In class: Total low. In New Zealand on Tuesday so will have to be more active in the Thursday class

Readings: Fine, i’m still quite engaged with Bogost’s ‘Alien Phemonology’. I have become extremely interested in his theories where this creates great conversation between me and dad which I really like

Blogging: Average… was really good last week with engagement, but when I go home I always slip off the constant blogging. It’s been a very difficult semester for me with getting sick and having to travel back and forth often

Assignements: Really good! I have already got started on my first video of the object which I am really enjoying to film and have so much to say about it. Still struggling a bit for the ‘action’ video as would love to film myself dancing (as don’t have any friends in Melb who dance) but not sure exactly how to do that yet and make it interesting… will keep thinking.

Group: We are going great. Just handed in the last Offenburg part which is awesome and our communication and engagement with one another is always on form. Really lucky for the group I had!

After going through my blog posts I realised that I never actually conducted a list of the 5 significant actions that will contribute to my performance for this studio. So here it is! (which I found in my notes)

• In class participation: asking questions, interacting with studio members, active engagement in conversation
• Readings
• Blogging
• Assignments
• Group: engagement, equal share of work, communication

I want to know why do we choose an object and then an activity to film that MATTERS to us, we have constantly been told to eliminate the idea of meaning and now we are bringing it back to us. Furthemore, doesnt this also reflect the human element and conflict ontology? I get so confused as we bounce back and forth between filming things that matter to us but then having to distance ourselves. Maybe this is the idea of it but I struggle to see what I am going to learn from this as a whole?

Defiantly a bit rough, not upset with the result but after the feedback from Adrian I should have defiantly spent a bit more time editing and making it tidy. I forgot to add my bibliography which is very embarrassing as well as my introduction should have included chapter 3 of Alien Phenomenology and why I am going to include it. I feel I am more confident in my writing but editing and introduction/conclusion defiantly needs work

• How specifically will the theories of Alien Phenomenology benefit me in the future of my media degree. I feel like I have learnt so many different ways of looking at the objects/units through either ontology and metaphorism BUT where am I going to use this and how for my future studies? I do find this all really fascinating but I struggle to apply it to daily life/ other subjects/ further media communications studies as it is thinking in a way not the greater proportion understand.
• As I further go into understanding of removing human pre determined goals to understand relationships between objects, I still find myself sitting at the basis that humans do revolve around everything. How do I change this? I want to again be able to apply this knowledge to outside of this studio. I find removing the human away from the centre very difficult, and even more so WHY. Why do we actually need to remove the human, it makes a lot more sense to me not to but I constantly feel like we are fighting just the way things plan out to be.

1st video) an artefact/object e.g. something materialistic that matters to me

2nd video) an event/ activity that matters to me e.g. a dance, the way something moves (need to think carefully about this one)

3rd video) write the script first to the chosen quote (from any course reading), and then think of an image track that will work contrastingly with it

Narration) detailed description to describe the location/ and or what it is, noticing WITHOUT saying exactly what it is

I have some confusion here that I hope to get cleared up on Tuesday with Adrian.

• the first film is about a single thing you have that matters for you
• the second film is about one activity and in that activity one key action that you do that matters for you what does this mean? what does it mean by filming the single thing and then how does an activity relate to the second film deciding what you want to film. MAKES NO SENSE PLEASE HELP
• the third film is about one statement (quote) from any of the course readings that matters for you

In the thing and activity films there must be a narrational sound track. This sound track must detail the parts of the thing or action. It should not name the thing or action. It will involve you filming their single thing, and in the second film you deciding what you want to film, and why. Do not understand this in anyway

We have all started to find a bit of a nack for what we are good at. This had made the process and response to Offenburg a lot faster, but also I feel like we are adjusting to the criteria/ thinking differently from a humans perspective as we look at the object to object. Last weeks video response we had to Offenburg I feel was really successful as it contributed onwards from the editing techniques they had done, but we added our own contributed and understanding of what it is and what it does.

• Observing both our habits and our agency
• Understand the importance of constant doing
• That things are their relations, the density of a thing
• Going beyond your initial assumptions
• Evaluate and reflect in a constructive way
• See things true to their form
• What is ‘alive’
• Exploring different avenues is useful
• Levels of control
• Realising how concerned we are with ourselves as specifies
• Deeper understanding of other objects understand of us
• Seeing the object from the objects perspective rather than the human perspective

Once again I feel embarrassed with my blogging participation! This doesn’t necessarily relate to the course over all as I feel the group work and essay work as involved a lot of my participation BUT documenting this is less to sufficient…

Not only have blog posts been low but active engagement in class/ attending has not been great either. I have been so ridiculously unwell since just before easter it has really put a damper on in class participation.

Apart from this, I have been keeping actively engaged with Alien Phenomenology to make up for the lost time in class. I have started to discuss this heaps with my dad and he is really fascinated with it. I have really enjoyed reading this with him because he offers so much clarification and to look at things differently to how I might.