POST ONE – ASSIGNMENT #4

Coming into Assignment #4, I was eager to take Mark and others advice on how I can push my account further and experiment. Some of the ideas I brainstormed during this time and got inspiration from was:

• Creating video content
• Showcasing style tips
• Asking other thrifters for advice
• Using other platforms other than Instagram

Firstly, I never intended to make video content for this project as most thrift accounts opt for the simple image. However, after the consultations, I realised that video content could be heavily engaging and had the potential for more engagement. I recall Fan telling me after my presentation that TikTok was a powerful and growing platform that I could use to my own advantage. Therefore, this week I decided to incorporate venturing into video content with ‘showcasing style tips,’ and made my first TikTok! It has so far been viewed 70 times after being uploaded yesterday but only time can tell if it ranks up well compared to my photo artefacts.

Next, Mark encouraged me to interview other accounts in the thrift community in order to get any advice or knowledge. So that’s what I did! I interviewed an account who at the time had a lot more followers than me: @iTrive.au 

The sweet owner of this account is a fellow Australian who has supported my account since the beginning! I reached out to her as she had previously wished me luck with this social media experiment, and she was happy to help and gave me some good advice in terms of what platforms perform well with thrifting! The owner told me that she sells through 3 platforms, Facebook Marketplace, Instagram and eBay. She admits sales are low on Instagram with only an average of 1 per week, whereas she performs better on the others. She gave me both pros and cons for why she picked those platforms and claimed to consistently post on Instagram stories to keep up engagement, as well as have sales/special offers.

I sadly don’t intend to branch out my business to other platforms right now as eBay can charge fees and FB Marketplace seems like the easy route. With these platforms, you can’t exactly grow as a business, you’re more selling just as an individual. I enjoy how Instagram can be set out like a proper business page and you can experiment as you please – more free reign.

Lastly, I wanted to reflect on Trevor Young’s advice for reaching a niche audience and being passionate about your idea. In terms of my audience, I am quite happy with how I have achieved a following of people who meet my target demographic and show engagement on my posts. My audience was always niche to begin with too which was an advantage because I was able to target people efficiently. I am also proud to announce that I am now up to 48% Australian followers! Only 2% from my main goal.

Trevor also talked about being passionate, consistent and to make content that is in sync with one another. I feel like I have adhered to this as I have reached a good following (sitting on 550+ followers right now) and post at the same times every week (on either Sunday, Wednesday, Friday) and I get enjoyment out of what I make. I love the look of my account and although I haven’t made a sale, I am more enjoying engaging with followers and being a part of this community.

ASSIGNMENT ONE – EMILY CONLIN 

Post One

Post Two

Post Three

What is Social Media?

To put it simply, social media platforms were ultimately created in order to establish a form of community within the broad and crazy network that is the Internet. As Jan Kietzmann states, “Traditionally consumers used the Internet to simply expend content: they read it, they watched it, and they used it to buy products and services” (Kietzmann et al, 2011, pg. 241). Upon the invention of social media, individuals can now interact, create, share and discuss content. News sites can hear from their viewers; brands can interact more closely with consumers. Social media has given all of us a voice without having to show our face. For us Australians, being on these platforms is primarily for catching up with friends and family. To be exact that’s 82.6% of us, according to the 2020 Social Media Sensis report. This is why Facebook is so important and is still incredibly popular, even in this day and age. Although younger generations have switched to sites such as Tik Tok which is founded on content creation, older generations care more for staying connected to loved ones. 89.6% of respondents between 40-64 years old claimed they used Facebook compared to other social media networks. However, social media is no longer fundamentally about creating a community.

Overtime, businesses and brands have discovered the power that social media holds in terms of advertising opportunity and brand movement. Social media “influencers” now exist and Facebook earns billions of dollars a year on advertising revenue. Facebook acknowledges that they have a strong older demographic and uses this to their advantage. 83.3% of older respondents in the Sensis report claimed they follow a brand or business on Facebook, leaving them very impressionable to advertising. For younger generations, social media platforms such as Instagram now incorporate advertising. Influencers are extremely popular on this page where brands use individuals with a high following to promote their products or services. Serra Celebi from Yasar University produced a study in 2015 which involved understanding motives that affected attitudes towards advertising on Facebook. This mainly involved younger recipients and Celebi was able to conclude that individuals who longed for a sense of community and belonging were ultimately more open to advertising (Celebi, 2015, pg.323). I personally, as a young person, can understand this. I have a strong dislike to advertisements popping up on my screen, however, I still continue to follow a lot of brands and businesses online.

