While I am unsure where the term brainstorming originates from, I do know that I have been using the technique since the very start of my learning life. Brainstorming is a perfect way to completely unpack and display everything you know or want to know about a subject or theme, making them a perfect starting point for any creative or technical group or solo project. We often brainstorm as a class in the Seeing the Unseen studio, and while typically I haven’t found this very helpful or crucial in other classes, for this studio, its integral. We deal with such vague and multi meaning terms in this class that it’s hard to know where to start. Brainstorming fleshes out all these hesitant definitions, concepts and key words, in a neat and central map.

While I wasn’t able to be present for the class where we unpacked the 6 set words, Tuning, Lingering, Wondering, Priming, Encountering and Vanishing, I was able to review what the class brainstormed, as well as attempt the process solo. The two words I chose to explore were Lingering and Encountering. Lingering, because the idea of waiting and observing in a location has been a main focus of this class and how I’ve learnt to make the projects for it, and encountering because the conscious concept of trying to / unintentionally encountering something while filming is somewhat foreign to me.

I first brainstormed without the aid of the class examples, and came up with ideas like “longing”, “waiting” and “patience” for lingering and “meeting”, “unfamiliarity” and “discomfort/comfort” for encountering.  From there, I reviewed the class brainstorms, and added to my previously mentions lists, adapting some of the points to “maintaining”, “stillness” and “observing” to lingering and “discovering”, “physical/emotional” and “wanted/unwanted” for encountering. These brainstormed lists will aid me in my creation of an idea/theme for Assignment 3.