I was originally interested in this studio due to it’s experimental nature, I was excited to learn new ways to explore creativity. This studio in itself sounded like a way of being able to take whats is around us in our environment and being able to develop these observations into a film.

This semester observations were the main component to our learning, at first this was a difficult task but over time I was able to notice more. I began this process with noting things I saw and my interpretation of them, what things looked like, how they appeared, what vibe I got, as time went on I started to question the meaning behind this, what I think this observation infers about life. Throughout the process Robin reminded us that we are to observe things in different categories, one was the environment, one was human interaction and the other was more abstract. I really took this into consideration and started noting things not just about people and the thing they do on trains but the little things. I noted down the small speckles of dust that drifted down as the sunset pored through my window. It was at this stage that I realised inspiration really can come from anywhere, its so often that I tried looking for things to observe but my favourites were always the one that just came to me. It allowed me to see the world in an entirely different way. As I developed within this class I began observing things without noticing and writing down my thoughts it became easier and easier.

This process allowed me to explore how I put my observations into writing. For me writing has always been a large struggle, to get the ideas that are within my mind and to communicate that through words. Even this reflection right now will also have elements of confusion but it is as always something I will work on. After speaking with Robin he reassured me that this studio is about literature of our ability to write but our ability to get ideas and flesh them out into something more. This made me feel much more comfortable as I now had the confidence to jot down whatever I saw.

The hardest part for me was by far the development of an observation to a potential movie. I knew I didn’t want an ordinary film, I wanted something more experimental and meaningful. Something that my observations taught me is how when things just happen and when things fall into place wonderful things can come out of it. So that’s what I intended to create. This however was harder than I thought, what observation would I chose and how would I adapt it. I liked many observations but really struggled to nail one down. I ended up choosing my star observation about the night sky, something that really drew me o this idea is that I had such an enormous passion about this topic that would allow me to create a piece I was so genuinely interested in. This I think was a large part of the process to create something that we ourselves we excited about.

This idea I was excited about but I struggled to really structure it, I could never quite get onto paper a clear cut structure of how I wanted the film to look. For me I discovered this type of film would be best created quite spontaneously and figured out along the production process. However with such a broad idea and with such ambition to capture the stars I figured this idea in itself would be quite hard. So when listening to the other students ideas I went in with the intent of wanting to work with someone else. Listening to them all I was only really drawn to one of them, tim’s idea to be felt like it was based of an idea that he had about life and that really excited me. I felt that like mine his idea would be developed and established throughout the production period. So despite not knowing him very well I contacted him and let him know I was interested.

For groups me, Tim and Penelope all began on this journey of creating Tim’s idea. From the beginning we had it so set out and structured, we really got well under way. However this was quickly deconstructed as Robin told us that are plan was not a good idea, he told us to go into it unplanned and this really threw us. However after a group discussion (our first of many) we realised Robin was right this idea needs to be developed more. So for the next 5 or so weeks we shot footage, took audio, had multiple discussion about our idea of the moment. This originated from Tim’s idea but as the weeks went by we really narrowed down our thoughts and we ended up being quite clear about what we discovered. I think as a whole our group really learnt a lot, we challenged the idea and gave it room to develop and grow into something more. We spent weeks filming different footage on different people and from reviewing what we shot, it was at this point we decided a vignette idea would work best for us with little snippet of interviews over the top. The poem created throughout happened quite spontaneously and this was something I was personally really excited about as it really pulled the whole thing together.

As a group we worked amazing together we all put in effort and helped out in different ways bringing our own strengths. We went through many struggles in terms of doubting our idea, seeing it as a bit pointless because we lost touch with what we were trying to create. However we always brought it back around again and the editing process came together nicely. We took a lot of our setback in our stride, such as footage deleting and things not coming out as we thought but we worked with what we got to produce a really engaging and exciting film on an idea that we spent weeks discussing.

I felt for me the most memorable and rewarding part of this process was the collaboration. I got to work with two really incredible people that I got along so well with. We were able to work together in such an easy way, that the whole process just came together so smoothly. Despite whatever challenged challenges we came across we were able to openly discuss our best option forward. We had countless conversations about life and this idea about the moment. I think for us the idea was the most exciting part for us, the video was just a way to communicate what we discovered but the actual conversations were the real discovery for us.

Keeping up to date with my reflections is something I have worked really hard to maintain this semester, I actually found this to be really helpful. I used it as a tool to breakdown what we learnt and how we were developing as a group with our project.

All in all I think I have learnt a lot about the process of creating and developing an idea, Ive learnt how to take my surrounding and my observations and turn that into something written and tangible with the idea of developing it further. The studio experience has been a really enjoyable one, learning how to use the EX3 at first was very confusing but by the end of the studio I have grasped a confidence with it that I can now apply to other video cameras. The exercises we used with it were helpful in applying the tools that we learnt in class. For me I think I learn a lot by getting out there and shooting things, this happened throughout the semester with lots of trial and error. When filming I would make mistake such as having the filter on or raising the grain up to full and depose talking about it in class through these exercises I looked back on my footage and truly understood about these techniques, why its important to get it right and what environment you would use certain elements in. We also used the studio to learnt not just about observations but about all the components on a camera such as depth of field and more external things like lighting. This was really important I find as its something I can note down for next time I film. My performance throughout this semester I think has been really engaged, I’ve tried my hardest with all the exercises and hoped that my reflections were able to explain the positives and negatives I experiences. I think perhaps I needed to elaborate more on my reflections and I also think that my film idea could’ve been more developed. Overall I really enjoyed the studio and have taken a lot from it, our final film I think has been very successful my group was incredible and we were able to effectively communicate a small idea into a film. The process of developing this idea was for me really exciting and I think paid off well.