Essentially, social media in itself is an extremely powerful tool to both unite in and profit from (business wise). It can be used for good and used for evil, and its progression and evolvement through time is extremely interesting. This is why it is important for it be studied.

REFERENCES:

Celebi, S 2015, “How Do Motives Affect Attitudes and Behaviors Toward Internet Advertising and Facebook Advertising?”, Computers in Human Behavior, vol 51, pp. 312-324.

Kietzmann, J, Hermkens, K, Mccarthy, I, & Silvestre, B 2011, “Social Media? Get Serious! Understanding the Functional Building Blocks of Social Media,” Business Horizons, 54(3), pp. 241-251.

Sensis 2020, Have your say Australia – Social Media 2020 Data Report, Glow, viewed 19 March 2020, <https://portal.glowfeed.com/shared-report/f98c499e-2cfd-4c17-8432-12fa1d4734b6?token=ed8973833e9b454eaf8e6f1babb1464e&emailVerifyToken=5m3vlbjvb&gt;.

INSPIRATIONS AND CHALLENGES

Social media has an enormous capacity to do good; to be used for good. Over the years, companies and brands have utilised the reach of social media in order to spread a message. If this message is positive and uplifting, it commonly will go viral throughout the Internet. With one click of a button, a Facebook user can share a post to all of their friends. Those friends see the post and also decide to share it. Through this process, inspirational videos are able to achieve what they intend to do: Inspire. Something which I have found inspiring on social media is an Instagram account called ‘We’re Not Really Strangers.’ This account was created by a woman named Koreen who developed a card game with this same title. The card game focuses on bringing people together and breaking down walls. To engage with someone you hardly know anything about and to surrender to your feelings. With 1.5 million followers, Koreen has a huge audience to interact with. I find her posts incredibly inspiring as it invites strangers to come together on a social network and realise we are more alike than we think.

Here is a video which shows strangers playing her card game:

http://www.instagram.com/tv/B81-0HRAlvK/?hl=en

This video was incredibly inspiring as it reminded me that it is so important to discuss deep questions with other people; to understand our own feelings and how others may deal with them. I always suggest this account to others and it has become my favourite account to view when I’m feeling down and want to find comfort in Koreen’s positivity.

On the contrary, social media also has the capacity to be extremely toxic. I am constantly challenged whilst on social media platforms. Challenged, angered, disappointed, disturbed… the list goes on. A huge comment of social media and what makes it “social” is the involvement of users. To allow for comment sections where individuals can share their opinions, discuss content or even just to support someone. But with support there’s always someone who “hates.” Celebrity News accounts on Instagram are very popular including well known news channel E!News. E! specialises in celebrity news and updates and while their posts are usually positive, their comment sections are notorious for being just the opposite. Here is an example:

If you take a look at the comment section to the right, the FIRST 3 comments which are displayed are all negative. What makes me feel uneasy is that these are all women commenting these negative things. I am constantly challenged by how often I see other women tear each other down on social media. My question is, how do we prevent this? CAN we prevent this?

How will my work be influenced by my own understandings of social media?

I have always been fascinated with social media from a business perspective. I have been using social media since a very young age and from this experience have grown a real interest in how we can use such a tool to push out a message. Since completing the ‘Networked Media’ course at RMIT last year, I have learned a lot about the app Instagram and how its affordances work together to reach and engage with an audience. What I really hope to achieve within this studio is working more hand in hand with Instagram and other social networks through a business lens. This will be extremely beneficial to me as I want to work within a brand’s social media team when I graduate. Instagram has HEAPS of analytics which can help out brand’s towards finding out what their demographic is, what they are doing well at and what they need to improve. All of this information is free, I already use it for my own personal account because the data is quite interesting.

With Sensis, I hope to use their data to help influence how I might adapt my social media for a certain demographic and reach a broader audience. Who am I appealing towards? What are their user habits? How might they find my content? These are the questions I will be asking myself during the process.

With the examples shown in my last post, I will push myself to follow the footsteps of Koreen. Koreen’s account is a business; it’s her brand. But you honestly wouldn’t realise it due to her posts being focused more on positivity. Through her uplifting messages, her card game sells out and she has become extremely successfully without overly pushing her product onto consumers. She has also achieved this without pushing advertising which is quite impressive. I would love to achieve even a fraction of what Koreen has done and although that is impossible in the context of this class, I hope to keep in mind her values when approaching my own work.

