You know when you watch a video and it kind of changes your life?

That’s this one. This completely opened my eyes and called me out on things that I didn’t even know I was doing.

However, it’s not a hidden message, or a clever secret way of editing that got me, it’s the actual material. I think that this video is so, especially studying media, important to be aware of.

While, honestly, I’m not addicted to social media, it made me realise that there is an element of that in my life.

One part in the video Sinek specifically talks about is how his friends only take one phone when they go out for dinner. He notes that people come out and leave their phone on the table. And, my word they do. Since watching this video, I notice every time someone take their phones out and check it, and now I call them out on it.

Each time my closest friends and I say we will go out for dinner without our phones, someone always suggests that the night could turn into something bigger than just dinner, and having a phone becomes a safety issue. Someone will always suggest we go out somewhere for a few more drinks, and then a few more. By the end of the night we might have gone seperate ways, to different venues, or home early or later. And without our phones… the risk of the night taking a bad turn vastly increases. However, we do turn our phones off and leave them in our bags until we need them. A good compromise.

I highly, highly recommend this video. I think it’s so important that our generation be aware of what Simon Sinek is talking about, regardless of how much you think you use your phone. This will open your eyes.

This week’s workshop was all about feedback. We were required to show our materials for our self portrait to our tables and each person had a certain type of feedback they were to give. As usual, the hardest kind of feedback to give is criticism.

However, on my table – the internet only decided to connect 2 and a half hours into the 3 hour workshop, which meant we had no online shopping, or emails to distract us from our work. We were forced to pay attention through lack of a better alternative. And the results (unsurprisingly) turned out better than if we did have the ‘web’.  So this class, we talked. We showed each other our materials, and we got feedback. Isn’t that amazing?

If nothing else, it’s really interesting to see how someone without any context or knowledge takes the material you have shot. All in all, the feedback was really handy.

Although a reflection about each medium is in the respective blog, an overall summary of my goal follows:

• Reflect the key parts of my life
  • My every day activities
• Give an insight into my hobbies, and what I enjoy spending my time doing
• Portray different aspects of my personality
• Be real
  • Not put filters on my life like one does on social media

I would have preferred to have had more time spent on recording the real treasures in my life that don’t come around all that often. For example farming is a huge part of who I am and yet it is barely, if at all, represented in this ‘self-portrait’. However, I put in my best creative effort to make up for this, and hopefully achieved exactly what I was aiming to.

There once was a girl named Emily,

She always wrote from the heart,

Shit, what else rhymes with Emily?

This poem was doomed from the start.

The audio files were the hardest to record. What we hear and what we see become one in the same because we rely so heavily on our eyes. But when you take away the sight, it’s hard to decipher what you actually hear throughout the week.

But once you start thinking about it, it’s easy. I think these sounds all equally represent me in their own ways.

This first audio is of the general sounds around my house. Although, more accurately, it is of my housemate Abi doing the washing up while I sat at the table doing ‘uni work’. This is a classic sound around my house (the washing up, not me doing nothing).

This second audio clip is the sound that fills my entire summer. It’s the sound of my boat taking off. (Scorpian King rules the waters)

This is my favourite time of the week. I baby sit 3 girls and before bed, I play the uke and we all sing a song around their fire pit outside. This is our rendition of ‘Riptide’ by Vance Joy.

These videos (just like the photos) cover a wide range of what makes up ‘me’.

The first is a view of the run I go on almost every afternoon. It’s the view of Aami Park, and Gosha’s paddock (where there are, more often than not, very attractive sportsmen training).

The second is me on my Scooter, yes… it has sparks (but only because I can’t actually do any cool tricks…). This Scooter was given to me by the Boarding House when i graduated and so the Scooter itself is quite close to my heart, but, the street cred I get when I ride it is the real reason I keep it around.

Thirdly, the little back garden/courtyard at the house I am living at is where I spend most of my time. As I come from a farm, I need as much outdoors as I can get to function.

running oval-1ljd6g0

Studyng in the courtyard -2klj80d

Firstly, I took a photo of my wall of photo’s because I don’t believe you can accurately portray yourself without show a bit of where you came from and how you got to where you are. I have also chosen a photo of my bedroom, as that is a “behind the curtains” view, if you will, into who I am.

