Project Brief 3, a portrait of someone else. This project brief fell in line with some unprecedented life issues which, in turn, have left me here, late on a Sunday night, finishing up this assignment so as to hand in something I’m not 100% happy with just to reach a deadline. It’s my own fault, and I guess I’m glad I’m in this position now because I definitely don’t want to be in it again.
In my third Project Brief I used my housemate, Bianca, as my subject – she has an infectious energy that is unparalleled in most humans I meet. Enthusiastic, bubbly, open, she was next in line after my original subject had pulled out. But as soon as the cameras were on, her persona and voice inflections changed dramatically. This really threw a spanner in the works for my original idea, which was to have her tell a story, which I would play over a mix of found and original footage. This isn’t what happened because a lot of the conversation I ended up with, after a night and morning of filming were unusable. Even with the use of cheat sheets with reminder topics on them, what was left was just too much of my voice trying to lead the conversation. I had never factored in to my schedule that some people react differently in front of the camera and had left no time to re-film. I guess it’s just a lesson about collaboration; you can’t rely completely on others – because people are different. Working with someone means working around people’s weaknesses and finding their strengths – something I didn’t give myself enough time to do.
Up until this Project Brief I had just dismissed filming and editing as things I didn’t like to do, but this is only because I didn’t know how to do them. I have the ability to create pieces of media that I am proud of, even though I haven’t made that obvious in my work so far, and with a bit of time management and an open mind I will be able to learn the skills to create something exciting, original and ‘me’. Unfortunately Project Brief 3 wasn’t the one.
Stock footage and audio:
NATURE’S HALF ACRE
By National Archives and Records Administration
Published 1951
https://archive.org/details/gov.archives.arc.5832