THE ATTENTION SEEKERS: LIVE AT THE PLASTIC JUNGLE

Nursing hangovers that would kill lesser men, six musicians rally to put together a
performance worth listening to. After a night of partying, ‘Hyperactive grunge punk’, outfit
The Attention Seekers head into Laneway Studios to record the band’s first live session.
Filmed on Easter Sunday, THE ATTENTION SEEKERS – LIVE IN THE PLASTIC JUNGLE is
a 5 minute live music video that showcases an emerging band’s music – lively as it is raw –
and captures the atmosphere of working in a recording studio.

Jamie Marcetic: Performer & Editor

Jonah Ahearn: Camera Op

Emily Conlin: Camera Op

Ziggy Cross: Camera Op & Colour grader.

THE FINAL EDIT

How exactly does a live-session tell a story?

This was the question I aimed to answer through producing our final piece: The Attention Seekers Live in the Plastic Jungle. Unlike a documentary, the viewer isn’t hearing the subject express themselves through a conversation. The subjects here, The Attention Seekers, are telling a story through their music and lyrics. Yet, like a documentary, there can be other factors which assist this such as the location or b-roll. Our main intention was to express the personality of the band while showcasing their music and I believe this was achieved. It was extremely beneficial hearing from industry professionals in class and the feedback they had in regard to our work. What stood out for me was the comments made on how well we had showcased the personality of the band; the story they told. With that being our aim, we knew that viewers were following what we wanted to express.

I am really proud of the shot-construction we were able to deliver for this assignment and how that paid off in the final edit. Having three people on camera duty meant that we could generate a lot of footage from a variety of different angles; inspiring experimentation. We didn’t go in without a plan, each one of us figured out a spot to stick to and worked with the subjects in that spot. That way, our footage and time wasn’t wasted on sloppy framing or irrelevant shots. The shot I was able to create from sitting in the middle of the band’s circle particularly paid off in the end and is one I’m really proud of.

In term’s of media-production skills, in the future it would be beneficial for myself if I learn to play around with lighting more. Ziggy was a professional when setting up our lights, and although last year I did learn how to create a good lighting space, I do need a good refresher. I also didn’t get to work on the edit of this piece, meaning my editing skills have become a little shabby. Hopefully next semester I get to work more on the editing side of things rather than just on the production.

REFLECTING ON THIS SEMESTER

Looking back on my goals for this semester which I outlined in week one, I had the major goal of experimenting with photo-journalism. I remember expressing this in class and being excited when Rohan told me we were in fact going to work with photography. I loved working with a different style of camera and creating an alternative style of non-fiction content. In the first assignment, I walked around the streets of Melbourne City and Fitzroy and captured street art and graffiti. I had never been a professional at taking photos, especially considering I don’t have much experience with a proper DSLR. I am happy I had the opportunity to gain photography experience within this studio and properly investigate this interest of mine.

Although I expressed my love for documentaries in this blog post, I was quick to realise that they may not be my topic of interest in regard to creation. Most of the groups in our studio made a documentary style non-fiction piece. My group and I made a live session piece, quite different to a documentary. I don’t regret not choosing a documentary as my piece of work. I knew from the start that I would much rather enjoy telling the story of a band through music as opposed to sitting down with a stranger and asking them questions. However, it would have been a good experience to know what it was like telling the story of a stranger in this format; beneficial to myself in regard to my media practice.

I never experienced many challenges in this studio! I was blessed to be put into a great group and work with other creative individuals. I found that the work I created was of a high standard and I was never disappointed with what I had made. If anything, taking the course ‘True Lies’ alongside this studio was the only challenging aspect. This was due to the fact that True Lies works on exposing the unethical aspects of documentaries. In this studio, we also had to ensure we were being ethical at all times. Having this in the back of my head made me view the way we filmed documentary style content very differently. It was also quite the overload at times having to partake in two non-fiction focused courses. Other than that minor aspect, this studio was extremely rewarding and overall helped me achieve my goals in advancing my practice as a media student.

WORKING WITH THE GROUP

Group assignments. As a university student, you either learn to dread these or become lucky enough to be placed in a group made up of motivated and talented people. In my case, it was the latter. Jamie, Jonah and Ziggy were an absolute pleasure to work with. From the beginning, we all listened to each others thoughts and bounced off each others ideas and concepts. No one brought the team down in any way and I am really pleased with how well we will worked together. Although Ziggy didn’t become an official member of our group, it was generous of him to still give up his time to help us film and then later, colour grade. The group was basically broken up into the content producers being Jonah, Ziggy and I and then the editor becoming Jamie. From the get go, Jamie took a majority of control over this assignment with the idea of a live session being his to begin with. Basically, the other members and I were there to film Jamie and his band and then Jamie wanted to have creative control over what was shown to the audience. This would also be because he plans to post the live-session as a form of advertisement in the future.

