Final Reflection
You can see my organisational skills based on how crumpled this paper is
My first semester of Media 1 has come to an end. It has certainly been a busy semester full of growth. Before starting Uni this semester I had been out of any form of schooling for 4 years with the exception of a lackluster semester at Community College. Getting back into the practice of studying, writing, and failing at not procrastinating has been easier than I initially thought it would be. Because I had this gap in time before starting University I feel that I have been able to fully appreciate and take advantage of the opportunity given to me. In my first couple of weeks, I was excited to be moving forward – if not also a bit overwhelmed.
The first few weeks, thankfully, moved at a slowish pace that made it easy for me to keep up. When it came time to begin working on PB2 it hit me that I hadn’t really worked on much media related since High School (4 years ago) and that I had never used the Adobe Creative Cloud. This caused a bit of anxiety that was quickly eased by the presence of Youtube tutorials. My lack of previous experience has certainly been one of the bigger struggles throughout this semester; My lack of experience (anxiety) has held me back from choosing to participate in media outside of the course (SYN, RMITV)
When it comes to my growth technically, I don’t think my growth has high but it has certainly been gradual and steady. I feel comfortable using the programs and learning on the go. The biggest challenge I face is my lack of experience with equipment which I think was evident in my PB3. This is something we did not focus much on this semester but I’m sure is something I will delve into more in the upcoming studios.
If you look at the chart my ‘professionalism’ dropped quite a bit after week 8. I looked at the concept of professionalism from 2 angles 1) communicating in a professional manner and learning certain protocols and 2) personal . Overall, This semester I’ve been proud of my engagement with the course and not allowing myself to procrastinate – up until the end. This was especially prevalent weeks 7-9 when I allowed myself to take a break from readings/blogs, and I believe I skipped a lecture in that period as well. I fear this will be a continuing struggle throughout this course – but who knows? Maybe, I’ll surprise myself.
As I mentioned before I am satisfied with my level of engagement. Specifically, with the conceptual ideas brought up in the readings and in the workshops. I have enjoyed being able to explore the topics further through my blog and applied them to works of media I consume. I found passion in concepts I never knew I had much interest in. For PB4 my group was assigned ‘institutions’. I didn’t fully understand what that entailed at first. I originally thought of what most people may equate an ‘institution’ with a corporation, a medium, etc… Reading about how we set values to a specific piece of media (however broad or narrow you want ‘media’ to refer to) and how they have internal values as well mad me think about specific institutions I feel strongly about. I wrote about Sesame Street, SNL, and Late Night Talk in my blog and detailed my feelings about them as institutions and how they act as one within our culture.
The green on the graph above represents ‘my media practice’. Honestly, I did not know exactly how to graph this. The only thing I can say about my practice now is it certainly feels more focused. I think I have found specific concepts that I am passionate about and have begun to learn how I can explore them through my practice. I realized that a lot of my creativity lies with in narrative and trying to start a conversation amongst the audience. I also learned that my ideas will only ever be fully realized if I put in the effort to learn, practice, and master the technical skills they require. With all this I have certainly gained more confidence as a media practitioner and am looking forward to the next 5 semesters!
