Over the last week I’ve been working on a series of briefs for my creative advertising class. This is a relatively new experience for me, where I am tasked with using minimal language or script to basically tell a story or promote my product. This is a rather interesting activity, communicating your story through visuals and minimal wording having to keep it small sometimes using a singular word or no text at all. This for me had me thinking about how visuals, mainly when it comes to film and television can, if done right…. successfully have utilise ‘show don’t tell’! Where by you show your audience story, backstory and/or plot without monologuing and basically hand feeding them.

I find one of the things I’ve always been told about screenwriting is to leave bread crumbs for your audience to follow and allow them to find their own way. If the story is good enough and the plot makes sense they will figure it out no hand holding needed. This got me thinking about events in week 2, talking about backstory of characters and how they can apply to how certain characters handle certain situations and helps shape the character over all. In this scenario I wonder how we can apply this technique of show don’t tell, is it logical?…. are we leaving out information for the audience to absorb?…. or is this a good thing?  Get the audience thinking, asking questions engaging, this to me almost leads into what I was talking about in my earlier blog post about agency. I think any form of engagement from the audience, even some forms of confusion are good, it can engage your audience and make them feel invested, needing to know more and connect the dots for themselves.

I find it a great technique from a creative stand point, and when we apply this to other easier discussions from class about landscape as character it also heavily applies… Don’t tell me this landscape has been the battlefield for a century old war between good and evil, show me the scars and the destruction!

(COPYRIGHTED NO ONE CAN TAKE MY CENTURY OLD WAR STORY BETWEEN GOOD AND EVIL)

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