Media is Everywhere

Today for our media lectorial we were asked to go out and explore the city and see how much media we could discover. As you could imagine, it was a lot.

DSC_1160 shop fronts and displays

DSC_1170 DSC_1173 shop signs

DSC_1179 DSC_1182 sale signs

DSC_1167 DSC_1165 DSC_1181 posters

DSC_1174 DSC_1188 DSC_1186 DSC_1187 grafitti

DSC_1178 DSC_1168 public notices

DSC_1184 public art/sculpture

DSC_1163 public protest

DSC_1191 buskers

DSC_1159 trams

Of course, there were many more things that I didn’t take photos of, such as my phone (which was taking all the photos), people’s clothes and accessories (yes, you are a walking piece of media, whether you like it or not), sales people, newspaper stands, people’s conversations, music, signs of all kinds, flags, giant billboards, billboards tv screens, lights, etc.

And that was only between LaTrobe and Bourke St…

This only proves how filled our world is with media, and how little control we have over our exposure to it.

 

The Essential Art of Noticing

In our week 2 lectorial Brian Morris talked to us about media itself, and this quote pretty much sums it up, “The media are not so much ‘things’ as places which most of us inhabit, which weave in and out of our lives. Their constant messages and pleasures seem to flow around and through us, and they immerse most of our working lives”. (Morris, 2015)

Brian then went on to talk about texts, “sites where meanings are generated through the manipulation of materials and codes [and] do not simply ‘picture’ or ‘reflect’ a reality where meaning resides.” (Morris, 2015) This means that while media texts do in a way represent our reality, as they are created by an individual, they are therefore influenced by the way that individual percieves the world and thus the text is only a reflection of reality through that individual’s eyes.

Texts also tend omit certain information, as though attempting to persuade opinion or win an argument, as through omitting content in various ways, different effects can be achieved. This idea of omittion brought up another idea, of mediated vs. unmediated communication, as in communication utilising a medium such as books, films, the internet, etc. Unmediated communication, such as face to face interaction has an authenticity and a direct experience associated to it, whereas in modern society where social media communication is predominant, communication is more distant, as in order to communicate we have to go through another conduit to reach the desired person.

Media is everywhere, whether it’s assaulting your senses as you try to read on a Melbourne Central platform, or just sliding past you on your Facebook feed. The trick is noticing the interesting little details that inspire you to create or appeal to your view of the world.

Noticing things is surprisingly difficult. We don’t take in half the things we see as we are “multi-sensate beings, we are inundated with sense impressions all the time.” (Mason, 2002 ) Researching Your Own Practice, The Discipline of Noticing. This makes it increasingly difficult to notice even an instant of a moment and take note of it.

John Cage’s most famous performance emphasises our ability to notice things, as well as how cluttered our lives can get, as in his performance 4’33”, also known as ‘sounds like silence’ he performs nothing, allowing the people in the room to stop and notice the things they normally take for granted, such as breathing or the beating of their heart. He also created an emotional reaction and awareness, as many people panicked at the idea of sitting in a theatre and waiting for something that never happened, allowing people to become more readily aware of their bodies reactions as well.

Do you take the time to notice that the sun is actually shining when you’re having a horrible day? To see the interesting grafitti on the street? To see the birds dance through the shopping centre? Do you notice the life around you, or are you too focused and crowded in your head that you forget that the world is huge and yet small at the same time? These are all questions that are worth thinking about, if you just take time to notice the eccentricities of life.

– Morris, Brian. Lectorial, week 2

– Mason, John. “Researching Your Own Practice. The Discipline of Noticing.” Routledge Falmer, 2002

My First Lectorial, Dear Future Self

Yesterday was my first media lectorial. We talked a lot about how we learn and Brian Morris put a poem up on the board by Tom Wayman called ‘Did I Miss Anything?’, a poem which I thought was hilariously quirky and really emphasises the need to be present during a lecture, because you never know when you’ll miss “Everything”, “Nothing” or even “an angel or other heavenly being”. But the poem truly says it all, stating that you will miss everything as the classroom is “a microcosm of human experience assembled for you to query and examine and ponder. This is not the only place such an opportunity has been gathered. But it was one place. And you weren’t here.” And now, whenever I feel the urge to not come to a class for whatever reason, I’ll read this poem and smile, and think ‘hey, maybe, just maybe something crazy will happen that you’ll want to write about, that you’ll never be able to see. Because you weren’t there.’

And now I feel like I won’t miss anything as I feel the urge to be present in this brilliantly zany environment, and take this course by the horns, especially if such awesome poems are going to be thrown around.

We also had to write a list of goals for the course called ‘DEAR FUTURE SELF’, it sounded like something I did in Year 7, only now it would mean something to me, have substance over the next few years as I try to accomplish those things. I’m truly no longer that wide-eyed high school child any more and I’m ready to embrace it, ready to challenge myself by learning how to use a DSLR camera, how to use lighting properly so I can manipulate it for my own uses instead of being blinded by it, become better at drawing so I don’t just draw stick figures when I storyboard, and might actually give animating a shot, be able to develop all the fantastical stories I have stored in my head that are just chomping at the bit to burst forth onto a page. All this and more I can’t wait to achieve, and hopefully, being more of a hyper attentive learner will help in this journey.