potential with the idea, but Chris wasn’t really too sure where he wanted to go with it. during our initial pre production meetings, i think i was a key player in laying some foundations in what we wanted our visuals to be like, and what ideas we could run with. when the ideas started to come away from the brief, i was able to notice that, and think of ways to bring it back to the brief.
in terms of practical involvement, i think i have been quite influencial. i am an artistic person, and so have always loved being involved with the practical sides of a project, however, i understand that in order to make the practical work successfull, you need to understand the theory behind a piece. i was able to link the two, as i was heavily involved with both. if we decided to change our narrative slightly, i was able to think of ways to change the visuals and audio according to the new idea. i did the storyboards for our piece- which was a great way to put what we had in our heads down onto paper. i would never create something without checking it with my group- as i believe a group work is only successful when there is good communication involved, and a respect for the other group members.
i was present every time we filmed and edited, i have a good eye for things, so when we were filming i wanted to be there. i made sure we had the simple things down to a tee aswell- for example how to frame a shot of a person. i enjoy editing a great deal, and my group mates understood this, so i was involved with this too. i am getting more and more fluid at using avid, and now find it fairly simple- which means i can start exploring more of the complicated things which are possible in the avid programme. so i was able to do the simple things in avid (e.g. piecing together clips- making sure sound levels are good, making sure there are no dodgy cut aways) easily and quickly. after doing this project, i have realised that editing is maybe something that i want to take further and persue. i was also involved in creating the mash ups, and doing a voice over in the middle of the film, which is there to help carry the narrative.
i have noticed a few things about myself while creating this project:
firstly, i need to sort out my time management- although i was present everytime we were doing group work, i was often 10 or 15 minutes late. i understand that this wasnt helpfull for my group mates. and so in future this is something i want to improve upon.
another thing, is that i find group work fairly difficult- because i like being involved with every process of production (pre production, production, and post producton- planning, filming, editing) i could see myself doing freelance work. however, i do enjoy being in a group- as it means ideas can be bounced off of eachother- for example, if it wasnt for Chris, we wouldn’t have had our initial idea- i understand this and appreciate this. so i am perfectly happy to work in a small group (up to 3 people) as it means there is respect, i can cope with the amount of ideas going around, and cummunication is fairly simple. in a group which is bigger than 3 people, i find there isnt as much respect, there tends to be one leader who will do what they want, and not necessarily listen to the others- this is why i prefer individual work, or small group work. another plus about working with chris and tristan, is that we have got used to eachothers creativity and ideas- we have worked well together, as we now understand eachother. we have set up a small ‘business’ between us,where we will work in this group as much as possible- either with course work or external work.the last thing i have learnt about myself is that i need to learn how to communicate properly- for example with editing- i found myself doing things without running them by the other group members- so this is something else i want to improve on in the future.