Secondly, at this particular moment in my life, I am studying, working and seeing friends. I have chosen these photos as they each, in turn, represent that. There is a photo of RMIT, a photo of Joe cooking a pizza in the restaurant I work in, and a photo of my Housemates and I.

There were other photos that I took, but didn’t make the cut as I tried to accurately depict my life at this moment in time. The photo of my mother a father (much to their dismay) didn’t make the cut, as I am not living at home anymore.

Brief History

My bedroom

RMIT

Cooking Pizza

Housemates and I

You always find the most interesting things when you stop looking.

During today’s lecture, we were sent out into the streets of Melbourne to find as much Media as we could. And believe me, we did. We had sale signs and advertisements coming out our eyeballs.

We took photos of Telstra valves leading into the sewers, leaning against window display’s to write down notes. We recorded the sounds of song playing in different shops, while dodging people who were transfixed by their phones as they walked. Media. Was. Everywhere.

But it was only when we stopped looking, when we faced our heads forward once again and searched for a place to grab lunch,  that we found the real Magic of Melbourne. The real hidden walls that are either commissioned, or done in secret, or both, that make up the stereotype of ‘Artsy’ that’s so acutely associated with this city.

This wall had everything. From a large sticker of Pinocchio Hanging himself, to a red army figurine admiring a tiny framed photo of the Mona Lisa.

Melbourne is a beautiful city of art and a huge variety of Media, there is always something for everyone, even if you stop looking.

During the first week’s workshop we set up our blogs. So I guess the reflection blog would is about blogging itself.

This is the official welcome to my blog.

Welcome. You’re going to have, at minimum, a mediocre time – I can’t promise you’ll enjoy everything. Hell, first week in I can’t even promise I’ll enjoy everything.

Now, I find blogging it’s itself a weird concept. However I suppose in this context, it’s the perfect outlet. I think it’s a great way to do a (compulsory) overview of the lecture/workshop. It kind of replaces the parent/partner  and saves them the earful of the classic “What we learnt in class today”.

During this class I was also given my first assignment (exciting times ahead). I initially thought it was a hard task – trying to think of a variety of different forms of media to describe yourself (when just thinking of something to say about yourself during those wonderful ice-breaker games is challenge enough), let alone trying to keep a high standard of quality, originality and creativity. But again, upon further reflection (when thinking about what to right in this session’s blog), it’s kind of the perfect assignment for the class. It’s just a way to test creativity on a subject that isn’t foreign at all, and so there is no research or prior knowledge involved that may hinder the final product – it’s just… me.

Speaking of me – here is a link to my official student Youtube Channel where I’ll be posting a wonderful array of student-based media:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_AKnyYA1nYgtgwkcokxGdQ

I found the ideas suggested by N.Katherine Hayles in her article ‘Hyper or Deep attention’ relative to different forms of balance and priorities.

I always find that if I’m interested by something (for example a good book) I fall into a deep attention span very quickly. The world within the book immediately jumps to the top of my priority list and it takes me no time at all to be sucked back into it. However, turning to books that I don’t find particularly interesting, they’re very low on my list of priorities and it seems that almost anything in the world becomes more interesting and necessary to do before reading it.
But then again, that book (pretend now that it’s a homework book) becomes a lot more interesting and high on the priority list when the due date is the next day…

We, as a generation, are far more prone to hyper attention now as there is now, so much more to do and watch than there has ever been before. We have become a hyper attention society because of the internet and all the wonderful and not so wonderful things we can do on it. This again comes back to priorities. For example, scrolling through your Facebook newsfeed, there is an abundance of videos. Some short, some long, some weird as hell and some funny as hell. Personally, I prefer the comedy. I will click on a video that seems relatively funny and see how long it goes for. I always find there is a correlation between the length of the video and the quality of the video. If it’s not that good, but only a few seconds i’ll watch it. But as that length drags out, the quality has to increase or my attention will immediately be dragged elsewhere.

It’s all about priorities. If there is not one thing in particularly higher above other things on our individual list, we will focus on say, the top ten things. However, as soon as something moves itself up for whatever reason (interest or desperation, for example) I am able to solely focus on that.