I was completely happy to let Jamie take the reigns on the editing as I knew he had a vision that he wanted to achieve, however, I wish I could have maybe helped contribute a little more. Although I’m no expert editor, I felt a bit bad at times because I didn’t want Jamie to be overloaded with work and feel like no one was helping him out. This, however, was only a minor personal issue and I kept in contact with Jamie throughout the post-production process to ensure he knew I could help out if needed.

To be a good collaborator is to ultimately ensure you are communicating effectively and efficiently with your fellow members. Everyone needs to be on the same stage and be aware of the duties they have towards contributing to the group. You need to be reliable and motivated to perform to the best of your abilities. I was lucky enough to be in a group where all members did their best to create a piece of work that we could all be proud of.

FIRST EDIT SEQUENCE // SPLIT SCREENS

When we originally pitched our idea for this assignment, we had the intention to include split screens within our editing. Inspired by other music videos such as Vampire Weekend’s ‘Sunflower,’ our initial aim whilst filming was to generate many shots from different angles in order to develop content for a split screen. This particular sequence begins establishing the space and the characters. From the first shot we are introduced to Laneway Studios and the character it exhibits. The first shot is particularly striking, one of our members Ziggy capturing perfect details at the right moment such as the car lights flashing and a bat flying by. We are introduced to sounds of the crew and band setting up and visuals of the studio space. I believe these first establishing shots to be a real strength of this sequence. No matter what you create, whether that be non-fiction or fiction content, establishing shots are crucial. They help the viewer develop an understanding of where the characters/subjects are and what story is about to unfold. I feel this has been achieved in this sequence. Another strength of this sequence is the use of ‘titles.’ Because this non-fiction piece is a live session, it is easier to get away with using title cards in order to introduce the subjects. Jamie did an excellent job creating these in Photoshop. They ultimately fit the quirky and ‘out-there’ nature of the band. However, the major weakness of this sequence is the use of split-screens. Once again, it was our original aim to use split-screens, but once we got to the editing stage we realised how they didn’t come out as nicely as we anticipated. They begin at 25 seconds in and last for a majority of this sequence. Firstly, the actual appearance of these split screens is not visually pleasing. Both shots are from different cameras and therefore look completely different; they don’t compliment each other at all. Sure, a colour grade may help slightly but there is a difference in quality here that I don’t think could be fixed. Secondly, the split-screens carry on for far too long. There are only two or three shots in this sequence that introduce other members of the band. Although we aimed to stick on the lead singer while he was performing, we could have experimented with different shots in the split-screen to change things up. Hence, we decided to get rid of this idea and remove the split-screens in our final edit.

SECOND EDIT SEQUENCE // NO SPLIT SCREENS

Like the first sequence, we included the same edit of the establishing shots and title cards. The main difference in this sequence is the removal of the split-screens and the inclusion of normal, well framed shots. The aim in this edit was to try and introduce more members of the band and experiment with different shots so the viewer wouldn’t become bored staring at one single member for too long. What I believe to be a major strength of this sequence is achieving that exact aim: showcasing the other members in a better way. In our first sequence we stuck on the lead singer for a majority of the time, only drifting over to the other members a few times. This time, we show that there are two singers in the main shot of the lead singer, allowing viewers to distinguish who is who and that there are in fact two as opposed to one. In the middle of this sequence it cuts to another part where we try to achieve the same thing. We included a variety of different shots from wider or lower angles which we hoped would keep the viewer engaged. I am really satisfied with the amount of experimentation we as a group were able to conduct with our camera work. This allowed for the editing stage to become easier as there was more to work with. A downfall of this sequence, however, would still be the fact we are stuck on the lead singer for perhaps a beat too long. Our aim is to ultimately keep the viewer engaged but this might not be achieved if we keep the camera on one member for too long. The music and band itself is energetic and upbeat. It encourages us to be able to play with rapid shots and having the edit even become a little frazzled as it cuts to different members; the viewer is then encouraged to keep up with what is being shown to them and not become bored. There is also a shot in this sequence where you can see a light behind the bassist. This could be fixed in a colour grade but it is best to avoid these types of shots in general as it looks messy to the viewer.